19621: (Hermantin)PalmBeachPost- Local Coast Guard station reinforced (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

From: leonie hermantin <lhermantin@hotmail.com>

Local Coast Guard station reinforced

By Bill Douthat, Palm Beach Post Staff Writer
Tuesday, March 2, 2004



High-speed boats are running 24-hour patrols along the coastline to
intercept any Haitians trying to make landfall in Palm Beach or Martin
counties.

Six patrol boats with crews arrived over the weekend for a 30-day assignment
to reinforce the U.S. Coast Guard fleet at the Riviera Beach station.

"They beefed us up just in case something was to happen in terms of mass
migration from Haiti," said the station commander, Chief Warrant Officer Jim
Robertson.

The new boats arrived on trailers from as far as New York and Texas and each
came with a four or five-man crew trained in anti-terrorism tactics,
Robertson said.

"They can respond to anything of a threatening nature," he said. The 25-foot
boats are equipped with machine guns, he said.

Powered with twin engines, the rigid-hull inflatables will run offshore
patrols with the assistance of boats from other law enforcement agencies
with vessels capable of running in heavy seas.

Although Miami has been the preferred destination of refugee-laden boats
leaving Haiti, Palm Beach and Martin counties are popular entry points for
Haitians arriving from the Bahamas.

There are no signs of an imminent exodus through the Bahamas, said Art
Bullock, chief agent for the U.S. Border Patrol in the region. The Bahamian
islands are "stepping stones" for Haitians headed to South Florida, but the
smuggling pipeline usually takes weeks or months, he said.

The reinforced patrols were welcomed by U.S. Rep. Mark Foley, who has spoken
out recently about the need to curb an exodus and for years advocated a
greater presence of federal law enforcement along the coast.

"We are definitely a magnet for drugs and, for the moment, mass migration,"
said Foley, a West Palm Beach Republican.

Foley said he wants to visit Haiti soon to work on ways to bring economic
and political stability to the impoverished nation.

"I don't want us to step into the breech when it's chaos, and then just
leave," he said.

bill_douthat@pbpost.com

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