Boston.com
By Maria Sacchetti
Globe Staff / January 25, 2008
Millions applied before fees were increased in July
Immigrants in Massachusetts and nationwide could wait 16 to 18 months - more than double the usual period - to become US citizens because of a massive backlog, leaving thousands possibly unable to vote in November.
The backlog is the result of millions of applications for citizenship, green cards, and work permits that swamped immigration offices last summer before hefty fee increases went into effect July 30.
Federal immigration officials across the nation are hiring hundreds of staff members, paying overtime, and streamlining bureaucracy to process the applications more quickly. In Boston, officials will add more officers and in March will add an extra day, Saturday, to help break up the backlog in citizenship interviews.
Officials in Massachusetts had hoped the delays would be shorter. But after opening hundreds of applications that came in before the fee increases, a process they finished just recently, they realized the wait could be as long as 18 months, which is also the national average. Before the fee change, the wait here was four to five months, and about six months nationally.
"We're hoping that people won't have to wait that long," said Shawn Saucier, spokesman for US Citizenship and Immigration Services. But, he added, "What we're facing is immense."
In Lowell, Phana Sin's heart sank after learning it could be more than a year before he becomes a citizen, because citizenship will help him bring his three children to the United States from Cambodia.
"It's too long," he said, shaking his head.
Advocacy groups are also critical of the processing slowdown, pointing out that immigrants were doing exactly what politicians and others have been urging them to do: learning English, studying US history and government, and getting in line to become citizens, especially so they can vote and officially have a stake in this country.
"It's unforgivable," said Juan Vega, executive director of Centro Latino, a nonprofit in Chelsea that prepares immigrants to become citizens. "Some of this anti-immigrant sentiment has been about how people should be more invested and become citizens. This community has worked toward that, and now the government is saying that they can't keep up with that demand?"
Lucy Pineda, founder and director of Everett-based Latinos United in Massachusetts, said she feared the delays were attempts by the Republican administration to thwart would-be Latino voters, who tend to vote Democratic nationally, in the presidential election. "Unfortunately, they're not going to be able to vote," she said. "They're trying to close the doors."
But Saucier said it is "absurd" to suggest that the delay is politically motivated, and pointed out that applications for citizenship and other benefits jumped even more than officials had anticipated after the July 30 fee hike, from $400 to $675.
By the end of 2007, more than 1 million citizenship applications were pending across the United States, almost double the previous year. As of December, pending applications soared to 27,134 in Massachusetts, also twice the previous year.
Applicants for legal permanent residency, known as green cards, and other benefits are also facing delays because of an influx of requests.
In July, the fee to apply for a green card more than doubled to $1,010 from $395. As of December, 832,173 green-card applications were pending in the nation, compared with 587,930 that were pending at the end of last year. Statewide figures are unavailable.
Immigration officials in Boston will expand the number of staff who decide immigration applications, help with paperwork and testing, and perform other duties, Saucier said. The number of officers who approve or reject applications will increase this year to 54 officers from 38 last year - and so will their workload. A typical officer conducts 12 interviews a day, but in March the goal will be 18.
In general, applicants for citizenship must be legal residents for five years, have a basic command of English, pass a test of US history and civics, have good moral character and swear to adhere the US Constitution. They also undergo background checks for security.
In Lowell, Phana Sin's application for citizenship is especially poignant because his full-time job, as citizenship coordinator for One Lowell, a nonprofit group that works with immigrants, is to help others become US citizens.
The 42-year-old former human rights worker fled death threats in his native Cambodia in 2001, applied for asylum, and married a US citizen. But he worries daily about the three children he had to leave behind, a 17-year-old stepdaughter and two sons, ages 15 and 13, whose mother died in 1999 of bone cancer.
He applied for citizenship in September and has thrown himself into his work. At kitchen tables and senior centers, he helps other immigrants fill out forms, pay the fees, and prepare for the oral examination of US history and civics. Because of his gentle manner - and command of five languages, English, Khmer, Vietnamese, Laotian, and Thai - his cellphone buzzes constantly with requests for help.
On Wednesday, he rode the commuter rail to Boston with seven other Cambodian immigrants, ages 35 to 64, so they could take the test. On the train, he quizzed them with flash cards - how many stars in the US flag, who is the Supreme Court chief justice, who is the mayor of their city?
He nodded reassuringly to them as they greeted the security guards at the towering John F. Kennedy federal building. Sometimes, Cambodian immigrants he assists are afraid of the uniformed guards, remembering the decades of war in their homeland. He reminds them that most Americans trace their roots to a foreign land.
"We are all the same," he says. America is the country of "second chances."
Last year, he helped more than 200 people become citizens - not counting the seven who passed their test Wednesday morning and two more that afternoon.
In the meantime, he waits his turn. "I wish my day would come, too," he said.
