147,284 Apply for Amnesty in County

More than 147,000 people applied for amnesty at Orange County’s three legalization offices during the yearlong first phase of the program, INS officials said Thursday.

The Santa Ana office received 5,838 applications on Wednesday, more than 10% of its total of 56,196, INS officials said. The Garden Grove office proved almost as busy, registering 4,300 on Wednesday and 50,806 since the program began on May 5, 1987.

In Buena Park, INS employees accepted 2,120 applications on Wednesday, bringing that office’s 12-month total to 40,282.

The total of 147,284 among the three offices represents almost 7% of Orange County’s population of 2.2 million.

Open Until 1:30 a.m.

Officials at all three offices said they stayed open until about 1:30 a.m. Thursday to let immigrants who had arrived by midnight finish filling out their applications.

But that was it, except for agricultural workers, who have until Nov. 30 to apply under a separate provision of the law--and for Ugandans, Ethiopians, Poles and Afghans, who have until Dec. 22, 1989, to apply for legal resident status under a bill signed into law last year.

One man came into the Santa Ana office Thursday morning claiming that his car broke down on Wednesday, making it impossible for him to get his application in on time. “I took the application and said I would hold it here until I got a district decision on it,” Newland said.

No luck. “The district office said under no circumstances were we to take late applications,” Newland said.

“We did get four under the door when I came in this morning, though. I figured those made the deadline.”