Critics say the trips raise red flags

WASHINGTON – Rep. Jeff Flake has built a reputation in Washington as a fiscal conservative by berating his colleagues for wasting taxpayer money.

But he’s not against traveling the globe on the taxpayer’s dime.

Flake, who says the trips are necessary for members of Congress, recently took his wife, Cheryl, on a weeklong trip to Brazil, which included visits to the beach-studded city of Rio de Janeiro and the lush tropical rain forest of the Amazon.

Official travel to foreign countries is one of the many perks of serving in Congress, and the expeditions can be costly. Since 1994, House members have taken more than 5,600 government-sponsored trips at a cost of at least $15.9 million, according to CQ MoneyLine.

Flake, a Mesa Republican, traveled to Brazil on official congressional business along with five other lawmakers to learn more about global warming and ethanol.

The February trip was one of at least a dozen he has taken at taxpayer expense in the past five years – more than any of the state’s seven other House members, according to House public records – including trips to China, Cuba and Fiji.

Flake, a member of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, defends his foreign travel, saying congressional trips can help members of Congress ensure the foreign aid they approve is being used wisely and see the impact of U.S. policies on other countries.

“If you’re on the relevant committees with jurisdiction over foreign policy and foreign spending, you’d better take trips,” he said. “You’d better go over and see what you’re spending money on.”

Critics say the trips raise red flags, especially when they involve travel to warmer climates during winter, Paris and other European vacation spots and exotic locales such as China. Taking spouses along also can raise suspicions, some say.

Some trips can be more worthwhile than others, says Melanie Sloan, executive director of the Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, a nonpartisan watchdog group.

“Obviously, a (trip) to Iraq is never fun,” she said. “But there often seem to be these fact-finding trips to Europe. There’s a lot of time set aside for shopping and tennis games.

“These are things that really start seeming like vacations at taxpayer expense.”

Flake is perhaps the most vocal politician against earmarks, those spending projects inserted into bills by lawmakers intent on bringing home the bacon.

He is one of three Arizona lawmakers in Washington who refuse to ask for federal money for local projects. Republican Rep. John Shadegg and Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., say they shun earmarks because they waste taxpayer money.

Shadegg has taken eight federally funded trips in that same time frame to places such as Japan, Greece and Iraq.

“I’ve found all of the trips to be educational, particularly the trips to Iraq and Afghanistan,” Shadegg said. “There’s nothing like being on the ground and seeing what goes on there.”

McCain, who is running for president, has taken at least 17 federally funded trips in the past five years, more than three times as many as Sen. Jon Kyl, according to Senate public records.

McCain, who sits on the Senate Armed Services Committee, recently returned from a five-day trip through five countries: England, France, Iraq, Israel and Jordan. Democrats criticized his trip as a campaign tour at taxpayer expense – a charge McCain denied.

“I wish every senator would take the same trip that we have taken,” he told reporters. “They would be better informed, and they would be better able to make decisions as to how we can defend the national interests of the United States of America in these times of great challenge.”

Aides said McCain’s campaign reimbursed the government for the London portion of the trip because it included a fundraiser there.

Other Arizona House members have traveled far less. Only Rep. Raúl Grijalva, D-Ariz., has taken no government-sponsored trips.

The figure does not include transportation costs for members who travel on military aircraft because those numbers don’t have to be disclosed in House records. Those flights can cost taxpayers about $10,000 per flight hour.

The general lack of disclosure is what irks Craig Holman of the advocacy group Public Citizen.

“The more they travel the better, especially to Baghdad or Cuba for that matter,” he said. “But it should be an open book to make sure they’re not just going to vacation areas and taking their spouses with them.”

WASHINGTON – About 26 million acres of national monuments, historic trails and wilderness areas out West could get additional protection under a bill the House approved Wednesday.

The 278-140 vote would officially designate the system of land managed by the Bureau of Land Management as the National Landscape Conservation system. The lands include a portion of the Grand Canyon in Arizona, the Santa Rosa and San Jacinto mountains in Southern California, the California coastline, the Black Rock Desert of Northern Nevada and the Grand Staircase in Utah.

These “crown jewels,” of the West have fallen victim to vandalism, artifact theft and off-road vehicles that trample plants and other habitats despite their designation as conservation areas by former President Clinton in 2000.

Conservation advocates say the congressional recognition – already given to the national parks and wildlife refuges – would ensure a steadier source of funding for the system.

Rep. Raul Grijalva, D-Ariz., sponsored the bill. The Senate must still approve the bill before it could become law.

WASHINGTON – The Senate overwhelmingly approved housing legislation Thursday that would provide tax credits of $7,000 to people buying foreclosed homes and additional tax breaks for homebuilders. It would also add $10 billion for revenue bonds to be used to refinance subprime loans.

Sen. Jon Kyl, R-Ariz., was one of 12 senators who voted against the bill; 84 voted for it. Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., as well as the other two presidential candidates in the Senate – Hillary Rodham Clinton of New York and Barack Obama of Illinois – were absent for the vote.

Proponents say this is only the start of congressional help to address the mortgage crisis and acknowledge it won’t help many people facing imminent foreclosure.