By Maria Sacchetti
Globe Staff / January 25, 2008
Millions applied before fees were increased in July
Immigrants in Massachusetts and nationwide could wait 16 to 18 months - more than double the usual period - to become US citizens because of a massive backlog, leaving thousands possibly unable to vote in November.
The backlog is the result of millions of applications for citizenship, green cards, and work permits that swamped immigration offices last summer before hefty fee increases went into effect July 30.
Federal immigration officials across the nation are hiring hundreds of staff members, paying overtime, and streamlining bureaucracy to process the applications more quickly. In Boston, officials will add more officers and in March will add an extra day, Saturday, to help break up the backlog in citizenship interviews.
Officials in Massachusetts had hoped the delays would be shorter. But after opening hundreds of applications that came in before the fee increases, a process they finished just recently, they realized the wait could be as long as 18 months, which is also the national average. Before the fee change, the wait here was four to five months, and about six months nationally.
"We're hoping that people won't have to wait that long," said Shawn Saucier, spokesman for US Citizenship and Immigration Services. But, he added, "What we're facing is immense."
In Lowell, Phana Sin's heart sank after learning it could be more than a year before he becomes a citizen, because citizenship will help him bring his three children to the United States from Cambodia.
"It's too long," he said, shaking his head.
Advocacy groups are also critical of the processing slowdown, pointing out that immigrants were doing exactly what politicians and others have been urging them to do: learning English, studying US history and government, and getting in line to become citizens, especially so they can vote and officially have a stake in this country.
"It's unforgivable," said Juan Vega, executive director of Centro Latino, a nonprofit in Chelsea that prepares immigrants to become citizens. "Some of this anti-immigrant sentiment has been about how people should be more invested and become citizens. This community has worked toward that, and now the government is saying that they can't keep up with that demand?"
Lucy Pineda, founder and director of Everett-based Latinos United in Massachusetts, said she feared the delays were attempts by the Republican administration to thwart would-be Latino voters, who tend to vote Democratic nationally, in the presidential election. "Unfortunately, they're not going to be able to vote," she said. "They're trying to close the doors."
But Saucier said it is "absurd" to suggest that the delay is politically motivated, and pointed out that applications for citizenship and other benefits jumped even more than officials had anticipated after the July 30 fee hike, from $400 to $675.
By the end of 2007, more than 1 million citizenship applications were pending across the United States, almost double the previous year. As of December, pending applications soared to 27,134 in Massachusetts, also twice the previous year.
Applicants for legal permanent residency, known as green cards, and other benefits are also facing delays because of an influx of requests.
In July, the fee to apply for a green card more than doubled to $1,010 from $395. As of December, 832,173 green-card applications were pending in the nation, compared with 587,930 that were pending at the end of last year. Statewide figures are unavailable.
Immigration officials in Boston will expand the number of staff who decide immigration applications, help with paperwork and testing, and perform other duties, Saucier said. The number of officers who approve or reject applications will increase this year to 54 officers from 38 last year - and so will their workload. A typical officer conducts 12 interviews a day, but in March the goal will be 18.
In general, applicants for citizenship must be legal residents for five years, have a basic command of English, pass a test of US history and civics, have good moral character and swear to adhere the US Constitution. They also undergo background checks for security.
In Lowell, Phana Sin's application for citizenship is especially poignant because his full-time job, as citizenship coordinator for One Lowell, a nonprofit group that works with immigrants, is to help others become US citizens.
The 42-year-old former human rights worker fled death threats in his native Cambodia in 2001, applied for asylum, and married a US citizen. But he worries daily about the three children he had to leave behind, a 17-year-old stepdaughter and two sons, ages 15 and 13, whose mother died in 1999 of bone cancer.
He applied for citizenship in September and has thrown himself into his work. At kitchen tables and senior centers, he helps other immigrants fill out forms, pay the fees, and prepare for the oral examination of US history and civics. Because of his gentle manner - and command of five languages, English, Khmer, Vietnamese, Laotian, and Thai - his cellphone buzzes constantly with requests for help.
On Wednesday, he rode the commuter rail to Boston with seven other Cambodian immigrants, ages 35 to 64, so they could take the test. On the train, he quizzed them with flash cards - how many stars in the US flag, who is the Supreme Court chief justice, who is the mayor of their city?
He nodded reassuringly to them as they greeted the security guards at the towering John F. Kennedy federal building. Sometimes, Cambodian immigrants he assists are afraid of the uniformed guards, remembering the decades of war in their homeland. He reminds them that most Americans trace their roots to a foreign land.
"We are all the same," he says. America is the country of "second chances."
Last year, he helped more than 200 people become citizens - not counting the seven who passed their test Wednesday morning and two more that afternoon.
In the meantime, he waits his turn. "I wish my day would come, too," he said.
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