A New Use for Passports Riles Some in NH's Tourism Industry

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Senator John Sununu says he's aware of concerns about the Western Hemisphere Travel Initiative, or WHTI.

He says he's holding the hearing at New Hampshire's Technical Institute in Concord to hear more.

the field hearing is a chance to listen to people at the local level. whether you're in the travel and tourism industry, whether you're a manufacturer shipping products or goods with a business relationship in canada, you want to make sure that this isn't going to provide an unnecessary burden, that it won't be unnecessarily expensive and that it will actually provide the security that's intended.

Congress passed W-H-T-I to bolster border security after 9-11.

The first phase of it is scheduled to go into effect in 2008, but the Senate voted two weeks ago to delay implementation by eighteen months.

The U.S. House has yet to agree.

Despite its timing, several members of New Hamsphire's tourist industry are worrying about the effect of the new law.

Micheal Donovan owns Visit Canada, a business that caters to tourists.

Donovan worries the law requiring Canadian families to have passports to enter the U.S. would significantly increase the cost of their trip.

if that happens, perhaps as many as one in three canadians are going to stay home. and that means empty hotel rooms...on the seacoast, empty hotel rooms in the mt washington valley, it means gift shops are not going to see the same volume of consumer spending, it means in New hampshire the room and meals tax is going to decline, gas taxes are going to decline. this is a disaster for the whole state of new hampshire.

Much of New Hampshire's tourist industry shares those concerns.

New Hampshire's Business and Industry Association represents several firms that count on tourism.

Dave Juvet is a BIA vice president.

you know, we have really two primary concerns. one, we want to make sure the cost of this new security documentation is ...that its not at rate that is so prohibitive that it will discourage travelers coming in to new hampshire or new england. and secondly we want to make sure that whatever procedures are required to obtain this documentation is not so, so restrictive that it also acts as a disincentive.

Canadian tourism officials also have concerns about the law.

They're focusing on their side of the border.

More Canadians hold passports than Americans do.

The American rate is under 30 percent.

Craig Hermus of the Canadian Tourist Research Institute in Ontario says his country's industry has a lot more to lose than Americans do.

now that you need a passport to come to canada or another secure travel document, many areas in canada are going to feel significant impact and you know, the ones that stand out most are niagra falls, windsor and to a lesser extent, areas like vancouver.

And that's just the tourism industry.

Canadian truckers dread the day they'll have to present a passport at the border to bring goods to the U.S.

A passport would add another layer to their security requirements.

And it would add to their costs.

Ron Lenox, Vice President of The Canadian Trucking Alliance says he doesn't think the U.S. passport requirement makes much sense.

we've already got tens of thousands of guys with a document that we believe is as secure as a passport already. so then we would be asking them again to go out and pay more money for yet another document and frankly i don't think there's a lot of appetite for that.

There is discussion in the U.S. Senate to allow truckers and frequent travelers to get a cheaper, secure ID to pass through the border.

Senator Sununu's hearing at the New Hampshire Technical Institute in Concord tomorrow is open to the public.