MORE AGENTS NEEDED ON CANADA BORDER, PANEL TOLD

WASHINGTON - The No. 2 Border Patrol agent for Western Washington says
threadbare
resources have left the United States vulnerable to terrorists
sneaking into the country from Canada and defenseless against an
increasing flow of illegal drugs.

Deputy Chief Border Patrol Agent Eugene Davis told the House
Subcommittee on Immigration and Claims yesterday that federal
authorities need an 80 percent increase in the number of agents
working in the Border Patrol sector based in Blaine, Wash.

Forty-two agents now work in the region. Davis estimated at least 75
are needed to solve chronic problems, such as the inability to
dispatch agents when illegal crossings are detected, or the lack of
agents on duty from midnight to sunrise.

"Over the last 10 years, we have experienced large increases in
organized crime along the border," Davis said. "Our manpower levels
during this time have been static."

Rep. Lamar Smith, R-Texas, chairman of the subcommittee, asked Davis,
a 29-year Border Patrol veteran, to testify about increases in drug
smuggling and illegal entry of potential terrorists on the U.S.-Canada
border.

The Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS), the Border Patrol's
parent agency, initially told Smith's panel that Davis could not
appear before the committee, according to Smith staffers. They said
the INS eventually agreed after Smith threatened to serve a subpoena.

At the hearing, a top INS official agreed with Davis that there is a
problem with staffing on the northern border, while many agents and
resources have been redirected south to fight illegal immigration from
Mexico.

"We do need more Border Patrol agents, that's clear," said Michael
Pearson, executive associate commissioner for INS field operations.
"We do need more resources on the northern border, and we know that."

Last year, fewer than 300 Border Patrol agents watched the 4,000-mile
U.S.-Canada border, one of the longest land borders in the world,
while the U.S.-Mexican border, at about half the length, had about
7,400 agents.

"So few agents cannot monitor a border thousands of miles long 24
hours every day," Smith said. "The Border Patrol knows that the drug
and alien smugglers monitor their shifts and simply wait until they go
off duty."

Smith got significant support for that view from the Department of
Justice Inspector General's Office, which is reviewing the INS's
northern-border policy.

"They don't have adequate resources to control the vast northern
border," Inspector General Michael Bromwich said. "There is simply too
much land upon which terrorists, drug smugglers and alien smugglers
could work for the Border Patrol to be effective. It is an enormous
task they have."

Bromwich said the northern border has taken a back seat to enforcement
in the Southwest at a time when "the border in Western Washington is
experiencing a marked increase in the smuggling of `B.C. Bud,' an
especially potent strain of marijuana that sells for as much as
cocaine in Southern California."

The threat of terrorists sneaking across the unguarded portions of the
northern border emerged as more than a threat in 1997, when it was
learned that a man convicted in a plot to to bomb a New York subway
station had illegally entered the United States near Bellingham.

While the Border Patrol views the case as a success story because the
man was arrested three times and released on bail when he was
determined not to be a risk, Bromwich's office found several loopholes
in the system after that incident.

Particularly, the auditors found that INS agents do not do State
Department terrorism checks on more than 90 percent of the 150,000
asylum applications filed annually. Pearson said there was a policy to
do the checks, but that it isn't always followed.

"It has to do with our workload and what's going on at the time and
the number of people we have on the northern border," Pearson said.

James V. Grimaldi's phone message number is 206-464-8550. His e-mail
address is: jgrimaldi@seattletimes.com