High-tech ID cards are security need at all ports

THE ISSUE Workers at Honolulu Harbor and other sea ports will begin carrying biometric ID cards beginning in March.

SEA ports have been slow to take steps against possible terrorist attacks but finally are nearing adequate security. Measures were taken in 2004 to guard against weapons being loaded onto U.S.-bound vessels at foreign ports, and a long-awaited requirement for port and maritime workers to face background checks and buy identification cards will begin in March.

Only months after the 9/11 attack, a pallet that could have contained explosives was unattended at Honolulu Harbor until specially trained dogs reacted to it. A congressional investigator told a House committee that the incident demonstrated the importance of security at ports.

On a rolling basis during an 18-month period beginning in March, about 750,000 truckers, longshoremen and mariners will be required to pay fees ranging from $107 to $159 apiece for new tamperproof identification cards, good for five years. The cards will include the holder's photograph, name, biometric fingerprint template, serial number and high-tech identification verification.

Background checks of applicants for the ID cards will be as important as the cards' eventual use. Applicants must prove they have not been convicted of terrorism-related crimes as well as other serious charges ranging from extortion to murder. And they must prove they are legally working in the United States.

At Honolulu Harbor, port workers now must show a Hawaii driver's license and other identification in order to pass through the gate. Once the new system is in place, the identification program should improve not only security but efficiency.

Complaints about the cost of the cards have begun. "We're going to be paying $139 to $159 and we don't know how they work," said Steve Stallone, spokesman for the San Francisco-based ILWU.

In most cases, however, employers are expected to pick up the tab for longshoremen and mariners. Independent truckers will be expected to buy their own cards, but the price of $30 a year for a professional credential is reasonable, even in an industry that averages 120 percent yearly in turnover.

Congress ordered the cards to be used at seaports in 2002, but the Department of Homeland Security has been plagued with problems in creating the system at all kinds of ports. The recent announcement followed enactment of a port security bill in October that required rules for the card to be written by Jan. 1.

Equipment used to read the new cards will not be ready by the time the cards go into use at seaports, but Coast Guard patrols will conduct random checks with hand-held devices. This vital security need will not be completed until all 6 million workers at the nation's rail yards, airports and seaports carry the biometric cards.