Sent as under to Mr. Khatri:
To: Citizenship and Immigration Ombudsman <Prakash.Khatri@dhs.gov>
Subject: Nominate CSC director Don Neufeld for Ombudsman's Annual Report to Congress
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ImmigrationPortal.Com
5225 N. Wilson Blvd. Arlington VA 22205
Phone: (703) 908-4800
United for Dignity, Equality and Acceptance
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Dear Mr. Khatri,
We are glad to see the recent progress in some areas since you took the position of
Citizenship and Immigration Ombudsman. We appreciate your efforts in reducing
the backlogs and improving the USCIS service quality. As a legal immigrant waiting
for the Adjustment of Status, I would like to contribute my part by nominating
the Director of California Service Center (CSC), Don Neufeld for your Annual Report to
Congress. Mr. Don Neufeld is nominated for the bad performance and poor service
quality of USCIS CSC, which is under his supervision.
First, CSC's performance on I-485 adjudication is the worst among all the service
centers. At some point in the past CSC use to be the best service center, but no more.
Below is a chart comparing the progress of I-485 adjudication in the four
service centers by means of the processing dates officially published by USCIS:
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01/15/2003 - 03/22/2004 432 days
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California 11/16/2001 - 01/09/2002 54 days
Texas 11/01/2000 - 07/16/2001 257 days
Vermont 10/15/2001 - 02/15/2002 123 days
Nebraska 08/01/2001 - 09/30/2001 60 days
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In the last 432 days (1 year and 2 months), CSC moved only 54 days
on I-485 applications. While the other centers moved 2 months to 8.5
in the same time frame. Whether or not the above dates, published by the USCIS are valid processing dates is not known, however this is the only scale by which we can measure the outcome of service.
Second, Mr. Don Neufeld has not been putting his efforts at all to reduce the huge
I-485 backlogs in CSC. He made a promise to the public that after completing adjudication of
the El Salvadoran applications for Temporary Protected Status (TPS) on March 9, 2004,
CSC will significantly increase resource allocation to I-485 adjudications. But we
haven't seen much progress yet. At the current resource allocation rate and processing rate, several of us will end up collecting our social sercurity checks and Green cards at the same time.
Third, job scheduling in CSC's I-485 case processing is extraodinarily poor, and
extreme unfairness is brought to those long term waiting applicants because of this
fact. From the posts of the members of ImmigrationPortal.Com on the recent activities
on their own cases, we learned that putting thousands of applications submitted in
late 2001 and early 2002 with expired Finger Prints aside, CSC is issuing Fingerprint notices
and RFE's to the late 2002 applicants and even late 2003 applicants.
Fourth, the service quality is poor in CSC. Many of the FAX and/or email inquiries
on cases that have been pending for over 2 years are not answered promptly, or even
been ignored.
For all the above causes, I believe Mr. Don Neufeld should be included in your report
to Congress. I also urge you, on behalf of all applicants to take cognizance of the delays in processing and put efforts to provide relief to all of us, who are suffering at the hands of the CSC.
Should you need any further information, please contact ImmigrationPortal.Com at the
address and phone number shown in the bottom of this letter;
or contact me at <my phone number>, <my email>,
or write to:
<my name>
<my address>
Thanks for your attention.
<my name>
Member, ImmigrationPortal.Com
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ImmigrationPortal.Com
5225 N. Wilson Blvd. Arlington VA 22205
Phone: (703) 908-4800
United for Dignity, Equality and Acceptance
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Lets do it!