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Article: Border Patrol a boost for struggling towns
- Article from:
- Deseret News (Salt Lake City)
- Article date:
- September 28, 2008
- Author:
CopyrightCopyright 2008 Deseret News (Salt Lake City). Provided by ProQuest LLC. (Hide copyright information)
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EL CENTRO, Calif. -- The U.S. Border Patrol's gleaming new
regional headquarters building is just one sign of how the fast-
growing agency is boosting the local economy.
Agents frequent the restaurants and gyms. A new indoor shooting
range relies on Border Patrol employees. And dry cleaners do brisk
business pressing green uniforms.
The Border Patrol's growth to more than 17,000 agents -- from
12,000 two years ago and nearly double from eight years ago -- has
been a boon to towns and small cities along the 1,952-mile border
with Mexico, many of those towns plagued by poverty and high
unemployment.
"The Border Patrol had a very noticeable presence two or three
years ago. Now it's ...