HARTFORD, Vt. (AP) – A U.S. Border Patrol checkpoint on Interstate 91 – just under 100 miles from the Canadian border – is beginning to wear on residents and prompt questions by Vermont’s congressional delegation.

At a congressional hearing last week, U.S. Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., told Customs and Border Patrol Commissioner Robert C. Bonner that the I-91 checkpoint is “a long, long distance from the border that just stops honest Vermonters that have been driving back and forth forever and ever,” according to a partial transcript of the hearing provided by Leahy’s office.

“It is creating, both in the Live Free or Die state of New Hampshire and the former independent Republic of Vermont, it’s creating a bit of a concern,” Leahy said. “It’s not doing anything to stop people from coming across the border because they aren’t the ones that would get stopped.”

Bonner said the checkpoint, set up at the end of 2003, is part of a strategy that doesn’t rely solely on stops at the border itself.

“And it isn’t that the checkpoint is necessarily going to net terrorists that might come across the Canadian border into the United States,” Bonner said. “Part of the strategy of a checkpoint is lateral enforcement. It’s a second line of defense, and it’s going to be important.”

U.S. Sen. Jim Jeffords, I-Vt., also wrote Bonner in late January, questioning him about a proposal to make the checkpoint permanent. “Many Vermont residents feel that the check restricts the movement of people and goods and infringes upon their civil rights. Vermonters are also concerned that the traffic check is not a good use of resources since there are many alternate routes nearby,” Jeffords wrote.

Joel Barkin, a spokesman for U.S. Rep. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., said Sanders had heard from about a dozen constituents and will be writing Bonner asking “things like, “Are local people being harassed?’ (and) “Does it make sense to have this so far down?”‘

A spokesman for Republican Gov. Jim Douglas called the “stationary” nature of the current Hartford checkpoint “curious,” but deferred to the agency’s expertise. “The governor certainly wants the Border Patrol to do what it thinks is necessary to protect and secure the borders of America,” said Douglas spokesman Jason Gibbs.

Federal court cases have given the Border Patrol leeway to set up interior checkpoints within 100 aeronautical miles of an international border.

The Hartford facility is 97 aeronautical miles from Canada, the Border Patrol said.

Since the current checkpoint was established at the end of 2003, 626 foreign nationals determined to be in the country illegally have been apprehended there, according to Richard Kite, a senior patrol agent in the Swanton sector.

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Information from: Valley News, http://www.vnews.com