If you were an illegal alien...

[w¡n9Nµ7 §£@¥€r 123]

A border runs through it: Tiny town worries feds

DERBY LINE, Vermont (AP) -- Step through the front door of the Haskell Library and you're in the United States.

Walk across the carpeted floor to the circulation desk and you're in Canada. But if you sit down on the couch, you're back in the U.S.

The 106-year-old Romanesque building, which straddles the international border, has enjoyed a kind of informal immunity from border restrictions through the years.

But a U.S. Border Patrol crackdown focusing on three unguarded streets linking Derby Line with Stanstead, Quebec, across the border, could soon change that.

"There's been an increase in illegal activity, both north and south, in the last little while," said Mark Henry, the operations officer for the Border Patrol's Swanton sector, which runs across northern New York, Vermont and New Hampshire. "There have been some significant cases."

Under the crackdown, instead of parking their cars outside the library in Quebec and walking to the front door in the U.S., Canadian patrons would have to detour through one of two ports of entry linking the municipalities.

It's not far, though people are leery about the change.

"For as long as I've lived here, the practice was if they were only going to the library, they didn't have to report," said village trustee Keith Beadle, who also sits on the library board.

If the streets are closed, smugglers will just walk across lawns or through the woods, Beadle said.

No decisions have been made yet, but U.S. and Canadian authorities are holding a series of meetings with officials from both communities.

"This all fits in to the larger picture of the Border Patrol strategy to gain operational control of our borders," Henry said.

Grocery shoppers not the target

Cpl. Luc Bessette, a spokesman for the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, said: "I don't think they're aiming at people who go pick up groceries and come back. It's people that want to use this in a bad way."

Smugglers have learned the side streets are unguarded, and while surveillance cameras monitor activity on other streets, border agents on both sides can't always get there in time when illegal activity is spotted.

Recently, two vans carrying 21 illegal immigrants were caught in the U.S. after having crossed over on one of the unguarded streets.

What exactly would change in the crackdown remains to be seen.

"We don't know what the outcome would be," said Pierre Dussault, Stanstead's general director.

Even though Derby Line and Stanstead are separate municipalities, they share water and sewer systems and emergency crews, which respond to calls on both sides of the border.

'Quite the rats' nest'

In the town of Beebe Plain, about three miles west of Derby Line, the border runs down the middle of Canusa Avenue, a residential street.

Houses on the south side fly American flags and cars with green Vermont license plates sit in the driveways. Across the street, a sign says "Arrêt" (French for "stop") and cars have white Quebec plates. Anyone who crosses the street without reporting to its customs houses can be prosecuted.

"This is quite the rats' nest, if you think about it," said Pat Boisvert, 66, who has lived in the same house -- on the Vermont side -- his whole life.

Boisvert said residents never used to notice the border, but life along it has since changed.

"It was like it wasn't even there, especially for people who lived around here," he said.

http://discuss.ilw.com/eve/forums/a/tpc/f/...1010679831/p/13

[mawilson 2,133]

Too risky and probably too late, the U.S. Border Patrol crackdown focusing on that little town.

[chri'stina 190]

I saw on one of those World News tonight, or similar shows, awhile ago about a road that crosses the border, I believe up in the Michigan or Minnesota area, that was not manned. To cross, you went into a checkpoint yourself and called in your crossing. A video phone I believe was the only way they saw you. They'd say ok you can cross. Maybe they had a surveillance cam outside? But it seems it'd be easy to cross there. They use an honor system that you'll stop and call...only works for the honest right?

[w¡n9Nµ7 §£@¥€r 123]

Frankly, the easiest way to cross is with a fake passport.

I've driven into Canada many times. Never have they actually taken my passport in hand, I show it to them, they look at it and wave me through.

Getting back into the US has always been much more challenging.

[nane1104 146]

proven to work:

[mawilson 2,133]

Frankly, the easiest way to cross is with a fake passport.

I've driven into Canada many times. Never have they actually taken my passport in hand, I show it to them, they look at it and wave me through.

Getting back into the US has always been much more challenging.

They probably asked you a couple of questions and waved you through because you

didn't have a foreign accent. This wouldn't work for our illegal alien with a Mexican accent.

[Peikko 1,575]

Just a mexican accent? Or an 'arab' accent too?

[mawilson 2,133]

Just a mexican accent? Or an 'arab' accent too?

Any foreign accent, actually.

[nane1104 146]

also proven to work:

[mawilson 2,133]

also proven to work:

Nane, serious ideas, please.

[nane1104 146]

also proven to work:

Nane, serious ideas, please.

You think I am joking??

[HAL 9000 96]

Best idea:

Apply for immigration status directly from a Canadian consulate in your country of choice. No illegal walk/swim/fly/car ride needed and we keep mawilson out of business.

[mawilson 2,133]

You think I am joking??

Yes, I think you are. Your ideas are putting the illegal alien at risk of capture.

[one...two...tree 2,762]

...from the sky. Have someone fly me over the border in a small Cessna and then I'd parachute out.

[Peikko 1,575]

Illegal airspace manoever, you'd get shot down!