[migrawatch-public] Border fence delayed

Border fence delayed
Tech woes holding up virtual barrier at Sasabe

/Sean Holstege
The Arizona Republic
Jun. 22, 2007/

Technical problems have delayed the launch of a high-tech virtual fence
designed to secure a 28-mile stretch of Arizona's border with Mexico.
The cutting-edge fence has been touted as the model for controlling
6,000 miles of frontier with Mexico and Canada.

The delay comes a week before the U.S. Senate is due to renew the
supercharged debate over a proposed immigration-reform bill supported by
both Arizona's senators.

The bill will live or die on how well the government can guarantee its
ability to secure the border. Until the border is secured, key
provisions dealing with visas and guest workers would not be enacted.

The virtual fence, a network of remote cameras and sensors around
Sasabe, northwest of Nogales, is the first big test of that
security-first promise. But in tests this month, the fence produced
unreliable results. It was supposed to have been online by early July.

"It is our expectation that these glitches get fixed and fixed
immediately. We are simply not going to provide a tool to our front-line
people that's not ready," Homeland Security spokesman Russ Knocke said.

Boeing Corp., which won the $20 million contract to install the fence,
was to have it working by June 13. That date passed as Boeing's project
manager, along with top officials with Border Patrol and Customs and
Border Protection, told Congress that everything was on track.

"At this point, we don't believe it will affect the overall schedule,"
customs spokesman Michael Friel said Thursday.

Boeing has installed all nine portable 98-foot towers, cameras, radar
and ground sensors. It has fitted 50 patrol vehicles with computer
links. Mobile and central command bases have also been linked to the
network. The idea is to give front-line agents and commanders
up-to-the-second pictures of all the activity in their areas.

But the cameras and sensors convey inconsistent information. Software
glitches and integrating all the information have proved challenging.

"This is probably much more experimental than they've let on," said
Donald Kettl, the director of the Fels Institute of Government at the
University of Pennsylvania, who has reported extensively and testified
before Congress about the department's track record.

"As is often the case with Department of Homeland Security projects, it
is a very hard problem, and they are trying cutting-edge technology."

He said the agency has consistently overrelied on technology since it
was formed in March 2003. That makes it an agency overly dependent on
contractors but without the expertise to manage them. The result has
been anti-terrorism projects that slipped behind schedule and over budget.

The virtual fence is the first part of an overall plan called the Secure
Border Initiative, or SBInet. Homeland Security's point man testified
recently that SBInet will cost $8 billion and be done in 2013. But
Congress' auditing division, the Government Accountability Office, has
questioned the agency's planning, and the department's inspector general
pegged the cost at closer to $30 billion.

Boeing referred all questions to the department.

Arizona politicians were surprised by word of the delays. Gov. Janet
Napolitano said she had been assured last week that the project was on
target.

"The department's failure to be forthcoming and the repeatedly slipping
project deadlines . . . undermine the department's credibility with
respect to this initiative," wrote Reps. Bennie Thompson, D-Miss., and
Loretta Sanchez, D-Calif., in a letter to Homeland Security Secretary
Michael Chertoff. The two chair key House Homeland Security committees.

Reporter Matt Benson contributed to this article.

Reach the reporter at sean.holstege@arizonarepublic.com or (602) 444-8334.

*INFO ABOVE REPOSTED:*
http://www.azcentral.com/news/articles/0622fence0622.html

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