“The package that we agreed to is not perfect,” said Sen. Chris Dodd, D-Conn., the primary sponsor of the bill. “But it is an important step.”

Arizona foreclosure activity was up 6 percent from the previous month and nearly 210 percent from February 2007, making the state’s foreclosure rate the fourth highest in the nation. One in every 264 households received a foreclosure filing during the month, according to RealtyTrac, which tracks foreclosures.

Bush opposes the Senate bill because he thinks it would do little to help homeowners avoid foreclosure or reduce the large number of homes for sale. Instead, the administration announced Wednesday it is expanding a Federal Housing Administration program that will allow more homeowners to refinance high-interest mortgages.

The Senate bill’s $7,000 tax-credit to buy foreclosed homes could provide banks an incentive to take control of homes and sell them rather than working with owners who want to renegotiate loans and keep their houses, said Aviva Aron-Dine, a policy analyst at the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, a think tank that specializes in issues affecting low-income people.

A provision that allows homebuilders to obtain refunds from previous years’ tax payments rewards those who built too many houses and then promoted subprime loans, which allowed people to borrow more than they could afford, said Sen. Judd Gregg, R-N.H. “This cycle was a creation of their excess,” he said.

House legislation, proposed Tuesday by Rep. Charles Rangel, D-N.Y., chairman of the Ways and Means Committee, would take a more consumer-oriented approach. It would provide the equivalent of interest-free loans so first-time homeowners could make down payments, and provide tax credits for low-income housing.

Contributing: Doug Abrahms, Bill Theobald, GNS

———

Provisions in the Senate mortgage bill
The Senate bill contains:

- $7,000 tax credits claimed over two years for purchasers of foreclosed homes.

- Authority to issue $10 billion in bonds to refinance subprime loans.

- $4 billion in block grants for communities to buy foreclosed homes.

- $100 million for pre-foreclosure counseling.

- An extension, to nine months, of the time a lender must wait before foreclosing on a soldier returning from duty.

- A provision that allows homebuilders to offset more of their current losses with profits dating back four years to obtain larger tax refunds.

- Tax deductions of up to $1,000 for real estate taxes to couples who own a home but don’t itemize their deductions.

WASHINGTON — John McCain waded through a crush of strangers at a crowded roadside diner in Florida two weeks ago, shaking hands and posing for photos with admirers and gawkers alike.

It’s the kind of scenario that energizes voters but makes Secret Service agents shudder. And he’s making these campaign stops far from the watchful eyes of agents wearing dark suits and earpieces.

McCain, the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, is the only major candidate who is not guarded by a Secret Service detail.

“The day that the Secret Service can assure me that if we’re driving in the motorcade and there’s a guy in a rooftop with a rifle, that they can stop that guy, then I’ll say fine,” McCain told reporters late last year. “But the day they tell me, ‘Well, we can’t guarantee it,’ then fine, I’ll take my chances.”

Although it’s been decades since the last attack on a presidential candidate, Secret Service details have become part of the entourage that accompanies most White House hopefuls.

Often seen as a necessary part of modern-day campaigning, the details can offer an air of legitimacy to a fledgling campaign, cut down on security and transportation costs and provide a virtual safety net for candidates as they mingle among unscreened crowds.

But they’re also cumbersome and constraining for candidates who want to connect with voters on a personal level.

McCain, who has cultivated a tough-guy image over the years, bristles at what he calls the inconvenience of Secret Service protection and says it’s a waste of money. His decision not to use a Secret Service detail is emblematic of his pledge to shake things up in Washington.

“It’s partly his style,” said John Geer, a political scientist at Vanderbilt University. “He wants to be able to dive into a crowd. He derives his energy from that.”

McCain’s stance also helps explain the inherent conflict that exists between Secret Service agents and the candidates they seek to protect.

“The candidate wants to get as much hands-on exposure with the public and the Secret Service wants to pull back,” said Andrew O’Connell, a former Secret Service agent who is now managing director for Fortress Global Investigations Corp.

But O’Connell, who protected Bill Clinton when he campaigned for president in 1992, says most candidates want the protection.

“You’d think that in the interest of the party alone they’d have Secret Service coverage,” said Joe Russo, who worked for the Secret Service for 20 years, most recently as head of former President Clinton’s security detail.

Russo, who now works for the security firm T&M Protection Resources, said it’s “silly” to expect agents to guarantee they will save your life no matter what.

“A lot less could happen when the Secret Service is involved,” he said.

The agency began protecting Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., in May 2007. Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, D-N.Y., gets lifetime protection as the former first lady.

The Secret Service has not always protected contenders for the Oval Office. Agents began guarding presidential candidates following the assassination of Robert F. Kennedy, who was fatally shot after winning the California primary in the summer of 1968.

Four years later, Secret Service agents were unable to prevent the shooting of Alabama Gov. George Wallace as he campaigned in Laurel, Md. Wallace, a segregationist in the 1960s, lost his bid for the Democratic nomination and spent the rest of his life in a wheelchair. That was the last major attack on a presidential candidate.

