Archive for the ‘evangelical’ Category
Posted by Christopher Coen on January 22, 2012
Oh gosh. World Relief, in my opinion one of the public’s most intransigent and problem-plagued refugee resettlement contractors, continues to spread itself out (problems including refusing to hire an interpreter because he was Muslim, partner church staff and members moving into apartment complexes with refugees to “foster deeper relationships”, alienating other partner churches and having refugee clients work without pay, and placing new refugees in other refugee clients’ homes without agreements.) The group will soon open a new office in Oshkosh, Wisconsin, and may begin resettling its first group of refugees in February. A reader-submitted announcement about the office opening is found at The Oshkosh Northwestern:
International humanitarian agency World Relief will open an office in Oshkosh this month. With approval and funding from the U.S. Department of State, World Relief has selected the Fox Cities as a Wisconsin base for a nationwide program of refugee resettlement and support.
Longtime Oshkosh resident Norm Leatherwood will direct this office and UW Oshkosh Human Services graduate Sarah Kurer will serve as a case-worker and Resettlement and Placement Program coordinator…
…As an agency partner with the U.S. Department of State for the past 30 years, World Relief has assisted more than 200,000 victims of persecution resettle as legal immigrants in the United States…
…While details are still being finalized, the first group of refugees could move to Oshkosh by the middle of February… Read more here
Posted in churches, evangelical, faith-based, Oshkosh, World Relief | Tagged: Oshkosh, refugees, resettlement, World Relief | Leave a Comment »
Posted by Christopher Coen on December 1, 2011
The Morrison-Lautenberg Amendment of 1989 and the issue of whether Congress should renew it is up before us again (the last temporary extension of the measure expired on May 31, 2011). San Antonio’s Express-News reports that US Rep. Lamar Smith, R-San Antonio, chairman of the House Judiciary Committee with oversight over immigration policy, is holding up the renewal of the Morrison-Lautenberg Amendment:
In 1989, Congress passed legislation authored by Sen. Frank Lautenberg, D-N.J., codifying the U.S. interest in assisting [people to] escape persecution...
…Congress has routinely renewed the refugee measure for 22 years. This year, as in the past, Lautenberg attached the legislation as an amendment to the foreign operations budget. But Rep. Lamar Smith, R-San Antonio, chairman of the House Judiciary Committee with oversight over immigration policy, has stopped the Lautenberg Amendment dead in its tracks.
Smith raises two categories of objections. The first have to do with fairness. Smith contends that the 2,000 or so refugees who enter the United States annually under the Lautenberg Amendment receive preferential treatment in comparison with the other 73,000 refugees the United States takes in.
But that’s precisely the point of the amendment — to recognize special situations of persecution and open a relief valve to help avert a humanitarian catastrophe.
Smith’s second area of concern is that the amendment has never been subjected to oversight. Is the refugee program being run wisely and efficiently? Are people entering the United States under false pretenses?
Oversight hearings are entirely appropriate. We are confident that after hearing the facts about the refugee program, Smith will agree that the Lautenberg Amendment is a judicious and compassionate policy for legal immigration... Read more here
To understand this amendment we must first understand the meaning of the word “refugee” as defined by the Immigration and Nationality Act – the basic body of immigration law:
Refugee – any person who is outside any country of such person’s nationality or, in the case of a person having no nationality, is outside any country in which such person last habitually resided, and who is unable or unwilling to return to, and is unable or unwilling to avail himself or herself of the protection of, that country because of persecution or a well-founded fear of persecution on account of race, religion, nationality, membership in a particular social group, or political opinion. here
The Morrison-Lautenberg Amendment then added more language in trying to help people experiencing persecution within their country of nationality, and in circumstances that are not easy to prove. A member of a category group:
“…may establish a well-founded fear of persecution on account of race, religion, nationality, membership in a particular social group, or political opinion…by asserting a credible basis for concern about the possibility of such persecution.”
