 PETER BLACK Plattsburgh, Quebec eh?
If Sir George Prevost, the New Jersey-born governor-general of Canada, hadn't criminally bungled the Battle of Plattsburgh in September 1814, much of upper New York state, a large swath of Maine, and perhaps much, much more of the United States, might be part of Canada today.
But no, Sir George, leading an army of 11,000 Napoleon-tested troops, goaded his junior naval commander into a disastrous slaughter on Lake Champlain, reneged on his promise to take out the weakly defended American guns on shore, and, seeing what calamity he had wrought, marched his shamed troops back across the border.
Prevost handed the stunned gaggle of American defenders control of the strategically precious lake and, when the two exhausted sides hammered out a peace treaty three months later, Britain, having lost its leverage, relinquished the territory it had captured in Maine.
Prevost died in disgrace in 1815 before he could be court-martialed to account for his actions.
That was then, but what has happened now is Plattsburgh is being recaptured bit by bit by an invading mercantile army from the north, a multi-billion commercial force surging down the "Champlain-Hudson Gateway and Trade Corridor" - as the Montreal-Plattsburgh economic zone is dubbed by New York North Country trade boosters.
A study released this week by the Plattsburgh-North County Chamber of Commerce shows that Canadians -- Quebecers for the most part -- are taking a bigger and bigger bite of the northern New York big apple.
Canadian-owned companies now employ 3600 people in the area, with a payroll totally nearly $100 million. These companies range from the Bombardier rail car plant to a toiletries factory, both of which have head offices in Montreal.
The Bombardier shop is partly located on the former huge air base, with which Plattsburgh was once identified - that, and the long-gone boom in cross-border shopping in the era of the high-flying loonie. President Clinton's decision to board up the base seven years ago, local business leaders now confess, turned out to be one of the best things to happen to Plattsburgh since Prevost turned tail.
Plattsburgh has picked up the slack by cashing in big time on the boom unleashed by NAFTA, and the shift from an east-west axis of commerce to north-south. Just as the area was of enormous military importance in the early centuries of conquest and colonization, today Plattsburg is reaping the benefits of the revved up trade between Canada and the U.S.
There is, of course, the downside to this boom.
One is that inevitably some of the Canadian businesses setting up shop in Plattsburgh and Clinton County (named for George, the first governor of the state and a future vice-president) have pulled up stakes in Canada.
Obviously, some have fled Quebec for reasons ranging from politics to taxation.
Local chamber officials downplay the exodus of Quebec businesses and the loss of jobs up north, saying it only amounts to a fraction of the newcomers. The vast majority are setting up a U.S. shop to expand production and grab their share of the insatiable southern market.
The other dark side of Plattsburgh's success in developing the trade corridor is the convoy of big rigs, several kilometres long, that's constantly backed up from the crossing at Champlain, NY. The hundreds of truckers, fuming for hours on end waiting for a harried U.S. Customs officer to clear their load, would dispute a Montreal trade promoter's cheery claim of "a common border with the U.S. that's practically transparent and a virtual formality to cross."
Local officials are lobbying like mad to get Washington to modernize and expand the customs facilities to ease the current demand and make room for all the other Canadian business they want to see headed their way.
According to the local congressman, John M. McHugh, "the Champlain crossing can either be a bottleneck choking off traffic and commerce or a facilitator to our growing economy. Today an honest appraisal of that crossing would probably declare it to be more a hindrance ..."
Maybe with another Clinton laying claim to New York via the Senate, one who has the ear, at the very least, of the president, local officials may have a better chance of greasing the political wheels of Washington to get a beefed up border crossing.
Copyright © 1999 Peter Black/Log Cabin Chronicles/11.99 |
