At least $800M spent for 53-mile border fence
June 18, 2010 The federal government set aside $833 million for the fence of
cameras, sensors and other barriers in 2007, and the vast majority
of that money, at least $800 million, has been spent on a sliver,
in Arizona, of the nearly 2,000-mile southern border. About $20.9
million has been used on the northern border.
Rep. Chris Carney, D-Pa., chairman of a House Homeland Security
subcommittee, said the money was supposed to buy virtual fence for
655 miles of border in Arizona, New Mexico and a slice of Texas, at
a cost of about $1.2 million per mile.
"We are guardians of the taxpayers' money and someone said yes
to this, we said yes to this and it's not what was originally
sold," Carney said.
The totals come from the House Homeland Security Committee,
which got them from the Homeland Security Department. Customs and
Border Protection confirmed the figures.
The fence, developed as part of a border security plan under
President George W. Bush, was supposed to monitor most of the
southern border with Mexico by 2011. Now, the 53 miles in Arizona
is expected to be done by the end of the year.
Additionally, the expected capabilities of the virtual fence
have shrunk, said Randolph Hite, a Government Accountability Office
official.
"It's hard to redirect an iceberg once it's started moving in
one direction, and that's what we are facing," Hite said.
The Homeland Security Department has suspended the project while
it decides what to do next. Several officials acknowledged some
good has come from the project, but they questioned the cost for
those capabilities.
Carney urged the department to "find other means to secure the
border in a timely and effective manner."
Roger Krone, an executive with virtual fence contractor Boeing,
disagreed with portrayals of the spending. He said only $155
million was spent for the deployment of technology to monitor 55
miles of the Arizona border, a rate of $2.8 million a mile.
Krone said of the $828 million spent on the fence, $484 million
was for nonrecurring costs, on design, development, supplier and
program management and software design and development.
Mark Borkowski, Customs and Border Protections executive
director of the Secure Border Initiative, said it's unknown whether
the technology will be used to secure other parts of the border.
"The question is, is that really the right technology ... or
can we come up with something that's a little bit more rational,
that is tailored to each area of the border," Borkowski said.