Rep. Bennie Thompson, a Mississippi Democrat who chairs the House Homeland Security Committee, questioned the wisdom of refusing Secret Service protection.

“The magnitude of this election is greater than any one candidate or party,” he said in an e-mail.

Best-known for its protective functions, the Secret Service was created in 1865 to fight counterfeit currency at a time when about a third of the cash in the country was fake, said Ed Donovan, an agency spokesman.

It took the assassination of President William McKinley in 1901 — long after the assassinations of Presidents Abraham Lincoln and James Garfield — for the Secret Service to assume full-time protection of presidents. In 1902, two agents were assigned to guard President Theodore Roosevelt.

The Secret Service has since grown to an agency with a $1.4 billion budget and 6,500 agents, uniformed officers and support staff. The budget for campaign protection has grown from $65 million for the 2004 election to $106.5 million for the upcoming election.

While McCain can opt to go without Secret Service agents as a nominee, he wouldn’t have that choice if he’s elected president.

“We protect the office not the person,” Russo said.

———

Code Names
Barack Obama — Renegade

Hillary Rodham Clinton — Evergreen

John Kerry — Minuteman

Al Gore — Sundance

George W. Bush — Tumbler

Bill Clinton — Eagle

George H.W. Bush — Timberwolf

Ronald Reagan — Rawhide

Jimmy Carter — Deacon

Gerald Ford — Passkey

Timeline
1865 — The Secret Service Division was created to suppress counterfeit currency.

1894 — Secret Service began informal part-time protection of President Grover Cleveland.

1902 — Secret Service assumed full-time responsibility for protection of the president following the assassination of President William McKinley.

1908 — Secret Service began protecting the president-elect.

1913 — Congress authorized permanent protection of the president and the statutory authorization for president-elect protection.

1965 — Congress authorized protection of former presidents and their spouses during their lifetime and minor children until age 16.

1968 — As a result of Robert F. Kennedy’s assassination, Congress authorized protection of major presidential and vice presidential candidates and nominees. Congress also authorized protection of widows of presidents until death, or remarriage, and their children until age 16.

1994 — Congress passed legislation stating that presidents elected to office after Jan. 1, 1997, will receive Secret Service protection for 10 years after leaving office. President Clinton would be the last president to receive lifetime protection.

2003 — The Secret Service was transferred from the Treasury Department to the Homeland Security Department.

Source: Secret Service.

The earmark process for next fiscal year is just getting started, with lawmakers submitting their requests for local project funding to appropriations committees in the House and Senate.

Rep. Trent Franks, R-Ariz., helped secure about $29.2 million worth of earmarks last year but has vowed not to ask for any special project funding this year. Franks’ recent pledge would mean that only half of the state’s congressional delegation plan to actively seek earmarks.

One reason Arizona gets less money is political power.

Alaska, which got $346 million this fiscal year to Arizona’s $119 million, is home to Sen. Ted Stevens, a senior Republican on the Senate Appropriations Committee, which largely controls how money is doled out in Washington. Arizona has just one appropriator in the House, Democratic Rep. Ed Pastor, where rank and file members have less clout than in the Senate.

“It’s one of the illustrations of what’s wrong with the system,” said Ryan Alexander, president of Taxpayers for Common Sense, a watchdog group which tracks earmarks. “Earmark dollars are not distributed based on need or merit or anything else as far as we can tell other than by power.”

Rep. John Shadegg, R-Ariz., agrees.

“I would argue that if all of us sought earmarks, Arizona would still get shortchanged,” he said.

That doesn’t mean they’re shortchanged in the overall federal budget. The state receives more federal funding than state taxpayers put in, according to the Northeast-Midwest Institute, which found that Arizona got $1.19 for every dollar taxpayers spent in 2005.

Shadegg contends that earmarks corrupt the political process by often putting lawmakers in the position of asking for funding for groups that give them campaign donations. At the same time, lawmakers use earmarks to brag to constituents about what they’re accomplishing in Washington, he said.

“People in my district don’t want me to use their taxpayer dollars to get me re-elected,” he said.

Others say that earmarks increase government spending at a time when the national debt continues to climb.

“We simply can’t afford it in the country,” said Rep. Jeff Flake, R-Ariz. “I just can’t in good conscience just play the game.”

Sen. Jon Kyl, R-Ariz., who helped secure about $92.7 million in earmarks last year, does not think lawmakers should eliminate them altogether but argues the system should be more transparent and that funding be distributed based on the merits of projects.

Recent reforms in the House and Senate have forced lawmakers to disclose the earmarks they secure but don’t make them identify all the ones they request. Kyl and freshmen Democrats Reps. Harry Mitchell and Gabrielle Giffords have vowed to disclose all their requests.

“I’m willing to defend what I ask for, because I ask for so little,” Kyl said.

Pastor, D-Ariz., won’t release all of his requests because he says it would violate the privacy of groups asking for funding.

But he defends all the projects he supports and notes that earmarks make up 1 percent of the federal budget. If it doesn’t get spent on Arizona projects, the funding would be spent elsewhere, he said.

“All the money Arizona doesn’t take goes to Alaska,” Pastor said.

