Bill Would Up Staff in Customs By 6,500-Plus

By ARI PAUL

A Texas Congressman introduced a bill March 31 that would increase staffing at the U.S. Customs and Border Protection agency, where the National Treasury Employees Union has complained of personnel shortages.

COLLEEN M. KELLEY: Must add border staff.

The legislation sponsored by Democratic U.S. Rep. Silvestre Reyes would increase the number of CBP officers by 30 percent - or 5,000 officers - over the course of the next five years, as well as adding 1,200 agricultural specialists and 350 administrative workers.

Multiple Problems

"Inadequate staffing and outdated infrastructure at our land ports of entry are detrimental to our national security and have led to long and frustrating delays for those who use them," Congressman Reyes said in a statement. "Our land ports are an important avenue for both travelers and commerce, and delays hurt the quality of life of border residents and the economy of our nation. While the Bush Administration has focused much of its resources on the border, it has done so at the expense of our ports."

NTEU President Colleen M. Kelley, who represents nearly 20,000 CBP officers nationwide, hailed the bill as progress.

"For the nation's security, the dangerous cycle of inadequate resources for Customs and Border Protection (CBP) leading to insufficient staffing at the country's 326 border crossing points has got to end," she said in a statement. "Clearly, this much-needed legislation would be an important step forward."

The NTEU has been a vocal advocate for increasing staffing at the borders, saying its members were overworked and that travelers were experiencing unnecessary delays when crossing.

In November, Ms. Kelley testified before the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Subcommittee on Oversight of Government Management and blasted the agency's four-year-old "One Face at the Border" program, which a union statement said "combines the work of inspectors from the three legacy agencies that make up CBP into a single position."