U.S. Immigration chief Jonathan "Jock" Scharfen visited Atlanta for the first time on Thursday as acting director of United States Citizenship and Immigration Services. He was here to encourage and congratulate employees of the Atlanta office in Tucker. Scharfen, 52, also held an hour-and-a-half question-and-answer session with about 50 representatives of agencies that work with immigrants. Scharfen became head of the agency April 21. His term ends next Jan. 20, when the new president takes office.

WHY WAS HE HERE?

To congratulate employees for decreasing the delay in processing citizenship applications.

ATLANTA'S ACCOMPLISHMENT

Last July, the Atlanta office processing time for naturalization applications was 14 months. Now it's 10 months. In October, the Atlanta office expects the wait time to be eight months. The national goal for processing naturalization applications is five months.

WHY THE DELAY?

The agency received nearly 1.4 million citizenship applications in the fiscal year that ended last October. That's nearly double the approximately 731,000 received the fiscal year before. In July alone, the agency received a clump of 460,000 citizenship applications.

WHY THE INCREASE?

Fees for applications increased last July; many immigrants filed to beat the rate hikes. Others were motivated by the heated national immigration debate.

OVERTIME

The Atlanta office finished its four-month "surge plan" this month to tackle the surge in applications received last summer. The office held citizenship interviews and naturalization ceremonies on Saturdays from March through June.

NEW HIRES

USCIS started to hire 1,600 people nationwide in March to tackle processing backlogs of citizenship, green cards, adoptions and other paperwork. The Atlanta office has hired 10 new employees.