The American Dream -- Send US Your Tired, Your Poor, Your Huddled Masses - And Your Money

IT'S A MARRIAGE OF CONVENINECE: RICH FOREIGNERS WANT A GREEN CARD. SOUTH SEATTLE INDUSTRY WANTS ACCESS TO CHEAP, FLEXIBLE CASH.

Clamorous trailer-trucks chug past Gwen Fraser's boiler-repair shop on West Marginal Way at all hours, hauling their cargo through the Duwamish industrial corridor.

"This," says Fraser, "is where the action is coming and going."

But the action is much slower when it comes to investing in blue-collar enterprises. So when Fraser sought money last year to expand Fraser Inc., her boiler and diesel-engine repair business, she had to be creative.

She eventually came across an unlikely source of capital: the Golden Rainbow Freedom Fund. Aspiring immigrants from France to Thailand have bought into the fund, a U.S. government-approved program that arranges permanent visas for foreigners in exchange for a $500,000 investment.

Over the past year and a half in Seattle, about 100 investors have bypassed lengthy backlogs of immigration bureaucracy, their six-figure pledges entitling them to move to the front of the line for a green card.

Their money is pooled into a fund, now valued at some $50 million, reserved exclusively for the development of industrial businesses and properties in Seattle - the city organizers believe has the nation's highest level of investment by foreigners seeking a permanent visa, the first step toward American citizenship.

Immigrants aren't giving money to the fund, one of about 25 nationwide created under a 5-year-old U.S. program. As investors in a specific "regional center," they become partners in the fund's investments, and they share in the profits.

The result, proponents say, is a marriage that satisfies everyone involved. Local industrial businesses receive the capital they sorely need, often at lower rates than banks would offer, and with more flexibility. Foreign investors gain American residency while making an investment with potential returns.

Programs draw scrutiny

However, these "investor visa" programs are drawing scrutiny from the Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS), which says some investment funds are exploiting loopholes that allow foreigners to immigrate without paying the full $500,000.

Seattle's Golden Rainbow fund says it is not the type of program under fire from the INS because all its investors pay the full $500,000. But fund organizers acknowledge that a certain skepticism seems to follow these programs.

Henry Liebman, a Seattle immigration lawyer and the fund's manager, said Americans hearing about the program for the first time often are uncomfortable with the notion that a green card can be bought.

"It's the conflict between `give me your tired and poor' versus buying in," Liebman said.

However, Liebman points out that many of the world's industrialized countries have investor visa programs, notably Canada, where 5,578 "business immigrants" injected about $260 million into the Canadian economy last year.

The American investor visa program, created by Congress in 1990 and expanded to include "regional centers" three years later, has been slower getting off the ground. In 1996, the most recent year for which figures are available, 936 investor visas were granted in the U.S., mostly to investors from Asian countries.

"If you don't have these programs available, capital just goes elsewhere," said Darrell Sanders, president of Pacific Rim Acquisitions, the Seattle firm that markets the Golden Rainbow fund. "We're letting people `buy in.' It rubs all of us wrong. You have to say, why are we doing this? What is the benefit for the country? Is there a social purpose to this capital?"

In Seattle, the fund's objective is to spark development in the industrial region from West Seattle to part of downtown to the Rainier Valley. The INS approved the area in 1995 as a "regional center" - an industrial area where the government hopes to increase employment and encourage exports.

Investors pay $200,000 down, financing the rest through a $300,000 loan. Green cards then are issued on a conditional basis, after the applicant submits a special form to the INS and goes through an interview and background check. Their money, meanwhile, funds industrial enterprises and real-estate ventures in the south Seattle "regional center."

In most cases, investors must stay committed to the fund for at least five years. After two years, if the full investment has been documented, investors gain permanent residency status.

Fraser, who sold her company's building to the Golden Rainbow fund and is now buying it back over 10 years, said the arrangement has freed up capital that has allowed her company to expand. The company formed a new boiler-repair team to service Navy ships in Everett and is pursuing additional contracts for repairing power plant engines.

These days, Fraser said, institutional lenders and investors tend to shun basic industry in favor of "clean" industries such as high-tech or software. But the Golden Rainbow fund, Fraser said, takes "a sincere interest in the investment achieving its goal. . . . They take seriously what the fund is for."

A different opportunity

For Ronald Huiskamp, the fund represents an entirely different opportunity. Huiskamp, of the Netherlands, said he became enchanted with the Puget Sound region's views of Lake Washington and the Cascades last year during a business trip. He and his wife, Alice, have filed for a green card under the Golden Rainbow program, hoping to relocate here and establish a real-estate investment company in Kirkland.

"Holland is as flat as a pancake, so it doesn't offer the scenery you've got here," Huiskamp said. "And we like the way business is being done here."

While the fund's proceeds are restricted to industrial businesses in Seattle, investors are free to live anywhere in the country.

Jack Huang, a Golden Rainbow investor from Taiwan, works for a computer network consulting firm in New York that sponsors his temporary work visa.

Huang, who recently earned a master's degree in computer science, said he wants to establish permanent American residency so he can negotiate a job on his own terms as a full-salaried employee in the lucrative computer networking industry. His investor visa application is pending.

"I can get back the investment - if I get a good job - in two or three years, so I think it's worth making the investment," Huang said.

Huang said he has acquaintances who turned to immigrant investor programs so their children would not have to enlist for mandatory service with the Taiwanese military. Huang said many of those friends opted for Canada's investor visa programs.

Canada a leader

Indeed, Canada is viewed as the leader of such programs, both in scope and benefits realized. Canadian immigration officials estimate that entrepeneurial visa programs have pumped $2.2 billion into the country's economy since 1990, creating more than 48,000 jobs.

"The numbers have been more than doubling each year," said Deborah Olive, an account manager for the immigrant investor program run by Desjardins in Montreal. "We don't even advertise this program, because we wouldn't be able to meet the demand."

In the U.S., however, the programs are still relatively obscure. And when they have garnered attention, the tone has not always been positive.

Last month, the INS publicly lambasted certain types of investor visa plans, which it said are designed to capitalize on technicalities enabling some foreigners to immigrate to the U.S. while paying only part of the $500,000 investment. The immigration agency froze all investor visa applications filed before March 11 - including Huiskamp's and Huang's - as part of an internal review.

Liebman, however, said the Golden Rainbow fund is safe because it's set up to accommodate only the full $500,000 investment. Liebman met recently with INS attorneys in Washington, D.C., and he said the government's response to the Seattle fund program was positive.

The perpetual allure of the United States to foreigners, coupled with Seattle's robust economy and proximity to the Pacific Rim, make future prospects promising for local investor visa programs, Liebman said.

"The market for immigration comes and goes," he said. "But there's always a market for good investment opportunities, plus a green card."

Jake Batsell's phone message number is 206-464-2595. His e-mail address is: jbatsell@seattletimes.com