Over 25 million Italians have emigrated between 1861 and 1960 with a migration boom between 1871 and 1915 when over 13,5 million emigrants left the country for European and overseas destinations.
I recently received the letter from the NYC Consulate stating I could come in for an Italian passport. I made an appointment, went in with the passport application but was told by the official I needed to wait 30 days to be granted the passport. It seems they need to fax my paperwork over to Italy and wait for authorization.
The official mentioned the questura but when I asked if they were doing a criminal background check he said no. Odd.
Does anyone know why there's the wait time? The official was very nice but getting information out of him was like pulling teeth! I have to go back on the 30th now.
There is a lot of confusion on this issue which is complicated by NYC's unusual handling.
Let me start by saying that my wife and I received the same letter back in July, 2008. For reasons beyond our control, I did not get back to NYC for my passport until January, 2009 and my wife several months later; we did not have any isssues when we finally went.
Many or even most of the other US-based Italian consulates require that the applicant obtain a copy of his/her Italian "birth certificate" from the stato civile office of the ancestral comune before applying for a passport. Some applicants have waited months (many, many, months) for the comune to register their documents ("We wish to inform you that this office has forwarded your birth certificate to the Vital Statistics office in the City of xxxxxxx for registration and your name has also been entered in the data base of this Consular office...") and supply the needed certificate.
New York has never to my knowledge made this demand (for an actual birth certificate) of its applicants, and this is the first time I have heard of them telling someone he had to wait "for authorization". My suspicion is that NYC has always been putting the cart before the horse and is now waiting for the ancestral comune to indicate that documents have been received and registered before actually issuing a passport. I suppose it is just a matter of time before they impose the birth certificate requirement as done by other consulates.
Another possibility relates to the imposition of fingerprinting for all new passport applicants (and renewals) which began in the spring of 2010, if I recall correctly. Perhaps in order to electronically file the fingerprints, the passport applicant must already be "in the system".
Carmine
My hobby is finding things. Having found most of my own, I am happy to help others find theirs. PM me!
I have a feeling you may be right about the Consulate jumping the gun. I was surprised to get the letter only two weeks after dropping off my birth certificate with the front desk. I didn't have a citizenship appointment. Both my parents are Italian citizens who never registered my birth with the Stato Civile. I was advised to just drop off the paperwork at the front desk. Maybe I was misinformed and that's part of the problem?
I went into the passport appointment with the mindset that something may come up and I wouldn't be leaving with an Italian passport in hand. I've dealt with the consulate before.
I'm crossing my fingers I'm successful at the end of the month. Thanks for replying to my post.
I had a similar experience with the Newark consulate. I had my appointment for citizenship on November 23rd. They accepted all my paperwork and told me to make an appointment in 2 months for my passport. I thought that was odd because I heard other consulates make you wait to get confirmation of the Italian city before you can get a passport. When I called to make my appointment for the passport, they told me that they now require 2 appointments for passports which are usually about 2 weeks apart. They also mentioned something about the town in Italy having to process everything. I'm not sure when the passport will actually be issued but hopefully it won't be too long after the first appointment.
Nowadays, very few Italian actors are able to emerge on the world cinema scene. Until a few decades ago it was different, but we talk about the age of the young Cinecittà, where it was not unusual to meet world-famous directors who set their stories which became known all over the world in those stu...
