Border Patrol Seeks More Female Agents
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EL PASO (AP) - The U.S. Border Patrol is seeking to increase the number of female agents in its ranks to help with the influx of women who are in the country illegally.
The agency on Dec. 1 issued a job posting aimed at women only. The application deadline is Wednesday.
"This is the first time we've had a job announcement for female agents only," said Border Patrol Agent Yesenia Leon, a spokeswoman for the agency's El Paso sector.
Just 5 percent, or 1,039, of the Border Patrol's 20,824 agents nationwide are female. In the El Paso sector, 150 women work as Border Patrol agents, or 6 percent of the 2,500 agents in the sector.
Leon told the El Paso Times that women were just 16 percent of applicants to an October posting. The agency often needs more female agents for pat-downs and other processing for women detained at the border
The agency hasn't set an overall hiring goal.
In the fiscal year that ended in October, 120,000 undocumented women immigrants were detained by the agency nationwide, compared with about 44,000 in fiscal year 2011, Leon said. That increase came mostly from the influx of mothers and their children from Central America, she said.
Women who are ages 18 to 37 can apply if they are U.S. citizens and have lived in the country for the last three years. Applicants also must pass medical, fitness and polygraph tests and meet other requirements.
The annual, starting salary for a Border Patrol agent ranges from $39,012 to $44,403, according to the agency's job posting.
Another jobs announcement for both women and men will be posted in January, Leon said.
Recruiting more women is a good public relations move for the agency whose image needs help, said Erik Lee, executive director of the North America Research Partnership, a San Diego-based research organization which looks at economic and other issues along the U.S.-Mexico border.
"By its own admission, the Border Patrol lags other federal law enforcement agencies in the number of women" agents, he said.
Applications are taken online only at www.cbp.gov/careers.
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