Mainers feel trapped by border rules

TOWNSHIP 15 RANGE 15 – Diane Marquis was wondering Friday how she was going to see her college-age children, both of whom are in Quebec, if they come to visit her on Sunday, Mother’s Day.

She doesn’t want them to get arrested, but if she goes to see them, she won’t be able to get back home until Monday.

“I don’t know what I’m going to do,” she said during a telephone interview. “It makes me sick.”

The small Maine settlement along the U.S.-Canada border with Quebec where Marquis lives has no official name. Most people just call it St. Pamphile, adopting the name of the Quebec town less than two miles down the dirt road.

The settlement has no stores, no churches, no medical facility, no post office and no movie theater, but it does have about 15 people.

Because of tightened security stemming from the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, the U.S. Bureau of Customs and Border Protection on May 1 eliminated the Form 1 program, which allowed preapproved people to cross the border when border stations were closed, including the one at St. Pamphile.

Now when the border station there closes at 2 p.m. Friday, the gate is locked for the weekend, and the 15 people who live in Maine can’t drive to St. Pamphile, Quebec, or get back home if they are in Canada.

Cameras and sensors monitor the station when it is not staffed, and crossing illegally could result in criminal prosecution, with penalties including jail and a fine of $5,000.

Janet S. Rapaport, Customs Bureau public affairs officer in New York City, said Friday that bureau officials were aware of the problems faced by the people in the township.

Although a long-term solution has not been developed, bureau officials “don’t anticipate any adverse issues this weekend,” concerning the Mother’s Day holiday, she said.

Marquis and her husband, Bruce, have lived in the settlement for 25 years. Bruce Marquis, who is 48, was born there.

But since May 1, any time they go to St. Pamphile, Quebec, to shop, go to church or visit family or friends, they must rush to get back before the gate is closed at 2 p.m.

“It makes life very miserable,” she said during a telephone interview.

Richard Albert, 52, has lived in the settlement most of his life.

“We’re virtually penned up like animals once they close the gate,” he said Friday during an interview.

Rod Sirois, 59, a retired Maine game warden and former U.S. Navy SEAL, operates Northern Hideaway Guide Service located in the border settlement. He’s angry about how the community has been treated.

“We’re all very patriotic, and if we thought this was stopping terrorists, we’d support it,” he said Wednesday.

“Times have changed, but we haven’t,” he said about the people who live in the border community, most of whom work in the woods industry or are retired. “We’re the same people who have been there for 30 to 50 years.”

He said if the crossing issue wasn’t resolved, problems will arise on other holidays, such as Thanksgiving and Christmas, as well as birthdays, weddings and funerals.

There also is concern, Sirois said, that should there be a fire or the need for an ambulance when the gate is locked, emergency responders from St. Pamphile wouldn’t be able to cross the border.

Rapaport said Friday that keys to the gate will be provided to emergency services that cover the community in Maine so that they can respond if called.

Though it has been only a little more than a week since the new border procedures were implemented, Sirois said, residents already are becoming frustrated and might be willing to break the law to make their point. They also have talked about filing suit against the Customs bureau.

In an e-mail letter dated May 5 to Philip W. Spayd, director of field operations for U.S. Customs Service North Atlantic Management Center in Boston, Sirois wrote: “What you are doing to these people is wrong; a direct violation of their safety and their rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.”

The people of T15 R15 “will do whatever is necessary to protect their families’ happiness and way of life,” he said.