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New Passport Regulations
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New Passport Regulations
By JAMES OSBORNE The Monitor
Local post offices have been flooded with passport applicants with just more than a week ahead of a new federal regulation requiring one for air travel within the Americas.
“I’ve been here waiting for an hour and a half,” said Mary Godfrey, while waiting at the Pecan Boulevard branch of the U.S. post office in McAllen recently.
“The line’s moving some now. The woman in charge said to come back Monday, but we figured the line would be even worse.”
Over the last week that post office has seen a 300-percent increase in passport applications, said Jim Coultress, a spokesman for the U.S. Postal Service, which handles the vast majority of passport applications nationwide. Until the regulations go into effect on Jan. 23, the lines are expected to get even worse.
“They were averaging 30 per day and then it escalated to 60 to 80 per day. In the last few days it’s up to 100,” Coultress said. “Almost all our offices across the county are experiencing an increase.”
But in the Rio Grande Valley, where so much of business and family life takes place in Mexico, the federal initiative to improve security at U.S. ports of entry has even stronger ramifications for many families.
With much of her family living in Guadalajara, Maria Rodriguez travels to western Mexico three or four times a year, usually by airplane. Waiting in line Friday, she was eager to get her three children’s travel documents in order before the approaching deadline.
“It’s a hassle, but I think it’s fair,” she said. “They would have gotten passports anyway. I got mine when I was 25.”
Fewer than 27 percent of Americans hold a passport, according to the U.S. State Department, but within the next year, after the second phase of the new federal passport initiative goes into effect, all travel out of the United States, whether by land, sea or air, will require that document.
The State Department says its goal is to strengthen border security and standardize travel documents, hopefully producing a quicker and more secure means to identify people entering the country.
But many business leaders fear the new regulations could hurt commerce across the border, as well as make the U.S. a less attractive shopping destination for those from northern Mexico. It could get worse after Jan. 1, they say, when the second phase takes effect, requiring passports or other documents for everyone traveling — by air, land or sea — between the United States and Canada, Mexico, Central and South America, the Caribbean or Bermuda
The Brownsville Herald reporter Matt Whittaker contributed to this report.
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By
Kenya @
Saturday, January 20, 2007 5:02 AM |
Starting January 23, new passport rules will change the face of travel.
On Tuesday, all air travelers entering the United States will be required to have a passport including American citizens returning from Canada, Mexico and the Caribbean. |
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