At a glance
The U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Center has seen considerable growth in the number of EB-5 regional centers approved to attract immigrant-investors and facilitate their visa paperwork. The program was created in 1990.
2011* 125
2010 114
2009 72
2008 25
2007 11
* As of March 16
Source: U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services
With lenders less generous and capital harder to raise in recent years, more U.S communities are looking overseas for investors and creating special organizations at home to make those connections through a special visa program.
Grant County could soon have its own federally approved EB-5 regional centers to attract wealthy foreigners and facilitate their path toward achieving permanent resident status.
Korean-born Michael An recently said he expects to hear soon whether his application to be become a regional center is successful. He has invested heavily to rehab the former YMCA building downtown and has other development projects in the works.
City Development Director Darren Reese and Tim Eckerle, executive director of the Grant County Economic Growth Council, are excited about the prospect.
“We need to make sure we keep our economy open; that’s how we’re going to survive,” Reese said.
The EB-5 immigrant investor program has been around since 1990, offering a fast track to a Green Card for non-U.S. citizens whose investment creates 10 U.S. full-time jobs for at least two years.
The minimum investment is $500,000 to $1 million, depending on the economic conditions of the community where the money is invested.
“The benefit to an investor, obviously, is a green card,” U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services spokeswoman Marilou Cabrera said.
Each year, the immigration agency, a division of Homeland Security, sets aside 10,000 visas for the EB-5 program.
Because of the meticulous paperwork involved with the application, from ensuring the investor’s money hasn’t been acquired illegally to documenting the jobs created through the investment, many applicants find it easier to work through a U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services-approved regional center.
About 3,000 EB-5 visas are set aside for applicants affiliated with regional centers.
There has been rapid growth in recent years in the number of regional centers. Today, there are more than 11 times the number of approved EB-5 regional centers compared to 2007, according to U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services.
Tom Farris, a consultant with Energize-ECI, said the program has become more popular since lenders became more reluctant to loan money following the U.S. financial system crisis.
“There are a lot more people than you might think that have a lot of money to invest,” Farris said. “There are many, many millionaires in China.”
Reese said there are advantages for foreigners to invest here.
“People who are in countries that perhaps don’t have as stable of a political or economic system as the United States see America as an attractive home for their wealth, as well as familial and educational opportunities,” he said.
Farris said one of the common misconceptions about the program is, “It will bring foreign cheap labor.”
That’s not the case, he said, because the program strictly states the jobs created must be for U.S. workers and is closely monitored.
Indiana so far has only a tenuous connection to this development tool, with none of the currently active 125 regional centers based in the Hoosier state. Two centers based in the Chicago and Louisville, Ky., metro areas claim to include portions of Indiana.
However, area economic development leaders already are touting the possibility that Grant County could soon have one of its own.
Marion’s development team has long known An intended to seek other investors through the EB-5 program. Initially, the scope was just the Y, which would be considered a project-based EB-5 visa, where the investor must be intimately involved with day-to-day operations of the investment.
“Since his portfolio has grown, he’s better off as a regional center,” Reese said.
Reese said the potential to have an EB-5 regional center in Marion has been a part of talking points in economic development conversations with international groups for the past three years.
“We recognize the tenuous nature of the application process,” Reese said. “Assuming he does receive approval, it will become the cornerstone of what we’re touting across the globe.”
Eckerle said on past trips to China and Turkey, business leaders have asked about the EB-5 program by name.
“We consider it an important advantage,” he said.
In addition to An’s application, Energize-ECI, which promotes development across east central Indiana, also is seeking the EB-5 regional center designation.
Cabrera said the agency cannot comment on any pending applications for regional center status. Centers are publicized once approved, she said.
Earlier this month, the federal agency announced plans to speed up the process for approving new regional centers.
U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Service says the current processing time of a regional center application is five months.
It has proposed to reduce that time to just two months or 15 days for anyone willing to pay extra for “premium processing service.”
The regular filing fee for a regional center application is $6,230.
Farris said Energize-ECI plans to be a regional center serving Blackford, Delaware, Fayette, Grant, Henry, Jay, Madison, Randolph and Rush counties. It would focus on what Energize considers the region’s five core industries: advanced manufacturing, agribusiness and food processing, alternative energy and green technology, information technology, and logistics and distributions, Farris said.
Currently, only two of 125 approved EB-5 regional centers claim to serve parts of Indiana.
The Chicagoland Foreign Investment Group based in Chicago covers Illinois, Indiana and Wisconsin. The Indiana counties are Jasper, Lake, LaPorte, Newton and Porter.
The Midwest Center for Foreign Investment is based in Jeffersonville, part of the Louisville, Ky., metro area. It claims to serve Clark, Crawford, Floyd, Harrison, Jefferson, Scott and Washington counties.
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