I read these minutes from Parliament's Standing Committee on Citizenship and Immigration interviewing the Buffalo VO Program Manager a while back and today's news reminded me of it. Still think it's a good read.
Sad to see one of the most - if not the most - efficient visa office closing down. I hope that the knowledge the folks in Buffalo have gained gets put to good use in NYC and to hopefully make things faster for Vegreville too. I also wish the best for the folks who have been working very hard on all the applications in Buffalo.
"The Chair (Mr. David Tilson (Dufferin—Caledon, CPC)):
Good morning, ladies and gentlemen.
This is the Standing Committee on Citizenship and Immigration, meeting 47. Today we are televised, and pursuant to Standing Order 108(2) we are studying the immigration application process and wait times.
Today it's no different from the program we had at the last meeting. We have three groups of witnesses, and the meeting will be divided into three. The first group will end at 9:25 and the second group at 10:05, as you can see from the agenda.
We have with us today Mr. Gilbert—once again, sir, good morning to you—who is the director general of the international region. He will introduce our witnesses from the Department of Citizenship and Immigration in Buffalo.
Sir, you have the floor to introduce your colleagues.
Mr. Rénald Gilbert (Director General, International Region, Department of Citizenship and Immigration):
First, thank you very much for the invitation, Mr. Chair.
I'd like to introduce to you Burke Thornton and Catherine Bailey, who are from our office in Buffalo. Burke is the area director responsible for all the U.S. mission. He is also responsible for the office in the Caribbean. So he's the area director of the first group you met here two weeks ago. The office in Buffalo has produced the most visas of any office that CIC has. Burke is going to describe what they do.
The Chair:
Good morning, Mr. Thornton and Ms. Bailey. You can hear us?
Mr. Burke Thornton (Immigration Program Manager, Buffalo, New York, Department of Citizenship and Immigration):
Yes--loud and clear.
The Chair:
That's good.
Mr. Thornton, I assume it will be you, but one of you has up to seven minutes to make a presentation to us. We thank you for taking the time to speak to us this morning.
You may proceed.
Mr. Burke Thornton:
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
I'd like to thank the committee for inviting us to speak.
As Mr. Gilbert has indicated, my name is Burke Thornton, and I'm the immigration program manager in Buffalo. I am joined by Catherine Bailey, who is our deputy program manager.
I'd like to provide a short overview of the program in Buffalo, emphasizing some topics that I believe would be of interest to the committee.
We are an office of 51 people, including Canada-based officers and local staff. Approximately half our staff are Canadian citizens and residents who commute from the nearby communities of Fort Erie, St. Catharines, and the Niagara region, across the bridge daily, to work at our consulate in Buffalo.
I will start the description of the program with the temporary residence program.
Our movement is incredibly varied. We have applicants from more than 160 countries applying at the consulate in Buffalo. Only a very small part of this non-immigrant movement are U.S. citizens, because visitors are visa-exempt, and most U.S. students and workers apply directly at ports of entry into Canada.
Our temporary resident program has been characterized by continuous growth over the past few years. We have set a new record for output every year since 2005. Our intake has increased 64% since 2005, and 25% in the past two years alone.
We have now surpassed New York, our colleagues in New York, as the U.S. mission with the highest non-immigrant application intake, and we have made the top-ten list globally.
Acceptance rates are much higher than global norms, running to about 94% or 95%, as most of our applicants have already been admitted to Canada or the U.S.A. So we have the advantage of having, if you like, a pre-screening done on those applicants.
While we offer walk-in service four mornings a week, approximately 80% of applications are submitted by mail, and we have established a post office box in Fort Erie, Ontario, just across the bridge, so that our Canadian clients can submit applications entirely using the Canadian postal system. Because of the high percentage of mail-in applications, our processing times are lengthier than in most offices where walk-in service is the norm, but still approximately 67% are finalized in 14 days or less.
Here is just a word about students. Our numbers have increased 54% in the last two years. Most of our applicants live in Canada. Korea is the country from which we have the highest intake, with about 18%, and that's followed by the U.S.A., running about 12%.
With regard to temporary foreign workers, again, most of our temporary applicants reside in Canada, having entered as visitors. Buffalo received 2,800 such applications in 2010, which is an 80% increase in the last five years.
With respect to permanent residents, Buffalo is responsible for the intake of all permanent resident applications submitted by persons lawfully admitted to Canada or the United States for at least one year.
We're the regional program centre and the hub of the United States delivery network, and our partner offices are in Detroit, New York, Seattle, Los Angeles, and Washington.
Our office is responsible for the initial review of applications. This includes the creation of the paper and electronic files as well as the initiation of security and criminality checks. Buffalo keeps approximately 50% of the applications and sends the other 50% to the other four U.S. offices for processing.
In 2010, the U.S. delivery network received the highest volume of permanent resident applications, approximately 20,400, and issued the most visas, approximately 38,500, out of all visa offices and regional program centres across the world.
Approximately 15%, or one in six, of all visas issued abroad in 2010 were issued by the U.S. delivery network. We expect similar results for 2011.
A high percentage of applicants are from Canada or residing in Canada, and that is due in part to the growing uptake from the provincial nominee program and Canadian experience class.
I'd like to talk a little bit about provincial nominees and skilled workers. We received the largest volume of nominees, more than 6,000, and issued the most visas in this category, approximately 13,000.
