Immigration Law

Salvadoran Consulate in Dallas Speeds Up Services

By Robert A. Kraft

The Salvadoran Consulate in Dallas is working hard to process applications faster. This was reported in a recent article in the Dallas Morning News. Here are excerpts from the article:

The last time Héctor Guatemala and Araceli Jiménez came to the Salvadoran Consulate in Dallas to request passports, they arrived at 8 a.m. and waited several hours before being called to the counter.

Five years later, the couple returned to renew their documents and noticed a big change – their request was processed within minutes. "I see things have improved because now they have appointments," said Guatemala, 44, a resident of Dallas.

The appointment system is one of the recent changes that José Mario Mejía Barrera, the new consul general of El Salvador in Dallas, hopes will improve services.

Mejía says he has been tasked by his government with improving relations between the consulate and the Salvadoran community in North Texas, protecting the civil and labor rights of immigrants, encouraging remittances and, most important, speeding up service.

The Dallas consulate, at 1555 W. Mockingbird Lane, serves about 100,000 Salvadorans in North Texas, Oklahoma, Arkansas and Kansas with six clerks and consuls.

More people are requesting services, but the lines at the consulate are shorter because the appointments are spread out over several weeks and the crowd is predictable. In the past, sometimes 70 to 80 people showed up one day, and only a handful the next. Now an average of 35 to 40 Salvadorans get services each day.

Full post as published by Immigration Law Answers Blog on January 17, 2011 (boomark / email).