WASHINGTON, Aug. 21 (UPI) -- The U.S. agency that processes naturalization requests has started a project to digitize millions of immigration records now available only on paper.
U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services is the agency within the Department of Homeland Security that adjudicates all requests for so-called immigration benefits, like U.S. citizenship or the coveted "Green Card" which can lead to it.
The agency holds about 70 million immigration records, known as Alien Files or A-Files.
The agency announced last week that it had awarded a blanket purchasing agreement for the project to Texas-based Datatrac Information Services Inc.
According to Government Computer News, the company plans to build a facility for the work in Williamsburg, Ky., the home district of GOP Rep. Harold Rogers, the chairman of the House Appropriations Committee's Homeland Security Subcommittee.
The company estimated the contract's value at $150 million over its five-year span. Datatrac has been directed to complete the digitization of the first million A-Files in 12 months, the company said.
Digitization is an essential step if the agency is to ramp up to deal with potentially millions of applicants for any foreign guest worker program or "path to citizenship" for undocumented workers already here -- labeled an amnesty by opponents.
Janice Sposato, head of the agency's newly created National Security and Records Verification Directorate, acknowledged earlier this year to United Press International that a paper-based records system was a problem. "It's not efficient, it's not effective," she said.
She added that the antiquated system was a security issue, "If you have to move paper records around, you will have people acting on incomplete information."