The category groups were Jews and certain Christians from the former Soviet Union (FSA), as well as certain refugees in Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia. A 2003 update to the law made the category also available to refugees from Iran – mostly Christians, but also Jews, Bahais, Zoroastrians and other persecuted minorities. Presently the US allows in only about two thousand people annually this category.
The problem with the Morrison-Lautenberg Amendment was that powerful US political groups, e.g. Jews and evangelical Christians, abused it to help people they favored emigrate to the US. It allowed people to enter the US as political refugees from the FSA even after glasnost (openness) and perestroĭka (restructuring) often made moot any claim to persecution. Preferential treatment was indeed given to these people, which left some people with a bad feeling about the amendment. The Morrison-Lautenberg Amendment, however, remains the only option for legitimately persecuted groups who stay trapped inside their countries of nationality in circumstances of persecution not easy to prove. I would agree that Congress needs to inspect the oversight of the refugee program to check the many shortcomings that we explore on this blog, but not in the context of the Morrison-Lautenberg Amendment. I also question why the category is only open to persecuted groups from a select handful of countries.
Posted in Bahá'i, Cambodian, evangelical, former Soviet republics, HIAS, Iranian, Jewish, Laos, legislation, Morrison-Lautenberg Amendment, Vietnamese | Tagged: evangelicals, Iran, jews, Lamar Smith, Lautenberg Amendment, Morrison-Lautenberg Amendment, oversight, persecution, refugees, resettlement | Leave a Comment »
Posted by Christopher Coen on November 2, 2011
The wait for refugees in San Diego needing to take english as a
second language (ESL) classes has increased by nearly 14-times. The head of the US Department of HHS’s Office of Refugee Resettlement (that would be Eskinder Negash) claims he “was caught off guard by the size of the problem”, and did not offer any immediate solutions. Yet, the California state government has been in deep financial troubles for two years now. An article in Fronteras has more:
SAN DIEGO — On a recent Friday morning, students of Iraqi descent practiced phrases they might need for a job interview in the language lab at Cuyamaca College…
…English as a Second Language, or ESL, courses, are in high demand at Cuyamaca, which is located in San Diego’s East County.
“We had enough students on the wait list to double the program,” said Alicia Muñoz, Cuyamaca’s ESL coordinator. In fact, over the past two years, the wait list for ESL classes has increased by nearly 14-times.
Most of the demand comes from recently arrived Iraqi refugees. More than 13,000 Iraqis have relocated to San Diego County since 2005, making it one of the largest refugee communities in the country…
…But budget cuts – affecting community colleges across the state – have forced schools to cancel classes in many subjects, including ESL. At the same time, the demand for these classes has skyrocketed. And it’s not just community colleges that are feeling the strain.
County Supervisor Dianne Jacob has gotten an earful of concerns from elementary schools, hospitals and other public institutions in her district. They all say that they don’t have the funds to address refugee needs, especially on shrinking budgets.
“There have not been adequate resources available to serve this population,” Jacob said.
The supervisor recently hosted a meeting of refugee resettlement officials and service providers to discuss the problem…
…After the meeting, the head of the federal office of refugee resettlement admitted he was caught off guard by the size of the problem. He didn’t offer any immediate solutions, but conversations between Jacob’s office and service providers are ongoing… Read more here
A year-and-a-half ago we wrote to the ORR about a refugee who was unable to use medical health care in Sacramento – that too, explained a California state official, was related to budget problems. If the ORR had investigated the case – or even talked to anyone in California – wouldn’t they have discovered the budget problems by now, and the effects on refugees? How do they manage to be completely out of touch with the problems that refugees in San Diego (the largest resettlement site in the US) are experiencing?
Another issue we put in a complaint to the ORR about is the issue of discrimination in hiring by faith-based refugee resettlement agencies (World Relief and Catholic Charities). World Relief claimed they could not hire a Muslim former refugee in Washington state because “he might not feel comfortable while they prayed at staff meetings.” Yet, federal regulations prohibit worship on the public dime. The ORR claimed it was investigating, yet has stonewalled since we placed the complaint in April 2010. We wrote once again in April 2011 to find out what progress they were making, Mr. Negash’s Deputy Director, Ken Tota, did not even bother to respond.
