[B]EEBE PLAIN – For Janice Beadle, life on an international roadway requires planning her day around wait times at the border checkpoint.
“You might get asked two or three times a day, what’s your house number, where are you coming from,” she said.
Louise Boisvert said she believes her mobility rights are being infringed.
“My feeling is shame when I go under the canopy and I feel like I’ve been violated,” she said.
Fourteen houses line the American side of Canusa Avenue – a name which derives from Canada and USA – where the northern side of the road is in Stanstead, Quebec, and the southern side is in the town of Derby.
Heightened security measures have bolstered the area where the international boundary cuts through two villages and several houses. Barriers have gone up in recent years, officer patrols have increased and security cameras and technology use has risen.
For residents, security changes on the northern border have reached the tipping point.
The only way to access their homes by vehicle is passing through a U.S. Customs and Border Protection port of entry. Previously, they had been able to wave at officers on their way back into town. Then that changed to a policy whereby residents were asked to stop and report under the canopy of the customs building.
Now, officials have added a new barrier restricting access to the small entry lane they formerly had used.
Beadle, an eight-year American resident on Canusa, said the new change goes too far.
“I love my house, I love my backyard, but it’s gotten to this point now with this new barricade – what’s going to happen after this in a few years,” she wondered.
U.S. Customs and Border Protection say the local access point was closed in response to several motorists illegally entering the U.S. by driving past the building.
Assistant Area Port Director Kevin Coy said there are cases in which people have “deliberately” crossed without reporting. He said the barrier was added about two weeks ago, and has yet to be completely installed.
“We’re always looking for ways to enhance our ability to complete the mission, and this is something relatively new and efficient that we’ve discovered that we thought would improve our capabilities, without hindering back-and-forth traffic,” Coy said.
The new system is a white hydraulic barricade that can be raised and lowered by customs officials. Next to the machine is a series of orange barriers, with a Border Patrol cruiser parked behind, blocking the road. Coy said the system is wide enough for emergency service vehicles to pass through.
Residents say they had heard rumors about the gate system before it first went up. Then a printed “stakeholder notice” was handed to them as they crossed through the canopy.
The document notes that the barricade replaces a vehicle that had been parked diagonally across the roadway to “address a security concern.”
The barrier is placed on a town road, not on federal property.
Spokesperson Jacqui DeMent said the Vermont Department of Transportation has not been involved with these new steps at the border in Derby.
“Under Vermont law, the subject roads in Vermont are town highways, under the jurisdiction of municipal authorities,” DeMent wrote in an email. “Additionally, under federal law, the federal authorities have broad powers at international borders.”
Changing life at the border
It’s unclear how a residential road ended up split between two nations. Local legend claims that a group of surveyors had a little too much to drink and decided to place the border right through the village. Regardless of who or why the boundary fell on Canusa, locals agree the international line was once non-existent.
Patrick Boisvert, 76, lives in the same house he grew up in on Canusa. He said he used to ride his bicycle all over the Canadian side when he was younger, at a time when things were “free range.”
“When I was a kid it was like no border existed,” Boisvert said. “My best friend when I was growing up lived in that house across the street, so we were back and forth across that street a hundred times a day.”
Rep. Brian Smith, R-Derby and a lifelong resident of the town, said he remembers crossing the border late at night on Main Street and waking up the only customs officer, who had fallen asleep in the station.
“He knew me, he said ‘OK Brian, go ahead,’” Smith said.
Communities on the Quebec-Vermont border were once tight-knit, connected by marriages, relations and, in many instances, dual citizenship. The two sides contained a blend of nationalities and language. Derby Line and Stanstead were once viewed as one town that shared a hockey rink, curling facility, churches and doctors.
Boisvert’s father was a Canadian, born in Stanstead, who married an American and moved to a white clapboard house in Beebe Plain.
Now, the two are divided by an increasingly firm, and nearly invisible line, prompting residents to stick primarily to their own side. One of the few remnants of free movement is the Haskell Free Library and Opera House in Derby Line, where the international boundary runs directly through the walls of the building. A line runs down the floor splitting the children’s section in half, and the opera house’s stage is in Canada while the seats are in the U.S.