WASHINGTON – Arizona has some powerful lawmakers in Washington, including Republican presidential candidate Sen. John McCain.

But when it comes to pork-barrel spending, otherwise known as earmarks, the state ranks last.

That’s mostly because three of the state’s 10 lawmakers in Washington – McCain and House Republicans Jeff Flake and John Shadegg – refuse to ask for any federal money for local projects. Another Arizona Republican, Sen. Jon Kyl, strictly limits his earmark requests.

They all say the earmark process wastes taxpayer money and desperately needs reform. But other Arizona lawmakers counter that their colleagues’ stance hurts the state.

Arizona, the second-fastest growing state in the nation, will receive just $18.70 per capita in federal earmarks this fiscal year. By comparison, Alaska – with roughly a tenth of Arizona’s population – is set to receive $506.34 per capita, the highest in the nation, according to Taxpayers for Common Sense, a watchdog group that tracks earmarks.

Alaska receives about three times as much as Arizona receives in actual dollars, $346 million to $119 million. That means Arizona gets less money for water projects, bridge repairs, road construction and rural clinics.

“We have members of our delegation who feel their job is not to bring equitable resources back to the state,” said Rep. Raúl Grijalva, D-Ariz. “The fact remains we are shortchanging our taxpayers by not bringing more resources into the state.”

Earmarks have gotten a bad name after public corruption scandals involving former high-profile lobbyist Jack Abramoff and former Rep. Randy “Duke” Cunningham, R-Calif.; and the 2005 disclosure of funding for a $223 million “bridge to nowhere” from a small Alaska town to a tiny island with a population of 50.

Despite the controversy, lawmakers secured about $18.3 billion for nearly 13,000 projects last year. Only 18 lawmakers declined to seek any earmarks.

———

On the Web

Taxpayers for Common Sense

www.taxpayer.net

WASHINGTON — When lawmakers passed a new ethics bill last year, they bragged they had finally closed a loophole that allowed lawmakers convicted of serious crimes to continue drawing their congressional pensions.

But at least two current lawmakers under indictment could still be eligible for retirement benefits despite the ethics bill signed into law Sept. 14.

Rep. Rick Renzi, R-Ariz., won’t stand to lose his taxpayer-funded pension even if he’s found guilty of using his position in Congress to his financial benefit. That’s because prosecutors allege he committed the crimes before the law was enacted.

Under new rules, lawmakers can lose their retirement benefits if convicted of certain crimes such as bribery, conspiracy or perjury that were committed before Sept. 14. Murder and other serious charges are not included under the crimes that would render lawmakers ineligible for a pension.

“It’s telling taxpayers we’re only going to subject ourselves to punishment at certain times and for certain crimes,” said Pete Sepp, a spokesman for the National Taxpayers Union, which pushed for the change. “That doesn’t include knocking over a liquor store or killing someone.”

The changes came amid a public outcry over how Rep. Randy “Duke” Cunningham, R-Calif., would be able to draw his congressional pension while serving an eight-year prison term for tax evasion and bribery.

The new rules were part of a broad ethics reform bill last year that became the signature legislation for Democrats eager to show they were cleaning up Washington after winning control of Congress in the 2006 elections.

Renzi, 49, is one of two current lawmakers under indictment. The other is Rep. William Jefferson, D-La., who was indicted June 4 on federal charges of racketeering, soliciting bribes and money laundering.

Renzi was indicted Feb. 22 on 35 counts of extortion, wire fraud, money laundering and other charges. He is accused of manipulating a federal land exchange to enrich himself and a business partner. Prosecutors also say he stole from an insurance-trust fund to help finance his first campaign in 2002 then tried to cover it up.

Neither Renzi nor his attorneys could be reached for comment.

Members of Congress are eligible for a pension at age 62 if they have completed at least five years of service. They can draw retirement benefits at a younger age after more years of service.

Renzi, who has served five years in Congress, would be eligible for a $15,000 annual pension in 12 years, according to the National Taxpayers Union. Renzi, a former real estate investor and insurance executive, draws a $169,300 annual congressional salary.

Federal officials do not disclose pension information for current or former members of Congress, but rough estimates are possible using federal guidelines for the plan.

At least 20 former lawmakers convicted of crimes are eligible for pensions, according to the National Taxpayers Union. Some of the pensions could be as high as $125,000 a year.

Cunningham, who pleaded guilty to taking $2.4 million in bribes and evading more than $1 million in taxes, is eligible for a $36,000 annual pension from his eight terms in Congress. He also receives a military pension.

Bob Ney, an Ohio Republican who served 12 years in the House, will be eligible to draw a congressional pension of about $29,000 a year when he turns 62 in 2016. Ney was sentenced to 30 months after pleading guilty in 2006 to trading political favors for gifts and campaign cash.

Former Rep. James Traficant, D-Ohio, who is serving eight years after his 2002 conviction for bribery, racketeering and tax evasion, could be drawing as much as $40,000 a year.

The pension measure had been debated for years before it passed last year. Before the provision became law, only a conviction for a “high crime” such as treason or espionage was sufficient grounds for a lawmaker to lose his or her pension.