Posted in Chaldean, discrimination in hiring, ESL & ELL, evangelical, funding, Iraqi, language, ORR, Sacramento, San Diego, World Relief | Tagged: English as a Second Language, Eskinder Negash, ESL, Iraqi, Ken Tota, Office of Refugee Resettlement, ORR, refugees, resettlement, SanDiego | Leave a Comment »
Posted by Christopher Coen on September 8, 2011
A suburban Chicago church, the Wheaton Bible Church, partnering with the World Relief refugee resettlement contractor has found a “window” in their efforts to convert Muslims to Christianity. They term this conversion strategy “immigration engagement theology” and are implementing it via their MOVE Initiative. So committed are they to converting the refugees, several staff and church members have moved into the Wheaton apartment complex where World Relief placed 15 Iraqi families, claiming they want to foster deeper relationships with the refugees. The story is found in the September 2011 issue of Christianity Today:
Shortly after our son Paul graduated from high school this spring, we put him on a plane with seven other students for a two-week trip to France and Italy. Their trek, led by four adults, was a small piece of Wheaton Bible Church’s (WBC) MOVE Initiative, a relatively nascent project defined by its mission and ministry to Muslims both in suburban Chicago and abroad…
…Locally, the MOVE Initiative reaches out to about 15 Iraqi families in a nearby apartment complex through a partnership with World Relief. Several staff and church members have moved into the complex to foster deeper relationships, which typically begin with relatively simple tasks when the refugees arrive: picking them up at the airport, stocking their fridges, running errands, and meeting other practical needs involved in resettlement.
“We’re just meeting needs and building relationships,” says local-impact pastor Chris McElwee. “They’re not strangers to us. They know us and trust us, and they’re interested in spiritual things.” At least a couple of the Iraqi men have been visiting WBC in recent months, attending worship services (with their Arabic/English Bibles in hand) and taking part in a discussion group.
Our new MOVE missionaries, who recently arrived in France, will take essentially the same approach: helping refugees resettle, meeting needs, and building relationships. The hope is that as the friendships grow, so will opportunities to share the gospel…
…Greater Europe Mission president Henry Deneen says the relatively recent influx of Muslims to Europe has affected his ministry’s overall strategy. It still reaches out to native Europeans, but “there’s a window of time here, especially with all the uprisings in North Africa and the Middle East, that immigrants are flooding into Europe.
“Several European governments—particularly France, Germany, and the UK—are saying that the experiment of multiculturalism … has failed,” he says. “So you have a perfect storm—immigrants flooding in, and governments saying it’s not working. We’re saying, what a great place for the Lord Jesus to be.”
Thus, Wheaton Bible’s efforts to reach out to Muslims in France. Says Bugh, “It’s all part of a larger immigration engagement theology that’s worked for us.” Read more here
Posted in Chicago, churches, converting refugees, evangelical, faith-based, Iraqi, Islamic, World Relief | Tagged: Chicago, Chris McElwee, conversion, Emily Gray, Henry Deneen, immigration engagement theology, missionaries, MOVE Initiative, multiculturalism, proselytization, refugees, resettlement, WBC, Wheaton, Wheaton Bible Church, World Relief | 2 Comments »
Posted by Christopher Coen on February 14, 2011
ORR director -- Eskinder Negash
Last March I blogged about the issue of World Relief Seattle refusing to hire a Muslim man who volunteered with them as an interpreter because he “might not feel comfortable while they prayed at staff meetings.” But regulations supposedly prohibit using government funding for any form of worship (praying at staff meetings in a public program resettling refugees). Oops.
I wrote to the Deputy Director of the U.S. Department of Health & Human Services (HHS) Office of Refugee Resettlement (ORR), Ken Tota (ORR director Eskinder Negash’s second in command) last April and asked them to look into World Relief and Catholic Charities’ announcements that they would be discriminating in hiring based on religious affiliation.
