US lists fee hikes for new citizens

US Citizenship and Immigration Services announced its long-awaited, and much-dreaded, schedule of fee increases yesterday.

As of July 30, when the fee hikes go into effect, it will cost an individual $675 to file a citizenship application. The current fee is $400.

The increases are expected to raise an extra $1 billion for the Citizenship and Immigration Services Department, which processes 6 million to 8 million applications each year, including those from immigrants seeking citizenship, legal permanent residency, or green cards; work authorizations; asylum petitions; and US citizen petitions to bring fiancées or adopted children into the country.

The extra money will be used to cover existing costs, which outstrip revenues at the fee-based agency, and to improve services, spokesman Shawn Saucier said.

But immigrant advocates across the country blasted the increases yesterday, saying they will put citizenship even farther out of reach for immigrants in low-wage jobs who are already struggling to pay the fees.

"In spite of thousands of comments to the contrary, the Bush Administration moved forward to put another brick in the wall to citizenship," said Ali Noorani, executive director of the Massachusetts Immigrant and Refugee Advocacy Coalition. "There is no indication that services will improve, but fees are increasing. There are no changes to the system so that a person or a family can become citizens in a more efficient manner. It's still bureaucracy run amok. And now it's just a more expensive bureaucracy."

Saucier countered that the fee increases are meant to make it faster and more efficient for immigrants to become citizens, not to add to their burdens.

Currently, immigrants who file citizenship applications in Boston wait seven months for them to be processed. Saucier said the new revenues will be used to reduce waiting time by 20 percent by the end of fiscal 2008.

"Obviously no one wants to pay more money, but it's an economic reality that the fees we charge right now do not cover our costs," he said. "We want to provide better services, and the advocates want to see better services, and the only way of raising resources is raising fees."

Since announcing the proposed increases in February, CIS has received 3,900 comments, most of them objecting to the hikes.

"We really did listen to the comments," Saucier said.

As a result, fees for families and children applying for certain status adjustments have been reduced or eliminated, compared with those the department originally proposed, he said.