By Calvin Biesecker
Customs and Border Protection (CBP) is increasing its emphasis on the electronic fence portion of the Secure Border Initiative (SBI) as the installation of physical fencing along the United States’ border with Mexico nears completion, the acting commissioner of the agency said yesterday.
Despite setbacks that have occurred on the electronic fencing project, called SBInet, CBP has learned a host of lessons from its mistakes here and now has “confidence in the overall system design” based on testing completed last December, Jayson Ahern, CBP’s acting chief, told the House Appropriations Homeland Security Subcommittee.
“We have adopted an evolutionary, spiral development strategy for the SBInet program,” Ahern said in his prepared remarks. “Essentially this means we will develop and deploy SBInet technologies in reasonable, achievable blocks or spirals of capability. Spiral development acknowledges that, through deployment of systems, we may identify opportunities or desires to do other things or to increase effectiveness. Spiral development supports an interactive dialogue between the end user of a system–our agents and officers–and the people who develop the system.”
Ahern said that one of the challenges moving forward with SBInet will be deploying the network of integrated sensors and communication systems while also building a strong technical program management capability. Last fall CBP named a new program manager for SBI. Ahern said that in addition to improving core program management competencies, CBP is also boosting efforts to integrate operational requirements into the program that “will give stronger voice to the agents and officers who will ultimately use the system.”
Now CBP is mapping out a less aggressive tack for completing the deployment of SBInet and appears to be putting a higher premium on integrated testing of the various components that make up the electronic fence in a field environment, working out bugs as they arise, and making sure input is gathered from the ultimate users, the Border Patrol (Defense Daily, Feb. 9).
Boeing [BA] is developing SBInet for CBP. The system will consist largely of permanent towers along stretches of the nation’s southwest border, and even the northern border, equipped with radars and day/night cameras linked to Border Patrol command stations that are equipped with a common operating picture that integrates the sensor data for command and control. Unattended ground sensors that can pick up movement of possible illicit migrant movements will also be part of the sensor network and will allow the CBP to automatically cue cameras to movement detected by the ground sensors.
The current SBInet effort is focused on Block I and will be deployed at least through Arizona, Ahern said. It’s unclear yet where Block I will end and the second block will start, he added.
Not all test objectives were met in the system qualification testing last December, which is not unusual, so adjustment and design changes are being made for further testing which should be completed this month, Ahern said.
The initial deployments slated to occur this year are called Tucson-1 and Ajo-1, which Ahern said make up a combined 53 miles of border in Arizona. Early next month land clearing and basic construction will begin although sensor integration and related system work will wait until the test issues are resolved, he said.
Tucson-1 should be ready this summer and will allow for a system acceptance test to ensure that it works the same as the design tested last December, Ahern said. Once that is done, the Border Patrol will conduct a formal operational test, he said.
Ajo-1 deployment will begin early this summer as long as the qualification test issues are resolved along with environmental and land issues, Ahern said. The deployment will be in a wilderness area, he added.
If all goes well with the pending deployments and tests, CBP late this will ask DHS for permission to fully deploy the Block I system. That deployment would be finished in the 2011 to 2012 period depending on available funding, Ahern said.
On the Northern Border this spring CBP plans to deploy existing sensor technology being used on the Southern Border in demonstrations to provide an initial capability and also to generate lessons on how well the technologies work in a different environment as part of longer-term SBInet design plans for that region, Ahern said.
In Buffalo, N.Y., and Detroit, Mich., the SBI program will use Remote Video Surveillance Systems, which are day and night cameras. In the Border Patrol’s Swanton, Vt., sector and Detroit, Mobile Surveillance Systems that are equipped with radar and day and night cameras will be used.
CBP has $60 million available for the Northern Border demonstrations and additional technology investments. The agency is reviewing a Department of Homeland Security Study of the technologies that could be used for the Northern Border and in coordination with CBP operational elements plans to have an implementation plan ready this spring, Ahern said.
“We expect the plan will include among other things, significant emphasis on demonstrations of sensor and operational integration,” he said.
The physical infrastructure that is being installed along the southwest border consists of pedestrian and vehicle fencing, roads and lighting. Over 600 miles of the planned 661 miles of fencing has been constructed and the remainder should be finished this spring, Ahern said. Emphasis on the physical infrastructure work will be shifting to lighting and roads, he said.