After waiting two months and getting no response I wrote to Mr. Tota again on June 10, 2010 and asked for an update. Mr. Tota finally responded on June 22, 2010 and wrote that the ORR would be conducting an investigation (now more than two months after my complaint) and that I “should not hesitate to contact [him] should [I] have questions or follow-up concerns in this regard.”
Then, four more months went by with no response from Mr. Tota or anyone else at the ORR, so, once again, I wrote to Mr. Tota on October 19, 2010 asking for an update. Mr. Tota wrote back on November 2, 2010 and claimed that his agency needed at least two more months to close its “investigation”, and said that he would send me the conclusions by late December. December came and went.
On January 20, 2011 I wrote to Mr. Tota yet again to find out what was happening. No response. On February 8, 2011 – almost one year after my original complaint – I wrote again to Mr. Tota to ask what was happening. Again, he has not responded.
This Hosni Mubarak Egyptian-regime-style of responsiveness, accountability and transparency shows me that the ORR does not take its responsibilities seriously, and apparently views the public, whom they supposedly serve, as nothing more than an irritant. Of course, this is an agency that has also refused to release to the Congress their annual reports for 2008, 2009 and 2010, even though the law requires it.
It’s clear that laws and regulations don’t seem to matter much to these federal agencies or these public servants. How do we explain to refugees that their new country of residence has government agencies as non-accountable to the people as the governments they have escaped from?
Posted in Annual Report to Congress, Catholic, Christian, discrimination in hiring, evangelical, faith-based, funding, Islamic, openess and transparency in government, ORR, religion, Seattle, World Relief | Tagged: Administration for Children and Families, catholic charities, discriminating in hiring based on religious affiliation, Eskinder Negash, HHS, Ken Tota, Office of Refugee Resettlement, ORR, refugee resettlement, refugee resettlement agencies, refugee resettlement program, refugees, religious discrimination, seattle, separation of church and state, U.S. Department of Health & Human Services, World Relief | 7 Comments »
Posted by Christopher Coen on January 21, 2011
This story just amazes me – an evangelical church in Abilene, Texas is converting Bhutanese refugees to Christianity by teaching them English using the Bible. Refugees who have been Hindu or Buddhist all their lives suddenly abandoning their faiths and converting to Christianity after a few of these “English lessons”. Of course, proselytization is supposedly forbidden in the refugee program, so why does the International Rescue Committee allow this? The Abilene Reporter News gives more details:
For more than 30 years, Pat Cranfill has lived, worked and worshipped in Abilene.
She is known by people closest to her as someone who loves to help and serve, but it wasn’t until about five years ago that she had an opportunity to put that servant attitude to work on an international mission field right here in Abilene.
Cranfill, a member of the congregation at Southern Hills Church of Christ, answered the call to her new “mission” field by initially helping some young ladies — refugees from Bhutan — find their way around Abilene.
That offer of help has grown into her participation in a program at Southern Hills that teaches English to refugees through Bible stories…
…According to Phil Ware, Minister of The Word at Southern Hills, when the International Rescue Committee began bringing refugees here a few years ago, it was clear that his church could step up and model Jesus to them…
…Using tools and programs like Let’s Start Talking, FriendSpeak, and the World English Institute, more than 50 Southern Hills members are engaged in teaching English to these new Abilenians.
“All the English is taught by reading passages of Scripture from the easy-to-read version of the Bible, which has been used internationally,” said Ware. “The lessons are simple, less colloquial, and designed best for someone with a very limited English vocabulary.”…
…”It is that the Bible is the message, and you are the example. You are not there as a teacher; you are there as a friend”
DeLynda Gray, LST/FriendSpeak coordinator for Southern Hills, said she has seen some very rewarding things come out of using the Bible to help the refugees learn English.
“When you have a different world view than we do the journey through the Bible’s parables and lessons can seem figurative,” she said. “What continues to amaze me is their devotion and excitement to learn. They are so thirsty for the Bible; they really want to go more deeply.”