The boundary outside the building is marked by no fence, rather, a simple row of flowerpots. And an agreement between Canadian and American border patrol allows Canadian citizens to cross by foot into the U.S. to access the library’s main entrance, if they return immediately after to Canadian soil.
The limited free movement has seen opportunity for abuse. A Canadian man pleaded guilty in June to smuggling more than 100 guns into Quebec through the international library’s bathroom.
Boisvert and other residents say everything began to change along the border after the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001. Surveillance has substantially increased and grown stricter along the 3,900 mile lower U.S.-Canada border.
On Canusa, that’s visible in the form of security cameras and increased foot patrols behind the yards of residents’ homes. Surveillance cameras can be found attached to trees on small wooded roads farther back in the village of Beebe Plain.
The stricter border enforcement has also resulted in further separation between the Vermonters and neighboring Beebe, Quebec, just a stone’s throw away for the Canusa Avenue residents.
Beadle grew up in the area, would go to church in Stanstead and used to have friends on the Canadian side. Now she barely knows who her across-the-street neighbors are. The only indication that the other side is another nation is the contrast of Beadle’s front porch American flag with a Canadian maple leaf flapping in the wind across the road.
A visit to a Canadian neighbor would require stopping at Canadian customs near the intersection with Main Street in Beebe, Quebec. The only sidewalk on Canusa Avenue is in Canada, so American-side residents have to walk on the shoulder of the road.
The precise international boundary splits a large home with apartment buildings in half and goes down the street before Canusa turns entirely into Canada, continuing as Quebec Route 247 toward the Stanstead town center.
Coy said the division is at a slight angle, which follows roughly the yellow line for part of the stretch.
“They’re in a very unique situation, where they’re located,” he said. “There’s nothing like this.”
Challenges of life on the line
The new hydraulic barricade is the latest change affecting life for Canusa residents — and for many it’s one change too many.
“Gradually they’ve been tightening the screws about every year, more of the road and more of the liberties,” Boisvert said.
Residents have complained to the Derby selectboard and reached out to representatives from Vermont’s congressional delegation.
At a recent meeting, they recalled stories of the challenges they’ve had living in close proximity to the border.
Smith was present at the meeting and has been working to help communication with Customs and Border Protection and address some of the issues.
He said long lines waiting to enter the U.S. can prevent residents from leaving their homes, leaving them trapped and unable to access Beebe Road.
“Sometimes if there’s a Canadian holiday they can end up waiting an hour or more simply to go into Derby to buy a gallon of milk,” Smith said.
Beadle said in the past, residents could call in before leaving, and customs officers would help divert traffic to let them through. But that practice has been inconsistent lately, she said.
Coy said the port has sent officers to assist in the past, and continues to respond when personnel are available to help.
“It’s not something we can do all the time,” he said.
Pat Boisvert’s wife, Louise, described living in the geographic quirk as being “kind of like aliens.”
Traffic at the border makes it hard to get to town, and is disrupting day-to-day life.
“We’re practically prisoners on this street,” Pat Boisvert said. “If there’s lines of traffic going one way or the other you can’t get out of the place.”
If they’re searching a car under the canopy, or waiting vehicles don’t line up properly, residents are held up, Louise Boisvert said.
“We don’t like being late to church, we don’t like being late to appointments, that’s not how we do things,” she said, “and you never know when there’s going to be someone there holding you up.”
Beadle, 64, works as a cashier in a Newport grocery store, where she’s paid on the clock. She said the border checkpoint can make her late to work sometimes, and she has to plan her day around the wait times.
“It’s an awful feeling to leave the street every day, just knowing you have to go under the port,” Beadle said.
‘It’s filtering into our lives’
Pat Boisvert said living on Canusa Avenue made for “quite the topic of conversation” and was once a big deal.
“It used to be pretty cool to live on this street because it’s so unique, it’s the only thing in the whole country like this,” Boisvert said. “But god, now you wouldn’t even want people to know you live here because it’s such a pain in the neck.”
Residents say friends and family don’t want to come and visit, and it’s difficult to hire people to work on their homes because they don’t want to deal with the border.
“That’s the job they have, they wear the uniform, and they get paid to do – but it’s filtering into our lives,” Louise Boisvert said.
Border “horror stories” at the last citizen meeting included one neighbor sharing that officers used to search kids’ backpacks on occasion when they were waiting for the school bus by the village post office.
