Summary: Pursuant to a congressional request, GAO reviewed certain aspects of Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) operations in its Miami district.
GAO found that: (1) INS lacked the resources to actually fund all authorized positions, resulting in numerous position vacancies; (2) the Miami district consistently had fewer authorized positions than other districts in the same INS region; (3) Miami had a larger percentage of temporary staff than other districts; (4) Miami processing times were generally twice as long as most other districts; (5) regional officials stated that district staffing was related to the low salaries paid to clerical staff and detention officers; (6) aliens in the Miami district had to wait about a year to have their residency and naturalization applications processed; (7) INS established a task force in November 1989, consisting of staff from other districts nationwide, to expedite application processing in the Miami district; and (8) districts in that region had their funding allocations reduced in fiscal year 1989 to finance unanticipated increased operations in Texas.
