The wall at Eagle Pass Texas - Feds sue town to put up wall

[underpants]

Fence Could Change Border Town Landscape

http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5jE_bOUpQb6MxrxSQno3N6gEdY-MAD8UKB7C00

EAGLE PASS, Texas (AP) — With its motto "Where Yee-Hah meets Ole," Eagle Pass is a border town that prides itself on being both Tex and Mex, a community with many cultural and financial ties that bind it to its sister city across the Rio Grande.

"They come in here like storm troopers," Mayor Chad Foster said. "They are steamrolling the people and abusing our liberties and are absolutely out of control."

Local officials and residents say the fence won't work without other reforms, such as a guest-worker program for Mexicans. The economic draw of the U.S. is too strong, they say, and the fence will cover only a third of the border.

"There's no way this is not going to be very detrimental to us," said John Stockley, a 74-year-old native of Eagle Pass. "I keep thinking if we took this money that's going to be spent not just here, all along the border, and put it into the Mexican economy, we'd probably have people going back the other way."

:wow:

MORE HERE



On Jan. 14, US Attorney Johnny Sutton filed a lawsuit on behalf of the US Department of Justice against the city of Eagle Pass, Texas, to seek access to land for a planned border fence. It was the first of 102 lawsuits expected to be filed in an escalating battle with local landowners and municipalities as the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) seeks to build 370 miles of new border fencing by the end of the year.

Eagle Pass mayor Chad Foster serves as chairperson of the Texas Border Coalition, which has been fighting the border fence construction plans. The coalition says DHS has failed to respond to concerns about the impact the fence will have on the environment, residents' property access and rights, and the binational way of life along the border, and has ignored local officials' suggestions for alternatives. (AP, Jan. 15)

Within hours after the suit was filed, and without a hearing, US District Judge Alia Moses Ludlum of the Texas Western District Court, Del Rio division, ordered the city of Eagle Pass to "surrender" 233 acres of city-owned land to the federal government for 180 days so it can begin to build the border fence. The judge's order said the federal government is entitled to possession or control of the property as requested. (AP, Jan. 16; San Antonio Express-News, Jan. 16)

City Attorney Heriberto Morales said he believed Eagle Pass was the target of the first lawsuit because of Foster's activism against the fence. "I really think it was to send a statement all along the border, to the other cities and individuals: Let's go after first and everyone else will fall into line." Brownsville mayor Pat Ahumada agreed: "They picked the one that had the least defenses against the border fence so they can win in court easily and set a precedent and hold a big stick over the rest of us and make us fall in line," he said.

http://www.ww4report.com/node/5051

[ananda]

1. Doncha just looovvee living in a police state!

nt

[liberal N proud]

13. Pretty close to my thoughts

This could only happen in a police state. Also think of Palestine walled off from the rest of the world.

[midnight]

2. Mayor Chad Foster -That is what a true American sounds like.

City Attorney Heriberto Morales said he believed Eagle Pass was the target of the first lawsuit because of Foster's activism against the fence. "I really think it was to send a statement all along the border, to the other cities and individuals: Let's go after first and everyone else will fall into line." Brownsville mayor Pat Ahumada agreed: "They picked the one that had the least defenses against the border fence so they can win in court easily and set a precedent and hold a big stick over the rest of us and make us fall in line," he said. I'm sure that the reason stated by the city attorney is spot on.

[underpants]

3. John Stockley too

"There's no way this is not going to be very detrimental to us," said John Stockley, a 74-year-old native of Eagle Pass. "I keep thinking if we took this money that's going to be spent not just here, all along the border, and put it into the Mexican economy, we'd probably have people going back the other way."

[treestar]

7. Notice that having them go back is the most important part

At least, that'd be the most convincing to the All Americans All the Time Crowd.

Though they'd whine about putting $$ into the Mexican economy -"They should take care of their own people," as they say. Yet suddenly "socialism" is therefore a good thing.

[Squatch]

4. Having patrolled the Mex-AZ border, myself

and having interviewed many dozens of illegals captured by USCBP, if the US government spent as much money investing south of the border as it did on USCBP and ICE law enforcement, it'd be a much more effective way to keep would-be illegal immigrants on their side of the border.