(0850)
Our application intake has seen a significant shift in recent years. In 2010 the issuance of nominee visas exceeded that of federal skilled workers for the first time in our history. Even so, we delivered a significant proportion of the skilled worker visas in 2010--almost 17,000--and that includes quite a large Quebec skilled worker caseload.
We are responsible for processing all Canadian experience class cases. That movement is going up. We issued 3,900 visas in 2010 and we expect to issue 5,000 in 2011. In the family class priority we issued 3,700 such visas in 2010, again including Quebec cases. That's the second-largest in the world.
Many of these cases are straightforward, but there can be challenges--high incidence of criminal convictions, difficulty in obtaining medical results from non-accompanying dependents, and difficulties in motivating certain applicants to comply with processing requirements. Most of these cases are finalized well within one year. And we are able to finalize 50% of our spousal cases in less than six months, once they're received.
In 2010 we issued almost 450 visas for parents and grandparents. Processing time is currently about 19 months. We expect to issue close to the same number of visas in 2011.
We believe we're in a good position to deliver on our commitments this year and will continue to try to motivate ourselves and our staff to make ourselves the most efficient visa office in the global network.
Thank you.
(0855)
The Chair:
Thank you, sir.
We will have some questions. Each caucus will have up to six minutes.
Mr. Wrzesnewskyj.
Mr. Borys Wrzesnewskyj (Etobicoke Centre, Lib.):
Thank you, Chair.
I'd like to start with our witnesses in Buffalo. You say a high percentage of applications are from Canada. What is the actual percentage?
Mr. Burke Thornton:
Probably about 80%. People both on the permanent resident side and on the non-immigrant side are currently temporarily residing in Canada.
Mr. Borys Wrzesnewskyj:
So in actual numbers the 80% translates into approximately....
Mr. Burke Thornton:
I'll just do a quick bit of math here: from the Buffalo office alone, about 16,000 permanent resident visas and about 24,000 temporary resident visas per year.
Mr. Borys Wrzesnewskyj:
That would be Canadian-based?
Mr. Burke Thornton:
That would be persons currently temporarily residing in Canada, yes.
Mr. Borys Wrzesnewskyj:
Can you just repeat those approximate numbers?
Mr. Burke Thornton:
I believe it was 16,000--this is from the Buffalo office alone--
Mr. Borys Wrzesnewskyj:
Yes.
Mr. Burke Thornton:
--who are Canadian residents on the permanent side, and 24,000 on the temporary side.
Mr. Borys Wrzesnewskyj:
So approximately 40,000 are processed that are Canadian-based.
Mr. Burke Thornton:
Yes.
Mr. Borys Wrzesnewskyj:
You mention a large portion are done through the mail, but many are also done in person. What percentage of the Canadian visas would be done in person in Buffalo?
Mr. Burke Thornton:
We offer walk-in service on the non-immigrant side, and I would say again approximately 20% of our Canadian applicants opt for walk-in processing. It's currently same-day service so if they're within commuting distance of the Buffalo office they prefer to take advantage of that service and come down, apply, and get their visas in Buffalo on the same day.
On the permanent resident side we interview probably between 5% to 10% of our applicants, so unless we have a good reason to interview them, we will conduct the process entirely through correspondence.
Mr. Borys Wrzesnewskyj:
So we have a situation where we have a Canadian government operation in Buffalo, across the border in the States, which necessitates people in Canada travelling across the border if they want fast, same-day service. My colleague here says that it's widely known as the Buffalo Shuffle. So they travel from Canada to Canadian government offices in the United States and then turn around and travel back to Canada. Wouldn't it just make sense to find a way to cut out that bureaucracy--that little loop, that Buffalo shuffle--and make things a little more efficient and perhaps have the offices located in Canada?
Mr. Burke Thornton:
There are a couple of reasons why we do it the way we do. One is that the act requires applicants, except in certain very strict categories, to apply outside of Canada.
The second reason is that we have, if I may say so, a very efficient operation here. We have officers with a combined experience of more than 300 years. Where we are--quote--“in competition” with our inland colleagues, we process applications more quickly and more efficiently than they do.
To give you an example, if you have a spouse in Canada and you wish to have that spouse achieve immigration status, you have a choice of applying through the office in Vegreville, Alberta, or through the consulate in Buffalo. We are consistently and significantly faster in our processing than the Canadian office.
(0900)
Mr. Borys Wrzesnewskyj:
I'd actually like to congratulate you on your efficiency. We'd like to see that sort of efficiency in our Canadian government offices based in Canada.
You know, it's a bit of a facade here. Yes, there's a requirement of the act, but it would seem that we're engaged in a strange sort of facade to maintain a portion of the act that in fact seems to be somewhat irrelevant in these cases.
A large portion of these are mail-ins, so technically, I guess, because the mail arrives in Buffalo, it satisfies the act. But the people who are doing the mail-ins are actually living in Canada. So I think there's a potential for a quick fix there to stop some of this bureaucratic shuffling that goes on.
Just out of curiosity, you've noted that your staff are super-efficient and extremely experienced; how many are locally hired as opposed to Canadian?
Mr. Burke Thornton:
We have six Canada-based and 45 locally engaged staff.
Mr. Borys Wrzesnewskyj: Thank you.
"
http://www.parl.gc.ca/HousePublications/Publication.aspx?DocId=5022762&Language=E&Mode=1&Parl=40&Ses=3#Int-3785764
