Waits may be keeping legal crossers out

Waits may be keeping legal crossers out
BLAKE MORLOCK and FERNANDA ECHÁVARRI
Tucson Citizen 6/21/08

Waits will get longer and Mexican visitors will arrive in fewer numbers until the U.S. improves its seven ports of entry along the Arizona-Mexico border.

That's what a University of Arizona study released Friday by the Arizona-Mexico Commission concluded as it showed a drop in the number of people crossing into the U.S. Wait times average 45 minutes and regularly extend to two hours.

The commission tackles cross-border issues and operates out of Gov. Janet Napolitano's office and includes Mexican officials and citizens.

The report attributes the delays primarily to increased security at U.S. entry ports since 9/11 and to old, inadequate port facilities. Fixing the state's seven ports of entry would cost about $500 million and would move people through more quickly, the study said.
Vehicular traffic dropped 20 percent from 2002 to 2007, with 4 million fewer people driving across the border, the commission found.

However, 2 million more people walked across.

"It is concerning that we are crossing 2 million less people and our border wait times are longer than they have ever been," said Luis Ramirez, a Nogales border expert advising the commission. "People don't just come in to Nogales. They may go to the Grand Canyon, or go to a ballgame in Phoenix or shop in Tucson."

The traffic slowdown from Mexico to Arizona happened as the peso's value gained 10 percent against the dollar, Ramirez said.
In Texas, where border crossings are larger than those in Arizona, wealthy Mexicans are investing in the Rio Grande Valley but similar investments are not happening in southern Arizona, he said.
Carmen De Andrade, 72, lives in Nogales, Son., and goes grocery shopping in Nogales, Ariz.

"I watch for the lines to look somewhat reasonable, which is usually an hour, and then drive across," she said. "I used to go across all the time but now I only go shopping three or four times a month."

De Andrade said the waiting time can be more than three hours.
"The lines are horrible most of the time, and not only for the cars. A few months ago it took me an hour to walk through just to have coffee with my friend," she said.

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