WASHINGTON, D.C. (June 15) — Following a two-day conference in Mexico, U.S. Secretary of Transportation Rodney Slater predicted that the issues keeping the Mexico cross-border aspects of NAFTA from going into effect would be resolved by the end of next year.

Slater met with Mexican Transportation Secretary Carlos Ruiz Sacristan to discuss the issue. Cross-border trucking was scheduled to go into effect in each nation’s border states four years ago, but the Clinton administration suspended that provision in late 1995. Full cross-border trucking was slated to go into effect in 2000.

Discussions went well, Slater said, and predicted an agreement would come before the end of the Clinton administration.

Teamsters President James Hoffa expressed concern about Slater’s comments. “I am deeply disturbed that the administration is moving to open the U.S.-Mexico border to unsafe trucks and unqualified drivers,” he said.

Five months ago, an audit by the U.S. DOT Inspector General found that unsafe trucks were bypassing inspections at the border, and those that were being inspected were nearly twice as likely to fail as U.S. or Canadian trucks.

The California Trucking Association and anti-truck group Citizens for Reliable and Safe Highways have also come out against opening the border.