———

Felony convictions that could lead to the loss of a congressional pension include:

Bribery

Wire fraud

Witness tampering

Perjury

Conspiracy

Defrauding the United States

Prohibited foreign trade practices

WASHINGTON — Reps. Harry Mitchell and Gabrielle Giffords are among 19 first-term House Democrats who belong to the “new center” in Congress, according to the National Journal political magazine.

The Arizona lawmakers’ voting records last year were among the most centrist in the House, the magazine said in a report published Friday.

Researchers scored 109 House votes, classified them as relating to economic, social or foreign policy, then ranked lawmakers’ positions as liberal or conservative. Lawmakers with composite scores between 35 and 65 were classified as centrists.

Nearly half of the 42 House Democratic freshmen got the label. Mitchell, who had a 54 percent liberal voting record last year, replaced one of the most conservative members of the House in 2006. His predecessor, J.D. Hayworth, R-Ariz., had an 85 percent conservative record in 2006.

Giffords scored a 57 percent liberal record. She replaced Jim Kolbe, R-Ariz., who scored a 65 percent conservative record in 2006.

Rep. Rick Renzi, R-Arizona, also fell into the centrist category, scoring a 63 percent conservative record last year.

Three of nine Senate Democratic freshmen qualified as centrists: Sens. Claire McCaskill, D-Mo., Jim Webb, D-Va., and Jon Tester, D-Mont. Sens. John McCain and Jon Kyl, both Arizona Republican, did not make the centrist list.

WASHINGTON — Figuring out who’s got power and who doesn’t is something of a parlor game in Washington. So a study ranking members of Congress by clout and influence has given folks on Capitol Hill plenty to talk about this week.

Rep. Rick Renzi, R-Ariz., ranks as the least powerful among the 435 members of the House, according to this year’s power ranking by Congress.org.

Renzi, who has not been in office long enough to gain the clout seniority can bring, has one major factor working against him — controversy over a land swap deal and how he financed his first election campaign. Renzi was indicted recently on 35 counts of extortion, embezzlement, money-laundering and other charges.

Renzi could not be reached for comment.

Other Arizona lawmakers fared better. Rep. Ed Pastor, D-Phoenix, was ranked 84th in the House, making him the most powerful House member from Phoenix. Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., ranked 10th in the Senate. Sen. Jon Kyl ranked 18th.

The annual study ranks members each year based on committee assignments, leadership posts, influence, legislative accomplishments and money they’ve helped secure for their districts.

“Legislators always compare themselves with their colleagues,” said Brad Fitch, head of Knowlegis, which provides analysis for Congress.org. “It is one metric that legislators and staff can use to measure their performance.”

But Fitch acknowledges the rankings have limitations.

“Power rankings don’t represent the full picture of what a legislator contributes and does for his or her constituents,” he said. “Sometimes likeability, your reputation and personality, is something else that contributes to a legislator’s power. We can’t measure that.”

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Arizona delegation power ranking:

Senate:

Sen. John McCain – 10

Sen. Jon Kyl – 18

House:

Rep. Ed Pastor – 84

Rep. John Shadeg – 211

Rep. Raul Grijalva – 246

Rep. Gabrielle Giffords – 277

Rep. Harry Mitchell – 334

Rep. Jeff Flake – 372

Rep. Trent Franks – 387

Rep. Rick Renzi – 435

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On the Web:

Congress.org’s Power Rankings:

www.congress.org

Study: Latest figures show cost to Az $26.6M for jailings, prosecutions

WASHINGTON – Illegal immigration is costing Arizona border counties millions of dollars a year for law enforcement and criminal prosecutions – diverting money from parks, libraries and other law enforcement efforts, according to a study to be released Wednesday.

The costs to the four border counties in Arizona have increased by 39 percent from $19.2 million in 1999 to $26.6 million in fiscal 2006, researchers at the University of Arizona and San Diego State University found.

Costs totaled $192 million for the nation’s 24 border counties in Arizona, California, New Mexico and Texas – more than double the costs in 1999.

The study was commissioned by the U.S./Mexico Border Counties Coalition, a nonprofit group of border county officials who want the federal government to reimburse their county jails and prosecutors’ offices for those costs.

“The study is important because for the most part, these border counties are small, they’re rural, they’re very poor and this is a tremendous hit to their county budgets,” said Tanis Salant, a public policy lecturer at the University of Arizona and the study’s main author.

The coalition, which has been studying the impact of illegal immigration on border counties since 1999, paid for the study using a federal Justice Department grant. Researchers estimate the costs of illegal immigration on county law enforcement at $1.2 billion in the past eight fiscal years.

Researchers examined county budgets, court records and crime statistics and interviewed hundreds of county officials for the report. The report did not look at the impact of illegal immigrants on cities, states or Indian tribes.

The coalition wants Congress to spend more federal dollars on the State Criminal Alien Assistance Program, which gave border counties $4.7 million in reimbursements last year. The money was less than a tenth of the actual costs the counties had for detaining illegal immigrants, according to the report.

The group also wants more funding for the Southwest Border Prosecution Initiative, among other federal programs.

