Native Americans to be issued Enhanced Tribal Identification cards to cross borders

The U.S. Government is moving forward with its plan to issue Enhanced Tribal Identification cards, or ETCs, to U.S. or Canadian citizens who are members of a “U.S. Federally Recognized Tribe,” as an alternative travel document to a U.S. Passport.

The ETC could be used by tribal members to cross U.S. land or sea borders. The 9/11 Commission Act envisioned the use of such ETCs, and called for them to be evaluated, along with other aspects of the Western Hemisphere Travel Initiative (WHTI).

Since April 2008, U.S. Customs and Border Protection has been working with Native American tribal officials to enhance their existing tribal identification cards. That process typically begins with the tribe submitting an ETC memorandum of understanding to CBP. To date, 10 separate tribes have submitted such MOUs, of which five  –  the Kootenai of Idaho, the Pascua Yaqui or Arizona, the Seneca of New York, the Tohono O’odham of Arizona, and the Coquille of Oregon – have had their MOUs approved by CBP. Those five tribes are expected to begin producing ETCs by September 2011, says a CBP solicitation published on August 11.

CBP is currently looking for a vendor to evaluate several aspects of the new ETCs that will soon begin to be issued:

• How is the blank card stock being physically stored and secured?
• Does the card have physical security features to prevent counterfeiting, such as watermarking, micro-printing, optically variable inks, ultraviolet sensitive inks, deliberate errors, unique fonts, overlapping data and holograms?
• Have employees of the tribal issuing offices had background checks?
• Does the net ETC card have both Gen 2 “vicinity RFID technology” and a machine readable zone?
• What documentation has been presented to prove that ETC cardholders are U.S. citizens or born in the U.S.?

CBP has designated the upcoming evaluation contract as a 100 percent set-aside for a service-disabled veteran-owned small business. Prospective contractors can submit questions about the solicitation until August 17, and must submit their final price quotations by August 24.

Full article by Jacob Goodwin, Government Security News