VAN NUYS : District Opens 8 New Citizenship Centers

In response to the rapidly growing number of immigrants expected to apply for naturalization in Los Angeles, the Los Angeles Unified School District has opened eight new citizenship preparation centers, for a total of 15, at its adult school locations.

Unlike most citizenship institutions that only offer classes in language and preparation for the written examination, the district’s centers are a one-stop shop for the often-confusing naturalization process.

According to Alma Gamez, assistant principal of the Van Nuys Community Adult School, which boasts one of the district’s most culturally diverse citizenship centers, the centers provide free fingerprinting, photographing and counseling on how to fill out the N400 Application for Naturalization forms, in addition to the schooling at $10 per course. “We also hand-deliver all the forms to downtown,” Gamez said.

Elsa Zamora, an adviser to the English as a Second Language and citizenship programs, said the only step of the process that has to be conducted at the INS office is the oral examination.

Since the program’s inception, the centers have helped about 8,000 immigrants become citizens. “Only four or five applications were not accepted,” said Zamora, explaining that they were rejected because the photographs submitted were not in the proper format.

Zamora said the school district goal is to help 50,000 of the estimated 90,000 immigrants who will be turning in their green cards this year.

After four months of biweekly classes at the Van Nuys center, Macedonio Sanchez, 61, passed the application process and will be sworn in as a U. S. citizen Nov. 9. Sanchez said he had applied for citizenship in March, but failed the test because he had only studied four hours for it.

Yelena Pelepis, originally from Odessa, Russia, said she is scared about taking the citizenship exam next month but said she has enjoyed her education at Van Nuys. She expressed concern about the mounting anti-immigrant sentiment she and her classmates have noticed.

“All Americans are immigrants from a long, long time ago,” Pelepis said.

“I think it’s an excellent service for the community. Otherwise, they’d have to pay $500 to fill out the application, fingerprinting and photos,” said Van Nuys instructor Salvador Aragon, an immigrant from El Salvador who became a U. S. citizen three years ago.