Business View Civil & Municipal | Volume 2, Issue 11

81 CIVIL AND MUNICIPAL VOLUME 2, ISSUE 11 DOUGLAS , AR I ZONA to do with the mixture of the Hispanic culture and the hardworking people who founded Douglas as a smelter town. So you put those things together and I think that’s what makes us what we are now. Of course, we have our disagreements, but at the end of the day, we all end up sharing a lemonade together afterwards.” For Interim City Manager, Luis Pedroza, that mix of community and culture is what sets Douglas apart from other cities. He shares, “The binational culture that’s here is unique from any other place that you go to. How we speak, how we celebrate, how we act with each other, how we hug when we see each other, it’s just a very warm and inviting type of culture that marries between the Mexican and American culture. It’s beautiful to be a part of that.” Situated along the U.S./Mexico border, Douglas has been the site of a port of entry to Mexico since 1914. An average of 60,000 trucks, 3.5 million cars, and 8 million people cross the country boundary each year, making it one of the region’s top gateways to Mexico. Over the last 18 months, work has been done to prepare for a second port of entry in the community, shifting commercial trucks five miles west of the current operation to a new state-of-the-art facility. The current port will remain open to non-commercial traffic, including cars, buses and pedestrians. The city is on edge, waiting to see if the Infrastructure Investments and Jobs Act will be passed by the House of Representatives this fall. That act will provide up to $17 billion in port infrastructure, including the funding needed for Douglas’s port improvements. “I think this is a critical point,” says Pedroza. “We are literally watching the news right now to see when this infrastructure bill is going to pass because this is the catalyst for what’s going to come to the city; $441 million into the City of Douglas. It’s