Gray said several of the refugees have made professions of faith and been baptized into the Christian faith.
“That is pretty amazing in a culture that claims thousands of gods,” she said. “For them to claim the one, true God, and follow Jesus is wonderful.”
Such was the case for 31-year-old Moti Lamagdey and his 27-year-old wife, Tila, both Bhutanese refugees.
“I made a decision to follow the Christian faith and was baptized with Tila on December 12, 2010,” said Lamagedy. “I’m very proud of the decision, and God has blessed us both. I learned so much from the Bible classes at Southern Hills, and the more I learned, the more I wanted to be a follower of Jesus.”
Cranfill said for many of the refugees, once they’re shown enough concrete facts revealed in the Bible, it doesn’t take them very long to get it.
“When they get it, you can see a light go on in their eyes it’s really amazing,” she added.
Gray added that she has seen these English classes as a powerful vehicle for Southern Hills members — who have been tentative about evangelism — to feel confident about evangelism.
“We are God’s ‘community front porch’ this is where the real worship is done,” said Ware. “Lives are changed person to person the same way Jesus did it. Christian life is about touching people walking alongside each other, helping each other become who we say we worship.”
“It takes very little to share the Gospel with them,” Cranfill said. “If more people were willing, we would have Bible studies going day and night wouldn’t that be great to know we were using God’s mission field for that purpose?” Read more here
Posted in Abilene, converting refugees, evangelical, IRC, Nepali Bhutanese | Tagged: Abilene, Bhutanese refugees, converting refugees, evangelicals, evangelizing, International Rescue Committee, IRC, Nepalese refugees, refugee resettlement, refugee resettlement agencies, refugee resettlement program, refugees, religious conversion, resettlement, Translation of faith | 5 Comments »
Posted by Christopher Coen on January 2, 2011
World Relief continues to resettle refugees to Aurora, Illinois (near Chicago). An article in The Beacon News details the conditions at the housing complex into which World Relief has resettled the refugees, including shootings, overcrowding, and empty kitchens.
…The World Relief organization in Aurora works with apartment complexes within the McCleery school boundaries to bring refugees from around the world into the United States…
…Many of those families live in an apartment complex near McCleery School. World Relief tries to house similar ethnicities near each other, Graham said…
…Many of the World Relief students come from situations such as these. Some have basic needs that must be met before an education can become too effective. Johns said she has seen students show up for school, wearing flip flops in the winter and knows that something is wrong.
“We found out later that the mother was blind,” she said.
Sometimes the kitchens are empty at home, or there are multiple family members sleeping on one twin bed, or the floor, she said. She has had students who told her that they heard shooting overnight, she said.
“You kind of profess ‘the land of the free,’ but they’re not always in an ideal setting.” Johns said… Read more here
Yet, World Relief is supposedly required to resettle refugees into housing that is safe and sanitary, according to their State Department contract. There is also supposed to be enough beds to accomodate all members of the family. As for “empty kitchens”, World Relief is required to give refugees enough food until their food stamp benefits kick in.
Posted in beds, Chicago, dangerous neighborhoods, evangelical, faith-based, furnishings, lack of, housing, Operational Guidance, safety, State Department, World Relief | Tagged: Aurora, refugee resettlement, refugee resettlement agencies, refugee resettlement program, refugees, State Department, World Relief | 1 Comment »
Posted by Christopher Coen on October 22, 2010
World Relief announced that they are pulling out of Fort Wayne two years after opening an office in the city. World Relief claimed they opened the office to relieve strain from the other refugee resettlement agency in the city, Catholic Charities of Fort Wayne-South Bend, but it became clear that World Relief arrived in town to resettle more refugees and not to help care for those who were already there. When the State Department tried to restrict resettlement to the city in response to a large influx of Burmese refugee secondary migrants that the city and county have had trouble absorbing, World Relief attempted to convince the State Department to reverse course, and thereby make the crises even worse. When they were unsuccessful at that they decided to abandon ship altogether. An article in the Fort Wayne Journal Gazette gives more details:
FORT WAYNE – One of Fort Wayne’s two refugee placement offices will close, a consequence of the federal government’s limitations on the number of refugees sent to the city.
