ARIZONA
Shipping container wall on border is coming down
PHOENIX — Former Republican Arizona Gov. Doug Ducey's border barrier of shipping containers was largely dismantled in time for a new Democratic administration, costing tens of millions of dollars over just a few months as they were set up and taken down again.
Removal of the hulking red, gold and blue steel boxes created a stark visual shift in affected sections of Arizona's southern landscape as a new governor took power and another $76 million in state funds was spent to remove the containers on top of the $95 million it cost to put them there.
Ducey had said the containers placed at an opening along the border near the western community of Yuma and across a grassland valley in eastern Arizona's Cochise County were intended as a temporary measure until the Biden administration undertook permanent construction to secure the border.
Gov. Katie Hobbs, who was sworn in on Jan.2, was among Democrats who called it a political stunt.
An agreement between Ducey's administration and federal agencies named in a lawsuit filed by Ducey called for the containers to come down by Jan. 4, but the court later stayed all deadlines in the case by 30 days to give Hobbs and new Attorney General Kris Mayes time to review the situation.
In Yuma, all 130 of the containers covering about 3,800 feet were removed by Jan. 3, but about a third of some 3,000 containers were erected in remote Cochise County, raising concerns about possible harm...
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