Border security
The recommendations of a Brookings Institution study would return U.S. border policy to a more discerning approach that recognizes the historic differences between our northern and southern borders.
The report rejects the "one-size-fits-all" method that has governed border policies since Sept. 11 and treated the U.S.-Canadian border the same as the one with Mexico without regard for geographic, economic and cultural differences.
The northern border, for practical reasons, has so far escaped the hundreds of miles of fencing erected in Texas, California, New Mexico and Arizona. But stepped up security since 2001 has established a virtual border enforcement with surveillance cameras and unmanned drones keeping watch on people and goods crossing between the two countries from Detroit to Buffalo, the Thousand Islands, Massena and beyond.
Land crossings have become clogged from delays caused by tighter security measures. Lengthy lines and stricter paperwork requirements frustrate and deter the occasional, recreational traveler, impairing cross-border tourism when they choose to stay home.
Trucks carrying more than $1.5 billion worth of goods a year between the world's two largest trade partners have been held up for hours. Minimizing delays takes on greater importance with the Obama administration's concentrated effort to revive the American auto industry, which makes up the largest share of U.S.-Canadian trade. The report noted that a vehicle produced by an American company crosses the border seven times with the transportation of raw materials and parts before the finished car or truck rolls off the assembly line.
Border policies have resulted in "considerable user frustration and economic drag," the report said.
Besides the north-south distinction, the report chided Washington for failing to recognize dissimilarities along the Canadian border and treating it as "a single and uniform line with problems and opportunities equally distributed along its length." It said national policy should accommodate the diversity of the border and treat border crossers, which it classified into five groups, differently.
The study urged greater decentralization of responsibility by allowing federal officials closer to the local level to develop plans tailored to specific crossings and called for greater collaboration between Canada and the United States.
In the post-9-11 world, some heightened security is inevitable, but Washington should adopt a more flexible approach to remove unnecessary barriers to U.S.-Canadian relations.
