New Rangeley Border Patrol Station officially opens

DALLAS PLANTATION – What was once where three to five agents worked in a 600 square foot rented, second floor space overlooking Main Street in Rangeley, is now a 24,000 square foot, state-of-the art U.S. Border Patrol Station built on seven acres for 50 agents.

Today, under the threat of rain, officials representing several law enforcement agencies, politicians, state, county and local dignitaries, along with a couple dozen agents and their families gathered for a ribbon cutting ceremony to celebrate the new $5.9 million Rangeley Border Patrol Station off Route 16.

The station, completed last summer after a year of construction, is modeled after the modern concept of a police station design, featuring an armory, six detention cells, helicopter and landing pad, training area, gym/fitness room, vehicle maintenance garage with space enough for 20 cars and a 30-space parking lot outside. The station, parking lot and landing pad are surrounded by security fencing and surveillance cameras.

Deputy Division Chief Gary Tharpe of the Northern and Coastal Border Division, told the crowd the new station, “will help prevent terrorism and terrorists’ acts and reduce crime in border communities.” He noted the overall “unprecedented growth of the Border Patrol,” in the years following the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center. Currently, 25 agents are working out of the Rangeley station.

“What you have here is your tax dollars at work,” Tharpe said. The Border Patrol was formed in 1924 “to protect our country from those who wanted to come in and do us arm,” he said. “The threat has changed; the threat now is terrorism and we are America’s front line.”

In Maine, there is 611 miles of U.S. border with Quebec to patrol. The agents at the Rangeley station are assigned to cover 80 miles of border, said Jeff Beauregard, the patrol agent in charge at the new station. After the ceremony, he said although there are 25 agents stationed in Rangeley now, the facility needs to be able to accommodate up to 50 agents, “should something significant happen,” he said.

Times have changed in the Border Patrol. In the early 1980s, the first few agents were stationed in Rangeley and based in the town garage. In 1991, the station moved to a second floor rented space on Main Street in Rangeley where three to five agents were based until the new station was completed last summer.

In those early years, Beauregard said agents would ride around in vehicles, but these days, the agents are more apt to be riding an ATV or snowmobile in the back woods somewhere. The agents generally live in the Rangeley area, work in a partnership with state and local law enforcement agencies and are active members in the community. More and more they rely, he said, on camp owners and guides to give them a call if they spot something suspicious.

“They’re very willing to help us,” he said.

Joseph Mellia, the chief patrol agent for the Houlton Border Patrol Sector, of which the Rangeley station is a part of, said that although the new facility expands their mission’s capability, it’s not nearly enough to do the job.

“If we had 400 agents up here we could never cover everything,” Mellia said.