A daycare center on Canusa is experiencing challenges with parents stuck in traffic at the port of entry, where the line can extend as far back as half a mile on Darling Hill Road. One time the children were on an outing walking through the back of the American yards, and were stopped by customs officials who thought they were coming in from Canada. The child care worker was said to have been threatened with a fine.
The area has had an issue with an ambulance trying to get through during a busy time at the border. Also, the garbage truck is unable to turn around in the parking lot of a business on the Canadian side of Canusa and instead must back up in the driveway of the last of the 14 American homes. Residents say that as a result, the heavy vehicle has been damaging the driveway.
Resident Brent Hilliard has been trying to sell his home on Canusa for two years, but has had no takers so far. His property is one of several on the American side of Canusa with “for sale” signs on the front lawn. Residents say as border problems have increased, property values have dropped.
“Buyers are turned off once they go on the street with the agent and see what they’d have to go through,” Beadle said.
Mobility rights in question
Coy said U.S. Customs and Border Patrol asks residents to report when leaving their homes on Canusa, even on foot through the back, to prevent any confusion.
“If they’re walking through their backyard to the post office, they don’t need to report,” Coy said. “But what’s going to happen is an officer is going to see someone going through a backyard, and is going to challenge them to see who they are, where they’re coming from and what they’re doing.”
Residents say another issue is staff changes at the border. New officers don’t know who lives on Canusa, which can result in questioning and a longer stop at the port of entry.
Coy said officers are assigned to the Derby port of entry and rotate shifts between the handful of crossings the port oversees.
“It is possible that an officer is unfamiliar with an individual person, and we want to stress that if one of those persons from Canusa Ave feel mistreated, they need to notify the port director immediately,” he said. “It is not satisfactory.”
Lia Ernst, a staff attorney for the Vermont chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union, said her organization routinely receives complaints about the matters involving U.S. Customs and Border Protection.
“We have not heard specific complaints, but we would welcome hearing more from citizens about these issues going on at the border,” she said on the situation in Derby.
The ACLU of Vermont is currently litigating three cases against the border patrol that are unrelated to the recent tightening.
Ernst said freedom of movement is a “fundamental” right protected under the Constitution, and that border patrol has taken “an extremely aggressive view” as to what their authority and capabilities are in general.
“It strikes me as wild and wildly disruptive to have to check in with CBP everytime you leave the house,” she said.
Proposed solutions
Smith, the Derby selectboard member and state representative, said the board and residents have considered a variety of possible solutions to ease troubles for Canusa residents.
One option includes building a road behind the border patrol station that only local residents could access.
The possibility of building a new street behind the homes has also been proposed. But that option would leave residents with no access to their garages, and would require purchasing the land from the owner and costly construction.
Smith said he thinks some sort of sticker with a barcode for residents, that would allow them to access their own lane, would be a good fix.
“There’s got to be a solution for these people, they’re going through hell up there,” he said.
Coy said U.S. Customs and Border Protection is willing to meet and talk with residents about their concerns. But a new road or buyout would definitely be out of the agency’s purview, he said.
“We are trying to take all their ideas and suggestions and to take those to the right people,” Coy said.
Residents have also directed their concerns to Vermont’s congressional delegation.
In response to an inquiry from VTDigger, Sens. Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., and Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., and Rep. Peter Welch, D-Vt., said in a joint statement that their offices are involved.
“There is no question that Canusa Avenue residents face unique challenges simply coming and going from their homes,” they said. “Our offices have met with both area residents and Customs and Border Protection representatives with the goals of improving communication between them, and exploring what steps can be taken to improve the quality of life while also ensuring a safe and secure border.”
Rebecca Kelley, spokesperson for Gov. Phil Scott, said the governor’s office had not been made aware of the situation. She said the office has reached out to the commissioner of public safety to learn more about the matter and what could be done to address it for residents.
Some residents have said they would take a buyout of their homes to avoid all the “hassle.” But a few, including the Boisverts, have no intentions to leave.
Beadle said she would be sad to leave her home, but would take a buyout if offered a “fair market” price.
“That would probably be the cheapest thing the federal government could do, so they wouldn’t have to worry about us anymore,” she said.
Hear more from Beadle and the Boisverts in this week’s Deeper Dig podcast:
