CHAMPLAIN, N.Y. (WCAX) – It’s been one year since the closure of Roxham Road in the town of Champlain, New York– once the most-traversed irregular border crossing along the U.S.-Canada border.
The gates were closed following an expansion agreement by the U.S. and Canada known as the Safe Third Country Act. Almost immediately, irregular crossings into Quebec from the U.S. dropped. Irregular crossings into Canada dropped from 9,392 in the first two months of 2023 to just 154 in the first two months of this year.
But since the road’s closure, there has been a huge influx of migrants at airports in Canada and a jump in the number of people illegally crossing into the U.S.
Roxham Road in the town of Champlain was once the busiest irregular border crossing along the U.S.-Canada border. Now, it is a very different area. Buildings that were once there were torn down. And the number of people trying to travel between ports of entry into Quebec has dramatically decreased.
The decision to end crossings at Roxham Road had an immediate impact. Data from the Canadian government shows 4,000 interceptions were made in March 2023 at the unofficial crossing. A month later, that dropped to 69. So far this year, there were just 154 irregular crossings into the province.
For humanitarian groups on both sides of the border, the road’s closure meant a shift in how they helped migrants.
“We saw that there was a need to reach out to people crossing at Roxham and to provide a voice for people to provide information for why people were doing this,” said Wendy Ayotte with the Canada-based group Bridges not Borders.
Ayotte says she was there in September when the remaining border facilities were removed. It’s also when the group’s mission changed.
“So there is only a small number of us who are now continuing to do a few small activities, like keeping our website updated,” she said.
In New York, the group Plattsburgh Cares found itself quickly running out of money and burning out volunteers as they tried to assist migrants who were turned back at the border, left stranded in the North Country.
“To be of no use to anyone was not what we were– that was not our purpose,” said Kathy Sajor, the president of Plattsburgh Cares.
Now, she says the group only focuses on the emergency needs of those passing through the region.
“So we chose to focus on feeding people because that is what most people need,” Sajor said.
But at the border, the issue of illegal crossings still remains. Now, though, it is a historic influx into the United States– a surge of migrants arriving in Canada by air and making their way to the U.S. border. That has led the Canadian government to reinstate a visa requirement for people traveling to Canada from Mexico unless they meet a certain set of criteria.
Advocates plan to create a virtual cross-border rights clinic this summer to help migrants.
“People will be able to write in, phone in and get legal advice from that clinic,” Ayotte said. “Hopefully, they will then be able to get the funds to be able to start taking on cases, so it is going to be a slightly longer process.”
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