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Zoe's passport getting closer

North Bay Olympian Alison Herst knows the wheels of Haitian bureaucracy move slowly and sometimes need greasing, her boyfriend Stacy Jackson says. But an unexpected source has stepped in to help Herst bring her adopted daughter Zoe home. As baytoday.
North Bay Olympian Alison Herst knows the wheels of Haitian bureaucracy move slowly and sometimes need greasing, her boyfriend Stacy Jackson says.

But an unexpected source has stepped in to help Herst bring her adopted daughter Zoe home.

As baytoday.ca first reported, a Haitian politician has become involved in trying to complete the adoption process Alison began over a year ago.

Zoe requires a Haitian passport before Herst and her father Paul, who have been in Port-au-Prince since Oct. 17, can bring her back to Canada.

Once the passport has been issued Zoe will be provided with a travel visa from the Canadian embassy in Haiti.

Sat there for three or four hours
Getting the passport, though, has been an ordeal.
Enter the politician, a Haitian senator, whom Herst met through the guesthouse she’s staying in.

“He took all the documentation from the Interior Ministry and brought it over to the immigration office and sat there for three or four hours to make sure the paper work was done properly,” said Jackson, an American Hockey League linesman currently in Corpus Christi, TX.

If all goes well, hardly a certainty in Haiti, Jackson said, the passport should be ready by Friday.

“That’s what the senator said, and he’s the only one in Haiti who has done everything he said he was going to do,” Jackson said.

Hoping embassy will make an exception
Providing the passport is issued on time, Herst could face one additional roadblock.

She had hoped to leave Haiti on Saturday, Jackson said, but the Canadian embassy closes at noon Fridays, which means there would be nobody there to issue the vital visa.

“Alison is hoping the embassy will make an exception and stay open later on Friday if the passport is issued after 12 p.m.,” Jackson said.

Herst will also have to check with the airport to make sure her plane ticket can be used next week, if she can’t leave Saturday.

In the meantime, Jackson said, Zoe, almost 13 months, is having “a great time” with her mother and grandfather.

“She has no idea about what’s going on, about the roller coaster of emotions Alison is going through waiting for this to be all over.”