Thread: Oklahoma City joins program to fast-track immigration

http://www.newsok.com/article/2978976

Oklahoma City has become one of only three places in the nation where eligible immigrants are fast-tracked to get green cards.

Citizenship and Immigration Services announced last week it was expanding a pilot program that started in Dallas to include Oklahoma City and El Paso, Texas.

The goal of the District Office Rapid Adjudication program is to get green cards — the document indicating someone is a legal permanent resident — into the hands of eligible immigrants in 90 days.

It now takes at least eight months.

The program was expanded because of its success in Dallas, said Maria Elena Garcia-Upson, an immigration services spokeswoman.

"It's absolutely a success. The media loves it, but more important, the applicants like it," she said.

Oklahoma City and El Paso were selected because both are in the central region with Dallas and neither has a big application backlog, Garcia-Upson said.

The expansion got mixed reviews from two Oklahoma City immigration lawyers.

"It's good news. It's going to help tremendously," said Douglas Stump, a national director of the American Immigration Lawyers Association.

Stump said he has filed more than 18 lawsuits on behalf of immigrants who allege unreasonable delays in getting their green cards.

But E. Vance Winningham was withholding judgment.

In Dallas, the short-cut process worked only 60 percent of the time, leaving 40 percent of immigrant applicants out in the cold if they did not also apply for interim travel and employment documents at additional cost, he said.

"It's kind of strange to set up a program that's bound to fail 40 percent of the time," Winningham said.

The change affects only immigrants who by law do not have to wait to get a visa — mostly those with an immediate relative who is a U.S. citizen. (The parents, spouses and minor children of U.S. citizens are entitled to legal permanent resident status no matter how many visas the government has allotted.)

Often, those relatives arrive on tourist or student visas, then apply to change their status to legal permanent resident. Until now, they mailed applications to a Citizenship and Immigration Services address in Chicago, then waited for the government to complete a security check and schedule an interview. The process takes eight to 10 months, Garcia-Upson said.

Under the expanded program, immigrants will schedule an interview via computer, then hand-carry their applications to the interview. If the application package is complete, an immigration officer will proceed with the interview and the process will be complete as soon as the security check is finished.

"It's great sounding, to get your card in 90 days. We'll just see," Winningham said.

DORA program
The District Office Rapid Adjudications pilot program is an attempt by U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services to speed up processing of green card applications.

In its first 18 months in Dallas:

• 10,973 cases were accepted for processing from May 2004 to August 2005• 8,797 were completed by the end of November 2005• 6,347 were completed within 90 days

Source: U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services ombudsman Prakash I. Khatri

"It's absolutely a success. The media loves it, but more important, the applicants like it," she said.

correct....that IS more important. Smelling salts please!