NIAGARA: If regional politicians have their way, truckers and other motorists crossing into Canada over the Peace Bridge could find themselves coming face to face with U.S. customs officers on Canadian soil.
That’s because regional council has overwhelmingly endorsed calling on the federal governments in Canada and the United States to establish the first pre-clearance facility for commercial trucks and automobiles in Canada on the Canadian side of the Peace Bridge.
The idea would see U.S. customs agents actually working on our side of the border, with the hope that not having trucks and cars queued up in long line ups at the border will make the flow of goods and traffic at the key border crossing with Buffalo more efficient.
A couple of years ago, the Peace Bridge was the site of a pilot project for truck cargo pre-inspection, with U.S. agents working north of the border. The project was designed to test if preclearance could reduce wait times and enhance border efficiency.
There are already preclearance programs in place at a eight Canadian airports, such as Pearson International in Toronto, where U.S. customs agents pre-clear roughly 11 million passengers for flights to the U.S., according to statistics from Canada’s federal government.
In March of last year, Canadian Public Safety Minister Steven Blaney and U.S. Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson signed an agreement that would provide a legal framework to enable the establishment of new land, rail, marine and air transport preclearance operations.
Fort Erie Coun. Sandy Annunziata won the support of regional council last week in calling for Niagara to host the first commercial truck and car land crossing facility in Canada.
The timing is especially important because it comes on the heels of the announcement in April that Niagara has received Ontario’s very first designation as a foreign trade zone. That designation allows companies here to avoid or delay paying taxes and tariffs on imported raw materials, components or other goods that will eventually be exported after ‘value added’ work, and supporters say it could attract new investment and new importing and exporting companies to Niagara.
But Annunziata said the first companies to benefit from the designation in Niagara will be firms such as freight forwarders, logistics firms, distributors and manufacturers already here.
Having preclearance could “dramatically impact the fortunes” of the foreign trade zone, said Annunziata, whose motion notes that billions of dollars in trade crosses the Peace Bridge every year but millions more in trade is lost due to delays and inefficiencies.
St. Catharines Mayor Walter Sendzik, former CEO of the Greater Niagara Chamber of Commerce, said the chamber has worked for about seven years with local chambers and the Niagara Industrial Association on getting the preclearance program. Getting preclearance in this region should be a key economic priority, he said.
Bart Maves said Niagara needs to think bigger rather than limiting the possible location of preclearance only to land the Peace Bridge Authority owns. He said trucks entering Canada could be diverted further down the QEW to a location such as Bowen Road, where a much larger land footprint could also play host to warehousing firms, customs brokerage offices, logistics firms and manufacturing companies, or even to Highway 405.
Maves said the Niagara Falls Bridge Commission, which operates the Rainbow, Whirlpool and Queenston-Lewiston bridges, has also invested tens of millions of dollars in improvements at its border crossings.
Lew Holloway, general manager of the bridge commission, said in a letter to the Region recently that his commission is also interested in being involved in customs preclearance.
Annunziata said the Region should also support preclearance at the other bridges, but said right now only the Peace Bridge has the physical capacity to handle that.
“They (other bridges) don’t have the capabilities yet,” he said. “There is only one possible location initially for pre-clearance initiative, and that is at the Fort Erie Peace Bridge.”
His motion was amended to also support the Niagara Falls Bridge Commission bridges as they become capable of hosting preclearance facilities.
St. Catharines Coun. Kelly Edgar said he’s concerned that U.S. customs officers would be carrying firearms on Canadian soil. He also wondered if they’d have powers of arrest on this side of the border.
“I think it’s important we understand this before we go ahead with building it,” he said. “I don’t want Americans to have the power of arrest in my country.”
