I first want to congratulate the gentleman from New Jersey. the chairman. and the gentleman from Kentucky. the chairman of the subcommittee. for what I think is an excellent bill. I certainly intend to support it. The intention of this amendment. which I will ask unanimous consent to withdraw after a statement of position. is to point out that probably the worst problem we have in all the casework we do in my district is with the Immigration and Naturalization Service. It is an acute problem in all their offices. but especially in the Miami field office. In Miami. they have only 3.2 percent of all the INS personnel outside Washington and yet they are processing 4.7 percent of the nationwide applications for changes in status and they are processing 6 percent of applications for naturalization. This amendment as offered would correct that imbalance. so although I intend to support the chairmans bill. the committees bill. on the much needed restoration of these positions that are targeted for destruction. these positions that were targeted for elimination. I would hope that through this statement on this amendment that INS will understand that the priorities need to be rearranged and some additional personnel are needed to address the problems of just being swamped with applications in Miami. It is not uncommon for it to take 6 weeks for them merely to respond when a Congressman in Florida inquires about an immigration problem.
Keywords matched
Naturalization Immigration immigration naturalization