More USFK contractors lose jobs over visas

[unhappycamper]

More USFK contractors lose jobs over visas
By Erik Slavin, Stars and Stripes
Pacific edition, Tuesday, February 10, 2009

When Charles Hoelderlin accepted a job as an on-base credit union manager in 2005, Contracting Command Korea approved the move and his Status of Forces Agreement visa.

Nearly four years later, Hoelderlin was forced to leave his post and the country when CCK officials changed their minds about how the regulation governing his visa should be interpreted.

Hoelderlin wasn’t eligible for SOFA, they said, because he spent three months with a legal 2004 South Korean working visa teaching English.

Hoelderlin was told by CCK officials last fall that had he been hired by the credit union from the United States, he could have remained.

A stateside hiring point wasn’t necessary for Hoelderlin and more than 2,000 other contractors, until last year.


Rest of article at: http://www.stripes.com/article.asp?section=104&article=60591