The Arias administration officially wants to put off the effective date of the new immigration law until Dec. 1, 2007.

That is the change the administration is going to ask the Asamblea Legislativa to make before the new law goes into effect in early August.

President Óscar Arias Sánchez and Federico Berrocal spelled out the reasons in a cover note to lawmakers.

Basically the administration does not have the resources or the manpower to handle the requirements of the new law, the cover note says.

Berrocal, who is minister of Gobernación, Policía y Seguridad Pública, said the immigration police would have to be expanded from the present 35 officers to 350 to do all that the law required.

And other parts of the Dirección General de Migración y Extranjería are not prepared to handle the fines that would be handed out to persons harboring illegal residents, Berrocal said. He added that there was some question of the constitutionality of the law.

In fact, the Arias administration wants a wholesale rewrite of the law which some feel is too hard on illegal aliens.  The new law also criminalizes trafficking in persons, the so-called coyotes who help people immigrate to the United States.

The previous security minister, Rogelio Ramos used to complain that officials had to release coyotes because there was no law against the practice, which is universally deplored. President Abel Pacheco supported the new law.

The request to the legislators was expected. But the actual date of Dec. 1 is new information. The lawmakers are likely to comply.