California panel cites environmental effects; patrol to fight ruling

Associated Press
 
SAN DIEGO – California regulators denied a Department of Homeland Security request to fortify the westernmost stretch of the U.S.-Mexico border, setting the stage for a possible legal battle between the state and the Bush administration.

The California Coastal Commission found this week that the project, which would fill in canyons and erect additional fences along the final 3 ½ miles of the border before it meets the ocean, would harm sensitive habitats.

"The operation might succeed, but the patient might die," Commissioner John Woolley said.

The U.S. Border Patrol insisted the fortifications were needed to deter illegal border-crossers and protect its agents. It plans to challenge the commission's ruling.

"It doesn't end here," the Border Patrol's Michael Hance said.

The ruling could delay plans next year on the final phase of the $58 million fencing project.

If the two sides can't reach a compromise, the issue is likely to land in federal court, officials said. The U.S. government, however, holds a trump card: Under federal law governing coastal management, the president can override an unfavorable court ruling.

Plans call for two fences running parallel to the 11-year-old corrugated steel barrier along the border. A patrol road and series of lights run between the first and second fences; a road would run between the second and third.

Much of the environmental concerns stem from plans to fill a half-mile long canyon known as "Smuggler's Gulch" with 2.1 million cubic yards of dirt – enough to fill 300,000 dump trucks. The Coastal Commission said filling the canyon would erode soil near a federally protected estuary that is a refuge for threatened and endangered birds. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service also opposed filling in Smuggler's Gulch.

The Border Patrol said proposed alternatives would leave gaps in enforcement. The agency's apprehensions fell to 16,000 last year, a decline of 88 percent since the federal government launched a crackdown in 1994 by erecting fences, adding patrols and installing lights and motion sensors.

Steep roads were responsible for the deaths of three Border Patrol agents in the past two years. Agents often are pelted by rocks and debris hurled from the Mexican side of the border.

"I think we should defer to the people who put their lives on the line out there in very difficult situations," said U.S. Rep. Duncan Hunter, R-Calif., who has long advocated tighter border security.

Mr. Hunter, chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, said the commission's "nutty decision" ignored the risk of a terrorist slipping across the border to attack San Diego's Navy bases.