Thread: Immigration Chief Has Ambitious Plans

Immigration Chief Has Ambitious Plans
April 20, 2007

MIAMI - The chief of immigration services is pressing ahead with hefty application fee increases despite skepticism among critics about his plans to revolutionize an agency long derided by immigrants as inefficient, unfriendly and beyond hope.

Fee increases, now scheduled to take effect in June, would raise the cost of applying for a green card from $325 to $905 and citizenship from $330 to $595 - generating about $1 billion more a year than the agency now has in its annual budget.

In an exclusive interview with The Miami Herald last week, Emilio Gonzalez - director of U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services - promised that the higher fee revenue will help end chronic delays, move offices in run-down buildings to comfortable new facilities, replace paper applications that must be mailed with electronic forms that can be filed online and turn rude or inattentive employees into well-trained customer-friendly staffers.

Gonzalez concedes that past fee increases by the agency, once part of the old Immigration and Naturalization Service, didn't always speed up the process.

"For too many years, immigration, INS, was always sort of like the ... stepchild of the Department of Justice," Gonzalez said. "It was just sort of like an adjunct agency out there that did the best they could with the resources given to them, and what I wanted to do was ... turn it on its head. This is a world-class agency. This is the United States of America."

Gonzalez's ambitious strategy comes at a pivotal time - when the nation is experiencing a surge in legal and illegal immigration and as Congress gears up to debate immigration reform once again. If reform passes, USCIS would have to process millions more applications from undocumented immigrants for temporary work permits and eventually green cards and citizenship.

Gonzalez plans to have his agency prepared for the paperwork onslaught with a one-stop shopping approach that would legalize immigrants' status without compromising U.S. security.

His goal is to create a system so simple that immigrants won't need to hire attorneys.

"The system should be so user-friendly that one should not be scared to get into the system without having to consult an attorney," Gonzalez said in a recent interview while in Miami, where the Cuban American keeps a home with his wife and two grown daughters.

His plans call for 1,500 new immigration officers, online applications and 39 new facilities - all aimed at processing green cards or citizenship applications in six months or less.

Within five years, he said, immigrants could be summoned to interviews at facilities resembling bank branches. Officers would review applications by calling up records on computer screens instead of retrieving them on paper from offices across the country or from piles of millions of old files stored at an underground cave in Missouri.

Immigrants without computers would be able to use terminals at USCIS offices to file applications with help from federal employees.

"If I come here as a student, and I want to adjust my status to something else, I have to go and apply. And if after that I want to be a legal permanent resident, I apply again. And if I want to be a citizen, I apply again," Gonzalez said. "One person could have six or seven different files with our agency. That's ludicrous."

Fee increases, now scheduled to take effect in June, would raise the cost of applying for a green card from $325 to $905 and citizenship from $330 to $595.

Increased fees are needed, Gonzalez said, to end chronic annual shortfalls. By law, the agency must rely almost entirely on fees, now at about $1.25 billion annually.

Before issuing a green card or swearing in a naturalized U.S. citizen, Gonzalez's agency needs a green light from the FBI that the immigrant is not a terrorist or a criminal. Tens of thousands of applications are now delayed waiting for the FBI to complete the background checks.

Ninety seven percent of applicants are cleared in less than six months, Gonzalez said, but three percent get stuck in name check limbo. The situation has led thousands to sue Gonzalez's agency.

Gonzalez is negotiating with the FBI on ways to speed the process as early as September. One solution: his agency may pay the FBI more money and provide trained clerks to cut back on delays.

Immigration advocates have been unhappy with the plan, calling the proposed fees - in some cases almost $1,000 - outrageous. But even if immigrants can pay - USCIS will waive the fee in hardship cases - some advocates are skeptical that the agency will deliver better services.

"The goal is a good one, but our experience is promises of improvement after fee increases have not been met," said Flavia Jimenez, an immigration and policy analyst with the National Council of La Raza in Washington.

But some political observers predict Gonzalez won't be able to accomplish much as the 2008 presidential election draws near.

"He can promise the world, but he is not going to be around when it fails," said Miami attorney Tammy Fox-Isicoff, a former immigration official.

"Our commitment is, 'yes, the fees are going up, but let me show you what you're getting in return.'"

http://www.hispanicbusiness.com/news/ne ... olitics%2F

His plans call for 1,500 new immigration officers, online applications and 39 new facilities - all aimed at processing green cards or citizenship applications in six months or less.

This is beyond DISTURBING!

Why is there a NEED for this tremendous increase in officers?

This one really needs attention