Living in border counties is expensive, study shows

If the 24 counties along the U.S. side of the border with Mexico were the country’s 51st state, it would be a pretty poor state to live in.

A new report by the U.S./Mexico Border Counties Coalition says it would rank No. 1 in federal crimes committed, No. 2 in the incidence of tuberculosis, No. 3 in deaths due to hepatitis, No. 5 in diabetes-related deaths, No. 13 in population, No. 16 in violent crime, No. 39 in infant mortality and No. 51 in the number of health care professionals.

The national Border Counties Coalition was started in 1998 by the three members of the Santa Cruz County Board of Supervisors.

Attempts to elicit comment were unsuccessful from Robert Damon, the remaining supervisor on the board that created the coalition.

Most border counties are rural with smaller populations that have difficulty coping with the needs thrust on them,

But there are metropolitan counties in the mix�”San Diego, El Paso, Texas, and Pima County which is mostly rural but is home to Tucson.

Living on the border is expensive, the study shows.

Legal costs related to illegal immigration were $192 million in 2006, double the costs in 1999, the coalition’s first year.

A University of Arizona researcher, Tanis Slant, said the study is important because “for the most part, these border counties are small, they’re rural, they’re very poor, and this is a tremendous hit to their budgets.

She’s a public-policy lecturer at the University of Arizona and did an earlier study showing how many of the medical facilities are suffering financially because of unfunded care of treating illegals injured or sickened in this country and how law enforcement costs are also higher because of illegal immigration.

Last year, the U.S. government sent the 24 counties a total $4.7 million from the State Criminal Alien Assistance Program, SCAAP, to deal with those costs.

Those dollars are actually declining. In 1999, the 24 counties received $12.5 million in SCAAP funds, $4.4 million in 2005.

But somewhat surprisingly, the crime rates are declining.

“Since 1990, official crime statistics have recorded a drop of 30 percent. Property crimes are down 40 percent between 1990 and 2000 and violent crimes, among the lowest in the nation, making up only 12 percent of all crimes, dropped 29 percent in the same decade,” said the report’s Chapter No. 13 on crime and law enforcement.

El Paso and Tucson are considered some of the safest cities in the country. But drug and immigration offenses on the border rank high�”first in the nation if the border counties comprised the 51st state.

jlamb@gvnews.com | 547-9749