[teachermom]

PLEASE, read this and respond. This will effect all adoptive families. We can stop this. Let your voice be heard by April 2.

Fees are increasing at USCIS, and there is very little time left to voice our objection. The following is an outline on how the increase affects adoption and what we can do, as a group, to stop the increase. Please feel free to forward this message to any agency, listserv, group or individual who can help to eliminate the fee increases affecting adoption. We only have a week left to act on this.

Fee Increase Proposal
On February 1, 2007, USCIS published a Notice of Proposed Rule Making in the Federal Register that would substantially raise filing fees for most types of cases. If the proposed rule is adopted, filing fees would increase by an average of 66% over current fees. The proposed rule is subject to a 60-day comment period that ends on April 2, 2007. At the end of the comment period, USCIS will review and consider the comments it has received on its proposed rule. USCIS will then send its final proposal to the Office of Management and Budget for review. The OMB will make a final decision on the fee increase and issue the final rule

Fortunately, the “adjusted” fees will not take effect until the public has an opportunity to comment. The comment period is 60 days beginning February 1, 2007, and ending on April 2, 2007. The increase in fees should not become effective until June 2007 at the earliest.

Adoption-Related Petitions Affected by the Proposed Increase
I-600/600A Petition to Classify Orphan as an Immediate Relative from $545 to $670
N-565 Application for Replacement of Certificate of Citizenship (used for name changes) from $220 to $380
N-600 Application for Certificate of Citizenship from $255 to $460
Biometric Services (fingerprints) from $70 to $80

Submit Your Comments to USCIS by April 2, 2007
Anyone may comment on the proposed regulation. Those interested in commenting should take time to review the proposed regulation and formulate logical, potentially persuasive statements. Comments will be made public, as they will be posted as submitted at Regulations.gov. One should NOT include any personal detail unless s/he is willing to share it freely. While no one likes prices to go up, simply complaining about the increase in costs is unlikely to have an impact.

Comments must be received by April 2, 2007, and must reference the agency name (U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services), as well as the docket number (USCIS-2006-0044). Comments may be submitted at Regulations.gov the Federal eRulemaking Portal, or via mail or courier, in hardcopy, disk, or CD-ROM form to:

Director, Management Division
U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services
Department of Homeland Security
111 Massachusetts Avenue, NW, 3rd Floor
Washington D.C. 20529

Voicing your opinion makes you part of the democratic process, and this is how the U.S. government and legal systems are supposed to work. Although most of us hesitate to publicly comment, the government really does carefully consider the content of comments, as well as the sheer number of those responding. When USCIS introduced regulations to reduce the time for B-2 tourist visits from six months to 30 days, for example, there were more than 10,000 comments. That convinced the USCIS to shelve the proposal. Remember, the key is the QUANTITY of responses they get. It should not be difficult to get at least 10,000 of us to comment. Please take the time today to do this.

Together, we CAN make a difference!*

* Written by: Patti Urban, Director of Development, New England, Reaching Out Thru International Adoption. This is not an endorsement of Reaching Out or Patti Urban, just passing along vital information


Here are instructions someone posted on another group that make it
easy to find:

Go to Regulations.gov Choose
"Search for: Documents Open for Public Comment". From the dropdown
menu for Agency, select USCIS (the very last one in the list). Under
Document Type, select Proposed Rules. Under Keyword or ID, type in
USCIS-2006-0044, then Exact Phrase and Submit. It'll bring up a
Document Search Results. In the far right column (Comments Add/Due
By), there is a yellow icon. Click on it and it'll bring up a fill
in the blanks kind of form. Remember that all comments are public
information, so you should not include personal details unless you
want that information shared publicly

[Guatemomtobe]

Does anyone have a sample of what you submitted with logical, well thought out responses so we aren't just submitting "emotional" responses.

Susan

[krafmatic]

While I think it is important to make a response, i agree that a well thought out response in important. An emotional "It already costs so much!" will have little/to no effect.
Is anyone out there that can compose a well written response that we can all slightly modify and send seperately?

[Beachbaby]

I'm all for saving money....but if the increased fees will go to hiring more staff, I don't know if I'd object .... is that wrong? I'm not made of money, but if it saves you some weeks/months in the process, I'd be ok with it.