World Relief, a faith-based international humanitarian aid organization, opened an office at Simpson United Methodist Church on South Harrison Street less than two years ago in anticipation of an increased flow of refugees.
The U.S. State Department resettled about 800 Burmese refugees in the Fort Wayne area the year before the office opened. Refugees have been fleeing persecution in Myanmar, as Burma is called by the ruling military government, for years.
The high number being sent here had social services agencies seeking help, and World Relief said it hoped to ease some of the strain on Catholic Charities of Fort Wayne-South Bend, the sole agency tasked with placing refugees in the area.
But the State Department has since severely restricted the number of refugees who can be sent to the Fort Wayne area, and World Relief’s local office has welcomed only about half the number of refugees for which it was approved.
Calls to World Relief’s headquarters in Baltimore and Midwest office in Illinois were not returned Thursday. Dan Kosten, World Relief vice president of U.S. Programs, said in a statement the organization has tried to have the restrictions loosened.
Without more refugees, keeping the office open isn’t viable, he said.
Officials at the non-profit’s headquarters told Jeff Keplar, executive director of the Fort Wayne office, on Oct. 15 that his office would close...
…After World Relief Fort Wayne opened, the State Department limited refugee placement in the city to those who have parents, grandparents, children, grandchildren or siblings already living in the city.
Fort Wayne and Detroit were the only two cities to have such restrictions. In June, at the request of placement agencies, the State Department modified Detroit’s restriction to allow the placement of any refugees in the Detroit metro region who have ties there.
“This change should have the positive effect of strengthening family reunification and lessening secondary migration from other placement sites to the Detroit area,” a statement from the Department of State’s Bureau of Population, Refugees and Migration said.
Secondary migration occurs when refugees are resettled in one city and leave for another. That has contributed to a Burmese refugee population in Fort Wayne that has been estimated to be the country’s largest.
Keplar thinks the restriction did not lessen the influx of refugees; instead, it might have contributed to secondary migration of refugees who arrived in the city without the support system of a resettlement agency… Read more here
So what we have here is private refugee groups whose goal is not to help the local community and the refugees already resettled, or refugees who have migrated to town from other areas, but to bring in more refugees. Fort Wayne has been in dire need of private groups with private funding to help with refugee secondary migrants, but World Relief has made it clear that they only do business when they can tap government funding, i.e. bring in more refugees for resettlement and collect government resettlement funds. This is what the private resettlement agencies sell as the “private sector contribution” — in which resettlement “charities” no longer just contribute private resources, but only get and stay involved if they can feed off of public funding. It’s almost hard to imagine a worse arrangement for the U.S. refugee resettlement program.
It’s also hard to imagine what would have happened if World Relief had suceeded in pressuring the State Department to discontinue the reduction in flow of refugees to this already overburdened community. Its clear, however, that World Relief has no interest in responsible refugee resettlement. I believe that their involvement in the refugee resettlement is detrimental to the program.
By the way, here is a report on some of World Relief’s funny numbers from a 2005 audit by the State Department’s Office of Inspector General. (Part 1 and Part 2)
Posted in Burma/Myanmar, capacity, evangelical, faith-based, Fort Wayne, moratorium / restriction, public/private partnership, refugee magnet city, secondary migration, refugee, State Department, World Relief | Tagged: Burmese refugees, Catholic Charities of Fort Wayne-South Bend, Dan Kosten, refugee, refugee resettlement, refugee resettlement agencies, refugee resettlement program, refugees, secondary migrants, secondary migration, Simpson United Methodist Church, State Department, World Relief | Leave a Comment »
Posted by Christopher Coen on September 12, 2010
A church working with World Relief in Spokane says that they cannot keep up with the flow of refugees to the city, according to an article in The Spokane Spokesman. The church’s pastor says that World Relief must draw the line somewhere, or have it drawn for them.
