Chamber Brands March 21 "Separation Day" Calls for Plan & Progress for U.S.-Canada Border
The North Country Chamber of Commerce is branding March 21st as “Separation Day”, marking the two-year anniversary of U.S.-Canadian border restrictions, and is beginning an e-mail and social media “countdown” on March 11.
“It should be stunning at this point to realize that we are quickly approaching the full two-year anniversary of the substantial separation of the American and Canadian people from the historically strong social connectivity that defines the unique U.S.-Canadian relationship,” says Garry Douglas, Chamber President. “But what remains even more stunning is that we are still, after two years, without any plan, any metrics, and certainly any sense of urgency. And we have substantially lost the high degree of bi-national border policy coordination existing since 9/11, ending up with essentially two separate borders facing one another with different rules.”
The Chamber points to a period of hope and progress last November, starting with a waiver of Canadian COVID test requirements for Canadians coming to the U.S. for less than 72 hours. This significant interim step was announced with an assurance from the Prime Minister of Canada that it was just a first step in further phases to come. Then with Omicron accelerating in December, this allowance was reversed, though more recently Canada has shifted its test requirement to less costly and faster antigen tests, though this continues to greatly hinder a resumption of casual travel.
“We have a sense that the urgency called for, given the immense and growing impact on the U.S.-Canadian social and economic relationship, has nearly disappeared, and we are hoping that hammering home the looming two-year mark may help to bring it back,” notes Douglas. “We need all of our partners to resume strong calls for top level attention, including a plan with target dates that can hopefully get us to near normalcy ahead of summer, and a quick first step by Canada of resuming the 72-hour exemption from testing and early movement toward the current U.S. policy of admission with vaccination. Then we can go from there.”
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