Christopher Coen
Melissa Sogard
nancylee1
Bhutanese refugees are struggling with poverty, stress-related ailments, unemployment and the English language in Oakland, California. The refugees lack many needed services in the East Bay area that could help them meet self-sufficiency, partly due to the poor economy and related state budget cuts. An article in the Oakland Tribune explains:
Five years after a few pioneering families began trickling into East Oakland and Alameda, a burgeoning Bhutanese exile community is happy to have left refugee camps but still struggling to adjust to Bay Area life, according to the first report to survey their well-being.
“The community is still trying to survive,” said Jiwan Subba, president of the Alameda-based Bhutanese Community in California, a year-old organization helping link the refugees with jobs, health services and fellowship…
…Subba’s group used the occasion to reveal some of the economic and social problems felt by the community of several hundred refugees, nearly all of whom have arrived in the past five years.
In a survey of 91 Bhutanese immigrants in Oakland and Alameda, about 68 percent had incomes below the federal poverty line, more than half reported stress-related ailments, 42 percent are unemployed and many say they struggle with the English language, which makes it harder for them to find good jobs… Read more here
