Bidding on the Border Wall: Local company hopeful project will bring jobs to area

NORTHBRIDGE, Mass. — A local company is hoping to bring new jobs to the area by helping to build the controversial border wall along the border with Mexico.

Riverdale Mills in Northbridge is an old paper mill that now employs 200 people. These days, steel wire fills the factory. The wire mesh made there is used to for things like lobster traps and baby gates.

But it has also been used along 31 miles of the U.S.-Mexico border in Arizona and California, and it secures the Kuwait-Iraq border.

Riverdale hopes the companies that are bidding on the border project with the federal government will use their project there too.

BETTER THAN CONCRETE

The C.E.O. told Boston 25 News, the wire mesh works better than concrete, because you can see through it, and the mesh will pass air and water if there's a flood in the area.

The narrow spaces make it difficult to climb and hard to cut.

"We sent the product down to Fort Bragg many years ago to be tested. It takes a Special Forces person about 6 seconds to get through chain link and it took almost 45 minutes for them to get through our product," said Riverdale CEO James Knott.

Knott says that buys border security officers’ time. He says Riverdale Mills is the only factory in the nation with machines that can make this mesh.

NOTHING TO DO WITH POLITICS

"It has nothing to do with politics - but if it's going to happen, we'd like to be part of it," said Knott.

Cox Media Group