The costs of illegal immigration are placing “undue burdens” on people who live in border counties, the report says. Urban counties bore the highest costs, with San Diego County in California spending the most at $77.1 million, followed by El Paso and Hidalgo counties in Texas and Pima and Yuma counties in Arizona.

Residents of three Texas counties, Hudspeth, Terrell and Zapata, carried the costliest per capita burden, costing each resident about $378, $126 and $112 last year.

The costs meant the counties had less money available for libraries, parks and other services.

Officials in Santa Cruz County, Ariz., for example, say they need more money to offer better amenities at their local parks; officials in Presidio County, Texas, say they don’t have the money for a new ambulance they need.

Source: U.S./ Mexico Border Counties Coalition

———

COSTS TO BORDER COUNTIES BY STATE

California (2 counties) $82.6 million

Texas (15 counties) $75.4 million

Arizona (4 counties) $26.6 million

New Mexico (3 counties) $7.3 million

———

ON THE WEB

U.S./Mexico Border Counties Coalition: www.bordercounties.org

An array of sensors and cameras defending 28 miles of border near Sasabe does not work as well as it should, and much of the technology will be replaced by summer at taxpayer expense.

Five days after accepting and paying $20 million for the work, Homeland Security officials told lawmakers Wednesday that the virtual fence does not meet contract requirements for detecting border intrusions and endangers Border Patrol agents.

The officials declined to estimate a cost for replacing equipment or securing the border.

Meanwhile, Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff was praising the high-tech system Wednesday, saying it will be expanded to other rural parts of the border.

“We do what actually makes tactical sense,” he said.

“We will expand the virtual fence. We are not mothballing (the project). It did work. . . . There are some things in it we want to improve, and there are some things that probably it turns out we don’t really need. But I envision we will use this design in other parts of the border.”

Other agency officials, testifying before the oversight panel of the House Homeland Security Committee, said plans to expand the system to the Yuma and El Paso areas will be pushed back three years, to 2011, because of technological deficiencies.

The Sasabe network, called Project 28, was intended as a cornerstone of the government’s multibillion-dollar border strategy.

As hundreds of miles of physical barriers and thousands of Border Patrol agents are being added, technology, anchored by the virtual fence, was to fill the gaps.

“Project 28 was supposed to be an example of how we could use technology to secure the border. The lesson is we can’t secure 28 miles of our border for $20 million,” said committee member Rep. Bill Pascrell Jr., D-N.J. “After so many years of promises and tests and millions of dollars spent, we are no closer to a technological solution to securing the border. This is unacceptable. It’s what’s holding up comprehensive immigration reform.”

Contractor Boeing Corp. never consulted border agents before engineering the system, which is not suited to the rugged Sonoran Desert. The project was eight months late.

A Boeing executive testified that the company spent more than double the value of the $20 million contract to set things right and is now refining the network. The Department of Homeland Security awarded Boeing a $64 million contract to improve the network in December, two months before the government accepted the Sasabe work.

Amy Kudwa, a Homeland Security spokeswoman, said that the virtual fence is not in “full operation” and that the agency continues to test the system. Agency officials showed lawmakers shadowy footage taken last week in which Project 28 cameras tracked three large groups of immigrants crossing the border. The images were relayed to a command post in Tucson, 70 miles away.

“We have the beginnings of a system,” Border Patrol Chief David Aguilar testified. He told the committee that Project 28 does track people crossing the border without the need to position a Border Patrol agent, but he called the new tool a “marginal, limited capability.”

Congressional auditors and lawmakers on the Homeland Security Committee overseeing the work painted a very different picture, portraying Boeing’s work as little more than a multimillion-dollar science experiment.

Reading from contract documents written by Boeing, Government Accountability Office auditor Richard Stana told lawmakers that the company was paid to test a concept and leave behind a capability.

“It doesn’t work the way Border Patrol agents wanted it to,” he said. “As far as a leave-behind capability, the fact that we are going to swap out nearly all the equipment tells us that wasn’t met.”

By Diana Marrero, Sean Holstege

WASHINGTON – Celebrating fresh victories in Virginia, Maryland and the District of Columbia, John McCain spoke to House Republicans Wednesday in an effort to shore up support among conservative leaders.

McCain, who has often clashed with Republican leaders, said he was ready to unite his party. His speech at the Capitol Hill Club marked his second day on Capitol Hill trying to convince his congressional colleagues to rally around him.

House Republican leader John Boehner, who previously said he would not endorse the Arizona senator because he was chairing the GOP convention, threw his support to McCain after the speech Wednesday, saying he would be the eventual candidate.

“Clearly I’ve had some disagreements with Sen. McCain over the years,” he said, going on to praise McCain for his unwavering support for the war in Iraq. “That type of leadership takes courage.”

McCain addressed Republican senators, including those who have traded barbs with him, during their policy lunch on Tuesday.

Asked how it felt to return to his day job as a senator, McCain joked that he was “an outcast and a pariah.”

“My colleagues have embraced me,” he said.

McCain won Tuesday’s “Potomac Primary” but did not receive support among conservative voters in Virginia, who largely voted for Mike Huckabee.

