INS planning to hire 8,000 new employees

MONTPELIER, Vt. -- Six months after Congress authorized tripling the number of federal agents on the northern border, the Immigration and Naturalization Service is launching its biggest hiring push ever.

By the end of September, the INS hopes to have 8,000 new employees, with 6,000 headed to work on the borders. By September 2003 the INS hopes to hire an additional 4,000 people.

Most of the new employees will end up working on the northern border, approximately doubling the number of Border Patrol and immigration inspectors there.

The new employees will increase the INS work force by about a third.

Since the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, the Border Patrol, which is part of the INS, has helped increase its presence along the frontier by working longer hours and getting help from agents temporarily assigned from the Mexican border. Currently there are about 345 Border Patrol agents patrolling the 4,000-mile U.S.-Canadian border.