State’s number of legal immigrants takes jump

Friday, Sept. 6, 2002 | 9:11 a.m.

Nevada statistics reflected a nationwide increase in legal immigrants, according to an annual report by the federal government.

The report, covering Oct. 1, 2000 to Sept. 30, 2001, showed a jump from 849,807 to 1,064,318 legal immigrants nationally, an increase of about 25 percent, according to the Immigration and Naturalization Service.

The number of legal immigrants in Nevada went from 7,827 to 9,618 in the same period, an increase of about 23 percent.

Although the numbers for Nevada placed it 21st in the nation, states such as Oregon, Minnesota, Connecticut and Colorado, with only several thousand more legal immigrants, have anywhere from 1.4 to 2.9 million more residents than Nevada.

"We're definitely a draw for immigrants, mostly due to our jobs in the service sector," said Karen Dorman, officer-in-charge for the Las Vegas INS office.

The increase was largely a result of faster processing times for applications by immigrants already living in the United States, said Niki Edwards, spokeswoman for the INS.

Facing a backlog of more than 1 million such applications, the federal agency was able to drop processing times from an average of 30 months to 11 months during the period covered by the report.

"We have seen the same drop in processing times here in Nevada," said Julia Osborne, a Las Vegas immigration attorney. "Many of my cases are taking less than a year."

Dorman said her staff is currently working at a clip of 12 to 14 months per application.

The report also showed that 64 percent of the country's legal immigrants were sponsored by family members with citizenship.

Local observers said that Nevada may actually have a higher percentage of immigrants who were sponsored by family members.

"I would think that employment-based visas might be lower here," said Peter Ashman, a Las Vegas immigration attorney. "There aren't as many professionals entering on these kinds of visas because of the job market here."

Five countries of origin accounted for 40 percent of immigrants nationwide: Mexico, India, China, the Philippines and Vietnam.

The situation is slightly different here, Dorman said.

"Although Mexico accounts for most of our legal immigrants, the other countries we see in Nevada are the Philippines, El Salvador and Cuba, and different Eastern bloc countries, like Bulgaria," she said.

Osborne and Ashman both noted that next year's figures on legal immigration may show another spike, since many people who have lived in the United States for years decided to pursue applications with the INS after Sept. 11.

Also, hundreds of thousands of people nationwide adjusted their status through a law called 245-I that expired in April 2001.

"There's no telling how these two factors will affect the 2002 numbers," Ashman said.