Nation's borders still aren't secure, agents say

Top officials of a labor union that represents Border Patrol agents said this week that the agents did not have an emergency response plan when terrorists struck New York and Washington on Sept. 11, and that even now-more than three weeks after the attacks-the country's borders are not secure. In interviews with GovExec.com, three regional vice presidents with the National Border Patrol Council, all Border Patrol agents themselves, said that morale was extremely low among the rank-and-file and that many agents believe that heightened security steps ordered by the Immigration and Naturalization Service have been poorly implemented. Two Michigan Border Patrol agents, Mark Hall and Robert Lindemann, who raised similar concerns last month in an interview with the Detroit Free Press, have been threatened with 90-day suspensions without pay by INS officials for talking to the press. Border Patrol agents are INS employees. The response to the terrorist attacks by INS "was a knee-jerk reaction," said Phil Leveck, a union vice president and Laredo, Texas, agent. "What we found was that they were just unprepared and so they went to these sort of quick solutions rather than something that would really make a difference." That belief is widely held among agents. "I'm not aware of any contingency plan for an emergency," said Jerome Pawluk, a union vice president and Border Patrol agent in Montana. "I've been with the service for 16 years and if [the emergency plan] is not out at the agent level, it's meaningless." "It's been a typical reaction by the immigration service," said a Maine agent who requested anonymity. "They will send a show of manpower but when you get there, the local folks aren't happy to see you. They don't know what to do with you." Leveck said that many Border Patrol agents had been dispatched to airports but were never briefed on airport layouts. As a result, they are totally reliant on airport security in the event of an emergency. In many cases, the agents are standing around near security checkpoints with nothing to do. "It's just a show of force without a clear mission," he said. "And the agents view their assignments as a waste of time." Leveck said other agents have been ordered to guard Border Patrol installations, a task that Leveck doesn't believe is necessary. Meanwhile, the northern border with Canada "isn't secure now or anytime," said the Maine agent. With only about 350 agents to guard 4,000 miles of border, he said, "even with the best of electronics and remote cameras, you couldn't" secure the border. As a result, many agents are considering leaving the Border Patrol to join the expanded sky marshals program. "The journeyman grade would be a GS-13 [compared with GS-11 for Border Patrol agents.] So they would have better pay and better locations in big cities," said Leveck. That could raise a big problem for the Border Patrol since Congress has ordered the agency to boost its numbers by 1,000 agents a year. Already low retention rates will likely get worse, said Leveck.