Four-Year Delay Seen for New Detroit Bridge

(Journal of Commerce – Courtney Tower)

Canada approves environmental study but lawsuits delay cross-border span

Canada last week achieved a critical milestone toward building the $3 billion Detroit River International Crossing. But the final opening still faces at least four years of delay by the most hopeful calculation from 2013 to 2017.

Canadian authorities gave their final approval in an exhaustive environmental process which has lasted several years since federal and local governments decided to build a new bridge two miles upriver from the 80-year-old Ambassador Bridge. The same U.S. process ended in approval early this year. The two environmental approvals would normally allow the project to go ahead.

Even four extra years can become more if there are further delays from a huge tangle of lawsuits in U.S. courts or from renewed opposition in the Michigan legislature, where the private owner of the venerable Ambassador Bridge, Manual Moroun, has several supporters. Moroun wants to build his own new span and stop the public DRIC. Read more here.

U.S. Customs Extends Drawback Comment Period

(Journal of Commerce Online – R.G.Edmonson)

Proposed change would eliminate drawback on goods subject to excise taxes

Exporters and other interested parties have an additional month to tell Customs and Border Protection what they think about a controversial change in drawback regulations. The agency on Wednesday extended the comment period past the original deadline of December 14 to January 12, 2010, on a proposed rule change that would keep importers from claiming drawback on goods subject to U.S. excise taxes.

Companies have been able to recover 99% of the excise taxes they pay on imported goods if they export “commercially interchangeable” products. It’s widely used in the alcohol, tobacco and petroleum industries. Read more here.

Bureaucratic Drift: CBP, GSA and Ports of Entry

(Federal News Radio – Lurita Doan)

Federal agencies often share missions as a way to tap expertise, share responsibility and costs, usually for the good of the country. Land ports of entry, at the Canadian and Mexican borders of the United States, are a shared mission. Unfortunately, border crossing points have become victims of bureaucratic drift that hampers the free flow of legitimate trade and travel and does little to advance the agenda of President Obama and Congress.

With a few exceptions, land ports of entry are federally owned buildings. The U.S. General Services Administration (GSA) is the nation's landlord and builds and manages most of the federal government's buildings and courthouses. At the border, GSA is responsible for building, leasing and maintaining the facilities, while U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) provides security and inspection of both people and goods. Even the Departments of Commerce and State have responsibilities at the borders.

Also, unbeknownst to many Americans, state and local law enforcement use these border facilities in executing their missions. Our borders work best when these federal, state and local entities work together and when there is mutual respect for the responsibilities and the importance of each mission.

GSA isn't always efficient in executing its mission, and, often allows bureaucratic wrangling and inter-agency finger pointing that is counterproductive to accomplishing its mission priorities.
CBP is an organization, fighting for survival in the bureaucratic jungle that is DHS – an agency still undergoing growing pains since its inception in 2003. The 22 entities combined to form DHS still spend enormous amounts of time and taxpayer dollars fighting century-old turf wars. Read more here.

Deal Close on ‘Buy USA — With Strings

(Toronto Star)

There has been a breakthrough in talks between Ottawa and Washington aimed at resolving a dispute over a protectionist U.S. policy known as Buy America, according to a source close to the negotiations.

A tentative deal is ready to go to the desks of Prime Minister Stephen Harper and President Barack Obama, the source said, but both could still face significant political obstacles in winning support for the deal. […]

The compromise would for the first time guarantee that U.S. manufacturers could bid on supply contracts being awarded by provincial and municipal governments in Canada, the source said. Read more here.

DRIC Bridge Hurdle Cleared

(Video: Michigan DOT • Story: Chris Vander Doelen — Windsor Star)

The last major legal hurdle in the way of a new $5 billion publicly owned bridge over the Detroit River has been cleared, removing one of the last barriers to the start of one of the largest construction projects in Canadian history.

Transport Canada will announce today that it has won full approval for the wide-ranging Environmental Assessment it has prepared for the Detroit River International Bridge project.

Years in the making, the approval is to be announced this morning, a reliable federal source confirmed to me Wednesday afternoon. Read more here.

The U.S. Needs a New Deal on Trade with More Opportunities for American Exports – Gary Locke

(Seattle Times – Gary Locke)

For weeks before the 1999 World Trade Organization Ministerial meeting in Seattle, state and local authorities had known that peaceful protests were being planned around the Washington State Convention & Trade Center. But as I drove through downtown on the night of November 29 and saw waves of people returning from a rally waving placards, I got a sinking feeling that the anti-trade sentiment was stronger than people had anticipated. ...events of that day still resonate 10 years later – because the profound questions and concerns that many Americans still have about trade and globalization have not been fully answered. […]

The Obama administration is working to build a new consensus on trade, one that can create widespread prosperity for everyone. While in Asia recently, President Obama pledged that the U.S. would engage in the Trans-Pacific Strategic Economic Partnership Agreement, which would draw us closer to Asia – a bloc of countries that buys 26% of U.S. exports – while setting a high bar for human rights, environmental protection and labor that could serve as a model for future trade agreements.

Meanwhile, the Commerce Department, which I have the honor to lead, is significantly expanding our export-promotion efforts around the world to ensure that U.S. businesses – especially the small and medium-size enterprises that account for more than half of all new jobs – have fair and frequent access to foreign markets. I'm confident that the steps we're taking will help make the benefits of trade more immediately apparent to all Americans – and that is vitally important.

I understand the frustration we saw in Seattle 10 years ago, and in these difficult economic times, we're seeing similar emotions from people who feel like the American economy just doesn't work for them and their families anymore.

That's got to change. Under the leadership of this administration, it will.

Read the complete editorial here.