Advocates for public access to Friendship Park on the U.S.-Mexico border are accusing the Biden istration of building former President Donald Trump’s border wall.
of the collective Friends of Friendship Park condemned the istration’s decision to move forward with a project that will replace the current border barriers along the historic, binational park with a taller, more imposing design. Customs and Border Protection announced earlier this week after months of meetings with stakeholders, including the collective, that it would resume construction of a 30-foot border wall in the area at the edge of California’s Border Field State Park.
John Fanestil of Friends of Friendship Park called the decision a tragedy.
“We believe President Joe Biden is effectively choosing to complete Donald Trump’s border wall at the most historic location on the U.S.-Mexico border,” Fanestil said Thursday. “We consider it a reinvestment by the Biden istration in Donald Trump’s political brand, and we consider it a lost opportunity when the Biden istration could have invested in an alternative future for U.S.-Mexico relations.”
CBP did not respond to a request for comment in time for publication. The Department of Homeland Security directed the Union-Tribune to CBP documents published Tuesday about the project.
The area on top of a mesa that overlooks the beaches of Imperial Beach and the Playas neighborhood in Tijuana was designated as a binational park in 1971 in a ceremony led by then-First Lady Pat Nixon.
Then, the two halves of the park were separated by a low, barbed wire fence. Today, the entirety of the U.S. side of Friendship Park is between two layers of border wall. The current structures are about 18 feet tall.
People who don’t have permission to return to the United States if they leave have for years used the space to meet with family who don’t have visas to enter the United States. Family travel from across the United States and all over Mexico to see each other through the fence. However, Border Patrol reduced access to the U.S. side of the park over the years and closed it altogether in early 2020.
Under the Trump istration, CBP planned to take out the current barriers and build 30-foot bollard-style walls, as it did with much of the border between San Diego and Tijuana. When Biden first came into office, he paused all border construction projects for review. His istration opted to continue with several projects — including the one at Friendship Park — saying that they were necessary to replace structures that were no longer safe.
Friends of Friendship Park rallied community and politicians to speak out against the planned construction, and the Biden istration paused the construction at Friendship Park in August.
CBP collected public through mid-October, according to a letter from CBP. The agency reported receiving 150 comments signed by 740 people. Two of the 150 comments ed the construction, according to the agency’s report.
On Tuesday morning, CBP announced that the construction would resume, saying that it had “developed an approach that meets the border security needs of the area while also addressing from the community.”
A few minutes later, Border Patrol offered to meet with Fanestil.
Later that morning, according to Fanestil, agents told him that the construction plans had been slightly modified — a stretch of about 60 feet along the primary fence would be 18 feet rather than 30 feet, though it would still be the new bollard design. The secondary fence would remain the planned 30-foot wall.
Agents also said that the secondary wall would have a pedestrian gate in the same place where there is a gate now and that after construction ends, Border Patrol would commit to allowing access to the park on Saturdays and Sundays from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. with a maximum of 25 people in the park at a time.
For Fanestil and other of Friends of Friendship Park, the changes and promises are not enough.
“Those promises are not always kept,” said the Rev. Seth Clark, who hosts a binational church service in the area. “Even when we were allowed to enter Friendship Park, they would often kick us out.”
Fanestil worried that the design would make it more difficult for people to see each other from opposite sides of the border and that both sides would lose their views of each other’s oceans and landscapes.
The advocates were also concerned about the construction’s impact on the environment in the area, including a binational garden.
“It demonstrates the lack of understanding of the needs of this community project at our border,” said Dan Watman, who coordinates the binational friendship garden of native plants located at Friendship Park.
He said that the foundations that border barriers are built on disrupt the growth of native plants’ root systems, which can reach 30 feet into the ground. He said that bigger barriers will have bigger bases, causing even more disruption.
In a response to public comments included in its report, CBP acknowledged that the binational garden will have to be temporarily taken out.
“To replace the barrier in this section, CBP will work with interested stakeholders and subject matter experts to identify and salvage the native plants which will be replanted when the garden is restored following construction,” the report says. “Prior to construction actions, CBP will identify native and protected plants in the Binational Garden that should be salvaged as well as any other items in the garden that should be collected.”
CBP also acknowledged that the area is part of a critical habitat for the Western Snowy Plover, which is considered a threatened species by the federal government.
“However, because the habitat is within a previously disturbed area, the project would not significantly affect the species or its habitat,” CBP concludes in the report.
Border Patrol told Fanestil that the contractor would have 30 days to update designs. Then, construction will begin and likely take about six months.
Meanwhile, Fanestil and the rest of Friends of Friendship Park are determined to continue pushing back on the plans. They said they would be ing elected officials and planning an in-person demonstration.
