- Press Releases
Long a leader in serving refugees and immigrants, Jewish Family and Children’s Services (JFCS) of San Francisco, the Peninsula, Marin, and Sonoma counties was recently selected to receive a highly competitive grant from the United States Citizenship and Immigration Services’ (USCIS) Office of Citizenship. Approximately 290 agencies nationwide applied for the grant. Of the 13 grant recipients, JFCS was the sole Bay Area awardee. The grant will help JFCS expand its model Citizenship Services program, which provides legal permanent residents with the educational and legal services they need to secure U.S. citizenship successfully.
In the past decade alone, JFCS has helped clients file more than 5,500 citizenship applications, and JFCS’ Legal Services Department attorneys have represented more than 1,700 clients with special needs at naturalization interviews. Of these 1,700, more than 90 percent were clients with a severe disability who would otherwise not be able to become U.S. citizens.
With USCIS funding, JFCS will now be able to help more members of the Bay Area’s immigrant communities—those from Eastern Europe, the former Soviet Union, Asia, Mexico and Central American countries, and African nations—to become new Americans.
“We are honored that USCIS has selected us to provide this important service so that more legal residents of our country can achieve their dream of becoming full-fledged, actively participating members of American society,” said Gayle Zahler, JFCS’ Associate Executive Director. “Our agency’s history of providing outstanding citizenship services is well established, and we look forward to working with immigrant communities throughout the Bay Area to ensure that legal residents have the tools they need for American citizenship.
JFCS’ Citizenship Services program includes evaluation for eligibility; application preparation; tracking of applications; medical waiver applications; English-language and American civics classes; and volunteer, one-to-one tutoring.
Celebrating its 160th anniversary, JFCS through the years has helped resettle tens of thousands of individuals from around the globe and continues to help newcomers start successful new lives.
For more information about JFCS’ Citizenship Services, call 415-449-2900 or email [email protected].