The former Arkansas governor and Baptist preacher has been described as an “irritant” by the McCain campaign. But McCain said Wednesday that he respected Huckabee’s right to stay in the race.

“He is a man of integrity,” McCain said. “He has every right to continue this race for as long as he wants to. In the meantime, we will be trying to gather more support and more momentum for the campaign.”

Even so, McCain is trying to turn his attention to the general election, saying Wednesday that “there is going to come a time when we have to get into specifics” — a jab at the new Democratic frontrunner Barack Obama whose message of hope has appealed to many voters.

“I believe that I and my party, which is a center right conservative outlook, will prevail over the big government, big spending Democrats,” he said.

WASHINGTON – Virtually all of Arizona’s taxpayers could soon get rebate checks under legislation Congress approved Thursday.

The $150 billion package would provide one-time rebates of $600 for individuals who earn up to $75,000 a year. Couples earning up to $150,000 would receive $1,200. Parents also would receive $300 per child. Roughly 95 percent of tax filers in Arizona could get rebates under the package.

The measure had been stalled in the Senate as lawmakers debated whether to extend unemployment benefits and include energy-efficiency tax incentives as part of the legislation. That effort was blocked Wednesday by Senate Republicans.

Senate leaders reached an agreement Thursday that eliminated those provisions but added measures that would extend the rebates to retirees on Social Security and disabled veterans who pay no income taxes. They are now set to receive $300. About 800,000 Arizona seniors would qualify for the checks under the bill, according to an analysis by the AARP.

Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., took time away from the campaign trail to vote for the measure that passed the Senate 81 to 16. Sen. Jon Kyl, R-Ariz., voted against it.

The House followed with an overwhelming 380-34 vote for passage. Rep. John Shadegg, R-Phoenix, and Rep. Jeff Flake, R-Mesa, were the state’s only two House members who voted against the measure.

President Bush could sign the bill into law as early as Friday.

McCain, who was in Washington to deliver a speech to the Conservative Political Action Conference, voted for the measure after missing a key procedural vote on the package the night before.

Sen. Hillary Clinton, D-N.Y., had criticized McCain for his absence Wednesday. But she missed Thursday’s votes on the bill. Both McCain and Clinton have missed a substantial number of votes in the Senate as they campaign for the White House.

Kyl said he questions the wisdom of spending billions of dollars to issue rebate checks, a move he says may do little to stimulate the economy. A better approach, he said, would be to give larger tax benefits to companies that would create new jobs.

“Who isn’t going to be happy with 500 or 600 bucks in their pocket? But I also think people would rather have a job,” he said. “That’s a lot more meaningful than a one-time rebate.”

The legislation approved Thursday includes some tax incentives for businesses. The bill also contains a provision that attempts to prevent illegal immigrants from receiving the rebate checks.

WASHINGTON – Tourists pay $25 per car to enter Yellowstone National Park. Film crews must spend as much as $750 a day to film on federal land in Nevada. And hunters on a wildlife refuge off the Florida panhandle are charged up to $30 to shoot arrows at white-tailed deer or feral hogs.
But mining companies pay nothing to the federal government to extract billions of dollars worth of gold, copper and other valuable minerals from public property, thanks to an 1872 mining law that allows it. Lawmakers and activists are trying to change the situation.
“You have to pay the government if you’re using a mountain bike on public land, but you don’t have to pay if you’re using an earth mover,” said Jane Danowitz, director of the Pew Campaign for Responsible Mining, which supports mining reform.
The House passed a bill earlier this month that would make existing mining companies pay a 4 percent royalty on hard-rock minerals, much like the royalties already paid by oil, gas and coal companies. New mines would pay 8 percent.
Industry officials counter that lawmakers could drive mining off American soil if royalties are set too high.
“We’d certainly be drawing investments to other countries,” said Luke Popovich, a spokesman for the National Mining Association.
With the price of gold at about $800 an ounce, critics say the mining industry can afford to pay royalties.
Advocates for mining reform are pushing lawmakers to amend the mining law, written in an era when President Ulysses S. Grant was encouraging Americans to head West. They say the law cheats taxpayers, poisons the land and allows mining claims too close to national parks.
All sides are now turning their attention to Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, a Nevada Democrat who has long been a champion of the industry.
Reid, whose late father was a gold miner, is expected to play an active role in crafting legislation that would govern modern-day mining. While he says he favors some reform, he is critical of imposing a royalty on existing mines.
The fight over these fees has significant implications for the West, especially for Reid’s home state. Nevada is the largest gold producer in the nation and the fifth largest in the world behind South Africa, Australia, China and Peru. About a third of the state’s gold mining — worth $3.8 billion last year — is done on public lands.
Other states with significant hard-rock mineral mining production include Alaska, Arizona, California, Colorado, Montana, New Mexico, South Dakota, Utah and Washington.
Rep. Nick Rahall, D-W.Va., who sponsored the successful House bill, worries Congress will ultimately enact “sham reform.” The industry has beaten back attempts to update the mining law for decades.
If approved by the Senate and signed into law, the legislation would ensure that much of the royalty money would go to clean up abandoned mines strewn across the West. A 2004 report from the Environmental Protection Agency’s inspector general identified 156 hard-rock mining sites that could cost $7 billion to $24 billion to clean up.
The sites also pose a safety hazard. A 13-year-old Arizona girl died in September after falling into a 125-foot abandoned mineshaft near her home.
Environmental advocates say the industry should pay to clean up the mess it left in its wake while profiting handsomely off public resources.
Whatever Congress does, it’s clear Reid will have a firm hand in guiding the outcome.
He has collected $270,000 in campaign contributions from mining interests since 1989, according to the Center for Responsive Politics. Reid’s son-in-law, Steven Barringer, is a lobbyist for Newmont, one of the world’s largest gold mining companies, and Coeur d’Alene Mines, a silver miner.
Reid does not allow family members to lobby him or his staff, said spokesman Jon Summers. He said contributions play no role in the senator’s deliberations.
“It’s an important industry that employs thousands of Nevadans,” Summers said. “These are good-paying jobs that people particularly in rural parts of the state rely on heavily.”

