600 Immigrants Rush to INS Office : Amnesty: A shortage of temporary work cards triggers the false rumor of a deadline for applying for legal residence. Police officers are called in to control the crowd.

More than 600 immigrants flooded an Immigration and Naturalization Service office in Sepulveda Monday morning, mistakenly believing a rumor that today was the deadline to apply for legal residence status under the amnesty program.

The rumor apparently started Wednesday afternoon when the San Fernando Legalization Office on Parthenia Street ran out of the temporary work authorization cards issued to illegal aliens who have applied for residency under amnesty programs.

Because they could not issue work cards, the office stopped accepting amnesty applications and told prospective applicants to return this week. The office continued to turn away applicants last Thursday and Friday, said Richard Walden, chief legalization officer of the Northridge Amnesty Office.

“All the people who had been turned away became concerned that the program was about to end,” Walden said. “It was a wildfire rumor that got out. Word got around the community quickly. The rumor mill works very effectively.”

Divided in language but united in their confusion and desire for a green card, sari-clad women, turbaned men, immigrants in work clothes and others in suits milled around the parking lot.

Inside the office, staff members processed the applications of about 170 people who had been allowed inside while six police officers, speaking with the aid of the loudspeakers on their patrol cars, urged the rest of the crowd to leave and return another day.

An immigration lawyer stood amid the crowd, repeating that the program was not closing and warning those in line that immigration officers might deport them if they did not leave immediately.

Although the original amnesty program established by the federal government was scheduled to end in May, 1988, it has been extended by court rulings that found the initial eligibility requirements too strict.

Those court rulings are being appealed by the INS, and until the issues are completely litigated, amnesty offices must continue accepting applications for amnesty, Walden said.

The shortage of the work cards stems from an increasing number of aliens applying for amnesty to get work permits--and some “bureaucratic snafus,” Walden said.

Last fall, the San Fernando office processed about 15 applicants a day, but now about 300 people a day come to apply.

The surge in applicants is probably caused by an increasing awareness about the court-ordered extension and by a growing number of people who realize they can get temporary work permits just by filling in a minimal amnesty application, Walden said.

Polaroid supplies blank work authorization cards, upon which immigration officials affix the photograph of the applicants who show the cards to employers as a form of identification and proof of their right to work.

Walden said he ordered more cards in January but was told that the company had stopped producing them, thinking the amnesty program had ended.

As his supply ran lower, Walden said, he contacted the regional INS office and asked officials to locate extras from other offices.

A spare box of 1,700 cards was located early last week in Stockton, but a clerk there--ordered to dispatch them to Northridge by overnight mail--accidentally sent them through the regular postal service.

The cards arrived from Stockton Monday afternoon.