Travelers waiting for passports breathe easier

CITIZEN-TIMES.com

The U.S. Department of State on Thursday eased passport regulations for people traveling in the Western Hemisphere – and that put a smile on Elly Wells’ face.

“It was a nail biter,” Wells said this morning. “We’ve spent hours and hours on the phone the past few weeks, and if they hadn’t done this, we would’ve been totally out of luck.”

Wells, her husband and their 1-year-old son are heading from Asheville to Bermuda tomorrow for a wedding, and the nationwide backlog in passport processing had jeopardized their trip. The state department had withheld their son’s passport, and until today they were faced with postponing or canceling their trip, at loss of thousands of dollars.

The State Department announced Thursday “that U.S. citizens traveling to Canada, Mexico, the Caribbean, and Bermuda who have applied for but not yet received passports can nevertheless temporarily enter and depart from the United States by air with a government issued photo identification and Department of State official proof of application for a passport through September 30, 2007.”

The government made the move because of “longer than expected processing times for passport applications in the face of record-breaking demand.” The accommodation does not affect entry requirements to other countries, and Americans traveling to a country that requires passports must still present them.

Andrew Whalen, press secretary for U.S. Rep. Heath Shuler, D-Waynesville, said Thursday his office has been inundated with calls from people having problems similar to those Wells experienced.

“It’s gotten to the point now that they’re so backed up across the country that even expedited passports are taking weeks to process,” Whalen said. “If you’re going somewhere at Christmastime, you should start working on the passport now.”

Part of the backlog stems from the Western Hemisphere Travel Initiative, which Congress mandated in the Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act of 2004 to strengthen border security. WHTI requirements for air travel took effect on January 23, 2007.

The State Department noted that it set new records in March and April, issuing more than three million passports to traveling Americans. Passport production time averages 10 to 12 weeks, and the department recommends applying at least twelve weeks before you plan to travel.

From October through April, the department issued 8.6 million passports, a 33 percent increase from the same period last year.