In the fall of 2006, a young Spokane pastor and his wife welcomed an extended family of 12 ethnic Burmese refugees into their East Central neighborhood church called Jacob’s Well and prayed that more would come.
Nearly four years later, that family has been joined by more than 600 Burmese, and the Rev. Eric Blauer wonders how many more refugees from around the world his church, the city and the nation can handle in these tough economic times.
“From our standpoint it’s hard to figure out how we can keep receiving refugees who are unprepared for the realities they find when they get here,” Blauer said…
…ardent refugee advocates such as Blauer believe there are limits to the education, health care and social service resources available to support large, low-income populations of people whose attempts to find employment are impeded by culture and language.
World Relief and other voluntary refugee resettlement agencies must draw the line somewhere or have it drawn for them, they say. here
But the recalcitrant director of World Relief in Spokane, Mark Kadel, indicates that he has no intention of listening to feedback from churches, such as Jacob’s Well, that are working with his organization. He intends to try to bring MORE refugees to Spokane, and not less. Despite his defiance, he may have trouble getting through Washington state’s Office of Refugee and Immigrant Assistance, whose chief, Tom Medina, says that given the economic situation, this is not the time to increase the flow of refugees to the area.
…World Relief, the resettlement agency responsible for bringing thousands of refugees to Spokane over the past 24 years, says it would like to bring more – not fewer…
…Last year, Washington state received 2,588 refugees. Of the 80,000 refugees authorized to be admitted into the United States this year, Washington is expected to get as many as 2,900, including 500 in Spokane. World Relief expected to bring even more to Spokane next year.
The Baltimore-based agency has no intention of slowing the flow of refugees, says Mark Kadel, World Relief’s director in Spokane.
“Absolutely not. If anything, we need to move forward,” Kadel said in a recent interview.
Kadel said the United States provides a safe haven for less than 1 percent of the 13 million people suffering in refugee camps, and “we are not doing our share”…
…Tom Medina, chief of Washington’s Office of Refugee and Immigrant Assistance, looked at the state budget and advised the six resettlement agencies operating in the state to slow the flow of refugees this year.
Two other agencies – the U.S. Committee for Refugees and Immigrants and Catholic Charities of Spokane – attempted this year to begin new resettlement programs in Spokane. Medina convinced them that given the economic situation, this was not the time to initiate new refugee streams.
And then this statement:
Although resettlement agencies like World Relief are not required to notify municipalities about the number of refugees they may be bringing in, they are required under the federal Refugee Act to show that they have at least consulted with someone in state government.
That’s not correct. According to the State Department contract that World Relief signed, the Cooperative Agreement, World Relief must, “…colaborate with state and local officials, other agencies and services in the area in implementing a plan to rationalize the numbers of refugees to be resettled and to ensure quality services and a welcoming atmosphere are provided to refugees.”
By the way, I had an experience myself with Mark Kadel. In 2003 I discovered Lost Boys of Sudan refugees at World Relief’s Tampa affiliate in New Port Richey who complained of severe neglect and mistreatment by the agency. The refugees said that World Relief placed them in unfurnished apartments where they had to sleep on the floor for months, and that the agency made them work in their warehouse moving furniture and then setting up apartments for new refugees, but never paid them for the work. They also said that they had to spend days cleaning nursing homes but were never paid for the work. The World Relief refugees said that before they did the cleaning that a World Relief employee made them sign pieces of paper that he had folded over so that they couldn’t see what they were signing. When World Relief finally helped them get jobs, the jobs were in a different county, and the refugees had to wake early at 4am to commute by bike three hours to their jobs.
