Life, friends and business: February 2008

This is a letter I wrote to Congresswoman Judy Biggert (Rep, Illinois 13th District) as a part of a campaign being run by my friends at IV.

2^7th Feb 2008

The Honorable House Representative
13^th District of Illinois State
Ms. Judy Biggert
6262, South Route 83, Suite 305

Willowbrook, IL, 60527

Re: Administrative fixes to alleviate issues faced by highly-skilled immigrants in Illinois.

Respected Congresswoman Ms. Biggert,

I am a constituent of the 13^th District of Illinois State and an employment-based highly-skilled immigrant to the United States. I develop highly complex software for major nationwide business corporations in the United States. To be able to do this job, I am educated with a Bachelor’s degree in Engineering and also a Masters in Business Administration. Further, I have almost 8 years of progressive experience in my area of expertise. I'm also a member of Immigration Voice, a not-for-profit grassroots organization working to fix the issues faced by highly-skilled legal immigrants like myself. Currently a million immigrants and their families are stuck in the immigration process due to insufficient visa numbers and processing delays at the agency US Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS). Going by the publicly available statistics, these legal, highly capable and skilled immigrants may have to wait anywhere between 6 to 12 years to receive their green cards. During these 6 to 12 years, large corporate US-based employers for whom these immigrants work face declining productivity and lack of flexibility to employ these skilled immigrants. This is a huge deterrent to new immigrants and an encouragement for skilled labor to flee the United States. This is also a personally and professionally harming situation to be in for the highly skilled immigrants like me. This situation can be alleviated if your office decides to take positive action directed towards the economic betterment of these immigrants, your district, the state of Illinois and the United States. Your person and your office have the power to change the law and in effect change the lives of many people – including these immigrants.

Though Immigration Voice is interested in seeing positive legislative change enacted by the US Congress, we want to participate in the legal process and allow it to happen through the constitutional process of introducing bills that get debated, voted upon and ultimately signed into law. In the meantime, Immigration Voice has proposed the following points to President Bush's administration to fix some of the issues administratively. I urge you to support this cause by writing a letter to the President of United States to implement these administrative fixes as soon as possible. I have provided the content of the letter that you could possibly send to the 43^rd President of the United States Mr. George Bush.

“

Respected President Bush,

I urge you to implement the following administrative fixes immediately to help the highly-skilled immigrants waiting their turn in a severely backlogged system.

1) Recapture 218,000 unused visas wasted over the past few years administratively, in line with Congressional intent of providing 140,000 visas annually to our community.

2) Flexibility in the USCIS interpretation of "same and similar" jobs, to allow promotions and job mobility. Current USCIS rule is restrictive and pushes the applicant to the end of the line, if they accept promotions.

3) Allow filing of 'Adjustment of Status Applications', even when visa numbers are not available. This will not create an increase in visas, but will allow a number of immigrants to avail the benefits of changing jobs while waiting for their visa numbers.

4) Increase the period of Employment Authorization Document (work authorization) and Advance Parole (travel permit) to 3 years instead of the current practice of providing it for 1 year. This will reduce the burden on USCIS and on immigrants. It will also make travel to an immigrant's home country easier during emergencies.

5) Allow visa revalidation in the US as before. Currently, immigrants have to travel to their home country to renew their visas. If it was performed here in the US, it would be helpful in making it easier to travel back and forth during emergencies.

6) Restart premium processing for I-140 applications. Now that USCIS has cleared the receipting backlog, premium processing should be made available. Without it, many immigrants are unable to extend their stay beyond 6 years, if their labor certification was applied for after the completion of their 5th year of stay in the US.

As a really relevant opinion, I want to bring to your notice paragraph 2 of page 407 in the book titled “The Age of Turbulence” written by Former Chairman of the Federal Reserve Bank Mr. Alan Greenspan. This paragraph is part of the book’s 21^st Chapter that focuses on issues related to “Education and Income Equality” in the future of United States. He clearly states a business case for easy and flexible immigration policy as far as skilled labor immigration is concerned. I hope you and your office will use this to formulate your political case on the same cause: “Education and Income Inequality”. Please read the enclosed copy of this opinion.

Respectfully,

Mr. Sachin Sudhakar Dole

3615 Arlington Ct
Aurora, IL 60504
(630) 270 3102
sachin.dole@gmail.com
Web-site : http://www.immigrationvoice.org