Starting this week, New Haven , Connecticut will begin offering municipal identification cards to undocumented immigrants, which will allow access to city services such as libraries and a chance to open bank accounts.  According to Reuters, the validation attempt by the city is the first program of its kind in the US .  New haven officials approved the program last month in a 25 to 1 vote.  

Kica Matos, who administers the program for New Haven , said undocumented immigrants are often targeted by thieves and are robbed because they carry cash, a result of not being able to open a bank account.  "Part of the reason they can’t open bank accounts is because they don’t have forms of identification that were valid," she said.  Matos confirmed that two area banks had already agreed to accept the new city car as legitimate identification sufficient for opening an account.  

The new ID, Matos added, does not easily identify a person as an undocumented immigrant.  "This is the last thing that we want to have happen," she said.  The card was created with several features to appeal to all residents, including a debit component and access to city services.  

Officials in several cities, including New York and San Francisco have expressed interest in starting similar programs, according to Matos.  

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Last week, Bush administration officials acknowledged that there have been significant delays in issuing US travel visas to Iraqis.  According to the New York Times, as of June 30, the United States had admitted 69 locally employed Iraqis on "special immigrant visa" status this year, with 93 more cases pending.  But that status, as defined by Congress, can be applied only to interpreters and translators, which excludes most Iraqis, from drivers to soldiers.   

Iraqis not eligible for the special immigrant visas have been left to try to get to the US through a "refugee" category.  The office of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees has referred 8,295 Iraqis who were local employed by Americans to the US for processing, but as of July 23, the Department of Homeland Security had interviewed only 2,368 of them.  

"The tie-up is Homeland Security and vetting," said James Zogby, head of the Arab-American Institute.  "They’re arguing that working for the U.S. is one thing, trusting them over here is another."   

Since the US invasion of Iraq , the United Nations estimates that some two million Iraqis have fled the country; last month, 60,000 more fled Iraq .