Friends of Refugees

A U.S. Refugee Resettlement Program Watchdog Group

Archive for the ‘Connecticutt’ Category

Refugees Connect With A Slumlord In New Haven

Posted by Christopher Coen on January 23, 2012

In New Haven three refugee cases, including a family of eleven, were displaced after their apartments were condemned due to broken pipes and black mold contamination. The city housing inspector said his office previously cited the landlord for violations at other properties. An article in the New Haven Independent explains the situation:

When kids living in a Nash Street house kept showing up at the hospital with respiratory problems, city housing inspector Rafael Ramos went to their home and found black mold covered the bedroom walls of an apartment holding 11 Congolese refugees.

Ramos condemned 17 Nash St.‘s first floor on Dec. 22. The family has since been living in a hotel—at the Nash Street landlord’s expense—until they can find another place to live.

This month, Ramos returned and condemned the second floor, removing two other refugees who were living there, after pipes burst on the third floor…

…“In the seven years I’ve been doing this, this has been our most serious problem,” said Chris George, the head of Integrated Refugee and Immigrant Services (IRIS). That organization helped settle the Congolese family in New Haven when it first arrived more than two years ago…

…Now IRIS is reconsidering some of its policies, looking to see if the period of supervision of new refugees should be extended to ensure the safety and success of settlements. And the city is looking to work more closely with IRIS to insure that other newcomers to the United States don’t end up in similar straits…

…The property slipped through the cracks of the city’s Residential Licensing Program. That program is designed to ensure that the city safeguards the living conditions of all renters, even if—like some new immigrants—they don’t speak English well or otherwise aren’t equipped to complain about their situation…

…George said he heard about the problems from neighbors. “I visited the family a couple of times. I met with them in the backyard to go over the problems. I never went into the house. I realize now that was a mistake.”…

…on Dec. 22, Ramos got a call from a medical anthropologist working at the Yale-New Haven Children’s Hospital, who said he had visited 17 Nash St. after kids living there kept showing up at the hospital with respiratory problems.

Ramos visited the house and went into the bedrooms he hadn’t visited earlier. He took pictures of what he found there: Black mold covering the walls, right next to beds where children slept.

Somehow moisture was entering the home through the walls, seeping in and warming up, making it an ideal environment for mold growth. Airborne mold spores were then making the children sick. Ramos immediately condemned the first floor…

…LCI returned earlier this month after pipes burst in the third floor. The furnace apparently broke, lowering temperatures and bursting pipes, Ramos said. LCI removed two single men—also refugees—living on the second floor.

Ramos said LCI has previously cited the [landlord] for violations at other properties. He said what happened at 17 Nash St. is a perfect example of why the residential licensing program is important. “This family didn’t know that they could complain without retribution. They didn’t know we have ordinances in place to protect their health and safety.”… Read more here

Posted in children, Congolese, housing, Integrated Refugee and Immigrant Services (IRIS), Integrated Refugee and Immigrant Services (IRIS), New Haven, safety | Tagged: , , , , , , , | Leave a Comment »

“Mental illness? Sorry, we don’t cover that. Need an interpreter? Oh well.”

Posted by Christopher Coen on January 31, 2011

According to an employee who manages health and wellness programs at Integrated Refugee and Immigrant Services (IRIS) in Connecticut it’s almost next to impossible to get mental health care if you have Medicaid. Waiting lists are often longer then the eight months of Medicaid coverage for refugees. Need a translator? Sorry, many therapists don’t work with them. Plus, physicians aren’t trained to work with interpreters. The New Haven Independent tells more: 

The soldiers dragged out a pregnant woman and slit open her belly. A witness who was personally tortured for his political activism in Congo is more haunted by that image than his own pain.

Safe in Connecticut now, he has daily flashbacks and wants to see a therapist in order to cope with this memory as well as the stress of leaving his home, friends and family to start a new life in America.

But it will likely take months before he gets help. And if he does his therapist must speak French to communicate with him or be willing to work through an interpreter. To make matters worse, those months of waiting work against him – since he’ll qualify for health coverage for a limited time…

…About 28,000 refugees currently live in Connecticut, according to Integrated Refugee and Immigrant Services (IRIS) in New Haven. Many refugees come to the U.S. after suffering through traumatic experiences in their home countries, but financial and language barriers often keep them from getting mental health care.

This is one of many shortcomings in the services offered to refugees, according to a report issued this month by the Congressional Research Service, which was critical of federal resettlement programs that provide short term aid and often do not address the unique problems that refugees face, including trauma histories.

The long-term consequences of not providing refugees with good mental health care are devastating, according to Mary Scully, director of programs for Khmer Health Advocates in West Hartford. She connects untreated mental illness in her clients who came to the United States in the 1970s and 1980s with a wave a physical illness in the Cambodian-American community today. “Now we see the whole gamut of trauma-induced chronic disease,” she said.

The witness and other refugees need to go to providers who accept Medicaid, which covers refugees for their first eight months in the U.S. “It’s almost next to impossible to get mental health care if you have Medicaid,” said Kelly Hebrank, who manages health and wellness programs at IRIS. The providers who do accept Medicaid have long waiting lists, she said.

