Border security plan faces big questions as deadlines loom

SAN DIEGO -- With deadlines fast approaching, the Department of Homeland Security is racing to work out details of a hugely ambitious effort to use biometric technology to track foreigners entering and leaving the country.

Perhaps no place offers a better window into the challenge than the world's busiest border crossing.

Each day, about 50,000 vehicles funnel into the United States from Mexico through 24 lanes at the San Ysidro Port of Entry. Drivers already wait up to two hours for what is usually a cursory inspection before entering San Diego.

Government officials say wait times would balloon at San Diego and other busy checkpoints if inspections lasted just a few seconds longer, potentially damaging commerce and tourism.

Meanwhile, there are only eight southbound lanes into Tijuana, Mexico, though lines are thinner because Mexican officials rarely stop motorists and U.S. officials are nowhere to be seen.

To ease congestion expected to be created by the new plan, the U.S. government is considering whether to make room for 50 northbound booths and 24 southbound.

Dealing with such tight space constraints is essential if Homeland Security is to carry out its mandate -- established by Congress after Sept. 11, 2001 -- to scan biometric data on travelers' visas against terrorist and criminal watch lists. Travelers would be scanned upon entering and exiting, which at the very least would let authorities flag people who overstay visas.

Congressional deadlines are looming. In January, visa-holders at 115 airports and 14 seaports will begin having two fingerprints and a facial photograph scanned upon entry. The checkout system is undefined: The department says only that it will test self-serve kiosks but hasn't said when.

Then, automated entry-exit systems are due to be in the 50 busiest land crossings by the end of next year and all ports by the end of 2005. Land crossings handle about 80 percent of the 500 million entry inspections each year.

Still questions

But it is unclear exactly who will be required to check in and check out, what information would be collected, who would have access to it, and what technology would be used to verify identities. Biometrics can include digital fingerprints, facial photographs and iris scans.

Homeland Security officially requested bids Friday for the border-technology contract -- known as the U.S. Visitor and Immigrant Status Indicator Technology, or U.S. Visit. Program director Jim Williams concedes that he will be looking to bidders for answers about how the project can be carried out.

The contract will be one of the largest technology contracts ever. Homeland Security has estimated it would cost $7.2 billion through 2014. But the General Accounting Office said in September that figure excludes between $7 billion and $15 billion needed for biometric testing and $2.9 billion for new inspection facilities.

Williams, who joined Homeland Security this year after working on the Internal Revenue Service's multibillion-dollar technology overhaul, met with business leaders and officials in San Diego, San Antonio and Brownsville, Texas, in November to try to allay fears of massive traffic jams at border points.

Spending just a few more seconds on inspections can create huge bottlenecks. If agents in Blaine, Wash., took an extra nine seconds to examine each driver, the peak waiting time would jump to 13 hours from the current two hours, according to Homeland Security figures cited by the GAO.

Williams said he would ask Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge to at least initially exclude millions of Mexicans who have border crossing cards from the more rigorous entry and exit exams. The cards entitle Mexicans to travel within 25 miles of the border for 72 hours.

Nearly all Canadians, who can travel anywhere in the United States for six months, would also be exempt. So would citizens from 27 other countries who don't need visas to come to the United States. The United States is requiring those countries, many in western Europe, to add chips or bar codes with biometric identifiers to passports by Oct. 26, 2004.

Homeland Security officials say U.S. citizens will not have to submit to biometric testing to enter and leave the country, although Williams said inspectors could take questionable travelers to another area for such scans.

"We're not going to do anything that's operationally crazy," Williams said in an interview before meeting dozens of San Diego business leaders.

His remarks mollified some critics, at least for now.

"This was the first time we heard from anyone," said Elsa Saxod, director of binational affairs for the city of San Diego. "Most of us around the table took a deep breath and said, 'Oh, maybe this won't be so bad."'

In some ways, San Diego is further along than other entry points. The consulate in Tijuana is one of only about 20 U.S. offices worldwide that have begun collecting biometric identifiers from visa applicants. The State Department expects to reach all 211 visa-issuing outposts by October.

The Tijuana consulate opened an annex at a former gym in 1998 to issue Mexicans the border crossing cards -- known as "laser visas." About 300,000 people gave two fingerprints and a photo, which are stored on a chip inside the visa. Crowds were so big that the consulate temporarily opened a second annex in Mexicali, which processed 113,500 laser visas until closing last year.

But while about 6.5 million Mexicans now have the fancy cards, U.S. border crossings generally don't have machines to read the fingerprints and photo.

A pilot program this year in San Diego -- also tried at five other land and airports -- consisted of two machines to swipe the visas. Homeland Security spokeswoman Kimberly Weissman said more machines have been ordered for ports throughout the country.

Even if the traffic lanes could be increased at the San Diego border crossing, there would be little room to house people who are held back for inspection. The vehicle inspection lot has about 50 parking spaces and, on a recent weekday, about 30 cars were double-parked. Holding rooms can fit only several hundred people.

Dennis Carlton, director of the Washington office of the International Biometric Group, a consulting firm recently hired by Homeland Security, said the tracking system will have a share of setbacks.

"There will unfortunately be a combination of tears and triumphs," he said. "No one has the luxury of shutting down the border for three months to do a test."