A Border Patrol agent walks by the new border fence being built in Sunland Park, N.M. A total of 670 miles of fences are planned along the U.S.-Mexico border.
Posted on 05/04/2008 7:37:44 PM PDT by kellynla
WASHINGTON -- At a cost of up to $4 million a mile, the concrete and steel fence rising along the Southwest border constitutes one of the most ambitious public works projects in years, encompassing legions of federal bureaucrats and a lineup of blue-ribbon contractors. But as it slices through forbidding terrain, tribal lands, private property and sensitive wildlife habitats, the barrier faces its own towering wall of challenges, raising doubt that the projected 670 miles of pedestrian fences and vehicle barriers will be in place when the Bush administration comes to an end in January.
Facing a deadline of Dec. 31, the Department of Homeland Security was over halfway to its goal as of Friday, with just under 300 miles awaiting construction. A companion element to the physical barriers -- a so-called virtual wall of radar, cameras and sensors -- faces uncertainty after developing technical problems in a test project.
"That's an awful lot to do in a eight months of time," said Richard Stana of the Government Accountability Office, who investigates the project for Congress. "I don't think it's on the scale of the Great Wall of China, but ... to get it done right, to get it done on time, it's going to take a great deal of effort to have things fall together."
Ambitious goals
The goal includes 135 miles of vehicle and pedestrian fencing that was already in place when the administration launched its Secure Border Initiative in November 2005 in a multibillion-dollar, multiyear assault to fortify the border and curtail illegal immigration.
Since then, nearly 100 miles of 15- to 18-foot-high fencing and more than 140 miles of vehicle barriers have been built in California, Arizona and New Mexico. Much of the construction was done by National Guard personnel whom President Bush dispatched to the border in 2006 to assist the Border Patrol.
For the remaining phase, the Army Corps of Engineers, which is overseeing construction from its offices in Fort Worth, has selected just over two dozen contractors from an initial round of bidding. The contractors have been divided into smaller bidding pools -- with three or four in each pool -- to compete for task orders totaling $3.4 billion to build specific segments of the fence.
By design, some of the contractors are minority-owned or come from economically depressed areas. Others are giants of the industry. Sundt Construction, based in Phoenix, was founded in 1890 by a Norwegian immigrant and later earned fame for building the top-secret town of Los Alamos, N.M. -- the birthplace of the first atom bomb -- and for relocating the London Bridge to Arizona.
DHS officials say the project is on schedule but acknowledge the challenges. As of last week, only six task orders, valued at $91.6 million, had been awarded for 25 miles of fencing in Arizona and New Mexico.
Numerous obstacles
Obstacles facing the DHS reach well beyond the engineering challenges of stretching fences across arid desert, granite outcroppings and hostile mountain ranges. The undertaking has been mired in controversy since it was mandated by Congress in 2006. It now faces a multistate coalition of opponents, as well as legal challenges that could lead to a hearing in the U.S. Supreme Court.
A total of 131 miles of fence planned for Texas has been stalled by legal action and protests by political leaders and landowners in South Texas. One defiant holdout was Eloisa Tamez of El Calaboz, near Brownsville, who lost a court battle against granting government access to 3 acres that her family has owned since it was awarded by the king of Spain in 1767.
"It's not that we're for illegal immigration," she said, "but if the whole government can't take care of that issue, how is my little piece of land going to have an effect?"
Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff, exercising his authority under the REAL ID Act of 2005, has waived compliance with 36 laws -- including environmental statutes -- to speed past the regulatory roadblocks that threatened to further delay construction. He told Congress that it would be "impossible to come close" to the 670-mile goal without taking that step.
Although the Cabinet secretary has pledged that his department would continue to work with communities on environmental protections, the waivers generated a fierce blowback from environmentalists and their allies. Fourteen Democratic members of Congress, including eight committee leaders, have joined Defenders of Wildlife and the Sierra Club in asking the Supreme Court to hear their claim that the waivers are unconstitutional.
The justices could make a decision within the next few weeks on whether to review the case, but a hearing wouldn't be likely before the court's next term, which begins in October. Rep. Raul Grijalva, D-Ariz., one of the lawmakers challenging the waivers, plans hearings in Brownsville on Monday to underscore public opposition to Chertoff's decision.
Wrangling over property
With 54 percent of the projects on private property, DHS says it met with more than 600 property owners in an attempt to smooth the way for fence construction. But DHS has also gone to court against holdouts, filing 86 condemnation suits to gain access to land in Texas, California and New Mexico. One included a high-profile case against Eagle Pass.
In all but eight cases, property owners either agreed to make their land available or were ordered to do so by the court, according to the Justice Department. Two families in Los Ebanos, a small community in Texas' Hidalgo County, have filed an appeal with the Fifth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals challenging a lower-court decision favoring the DHS.
