"US Plans New Steps to Attract Visitors," by Mimi Hall - USA Today, 18 Jan 2006
Foreign tourists, students and business travelers will find it easier to get permission to visit the USA and will be treated more graciously when they arrive, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff said Tuesday.
After months of tough talk about beefing up border security to prevent terrorism, the secretaries acknowledged concerns from businesses, universities and the travel industry that post-9/11 security rules have driven away visitors.
Chertoff said post-9/11 biometric screening systems at land borders have helped nab 970 people with criminal or immigration violations and those systems are being improved to make sure terrorists don't get into the country. At the same time, the government is eager to keep "the welcome mat out for those who want to come from overseas."
He and Rice announced measures to make travel more efficient. They said the government will:
• Test digital videoconferencing to see whether foreigners applying for visas to come to the USA can be interviewed by videoconference rather than in person.
In Brazil, for example, there are only three U.S. consulates where people applying for visas can go to apply and be interviewed. That means people often have to drive hundreds of miles.
• Encourage foreigners to study in the USA by extending the length of visas. Students will be able to get visas 120 days, rather than 90, before school starts.
• Test a "model airport" program at Washington Dulles International and Houston's George Bush Intercontinental to create a more welcoming environment for foreign travelers. Rice said the airports will have videos to guide people through the entry process and "friendly greeters" to help them once they've been admitted.
• Develop inexpensive security cards for foreigners and U.S. citizens traveling across U.S. borders with Canada and Mexico and to the Caribbean and Bermuda.
Travel groups raised concerns last year when the Homeland Security and State departments said people would need passports instead of driver's licenses to cross the Canadian and Mexican borders. They complained that passports are too expensive and bulky.
Chertoff said the new cards will be "like the kind of driver's license or other simple card identification that almost all of us carry."
Roger Dow of the Travel Industry Association of America said the moves send "the proper signal to our friends around the world that we want them to come visit."
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