[rapf777]

well golly, like we have all of these extra money in our back pockets.

Rose

[nathansvolunteers]

Bumping for any of our great writers....

[umber]

HA!!!!! Please allow me to share my latest adventure with USCIS:
I mailed in my I600A last week. As I'm certain you all did, I checked that all my documents were enclosed, then rechecked, and checked again, and of course before sealing the envelope checked one more time. Ialso paper clipped everything together so no one would leave any of the documents behind in the envelope. Saturday I received a letter from USCIS and thought 'Wow, they're fast!" I open it and it says that they received my application and check but need all the other documents (i.e. HS, BC, MC). WHAT?! A chimp could have seen that everything was attached (no offense to chimps)! Then they also wrote a question about my husband's name change... Hmmmm, how would they know about that unless they received paperwork? I was furious, but of course you can't call them, no phone number! So someone on this board told me about getting an appointment via the internet (THANK YOU!) so I detailed my issue online and made an appointment for Tuesday morning. When I get there and speak to the agent I'm informed that the one person who does those applications (badly, I might add) HAS TUESDAYS OFF!!!!!! What?! I want her job!
So when I hear that they WANT more money I have to laugh. I've never received a raise when I'm incompetent! Sounds like throwing good money after bad.
OK, that's vent.

[DPline]

Originally Posted by umber

HA!!!!! Please allow me to share my latest adventure with USCIS:
I mailed in my I600A last week. As I'm certain you all did, I checked that all my documents were enclosed, then rechecked, and checked again, and of course before sealing the envelope checked one more time. Ialso paper clipped everything together so no one would leave any of the documents behind in the envelope. Saturday I received a letter from USCIS and thought 'Wow, they're fast!" I open it and it says that they received my application and check but need all the other documents (i.e. HS, BC, MC). WHAT?! A chimp could have seen that everything was attached (no offense to chimps)! Then they also wrote a question about my husband's name change... Hmmmm, how would they know about that unless they received paperwork? I was furious, but of course you can't call them, no phone number! So someone on this board told me about getting an appointment via the internet (THANK YOU!) so I detailed my issue online and made an appointment for Tuesday morning. When I get there and speak to the agent I'm informed that the one person who does those applications (badly, I might add) HAS TUESDAYS OFF!!!!!! What?! I want her job!
So when I hear that they WANT more money I have to laugh. I've never received a raise when I'm incompetent! Sounds like throwing good money after bad.
OK, that's vent.

Holy moly! That takes the cake! You poor thing. I hope you get it worked out soon!

I feel the same way. IF I really thought an increase in fee would mean an increase in service ok (well, not ok, but . . . .) but I am way too cynical to believe the fees will make any difference.

[tinaedmond]

I just tried to read the docket. You probably need a law or statistics degree to make heads or tails of it. So how can the layman comment from an educated standpoint?

Tina

[nwparents]

I wish it were free, but, USCIS is an entirely fee-based operation. Apparently, congress doesn't want ordinary tax-payers to foot the bill for the organization - only those who use it. According to what I've read, the fees are on par with Canada and other Westernized countries. With the increased security checks and other background checks needed in a post Sept. 11th world, unfortunately, someone has to pay. The ordinary waiting time for a petition is 6 months. We (I-600A people) get processed in 60 days (at least we do here in WI)- that is premium processing time, folks, and unfortuntely, we have to fork forward the old dinero to get that type of service ....I'm willing, as long as I don't have to wait like the rest of them. But, am I overjoyed about the increase - no way.

[umber]

I'm probably going to start a new thread about this but I received my I-797 today (again, I thought Wow... but with major apprehension.) I open it up and it has my appointment for our finger prints but under case type they have I600... not I600A!!! Please tell me that that is correct! I spoke to 3 different agents at the national USCIS "customer service" who said "ummm, I don't know. I think you should be OK." Think?? I'm not going half way around the world for "ummm, I think you'll be OK."
ARGH!

[umber]

bumping, hoping some morning people have an answer for me.
Thanks

[DPline]

I replyed to your other thread also, but just to make sure you see it . . . I pulled out our fingerprint letter and ours said the same thing - I600.

We made it through no problem and my kids have been home two years, so you should be all set.