Felice Gordoro is a young tech entrepreneur with big plans. When he was in college at Georgetown, he started the non-profit Roots of Hope to foster meaningful connections between American and Cuban youths. He worked as a White House fellow, and helped organize Colombian rock star Juanes’ “Peace Without Borders” concert in Cuba in 2009. Now Gordoro is working for Clearpath Inc., a company whose software aims to speed and simplify the visa application process for immigrants. “We are trying to be the TurboTax for immigration,” he told Kristina Puga of NBC Latino.
Former U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services Chief Michael Petrucelli started Clearpath Inc. in 2009, providing a website that guides people through the application process. The forms cost between $70 and $200, which offers a significant savings compared to getting help from an immigration lawyer. While Gordoro and Petrucelli stress that people with more complicated immigration situations should seek help from a lawyer, they believe their software can help make the process easier and less costly for many.
In fact, “The wizard-based system has more than 5,000 rules that check along the way to ensure that the user who is applying for the benefit is eligible for the benefit,” Gorordo told Laura Wides-Munoz of the Associated Press.
MORE: Meet the Undocumented Immigrants Who Created an App to Press for Immigration Reform