Your Tax Dollars at Work, Part 1

Well, through this process of adoption from China we have learned a few things about the way your government works!

Our first enlightenment came when we needed to get our fingerprints taken. Now, mind you, Wendy and I have both had our fingerprints taken several times while living in California, then when we came up to Washington, as this is standard procedure for teachers. Presumably, this information is given to the FBI. So you would think they would be on file, right? You'd be incorrect on that. We had to get them redone each time. Who do you think had to pay for that?

When we needed to get fingerprinted for USCIS (formerly the INS, now under the auspices of the Department of Homeland Security), we discovered that there was an office in Portland that does fingerprinting! How convenient for us! We could just call them, make an appointment at our earliest convenience, show up, pay and be done.

Of course, this being the U.S. government, things cannot be THAT easy. We had to send our fingerprinting fee ($70 each) and application to the Yakima sub-office, requesting an appointment at the Portland office. Then we waited. When we got the letter back, it told us when to show up. Oh, is that appointment during the middle of your work day? That's too bad. You have to miss work that you won't get paid for? Gosh.

Anyway, we did that.

Then, 15 months later, our fingerprints expired. I guess a lot can happen to your fingerprints in 15 months.

So, we had to do the process over again. And yes, it was another $70 each.

You'd think, with modern technology what it is, that we could schedule and pay for our own fingerprinting appointment online. Oh, but wait, that would probably make the USCIS run just a little bit more efficiently. Then they would probably have to also make their other departments just as efficient, like the one that takes forever to allow someone to legally become a U.S. citizen from another country...but I digress...