The department has estimated that its Secure Border Initiative, including the fence and the high-tech virtual wall, will cost $7.6 billion from 2007 to 2011. Since 2007, Congress has appropriated $2.5 billion and is being asked to approve $775 million for fiscal 2009.
But Stana, the GAO's director of homeland security and justice, said in a February report that SBI officials "are unable to estimate the total cost of pedestrian and vehicle fencing because they do not yet know the type of terrain where the fencing is to be constructed, the materials to be used or the cost to acquire the land."
Managers of the SBI program estimate construction costs at $4 million per mile for pedestrian fencing and $2 million per mile for vehicle barriers. Stana, however, said total costs "will be higher" because the estimate does not include other expenses, such as contract management, higher-than-expected acquisition costs, incentive costs to meet an expedited schedule and the unforeseen costs of working in remote areas.
Fort Worth tie-in
The command post for fence construction is in Fort Worth, where supervisors with the Corps of Engineers direct operations in all four states. More than 200 corps officials nationwide, many with specific areas of expertise, have also been drawn into the project.
"We're leveraging corps resources nationwide," said Todd Smith, project manager for the pedestrian fence, which in corps parlance is entitled PF225. Kevin DaVee is the Fort Worth-based project manager for the vehicle fence, VF300.
The goal is to erect a total of 370 miles of pedestrian fencing and 300 miles of vehicle fencing, including the sections that were in place before SBI. Planners envision 72 segments of pedestrian fence, most of which will be about five miles or less. Steel mesh or bollards -- tall posts rooted into the ground -- are the choice for PF225, while the Normandy barriers or rails welded to posts are being used for the vehicle barriers.
As outlined by Chertoff, the DHS plans to have fencing along about 30 percent of the 2,000-mile Southwestern border, largely in populated areas where illegal crossers can quickly blend in.
Natural barriers -- such as mountains and the Rio Grande -- will protect large sections of unfenced areas, said Chertoff. Despite problems with the virtual fence, known as SBInet, planners still hope to deploy cameras, radar and sensors in predominately rural areas to compliment the physical barriers.
ping
$4 million dollars per mile. That’s $6.8 billion if we had to build it along the entire border. That’s just $23 per American.
Where should I send it?
300 Miles eh ?
Why exactly won’t the immigrants just come across where the fence isn’t ?
“Why exactly won’t the immigrants just come across where the fence isn’t ?”
You’ve never been along the Mexican border have you? LOL
Build the double border fence!
Build the electrified triple border fence with alligtor-filled moat.
Truly astronomical "nearly 100 miles of 15 - 18 foot "fencing." With a record like that, DHS could even get hired by any number of residents to install fencing around their homes. Of course, at the price the American taxpayers are paying per foot, no one could ever afford to hire them!
Disgusting record!!!
I spent a night on one of those mountains that is supposed to be a natural barrier two months ago. The mountains did nothing to deter illegals, but there are lots of trees that make it difficult for the BP to find them.
I have seen the huge amounts of garbage the illegals leave behind. If I were a private property owner, I would welcome the fence.
To check progress, there should be a website that has Google Earth type satellite pictures with location overlays(i.e. milemarkers, county,state locations) so the citizens can check on what is happening sector by sector.
Every article I read about this fence confuses me with stats about:
A. How much fence is being installed
B. Where the fence is being installed
C. What type of fence is being installed and where
D. How much fence is remaining to be installed and where
How can we see for ourselves that the Feds are doing what they say they are doing?
Throw out the fencing they inherited, throw out the vehicle barriers that let invaders walk in, and they are bragging about building only 100 miles of new fence!!!!
This in a country that built the Empire State Building in 400 days, 3/4 of a century ago.
Yeah, I don’t think there is any doubt that even the government could do this a whole lot faster if they really wanted to.
“Managers of the SBI program estimate construction costs at $4 million per mile for pedestrian fencing and $2 million per mile for vehicle barriers.”
And RICO suits for delayed completion.
Just build the dang thing!
I'm so sick of all this politically correct (inept) stuff.
"According to the Congressional Research Service (CRS), DHS predicts that the San Diego fence will have a total cost of $127 million for its 14-mile length when it is completed--roughly $9 million a mile. Construction of the first 9.5 miles of fencing cost $31 million, or roughly $3 million a mile, while construction of the last 4.5 miles of fencing is projected to cost $96 million, or roughly $21 million a mile."
Sounds like there is some serious graft going on.
fence is a misused term. This is NOT the double fence/border patrol road as mandated in the Secure Fence Act
SMOKE - MIRRORS
That’s all this was ever meant to be. We’re being occupied by a foreign nation and the powers that be want it to happen.
End of story.
“That’s an awful lot to do in a eight months of time,”
It’s been eight wasted years,
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.