News Update - January 19, 2008
By Alan Lee, Esq.†‡
USCIS Director Gonzales Testifies to Long Delays as the Reward
for Fee Increases and Improvement Years Away
USCIS Director Emilio Gonzalez testified before Congress on January
17, 2008 about application processing delays, their causes and what
the Service plans to do about them. Gonzalez stated that there was
a surge of applicants in anticipation of recent fee increases in
a magnitude far greater than has occurred when previous fee changes
occurred. In the summer of 2007 over 3 million applications and
petitions were received. He attributes increased filings to a surge
of naturalization applications and employment-based visa filings
following the July visa bulletin fiasco. There were 300,000 adjustment
of status applications and that number added with applications for
work authorization and travel documents ballooned to 800,000. The
3 million applications received over the summer dwarf the 1.8 million
received the previous summer.
The result of this “surge” according to Gonzalez, was
a delay for green card applicants and receipting of naturalization
applications. I-130 petitions for relatives, a prerequisite to family-based
green card applications, are also backlogged in a lockbox and USCIS
is 3 months behind in receipting those petitions.
Security checks have also delayed adjudication of naturalization
applications. The Director promised advancement in technology and
automation including improving the background check process, but
did not state how the USCIS would or could do it. In addition, the
USCIS is hiring additional workers, re-hiring retirees and annual
workers and having workers work overtime to catch-up with the backlog.
Director Gonzalez told Congress that the surge of applications
will impact processing times for the next couple of years. Processing
times for naturalization cases have increased from 7 months to 18
months. Family-based green card applications have increased from
a stated average of 6 months to 12 months.
Preparation for the surge included advising the public and posting
a list of “frequently asked questions” as well as expanding
work hours and adding 84 staff members to Service Centers.
|