09/30/03 Sunset of Special Immigration Laws for Non-Minister Religious Workers and Pe
http://www.immigration-law.com/Canada.html
05/18/2003:
09/30/03 Sunset of Special Immigration Laws for Non-Minister Religious Workers and Pending Cases
* Currently, the qualified religious workers other than Minister occupation are allowed to file a special immigrant petition (I-360) and once the petition is approved, they file I-485 to get a green card. Except the occupation of Minister, though, the law on the special immigration for these religious workers lasts only for three years and unless the Congress extends or reenact the law, the law is expected to sunset at the end of September 30, 2003. Under the current law, the people who started this green card process should obtain "approval of I-485" before the law sunsets. Since September 30 is only approximately four months away, the people who have filed either I-360 or the subsequent I-485 are nervous about the situation.
* For some reasons, the Congress has been passing law to extend this law for three years at the last minute during last several years, driving the religious organizations and their religious workers into a breath-taking situation. It is expected that soon, the Christian religious organizations, particularly Catholics, will pump up their lobbying efforts, pressuring the Congress to introduce and pass the extension bill.
* However, there is no guarantee that the Congress will indeed pass such law again, or even if they do, whether they will pass a law giving the special immigrant benefits to all the religious workers on identical conditions and terms as they did it in the past. People should thus live with the current situation of sunset of the law at the end of September. It has been the immigration agency practice for the past several years that as the date of sunset of this law approaches, they expedited the pending I-360 or Special Immigrant I-485 cases so that these cases be adjudicated before the end of September. Thus far, though, there is no official announcement by the BCIS instructing the Service Centers to handle these pipeline cases on "expedite basis."
* Thank God, we have some good news for these waiters.
All the four Service Centers have indicated that they were aware of this sunset problem, and intend to adjudicate the pending cases as much as possible before the end of September! Additionally, the AILA is working with the BCIS to induce the agency to announce "expedite policy" for these cases. It appears that the reaction of the BCIS is somewhat positive and the BCIS may soon release such announcement.
* The people in the pipeline should also not neglect their own duties to assist the agency, assuming that the agency will adopt such expedite policy. Four months is a very short period of time. Unless the people collect all the evidence ahead of time against the upcoming potential RFE (Request for Evidence), even if the Service Centers wants to assist them, they may not have enough time to complete their cases before the midnight of September 30, 2003. Law does not, and should not, help those who sleep on their obligations and duties!! Remember that
once the agency starts expediting of these cases, some of your colleagues in I-485 quieu will suffer, even though negligible, as additional resources within the agency should be shifted to adjudication of these cases. You should be thankful to your colleagues!
It is good to see so many new faces. The rest of us know each other a little too well now (just shows how long we have been waiting together).
