Collins hears passport concerns on Calais visit

CALAIS – Area businesses fear that the federal government’s plan to require everyone who enters the country to have a passport could hurt cross-border business and the city’s international parade.

That was one of the concerns raised Monday with U.S. Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, who was in the city to meet with members of the St. Croix Valley Chamber of Commerce. Calais shares a border with neighboring St. Stephen, New Brunswick.

“I think we need to reconsider the passport requirement,” Collins said.

The original plan called for anyone entering the country after Jan. 1, 2008, to have a passport. But a mountain of complaints has forced the Bush administration to delay the requirement for six months.

Collins believes the requirement that people entering the country have passports should be delayed until June 2009.

“We need to come up with a system that keeps our enemies out, but lets our friends in and does not interfere with normal trade and travel.”

In the past, the nearly transparent Calais-St. Stephen border has led to cross-border shopping that has benefited both communities.

Often the success of who shopped where depended upon how strong or weak the Canadian dollar was. But for the most part, Canadians could be counted on to buy gasoline and milk at area convenience stores in Calais, even when the dollar was not to their advantage.

It is feared that requiring all visitors to have passports will result in Canadians declining to apply for passports and just staying home.

A second fear is that many Washington County residents will be unable to afford the $100 fee needed to get a passport in this country.

The passport requirement also could mean an end to the annual international parade. On Saturday, Calais and St. Stephen held the parade, which celebrates the strong connection between the two communities.

Asked if passports could mean an end to the parade, Collins said, “I thought about that because I marched in that parade [a few years ago],” she said. “I thought that demonstrates just how onerous this requirement could be. The people who are marching in the parade – how are they going to cross the border? Are they going to be required to have a passport? To me that just demonstrates that we need a different approach,” she said.

Although Americans who want to return to their country will need passports, the federal government is bogged down under an avalanche of requests.

“It is clear that there is no way that the federal government is prepared to handle this, aside from the cost issues and inconvenience issues,” she said.

Collins said she has received numerous complaints from constituents who have not yet received their passports after long waits.

“To put the requirement in place before there was a system that would ensure that passport applications would be handled quickly and efficiently makes no sense whatsoever,” she said.

There have been changes in the federal mandate, she said. “The Department of Homeland Security, in response to pressure that I and others have put on, has backed off the requirement that children have passports. Children age 15 and under will be able to have certified birth certificates instead,” she said.

The senator said she would like to see a substitute for a passport that is less expensive, but would still get to the security concern the federal government has.

“But again, if the federal government does not have the staff in place and the offices in place so that people can easily get those passcards, that’s not going to be a solution [either],” she said.

Collins said she and Sen. Norm Coleman, R-Minnesota, are working on the idea of creating mobile passport vans.

“We don’t want to discourage legitimate travelers, tourists and workers from crossing the border. That will hurt our merchants, that will hurt our health care providers,” she said.