I wrote to the State Department and the ORR to forward the refugees’ complaints, but the agencies did not bother to respond. I then wrote to the agencies again in 2004 and 2005 to report ongoing complaints from the refugees. In May 2005 the refugees told us that Mark Kadel came to their apartments and represented himself as a U.S. State Department employee. One of the refugees said that when he asked for Mr. Kadel’s business card, Mr. Kadel failed to produce one, and that he then asked Mr. Kadel to leave the apartment. Mr. Kadel also contacted me, and this time, misrepresented himself as a “mediator”, and tried to get information from me about the complaint. Of course, the organization that is the subject of the complaint could never act as a mediator.
State Department monitors then showed up in New Port Richey to talk to World Relief employees and the refugees. After speaking to dozens of refugees and inspecting World Relief’s records, which indicated extreme disrespect for their refugee clients, the State Department then canceled World Relief Tampa’s refugee resettlement contract.
Posted in Burma/Myanmar, churches, Cooperative Agreement, evangelical, faith-based, local officials, failure to notify, ORR, Spokane, State Department, Sudanese, Washington, World Relief | Tagged: Jacob’s Well, Lost Boys of Sudan, Mark Kadel, New Port Richey, Office of Refugee and Immigrant Assistance, refugees, resettlement, spokane, Tom Medina, World Relief | 8 Comments »
Posted by Christopher Coen on July 17, 2010
This is a story from March that we just found out about.
In Moline, Illinois (Quad-Cities) a man abducted and raped two refugee women. The women’s relatives report that their refugee resettlement agency, World Relief, did almost nothing to aid them after the crime.
A man in a van offered the women a ride to the bus stop, and after asking to borrow their cell phone he pulled a gun on them. He then drove them to an isolated section of Big Island and made them walk to an abandoned cabin where he tied them to a desk and repeatedly raped them. After the man left and said he would return for them the women were able to get out of their restraints and flee.
Police say the Woodhull, Illinois man accused of kidnapping and raping two women at gunpoint lured them into his car with the offer of a ride at a bus stop on the Rock Island-Milan border.
Instead, investigators say Jason Kugler victimized them in a day of terror on Big Island.
”It was essentially a ruse, and once he got them into the van, he asked for one of the victim’s cell phones, and once he received the cell phone, he pulled a gun on them”, said Sgt. Steve Ven Huizen, the lead investigator for the Rock Island County Sheriffs Department, who said the women didn’t know Kugler.
The victims, both in their 20′s were then driven the short distance to a remote section of Big Island.
”He ordered them out of the vehicle, and marched them to an abandoned building”, said Rock Island County lead investigator Sgt. Steve Ven Huizen.
The empty, garbage filled yellow cabin sits on the river, inside, a bunk bed, with a desk, which police believe the women were tied to and assaulted.
”They were sexually assaulted, they were bound inside the building, he was telling the victims he was going to return later on”, said the detective.
.
But once he left, they managed to un-tie themselves and escape, running through the woods, about a mile towards an embankment that lead to Route 92, where they flagged down a passerby for help…here
Relatives of the victims said that World Relief stopped by only once after the rapes, and that the victims went once or so for counseling and then it stopped.
The relatives also said that they were not happy with World Relief services and how the agency was handling their situation in Moline. The refugees said that World Relief employs heavy control of them, but not real help.
Posted in abuse, dangerous neighborhoods, evangelical, faith-based, Illinois, police, Quad-Cities, safety, sexual abuse, World Relief | Tagged: Illinois, kidnapped, Moline, Quad-Cities, rape, refugees, resettlement, Rock Island, World Relief | 1 Comment »
Christopher Coen
Melissa Sogard
nancylee1
Oh gosh. World Relief, in my opinion one of the public’s most intransigent and problem-plagued refugee resettlement contractors, continues to spread itself out (problems including refusing to hire an interpreter because he was Muslim, partner church staff and members moving into apartment complexes with refugees to “foster deeper relationships”, alienating other partner churches and having refugee clients work without pay, and placing new refugees in other refugee clients’ homes without agreements.) The group will soon open a new office in Oshkosh, Wisconsin, and may begin resettling its first group of refugees in February. A reader-submitted announcement about the office opening is found at The Oshkosh Northwestern:
