(CNN) -- Spending millions of dollars to revamp remote border crossings in Montana and North Dakota is an "unbelievable waste" of stimulus money, Sen. Byron Dorgan of North Dakota said Friday.

Dorgan, chairman of the Democratic Policy Committee, in September had asked Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano to re-evaluate plans to spend up to $15 million apiece on border stations that only a few vehicles pass through to reach Canada.

After a monthlong review by an independent panel, Napolitano announced October 30 that the projects would proceed as planned, but less money will be spent on each station.

Dorgan made clear he is not ready to let the matter drop.

"I'm not for wasting money," he told CNN. "And this notion of rebuilding ... small ports of entry, on average with four or five vehicles an hour, and spending 10 or 12 million dollars at each of them -- I think it is an unbelievable waste of money." Nine of the crossings are in his state, he said.

Other members of Congress, the Government Accounting Office and the Homeland Security inspector general also raised concerns about the spending under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act.

Napolitano said the upgrades will take place as planned, .

The independent review found that the port-of-entry projects were "based on a transparent, merit-based process and used reasonable and well-justified cost estimates," Napolitano said in a news release last month.

She said reviewers said that without new construction the ports would fail to "provide the tools needed ... [to] guard against terrorist threats," endangering law enforcement personnel and falling short of post-September 11 security standards.

Of the 43 ports of entry owned by the U.S. Customs and Border Protection agency, 39 are along the northern U.S. border, where the average age of the ports is more than 40 years old, the Department of Homeland Security said.

Of those, 33 are to be completely modernized, using stimulus funds, and others are to receive emergency repairs.

Mark Chabot -- whose family has been farming land adjacent to the border crossing in Scobey, Montana, for generations -- said that in the winter there are days when not a single car passes through.

The idea to build a new border station at a cost of $15 million, he said, could only have come from Washington.

And community leader Burl Bowler, who also lives in Scobey, said, "Well, I think everybody was pretty much blown away we're spending $31 million in Daniels County on new border stations. I believe they need to update, but that's kind of a crazy number."

-- From CNN's Drew Griffin, Special Investigations Unit

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