NEXUS meeting to be held in May

By Meg Olson

The first town meeting to introduce the NEXUS commuter lane system and invite community members to apply will be held in Point Roberts sometime next month. “I’ve told Point Roberts they’d be first,” said district chief of inspections Ron Hays.

The meetings are expected to cover who can enroll in the program, how enrollment will proceed and how the system will work when it’s up and running. Current plans include a $50 CDN enrollment fee, to be sent to a Canadian processing center. Canadian authorities would forward approved applications to the INS for U.S. processing, and the INS would send a letter to applicants telling them when to come in for an interview at the Pacific Highway enrollment office. “Construction on the office will begin Monday, April 29,” Hays said.

During the interview applicants will be fingerprinted, photographed and, if approved, issued a NEXUS card. “”We’ll have ten work stations plus a fingerprinting machine that takes an electronic print of two indexes,” Hays said. “We’ll check it against our database to be sure we haven’t encountered you before in a conflict situation. If we have any questions regarding your identity or criminal history, we’ll run you on the big machine.” The INS also have a ten-finger fingerprint reader linked to the FBI’s database.

NEXUS lanes expected to be up and running in June, but Hays wouldn’t say when during the month. “There are 30 days in June,” he said. “We’re looking to open the lane at Pacific Highway coincident with a June grand opening, but we may open enrollment earlier,”..

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