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Washington, D.C.—A U.S. Customs Service workforce that is already short of resources and desperately understaffed now has the additional responsibility of serving as the principal force standing between the American livestock industry and a devastating outbreak of hoof-and-mouth disease, the head of the union representing Customs employees said today.

President Colleen M. Kelley of the National Treasury Employees Union (NTEU) today urged the Bush administration “to rethink” its fiscal 2002 budget proposal for Customs, which calls for a very small boost in funding and an increase of only 370 employees nationwide. “With 24-hour-a-day responsibilities at many of the more than 300 air, land and seaports nationwide, the proposed increases in funding and manpower simply aren’t enough,” Kelley said.

With its present staffing levels, Kelley added, Customs already is struggling with its traditional missions of interdicting illegal narcotics and other contraband, facilitating more than $1 trillion in trade and processing more than 488 million passengers each year.

The addition of “enormous new responsibilities” relating to the overseas outbreak of hoof-and-mouth disease, and the critical need to try to prevent the disease from spreading to the U. S., Kelley said, makes it both “unfair and unwise” to ignore Customs’ staffing needs.

The NTEU president said a statement by the Agriculture Department warning that “introduction into the country of hoof-and-mouth disease would be disastrous” not just to the American livestock industry, but to the

wildlife community “shows how serious this situation is and how real the needs are.”

Hoof-and-mouth disease is a highly contagious infection that, while not affecting humans, spreads so fast among cloven-hoofed animals such as cattle, sheep and swine that it can result in the destruction of entire herds to prevent the illness from infecting still more animals.

The disease, which can be spread by human contact with animals through manure and soil that can be carried by footwear or vehicles, causes serious losses in the production of meat and milk.

Among the Customs responsibilities related to hoof-and-mouth disease, Kelley said, is a requirement to stop and inspect all used farm equipment imported from the nearly 20 nations of the European Union, as well as additional responsibilities in connection with the border clearance of a long list of certain merchandise and food products and travelers from specified areas.

“Without additional staffing, the only way these tasks can be done is at the expense of the other parts of the Customs mission,” Kelley said.

NTEU is the largest independent federal union, representing some 150,000 employees in 25 agencies and departments, including more than 12,000 in Customs.