ShareThisThe State Department isn't sweating a last-second surge of applications with only four months left before U.S. citizens will be required to have a passport to re-enter the country.
Since the summer of 2007 -- when wait times doubled to 10-12 weeks for most passports and even longer for others because of a record spike in applications -- the State Department has accelerated its hiring and expansion efforts to meet the demands. By October that year, the wait times were cut in half, and the current wait time is four weeks at the longest.
"We have expanded our capacity to the point that we can handle as many as 30 million passports (a year) and we're not seeing anywhere near that demand at this time," said Brenda Sprague, deputy assistant secretary for passport services with the State Department's Bureau of Consular Affairs. "We are very confident that we are very well situated to handle whatever comes up."
After passport applications surged to 18.5 million 2007 -- up from 12 million in 2006 and 10.4 million in 2005 -- they dipped in 2008 to 16 million, State Department figures show. This year, officials are expecting around 12 million, Sprague said.
The decrease in demand can be traced to less international travel due to the economic downturn, she said.
"We rise and fall with the travel industry to a large extent," Sprague said.
Customs officers don't actually have the authority to keep a U.S. citizen out of the country, even after the requirements go into effect on June 1, said Bonnie Arellano, spokeswoman for Customs and Border Protection in Arizona.
But, those traveling without a passport card or passport book will experience major delays because they would have to go into secondary inspection and validate their citizenship through other documents, she said.
Contact reporter Brady McCombs at bmccombs(at)azstarnet.com. For more stories visit scrippsnews.com
Must credit Arizona Daily Star