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On the Web:
• Nevada Mining Association.
• Pew Campaign for Responsible Mining.

WASHINGTON – Former Interior Secretary and ex-Arizona governor Bruce Babbitt has joined actor Edward Norton and other land conservationists on a campaign to protect wild and scenic lands out West.

The recently announced creation of the National Conservation System Foundation is aimed at raising awareness of the threats facing these lands and ways people can help shield them from destruction.

Babbitt, who worked to get these lands designated as conservation areas by former President Clinton, recently spoke with Gannett News Service about protecting 26 million acres of national monuments, historic trails and wilderness areas that dot the West. He also answers questions about global warming and the environment.

Question: What are some of the biggest threats to public lands today?

Answer: The reckless process by which lands are being opened up to marginal oil and gas development. The oil and gas prospecting is taking place in a lot of very inappropriate places.

Q: What about threats to lands within the National Landscape Conservation System?

A: The leasing of lands in some of the archaeologically sensitive areas. It’s just tragic to see the threats and the destruction of really fabulous cliff dwellings, Anasazi ruins.

The lands in the system generally call for management plans in which these decisions are made and evaluated. Many of the plans are very inadequate. The control of off-road vehicles is a major issue in all of these plans. They can be terribly destructive of archaeological resources, of biological resources.

Q: Why should Americans care about protecting these lands?

A: That’s like asking a Frenchman why should we protect Notre Dame Cathedral. America’s cathedrals and America’s heritage are our national landscape. That’s our heritage.

Q: What do you hope to accomplish through the foundation.

A: The really important piece now . . . is getting public support to work with local communities. The West is urbanizing so fast. People see the changes, the demands on the land. They’re really now starting to think we could wind up destroying the very values that brought us here in the first place, that make this such a distinctive area.

How we move to protect these landscapes is complex. Therefore, we really need a strong, vigorous dialogue at the local and state level.

Q: What are your favorite national monuments or wilderness areas?

A: I would say that my two favorites are the Missouri River Breaks and the Vermillion Cliffs.

The Missouri Breaks is where I made friends with Steve Ambrose. He wrote a fabulous book about Lewis and Clark, “Undaunted Courage.” We spent time together on the river. It was so awesome to be drifting through the White cliffs in a canoe with Steve Ambrose reading aloud the journals of Lewis and Clark as they floated through the breaks.

The Vermillion Cliffs are right in my own backyard. It is a true desert landscape. You can stand up there and can look for 100 miles in every direction. There’s a sense of openness and space.

Q: How would you characterize the state of the nation’s environmental protections?

A: This administration has been reckless in the way it’s gone about reducing protections for public lands, opening them up to road building, timber cutting and drilling for oil and gas. What is really interesting as this administration comes to an end . . . there’s really a flowering at the grass roots in reaction to this policy in Washington.

Q: What should be done about global warming?

A: It is the most urgent problem of our time. We must have an international treaty to reduce emissions in carbon dioxide. Once we have the next presidential election, it will happen. Washington is not responding but out in the American land, people understand this. We must have a mandatory emission control.

Q: Should the U.S. continue its effort to develop a nuclear repository in Yucca Mountain, Nev., given this renewed interest in developing nuclear energy?

A: We need a repository system irrespective of what we do with nuclear energy. We have to gather it together and store it. I think Yucca Mountain is the most obvious choice. We’ve been at it for 20 years.

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BABBITT HISTORY

Bruce Babbitt is the son of a northern Arizona ranching family. His father helped found the Arizona Wildlife Federation and the Arizona Game Protective Association.

Babbitt earned degrees from Notre Dame, the University of Newcastle in England and Harvard Law School, then won his first campaign in 1975 and became Arizona’s attorney general.

He became Arizona’s youngest governor in 1978 and served nine years, expanding Arizona park lands and negotiating and implementing the Arizona Groundwater Management Act of 1980, still a national model.

He ran for president in 1988 and failed to win the Democratic nomination.

He became president instead of the League of Conservation Voters.

President Clinton tapped him in 1993 to become secretary of the Department of the Interior, and he served till 2001.

He has written “Cities in the Wilderness,” a policy tome subtitled “a new VISION of land use in America.”