Arizona signs confirming that drug and human smuggling activity was taking place well inside the Arizona border have received a face lift and now offer campers and hikers different information when they travel to the Arizona public land regions.
The new sign now reads, “Visitor Information Update – active federal law enforcement patrol area, clean-up and restoration crews at work, contact BLM rangers for current area status.” In smaller print in the lower left-hand side of the sign provides the Bureau of Land Management district office phone number and encourages residents to call 911 for emergency.
The tamer BLM signs sparked speculation as to why Arizona’s Bureau of Land Management decided to make the change. Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio put it in plain and simple language: “They were embarrassed.”
“Arizona’s BLM decided to change the signs after they created a national hysteria and they decided to temper it,” said America’s toughest Sheriff. “What the new signs should read is ‘anyone caught smuggling drugs or humans are going to jail.” In an ironic twist, Sheriff Arpaio is in the process of working with BLM to have prisoners in his jails, including illegal aliens, to go into the desert and clean up the trash.
The new signs went up over the weekend as a result of a Congressional bill that granted $600 million to increase border security measures. BLM received a special $200,000 emergency grant to conduct and increase patrols in the southwest portion of Arizona in an effort to saturate the region, according to BLM spokesperson Debrah Stevens.
The new “temporary signs” are part of BLM’s three-prong approach to restore or mitigate the land damaged from illegal alien layup activity, construct physical barriers on roadways used by suspected illegal traffickers and acknowledge that armed BLM rangers are patrolling the area.
“We are working with 50 other law enforcement agencies including, tribal, county, Border Patrol, Sheriff’s Departments to secure the region. The intel provided to us confirms we are having a positive affect and have seen a decrease in activity,” Stevens explained.
While that may be true local activists and law enforcement say the summer months typically see fewer human and drug traffickers due to the extreme desert heat, plus the high-profile tactic BLM chose only forewarned the bad guys and diverted their activities elsewhere along the border.
Pinal County Sheriff Paul Babeu pointed out that; “We are three counties deep. How is it that you see pictures (BLM signs) like these? How is that okay?”