Some relief is on the way for passengers who arrive on international flights into JFK and Newark Airport, where Customs and Immigration delays are some of the longest in the countries.
Hundreds of new Customs and Border Protection agents will be hired for the airports, with JFK getting will get 200 and another 100 going to Newark.
Hiring will start immediately, and finish within 18 months.
The money comes from a larger $ 165 million in the Department of Homeland Security budget to hire 2,000 new agents nationally.
“It is a national embarrassment — and drag on the regional economy — that Customs lines there are so infuriatingly long,” said Sen. Charles Schumer, who secured the funding.
“Fortunately, that seems poised to change. With these additional agents, the airports will finally have the resources it needs to get travelers into the country and on their way quickly and efficiently.”
JFK’s waits are particularly rough, with wait times reaching as high as three hours for arriving international passengers.
The airport hit that mark on Aug. 24 at 4 p.m., Schumer said. The wait was two hours on Aug. 3 and two hours and 20 minutes on July 1.
Airport advocacy group Global Gateway Alliance said the new agents are long overdue.
In its own analysis last summer, it found that JFK had the worst customs wait times in the country — and that Newark had long delays as well.
The Alliance called for more agents to be hired, as well as nixing resources for pre-clearance facilities in locations like Abu Dhabi, which have few travelers.
The facility costs the U.S. Customs and Border Patrol over $ 400,000 a year to run in the United Arab Emirates — even though it has fewer then 1,000 passengers a day who go to the U.S.
Five other countries — Ireland, Canada, Bermuda, Aruba, and the Bahamas — have pre-clearance facilities staffed by customs officers.
“This announcement puts into action what we’ve been calling for — increased staffing to cut hours-long Customs’ wait times that hurt our region and economy,” said Alliance Chairman Joe Sitt.
“Coupling more staffing power with new technologies are the right steps toward fixing this problem for the long term.”
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