HOULTON, Maine — The Houlton Rotary Club met for its luncheon meeting on Aug. 14. Rotarian Joyce Fitzpatrick hosted the guest speaker Daniel Hiebert, the Chief Patrol Agent of the U.S. Border Patrol in Maine.
Hiebert gave a history of the Border Patrol that was established by an act of Congress in 1924. The first immigration law was passed in 1882 to affect the migration of Chinese workers on the railroads. The Angell Treaty suspended the immigration of Chinese laborers for a 10-year period. Plus every Chinese person traveling in or out of the country had to carry a certificate of identity.
In 1904, “Mounted Inspectors” were assigned by the Commissioner-General of Immigration to patrol the southern U.S. border. Only 75 inspectors were hired and they had to provide their own horses. By the year 1919, a mounted patrol was established to cover the range from El Paso, Texas to California. This border is 2,000 miles long and the physical barriers have been paid for by the United States.
The northern border patrol was first established in Detroit, Michigan. The Houlton agency opened in 1924. The northern agencies cover the 5,000 miles across the country. World War II doubled the number of border patrol agents.
The Bureau of Immigration and the Bureau of Naturalization were combined into the Immigration and Naturalization Service in 1933, and following that, in 1940 the Immigration Service was moved from the Department of Labor to the Department of Justice.
Before Sept. 11, 2001, the U. S. government had only 350 agents along the entire Canadian border. Today, there are approximately 1,000 agents along the northern frontier. In the year 2003, the Department of Homeland Security was established and the U. S. Border Patrol became part of the U. S. Customs and Border Protection. The total number of agents in 1986, the year Hiebert joined the agency, numbered around 2,700 and the total for the country today numbers around 21,000 agents.
The Houlton Border Patrol Sector is responsible for the security of the international borders between Maine and Canada and is comprised of 299 miles of land border, 312 miles of water/river and 309 miles of coastal border. The headquarters are in Calais, Fort Fairfield, Houlton, Jackman, Rangeley and Van Buren. Hiebert is responsible for all of the agents employed in this sector.
The agents are able to use technology, aircraft, vessel boats, canoes and sign cutting (tracking). They do not use drones but are researching the usefulness of this tool.
Hiebert has a 31-year-career with the Border Patrol so far and he and his wife Sylvia feel that where they live in Ludlow is the place to put down roots. They have two grown children and three grandchildren.