[underpants]

5. Localities respond

Brownsville mayor, Pat Ahumada, has been against the border fence since the beginning and believes the government should listen to the communities that would be affected if the wall was built. The Brownsville city commission just signed a form allowing Homeland Security to survey the city's land and Ahumada was against it, but says his hands are tied.

Cameron county has received letters from Homeland Security requesting access to survey its lands, but the county hasn't responded to any of them. Judge Carlos Cascos doesn't believe fighting the government will benefit the county in anyway.

Hidalgo county has also shown concerns on the lawsuit. In a written statement, spokewoman for Hidalgo county, Cari Lambrecht, says "The lawsuits are just a strong-arm tactic and something federal government should not engage in." She also states, "Hidalgo county has a better solution to the proposed border wall. The county believes this is a win-win for security and flood protection and it would save taxpayers money."

The city of McAllen supports Hidalgo county concerns stating, "We understand what the federal government is trying to do. However, we disagree on how they are going about it. Restoring to the courts, litigation and strongarm tactics should be a last resort for such an important issue."
http://www.kveo.com/news/local/13864037.html

[xchrom]

6. the new Monument to American democracy

is the new Great Wall.

the militarized version of democracy.

i guess no one thinks about if it keeps ''them'' out -- it keeps us ''in''.

[underpants]

9. 10,000 pounds @ 40 MPH

The river at Eagle Pass is about 280 feet wide and a muddy 8 1/2 feet deep — too deep to wade, and too dangerous for many people to swim.

The fence, as proposed, would be built to withstand the crash of a 10,000-pound vehicle at 40 mph. The barrier would bisect a property slated for a new riverfront housing development and cut in front of the park and golf course, slicing through the grounds of a historic fort built in 1849.

U.S. Customs and Border Protection hopes to construct 670 miles of fence across the 2,000-mile border by the end of the year. Agency spokesman Michael Friel said of the roughly 600 border landowners contacted nationwide, about 100 refused to grant permission to survey their property.

[xchrom]

10. ...

64. Mending Wall
 
SOMETHING there is that doesn't love a wall,  
That sends the frozen-ground-swell under it,  
And spills the upper boulders in the sun;  
And makes gaps even two can pass abreast.  
The work of hunters is another thing:          5
I have come after them and made repair  
Where they have left not one stone on stone,  
But they would have the rabbit out of hiding,  
To please the yelping dogs. The gaps I mean,  
No one has seen them made or heard them made,   10
But at spring mending-time we find them there.  
I let my neighbor know beyond the hill;  
And on a day we meet to walk the line  
And set the wall between us once again.  
We keep the wall between us as we go.   15
To each the boulders that have fallen to each.  
And some are loaves and some so nearly balls  
We have to use a spell to make them balance:  
"Stay where you are until our backs are turned!"  
We wear our fingers rough with handling them.   20
Oh, just another kind of outdoor game,  
One on a side. It comes to little more:  
He is all pine and I am apple-orchard.  
My apple trees will never get across  
And eat the cones under his pines, I tell him.   25
He only says, "Good fences make good neighbors."  
Spring is the mischief in me, and I wonder  
If I could put a notion in his head:  
"Why do they make good neighbors? Isn't it  
Where there are cows? But here there are no cows.   30
Before I built a wall I'd ask to know  
What I was walling in or walling out,  
And to whom I was like to give offence.  
Something there is that doesn't love a wall,  
That wants it down!" I could say "Elves" to him,   35
But it's not elves exactly, and I'd rather  
He said it for himself. I see him there,  
Bringing a stone grasped firmly by the top  
In each hand, like an old-stone savage armed.  
He moves in darkness as it seems to me,   40
Not of woods only and the shade of trees.  
He will not go behind his father's saying,  
And he likes having thought of it so well  
He says again, "Good fences make good neighbors."  
 
my beloved frost.

[Prophet 451]

8. *sigh* And it sounded like such a nice town too n/t

[redqueen]

11. This issue has been brewing down there for a while...

the heat's rising now, though. Should be interesting to see how things go. You know Texans.

[trof]

12. And Pink Floyd is suing for copyright infringement.

[Javaman]

14. It's all about money. nt