Archive for the ‘meatpacking industry’ Category
Posted by Christopher Coen on February 12, 2012
David Robinson, acting assistant secretary of the Bureau of Population, Refugees and Migration apparently spent some time discussing the new refugee law implemented in Tennessee last year – the Refugee Absorptive Capacity Act. State Sen. Jim Tracy, who sponsored the Act, alleges that the State Department thinks the new bill [actually a law now], which allows for local refugee moratoriums and codifies the federal regulation requiring quarterly meetings between resettlement agencies and local officials, is “just fine”. (???) An article in the Shelbyville Times-Gazette gives a view of the meeting from Tracy’s perspective:
A top representative of the U.S. State Department was in Tennessee this week to discuss a law dealing with the state’s refugee resettlement program.
The Refugee Absorptive Capacity Act, which originated from the desk of State Sen. Jim Tracy, became law last July. It’s the first bill of its kind.
It requires the state’s refugee program agency, Catholic Charities, to meet four times a year with local governments to plan and coordinate “the appropriate placement of refugees in advance of the refugees’ arrival …”
The law also allows local communities to apply for a “moratorium” on refugee resettlement if those agencies overload local resources, and so far, Tennessee is the only state that has passed this type of legislation…
A number of refugees from a variety of countries, such as Somalia, Burma and Egypt, have moved to Shelbyville in recent years to be closer to jobs at the Tyson Foods facility.
Tyson Foods needs workers who will willingly accept relatively low pay for the repetitive motion, cold environment jobs, and new refugee immigrants need jobs to support their families. (Alternatively, Americans could pay higher meat prices and the government could require companies like Tyson Foods to pay a more livable wage.)
…On Wednesday, David Robinson, acting assistant secretary of the Bureau of Population, Refugees and Migration, met with Tracy and other parties to discuss the law passed last year, the state senator told the T-G.
“That was the whole purpose of the visit, and they thought the bill was fine,” Tracy said, but he added that even though provisions in the new state refugee law passed last year was already codified in federal law, it had not been enforced…
Perhaps the State Department refugee office isn’t bothered by the new law’s quarterly meetings requirement, since it’s already an ORR regulation, but why would they think that the new law is just fine? Are moratoriums compatible with the constitutional provision that allows people freedom of movement? The government may not single out specific groups of people to restrict their freedom of movement (individuals get to decide for themselves where they want to live in this country).
…”If you are going to bring refugees into a community, you need to meet with community leaders, mayor, councilmen, commissioners, school superintendents, hospitals, anyone that an influx of a refugee group would affect,” Tracy said, explaining the reasons for the law being passed last year.
…Tracy said he “thought it was interesting that we had to codify something in state law to get [the State Department's] attention.”…
Yes that is interesting. Also interesting is why other government refugee program-related regulations and contract requirements are also regularly ignored. World Relief feels free to worship on the public’s nickel, even though its prohibited by a federal regulation, and their ORR partner has ignored our complaint about that practice. Also, the quite minimal “minimum requirements” that the resettlement agencies agree to meet in the refugee program are regularly flouted, and the State Department refugee office does not enforce those requirements or penalize the resettlement contractors. In practice this does not seem to have been working well for decades — the resettlement contractors just continue to violate regulations and contract requirements year after year. (What does that say about the public/private partnership philosophy in which contractors are put on pedestals and government oversight agencies don’t exercise much authority?)
…Tracy explained he also had questions for Robinson, talking about the local unemployment rate and about refugees getting on state assisted benefits, while the State Department discussed “sustainability” of the refugees. Supposedly, the refugees have 90 days to become sustainable in this country, Tracy said.
“The question we had for them was ‘what’s the definition of sustainability,’” Tracy said. “We had a good discussion about it.”…
Gee, wouldn’t it be nice if they shared that discussion with the public? After all, this is a publicly run and funded humanitarian program. The State Department refugee office apparently gave advance notice to all so-called “stakeholders”, except for the last minute notice to the public and press.
…”It was a pretty high level meeting,” Tracy said. “They were very concerned who was going to be in the meeting, it was very interesting.”
Tracy said that the State Department wanted to clarify that they had no control over secondary migration, when refugees leave the city they were initially settled in and go elsewhere.
The senator said that’s why the law is “so important, because we’re bringing refugees into Tennessee, the majority of them settle in Nashville, Knoxville, Memphis and Chattanooga,” but they eventually migrate to smaller towns…
So, what the state senator doesn’t seem to understand is that, under the Refugee Absorptive Capacity Act, Shelbyville and other localities will not be able to request any local moratoriums on refugee resettlement since no one is resettling refugees to those places. Refugees are moving to Shelbyville on their own for meatpacking industry jobs, in what is known as “secondary migration”.
…”It was interesting that they (the State Department) would travel to Tennessee to talk about the legislation that we passed last year and I really take it as a compliment,” Tracy said Friday. “I think they were already supposed to be doing that, and in Tennessee, they have to be doing that now.” Read more here
I guess I’d like to hear the State Department’s version of what was said at this “pretty high level meeting”, but since they treat refugee resettlement as a secret program, which seems only to guard against accountability, I won’t hold my breath.
***UPDATE*** — While the public had to sit outside the meeting one of the so-called “stakeholders” invited to the meeting was the lobbyist Jennifer Murphy of the Catholic Public Policy Commission of Tennessee.
Posted in State Department, ORR, World Relief, Cooperative Agreement, Somali, Assistant Secretary of the PRM, meatpacking industry, public/private partnership, Tennessee, openess and transparency in government, secondary migration, refugee, local officials, failure to notify, capacity, Catholic Charities of Tennessee, Joint Quarterly Placement Planning Meeting, Joint Quarterly Placement Planning Meeting, legislation, Murfreesboro/Shelbyville | Tagged: Catholic Public Policy Commission of Tennessee., David Robinson, federal contractors, moratorium, Population Refugees and Migration, PRM, Refugee Absorptive Capacity Act, refugees, regulations, resettlement, Tennessee | Leave a Comment »
Posted by Christopher Coen on January 27, 2012
Many refugee resettlement agencies nationwide have resorted to assisting in sending refugees off to distant locations, including to other states, to find employment with meatpacking companies, dairies, etc. The employment rate for Idaho’s employable refugees dropped to only 55 percent in 2009. Jan Reeves, who heads the Idaho Office for Refugees, says his office looked farther afield to find jobs for refugees. (Of course finding far-flung jobs, such as at a dairy in Boardman, Ore., do not come without risks. A refugee died in an auto-accident trying to drive to Boardman in 2010.) As a result, apparently, the employment rate has moved back up to more than 70 percent. An article in Idaho’s State Impact has more:
In the last few years, more than four thousand refugees have found their way to Idaho. They’ve come from Africa, and from East and South Asia. Most came to Boise. For years, the city’s strong economy, good quality affordable housing and supportive community created an especially favorable environment for refugee resettlement. Now, the recession has shifted that picture.
Most days, Nowela Virginie and her two young daughters are here, in her small apartment just off a busy thoroughfare on the outskirts of Boise.
Virginie is 23, and she arrived in Boise three years ago. She was born in Rwanda, but spent sixteen years of her life in a refugee camp in Tanzania…
…“You know, new country is supposed to be hard,” she says. “New language, everything is new…if you don’t speak any English, is so hard – really hard.”…
…Marcia Munden is a social worker with Catholic Charities of Idaho. She says Virginie is one of many refugees living in Boise who have found themselves stuck. “Three years ago we were just seeing a few extreme cases of refugees that had consistent difficulty with integration,” she says. “And then it really happened very suddenly where there were 50, 60, 100 families really struggling.”…
…The recession has complicated the hard task of refugee resettlement nationwide. But the shift is especially stark in Boise…
…Now, Boise is one of the places where the IRC has reduced the number of refugees it aims to resettle each year, cutting back by about a third. In addition, they and other local agencies that help refugees find work have adopted new strategies. Jan Reeves heads the Idaho Office for Refugees. “We’ve looked at other ways of opening doors that we’ve never had to look at before,” he says.
For example, Reeves says, they’ve looked farther afield, finding jobs for a number of refugees at a dairy in Boardman, Ore. The efforts appear to be paying off. Before the recession, in 2005, 95 percent of the office’s employable caseload found work. That dropped to 55 percent in 2009. It has since gone back up to more than 70 percent… Read more here
By the way, Jan Reeves is another person that came into government via the revolving door. Previously, he was the Director of the Mountain States Refugee Resettlement Program, and then Director of that agency’s Refugee Center.
Posted in economic self-sufficiency, employment/jobs for refugees, Idaho, IRC, meatpacking industry, revolving door, Rwandan, safety | Tagged: Boardman, employment, Idaho, International Rescue Committee, IRC, Jan Reeves, refugees, resettlement, Threemile Canyon Farms | Leave a Comment »
Posted by Christopher Coen on December 31, 2011
A Chevrolet passenger van carrying 15 Somali refugees from Amarillo in the Texas panhandle to their jobs at Cargill in Plainview rolled over today, killing three people. There are seven others in critical condition. The van, supposedly owned by one of the workers, struck debris on the road, swerved, overcorrected and rolled as many as five times. According to authorities neither those killed nor those critically hurt were wearing seat belts. An article in the Plainview Daily Herald reports on this tragic incident, the fourth van rollover this year in which refugees died or endured serious injuries:
Twelve of the 15 people in a van headed from Amarillo to Plainview to work at Cargill on Friday afternoon were ejected in a one-vehicle rollover two miles south of Canyon on Interstate 27.
Three of them died.
Department of Public Safety officials said Amar Ashur, Omar Abdi Qadir and Abdirizak Addulle Mohamed, 24, all of Amarillo, were killed in the accident that occurred when the Chevrolet van in which they were riding hit debris on the road, swerved, overcorrected and rolled as many as five times. The van, driven by 28-year-old Ibrahim M. Iden of Amarillo, came to rest on its roof…
…Neither those killed nor those critically hurt were wearing seat belts, authorities said…
…The van was carrying 15 Somali workers from their homes in and around Amarillo to work the second shift at Cargill…
…Catholic Family Service estimated about 1,000 Somalis lived in Amarillo in 2008 and expected about 400 refugees to come to the city this year, many of them fleeing military conflict.
The van apparently belonged to one of the occupants… Read more here
There was another van rollover on November 19 near Rushmore, Minnesota. Earlier this year there were van rollover accidents involving refugees in central Georgia (and here) and northern Georgia. A passenger van rollover in 2009 in Arizona killed six.
These vans are not safe when used for the intended purpose of carrying 15 passengers, due to instability caused by the raised center of gravity. Even 12-passenger vans are suspect.
***UPDATE*** January 3, 2012 — 3 still in critical condition, passanger van was a 2003 Chevrolet Express.
Posted in Amarillo, Catholic Family Service, Amarillo, meatpacking industry, passenger van roll-over, Somali | Tagged: Amarillo, Cargill, Catholic Family Service, Chevrolet Express, ejected, passenger van, refugees, resettlement, somalis, van rollover | Leave a Comment »
Posted by Christopher Coen on December 19, 2011
Vandals did damage to a row of cars and to several of the windows of an apartment building in Fort Morgan, Colo. where Somali immigrants reside. Fort Morgan is a site of secondary migration with refugees arriving in search of meatpacking jobs. A blurb at KUSA-TV 9News explains the story:
FORT MORGAN – Leaders in a local Somali immigrant community say they’re fearing for their safety after the windows of about eight of their cars were shot out Saturday night.
Police in Fort Morgan say vandals used a BB gun to attack the cars at an apartment complex which is primarily home to Somali refugees…
…The vandals caused about $3,000 in damage to an entire row of cars and to several of the windows of the apartment building where most of the immigrants live…
…Police are still trying to identify any suspects. At this point, they say they need to gather more information about the incident before they can call it a hate crime…
…Fort Morgan police say another car was vandalized in a similar manner Saturday night in a different part of town. They are trying to determine if the two incidents are related… Read more here
Posted in Fort Morgan, meatpacking industry, safety, secondary migration, refugee, Somali | Tagged: Fort Morgan, hate crime, meat packing, refugees, resettlement, secondary migration, Somali, vandalism | Leave a Comment »
Posted by Christopher Coen on December 4, 2011
Pilgrim’s Pride has apparently been working since February 2011 to attract Myanmar refugees from resettlement locations to Nacogdoches in east Texas to work in the company’s meat processing plant. Apparently the company claims that the jobs are “a gift”, and ones that the refugees “are happy to have” – although that doesn’t explain the turnover that requires year-round hiring. There are 50 refugees in a temporary boarding house and between 125 and 150 Myanmar refugees working at Pilgrim’s Pride. An article in the Nacogdoches Daily Sentinel obviously paints a pro-PR picture for the company:
…Pilgrim’s Pride Community Liaison Beh Reh said the Nacogdoches newcomers are adjusting well and are steadily bringing their families to the community.
“More and more families are in the community right now,” he said. “We have 40 to 45 families in the community in maybe four apartment complexes.”
For the families, the jobs at Pilgrim’s Pride are a gift and one they’re happy to have.
Depending on the department Pilgrim’s employees work in, they’re working anywhere from 32 to 40-plus hours, but the more the better, Beh Reh said…
…There are between 125 and 150 Burmese people working at Pilgrim’s Pride and could be even more coming next year, said John Thomasson, Pilgrim’s human resources manager…
…Hiring at Pilgrim’s continues year-round because of turnover and there could always be more Burmese refugees coming in, he said. The large-scale hiring of Burmese refugees has been scaled back recently, but could kick up again next year.
“We are trying to get ready for next year and the next group coming up,” Beh Reh said. “We at least need another 100 for next year. The thing is whoever is coming here, we are not guaranteed they will stay with us forever, so people will come and go.”
The temporary boarding house which opened as the first refugees came to town in February continues to have about 50 people in it still who are looking for more permanent homes, he said… Read more here
Posted in Burma/Myanmar, meatpacking industry, secondary migration, refugee | Tagged: Burma, Burma/Myanmar, meat processing, meatpacking, Myanmar, Nacogdoches, Pilgrim's Pride, refugees, resettlement, secondary migrants, secondary migration | 1 Comment »
Posted by Christopher Coen on December 3, 2011
Once again there has been a tragedy involving refugees and a van rollover. One refugee from Myanmar is dead and two others were seriously injured in an accident near Rushmore, Minnesota. The killed and injured were on their way to meatpacking jobs in Worthington. An article in the Argus Leader has the story:
Myanmar immigrants, persecuted for years, have found happiness in Sioux Falls, says a priest who works with some of the newcomers.
But for the past two weeks, grief has subdued the joyousness they have felt.
One member of their community died Nov. 19 in a one-vehicle rollover near Rushmore, Minn.
Two other passengers remain hospitalized in Sioux Falls, beginning what could be weeks of rehabilitation.
Three families are suffering, says the Rev. Paul King of St. Lambert Catholic Church…
…“For Bya Reh’s family, he was the only wage earner. His eldest son is going to school.”
Reh, 48, was pronounced dead at the scene of the accident, which happened at 2:47 p.m. on a Saturday. Eight people, including the driver, were traveling on Interstate 90 on a surface that had been made slick by freezing rain that started earlier in the day.
The group was traveling to their jobs at JBS Swift & Co. meat-packing plant in Worthington. Five of the passengers were Sudanese, King says. The other two Burmese on the van were Oo Meh, 30, and Beh Reh, 51. Bya Reh and Beh Reh are not related.
The two men and Meh are members of the Karenni, a minority group in Myanmar, formerly known as Burma…
…Bya Reh, whose funeral was Nov. 23, the day before Thanksgiving, leaves behind a wife and four children, a 23-year-old daughter and three sons, ages 21, 13 and 12.
Beh Reh, who spent a week at Sanford Health in critical condition, broke a hip in the accident and also suffered bruised ribs, a bruised heart and a severe blow to his head.
“He’s still quite confused and agitated,” King says. “He was on a respirator for most of last week. He’s able to talk but quite confused.”
Beh Reh is married with four children. His daughters are ages 21 and 11 with two sons ages 19 and 15.
Meh and her husband both work at the meatpacking plant. They took opposite shifts so someone could be home with their children, daughters ages 12 and 4 and a son who is about 8. She sustained fractures along her spine and broke her pelvis….
…The three families moved to Sioux Falls less than three years ago and have struggled to find work… Read more here
In the past several years there have also been van rollover accidents with refugees in Arizona, central Georgia (and here), and north Georgia.
Posted in Burma/Myanmar, Karenni, Lutheran Social Services of South Dakota, meatpacking industry, passenger van roll-over, Sudanese | Tagged: Burma, JBS Swift & Co, karenni, meat packing, Myanmar, refugees, resettlement, roll-over, van, Worthington | 1 Comment »
Posted by Christopher Coen on November 6, 2011
As secondary migrant refugees continue arriving in Waterloo – in search of jobs or to join their families – the federal refugee agencies remain incognito. In this vacuum the county public health agency has become the default lead agency involved with case coordinating all aspects of issues that refugees face. Hundreds of refugees need green cards – to apply for permanent residency status after 1 year in the US – an issue the health agency has no experience with. Other refugees have fallen victim to assaults and robberies with the lack of guidance and orientation to the community and culture. An article in the Waterloo/Cedar Falls Courier has more:
…The number of Burmese here has grown as members of the Burmese community refer friends and family, said Kaitlin Emrich, disease surveillance program manager. Before, the majority were recruited by Tyson Fresh Meats. The plant employs about 300 Burmese, including an interpreter to transport and interpret at appointments.
Now, some are seeking jobs elsewhere, while others are stay-at-home mothers, or have health problems and come to stay with family.
“They’re kind of coming in under the radar,” said Bruce Meisinger, director of public health for the county. “Before we were aware there were X number coming on a certain date.”
According to Emrich, Tyson continues to hire Burmese refugees, and the population is expected to continue growing quickly until winter. Several large families — with eight to 10 members each — will reportedly arrive soon, while many continue to wait for family to join them from Burma or other states.
“We are anticipating the first multigenerational family to arrive by the end of (October),” Emrich said…
…”Basically, we are still the lead agency involved with case coordinating all aspects of the issues the community is confronted with in terms of the Burmese resettling here,” Meisinger said. “There is no indication that the numbers are going to slow down in the foreseeable future.”
Emrich said close to two full-time-equivalent employees are now devoted to Burmese issues. The department is looking for a partner to handle non-health-related issues, and she has been in communication with a Des Moines agency about establishing a resettlement agency to serve the Cedar Valley.
She previously sought assistance from Catholic Charities, which declined because staffers have full loads and doesn’t have the means to hire additional workers.
“They’re used to working about 32 cases a year,” Emrich said. “We’re seeing about 32 cases every two or three weeks.”
Tyson has worked with the U.S. State Department to bring refugees to Waterloo from refugee camps in Illinois, Indiana, Michigan and Texas. Their resettlement here is considered secondary migration. Financial help is attached to primary refugees, Emrich said...
…According to Emrich, the Burmese live in rental housing with one primary landlord “who understands their unique needs as newcomers to our country.” However, some have fallen victim to assaults and robberies, especially in neighborhoods with high crime rates, she said… Read more here
Posted in Burma/Myanmar, Catholic Charities Diocese of Des Moines, community/cultural orientation, dangerous neighborhoods, economic self-sufficiency, immigration services, meatpacking industry, safety, secondary migration, refugee, Waterloo | Tagged: Burmese, catholic charities, Office of Refugee Resettlement, ORR, refugees, resettlement, secondary migration, State Department, Tyson Fresh Meats, Waterloo | 1 Comment »
Posted by Christopher Coen on August 21, 2011
Refugees have migrated to the rural agricultural community of Fort Morgan, Colorado since 2005, mainly in search of meatpacking jobs at the local Cargill plant. Most of the refugees are Somalis. An article in the Denver Post has more:
There is no sign, nothing to indicate this is a place of worship, just an open door in an alley near the Goodwill store and the sound of Arabic crackling over a tinny sound system.
The mosque is behind a real estate agency on Main Street in Fort Morgan. On Fridays, the Somali men come — standing, kneeling and pressing their foreheads to the floor in the rhythms of Islamic prayer.
The imam, or spiritual leader, does not have time to talk after his sermon. He has to hurry off to work second shift at the Cargill meatpacking plant.
The latest wave of immigrants to remake the face of this rural agricultural community of 12,000 is black, Muslim and scarred from experiences in a failed state.
An estimated 900 to 1,100 Somalis — most of them refugees — now live here, drawn by employment at Cargill in the past six years…
…The first Somalis arrived in Fort Morgan in 2005 — young men at first, there to feel the place out.
The meatpacking industry was struggling to find workers at the time, said Nicole Johnson-Hoffman, the manager of the Cargill plant in Fort Morgan. So company representatives fanned out to workforce centers across the country offering relocation packages, temporary lodging and food vouchers.
The company, which employs 2,000 in Fort Morgan, does not target particular ethnic groups, Johnson-Hoffman said.
But Somalis, like others before them, were willing to do work others would not. As the first wave of men contacted friends and relatives, families began arriving…
…Police Chief Keith Kuretich started to field complaints: Groups of 30 Somali men were loitering and littering outside a store. Somalis were haggling over prices at Walmart and holding up checkout lines. Their driving was dangerously bad…
…Kuretich has been at the forefront of refuting falsehoods about the newcomers. He recently discredited an e-mail that claimed two Somali men had attempted to abduct a child from the Walmart parking lot.
Real problems, however, do exist, including two or three domestic violence cases…
…On Nov. 3, 2009, a Somali man from Greeley fatally stabbed his 27-year-old Somali ex-girlfriend in a Fort Morgan apartment hallway — the eighth homicide in the city since 2000 at that time.
An out-of-town website that is critical of refugee resettlement spun tales of an honor killing. Kuretich dismissed that characterization, describing it as a domestic incident unrelated to religion or ethnicity.
The killing, however, provided fuel to those already unhappy about their new neighbors… Read more here
I understand some of people’s frustration when dealing with new Americans as they learn to navigate a new culture, but there seems to be an almost hair-trigger reaction by some Americans when it comes to their reaction toward Muslim immigrants. It’s as if they can’t make any distinction between the world’s billion and a half Muslims and the relatively few terrorists who try to justify violence in the name of Islam. According to a recent article in Salon.com, a Gallup poll indicates that Muslims in America are the religious group that is most likely to reject attacks on civilians by terrorists or the military.
Posted in anti-Islamic, capacity, Colorado, Fort Morgan, Islamic, meatpacking industry, police, secondary migration, refugee, security/terrorism, Somali | Tagged: Cargill, Colorado, Fort Morgan, islam, jobs, meatpacking, Morgan County, Muslims, OneMorgan, refugees, secondary migration, Somali | Leave a Comment »
Posted by Christopher Coen on June 11, 2011
Iowa has become a secondary migration site for about 1000 refugees from Burma, according to John Wilken, who heads the Iowa Bureau of Refugee Services, in a quote to the WCF Courier in Waterloo, Iowa. Secondary migrants are arriving largely in Waterloo, Columbus Junction and Storm Lake, and some may also be coming to Marshalltown and Perry. For the most part they are migrating to Iowa for meatpacking jobs.
…Since the 1990s, thousands of ethnic minorities and political dissidents have fled Myanmar, as Burma is called by its ruling military government.
[There are] about 150 Burmese refugees employed at the Waterloo Tyson plant. The first 40 Burmese employees arrived from…Rockford, Ill., in May last year. Tyson officials said another 100 likely will be hired by the end of the year.
“We knew the refugees were there and needed jobs, and we had these jobs to fill,” said Teri Wray, community liaison for the Tyson’s Waterloo plant.
The plant had added jobs faster than the local pool of applicants was providing candidates, said Worth Sparkman, public relations manager of Tyson Foods.
“More than anything, it seemed to be a good fit,” Sparkman said.
Tyson has worked with the U.S. State Department to bring refugees to Waterloo from…Illinois, Indiana, Michigan and Texas. Their resettlement here is called secondary migration.
“Based on the anecdotal information I’ve heard, I’d say there are 1,000 secondary migrants” from Burma in Iowa, said John Wilken, who heads the Iowa Bureau of Refugee Services. Along with Waterloo, secondary migrants are arriving largely in Columbus Junction and Storm Lake. He said some may also be coming to Marshalltown and Perry. Generally, they are being drawn to Iowa by jobs at meat packing plants.
Burmese refugees have been directly resettled into the Des Moines metro area since 2007, with 128 refugees arriving the first year.
“In that year, there were a total of 435 refugees that were settled into Iowa,” Wilken said.
“They were the largest single group coming into Iowa.”
Since then, “they have been the largest planned resettlement coming into Iowa.” A total of 825 Burmese refugees have been resettled in the state, although some have since moved. The numbers are down recently because in January 2010, Lutheran Services of Iowa stopped resettling refugees, Wilken said.
In the Des Moines area, Catholic Charities plans to resettle 120 Burmese per year, with a focus on relatives of those already here. The U.S. Committee on Immigrants and Refugees is targeting 350 Burmese resettlements in the Des Moines area next year. The Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Dubuque’s Cedar Rapids office plans to resettle a small number of Burmese next year.
Wilken’s agency resettled refugees until a year ago, but the State Department determined the bureau did not meet the criteria of a national office, so it had to stop. The bureau now focuses on job placement for the refugees, mostly in the Des Moines area.
“Right now, there’s no agency that has stated they’re going to open up a resettlement office in Waterloo,” Wilken noted.
Since there is no resettlement agency in Waterloo, many of the Burmese Tyson workers here are still waiting for green cards and for their families to join them… Read more here
Now I know that new Americans desperately need jobs, but I still councel them to stay away from meatpacking due to the deplorable safety record in the industry. There is chronic underreporting of injuries, according to an article in The Nation. An article in Mother Jones also reported that Bureau of Labor Statistics show that meatpacking is the nation’s most dangerous occupation.
Posted in Burma/Myanmar, Catholic Charities Diocese of Des Moines, Columbus Junction, Des Moines USCRI (field office), employment abuses, health, Iowa, meatpacking industry, secondary migration, refugee, Storm Lake, USCRI, Waterloo | Tagged: Bureau of Labor Statistics, Burma, Burma/Myanmar, Columbus Junction, Des Moines, human rights, Iowa Bureau of Refugee Services, John Wilken, meat packing, meatpacking, Myanmar, refugee, refugee resettlement, refugee resettlement agencies, refugee resettlement program, resettlement, Secondary migrantion, secondary migrants, State Department, Storm Lake, Tyson, U.S. Committee on Immigrants and Refugees, USCRI, Waterloo | 2 Comments »
Posted by Christopher Coen on June 6, 2011
USCRI office in Dillon, SC
Watch out Dillon, South Carolina. The USCRI has come to town, and oh, what a checkered history they bring with them. Having neglected refugees in Akron, Boston, Bowling Green, Chicago, Connecticut, Erie, Houston, Kansas City, New Hampshire, and Raleigh, they have decided to open new affiliates in other states — apparently to compensate for those that were shut down. An article at WPDE NewsChannel 15 announces the grand opening.
DILLON — Thursday morning, the US Committee for Refugees and Immigrants (USCRI) held a grand opening ceremony for its office on Lockemy Highway in the city of Dillon.
Since 2007, refugees from the African country of Burundi have been migrating to Dillon. There are about 300 refugees who now live there. According to its website, the USCRI “protect the rights and address the needs of persons in forced or voluntary migration
worldwide by advancing fair and humane public policy, facilitating and providing direct professional services, and promoting the full participation of migrants in community life.”
The refugees fled their home country due to civil war that started in 1993. Some reports estimate that has many as 300,000 people have been killed.
Samuel Ndikumana is a native of Burundi and has lived in the United States for many years now. He says he’s been a legal citizen in this country since 2008. He works at the USCRI office in Dillon as a caseworker and translator…
…Samuel Ndikumana is a native of Burundi and has lived in the United States for many years now. He says he’s been a legal citizen in this country since 2008. He works at the USCRI office in Dillon as a caseworker and translator…
…He says the refugees came to Dillon County because of jobs. Ndikumana says the county has several plants, including Perdue and Harbor Freight Tools that employ many of the refugees. They also work at fast food restaurants and other businesses in the area… Read more here
Posted in Burundian, meatpacking industry, neglect, South Carolina, USCRI | Tagged: Burundi, Dillon, Harbor Freight Tools, Perdue, refugee, refugee resettlement, refugee resettlement agencies, refugee resettlement program, resettlement, South Carolina, U.S. Committee for Refugees and Immigrants, USCRI | Leave a Comment »
Christopher Coen
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