Orlando's Lake Buena Vista & Spa Resort Designated First EB-5 "Regional Center" in Florida by USCIS
The EB-5 program was created by Congress as part of the Immigration 
and Nationality Act (“INA”) of 1990. Under section 203(b)(5) of the INA, 10,000 immigrant investor visas (green cards or EB-5 visas) per year are available to qualified individuals seeking permanent resident status on the basis of their engagement in a new commercial enterprise. Of the 10,000 investor visas available annually, 5,000 are set aside for those who apply under a pilot program involving a designated “Regional Center.” There are more than 20 such designated EB-5 programs nationwide. “Regional Center” is an entity, organization or agency that has been approved as such by the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Service (“USCIS”). “Regional Center” designation focuses on a specific geographic area within the United States and seeks to promote economic growth through increased export sales, improved regional productivity, creation of new jobs, and increased domestic capital investment. The Lake Buena Vista Resort Village & Spa Resort has become Florida’s first designated EB-5 Regional Center by USCIS. The designation, known as the “EB-5” immigrant investor program, allows foreign nationals to become lawful permanent residents (LPR or green card holders) of the United States by investing at least a $1 million in a project that creates at least 10 jobs. Lake Buena Vista & Spa Resort plans to build 1,300 condo-hotel units. The resort is planned for 1,875 furnished resort condo units ranging from 1,080-2,170 square feet, along with dining, a fitness center, spa-salon, aquatic center, and other amenities. The EB-5 program will help to finance the construction of a new 152-unit building at the resort.
Members of AILA (American Immigration Lawyers Association) are reporting
errors in EADs (Employment Authorization Documents) cards, including the following: 1) Incorrect country of birth, date of birth, gender or spelling of name. 2) Clearly incorrect validity dates. Please note that EADs approved at the NSC USCIS Nebraska Service Center) under the "express" adjudication system are approved as of the date of adjudication, whether it is an initial EAD or an extension. An example of a clearly incorrect validity date is an EAD approved on 07/09/2008 bearing validity dates from 01/01/2008 to 01/01/2009. 3) Approval for 
one year of validity, when the applicant clearly qualifies for two years (please review USCIS (U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services) updates and AILA postings to make sure the applicant qualifies). 4) Switched photos, i.e. husband's card has wife's photo and vice versa or a completely different person. If any of the above situations apply, please follow the instructions to submit an inquiry for individual case liaison assistance. You may ignore the instruction to first call the 1-800 customer service line at NCSC (National Customer Service .jpg)
Center) when submitting requests for EAD correction. To minimize delays, please describe the nature of the error as clearly as possible when submitting your request. Your liaison request will be forwarded to an NSC liaison committee member, who will review it and respond to you with instructions for obtaining the corrected EAD. IMPORTANT NOTE: individuals will be required to submit the incorrect EAD card in the original to the NSC in order to receive a corrected EAD card. Merely requesting a corrected card either by telephone or in writing will not be effective. Therefore, where necessary please ensure that the applicant provides the EAD to his or her employer for I-9 purposes prior to sending it in for correction. No new photos should be required, except in the circumstance of switched photos.
U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (“USCIS”) recently launched the online FOIA Request Status Check service providing customers a quick and secure way to check the status of requests they have made under the Freedom of Information Act (“FOIA”). Customers can use the online service anytime by entering their assigned control number to receive an immediate response on the status of their FOIA request. The customer will then receive either a ‘pending’ or ‘processed’ response. A pending response indicates to the customer the position of their request relative to all other requests in the same processing track. A ‘processed’ request indicates that the request was .jpg)
processed and the customer will be provided that processing date. USCIS will make daily updates to the status information. Customers without Internet access can still obtain information on their FOIA requests by calling the USCIS FOIA Requester Service Center at (816) 350-5785 from 7 a.m. to 2:15 p.m. (Central Time). As USCIS receives more than 110,000 requests annually for access to immigration records, the agency continues to improve its FOIA procedures and enhance processing times. For example, last year USCIS launched a new ‘Notice to Appear’ track that provides accelerated access of a large portion of FOIA requests from individuals, or their representatives, who have been notified to appear before an immigration court. That new track provides those customers quicker access to their Alien-File (‘A’-File) when it is requested through the FOIA process. 