That waiting list means the duration of therapy is shorter, explained Zurowski.  She has advocated nationally for extending the period of Medicaid coverage so that refugees have longer to establish themselves in jobs that offer health benefits. The Congressional Research Service also identified the short duration of Medicaid for refugees as a problem…

…A greater barrier is the refusal of some therapists to work through interpreters. Health care providers may resist using interpreters because it takes time during the appointment, time already limited by insurance regulations, said Dr. Hendry Ton, director of the University of California Davis Transcultural Wellness Center. “It’s almost an incentive not to use an interpreter,” said Ton, who is a psychiatrist. Most physicians, he added, are not trained to work through interpreters. Nor is there any standard of training for medical interpreters…Read more here

I guess I’m not understanding why a physician would need training to treat a patient who communicates through an interpreter. And why would any therapist worth their weight in salt not be willing to work through interpreters?

The interpretation for refugees at medical appointments reminds of a time in 2005 when a Sudanese refugee arrived with a giant mass protruding from his back (approximately 6’”x 5” and sticking out 2-3”) . Firstly, no one from his resettlement agency came to pick him up for his medical specialist appointment for this apparent tumor, so he had to wait another month for a new appointment. This time I took him to his appointment at which there was no scheduled interpreter even though he spoke Sudanese Arabic but almost no English. As a result of the lack of interpretation services medical personnel were not able to inject him for the CT scan as they were not willing to risk being unable to communicate with him in the event he had an adverse reaction to the injection. He then had another appointment at which there was only a Somali interpreter who spoke very little Arabic. Luckily, the CT scan done without the injection was sufficient that the doctor was then able to determine the need for a biopsy.

Once again I took him to the next appointment for the biopsy and, once again, there was no interpreter. The medical personnel then suddenly got the idea to call the Language Line (an over-the-phone interpretation service), although the refugee later complained that the interpreter on the Language Line spoke a Kurdish Arabic that he could not fully understand. As a result of this insufficient interpretation he endured a biopsy into muscle tissue in his back, including cauterization, while not being able to communicate to medical personnel that he had insufficient local anesthesia. He later said that the pain was excruciating. They then scheduled him for an X-ray. Once again, no interpreter arrived.

He was later diagnosed as having a hemangioma (most of the time a benign tumor of the capillaries or blood vessels – although rare for being of this large a size and at this location in the muscle of the back) and scheduled for an injection by an interventional radiologist in order to shrink the tumor. Unfortunately, he was so traumatized by this time by the earlier biopsy without sufficient local anesthesia that he then refused to go back to the doctor. All during this time his resettlement agency seemed oblivious to his case. At no time during my interaction with this refugee did anyone from his resettlement agency ever try to help him navigate the health care system, provide him with rides to the doctor or even a bus pass when he ran out of passes, or anything else that would have been helpful. They seem to have no awareness or interest in his plight. He later moved out of town having never returned to the doctor for treatment, and I sometimes wonder what his fate was.

Posted in Congolese, Connecticutt, Integrated Refugee and Immigrant Services (IRIS), Integrated Refugee and Immigrant Services (IRIS), language, Lutheran Social Services of ND, mental health, New Haven, North Dakota | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a Comment »

Lack of ESL Teachers Hampers Education for Refugee Children

Posted by Christopher Coen on October 27, 2010

According to a November 2009 report from the Migration Policy Institute thirty states started the last school year with ESL teaching vacancies. For example, according to an article in the TRIBUNA newspaper the number of students in the state of Connecticut that speak limited or no English, including refugee students, has skyrocketed while the number of teachers qualified to teach them English has declined.

Statewide, the number of students in the state that speak limited or no English has exploded over the past decade, but the number of teachers trained to help them has actually declined.

Eight years ago, one of every 27 students in the state was classified as speaking very limited English; today the ratio is one in 18, a net gain of almost 9,000 students.

Meanwhile, the number of qualified teachers has dropped by more than 9 percent, from 850 to 772.

“We have more students than we have staff to help them,” said Mark Mc- Quillan, the state’s education commissioner. “We have a problem to solve. … This is one of the neediest groups and we are not making much headway.”

The four-year high school graduation rate for students with limited English proficiency was 53.4 percent last year compared to 79.3 percent for all students, according to the State Department of Education.

Their test scores are also across-theboard way below their English-speaking peers. For example, just 18 percent of 10th grade students at Bridgeport Public Schools tested as proficient in math compared to 38 percent of all students being proficient statewide…

…The Migration Policy Institute, a non-partisan think-tank for immigrant integration, reports that the number of limited-English students nationwide has grown by 57 percent from 1996 to 2006.

The problem, their November 2009 report says, is there are not enough trained teachers in the U.S. to work with these students. Thirty states started the last school year with ESL teaching vacancies.

That was the case in Connecticut this school year. In a recent report, the Connecticut Advisory Committee to the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights said hiring more qualified teachers for limited-English students is a key to closing the state education achievement gap… Read more here

The result here is that we have a lot of refugee children moving through the school system and either not graduating or graduating with poor knowledge and abilities, and none of that comes cheap. The two obstacles are a limited number of qualified teachers and not enough money to fund education for students that speak limited or no English. Who should pay these increased costs? The refugee program is a federal program and some argue that the federal government needs to start reimbursing local school districts for refugee children. Or should states absorb these costs since states voluntarily accept refugees for resettlement? (At least those that do not come on their own volition from other states.) Or should local school districts pay these costs since that is how we fund our schools? One way or another we should not let children grow up in this country without basic education.

This is another issue of refugee resettlement capacity that is often ignored when refugee resettlement agencies each year reflexively demand that a larger number of refugees be resettled than were resettled in the previous year. If the agencies’ lobbying group RCUSA had its way we would be accepting 100,000 refugees this fiscal year instead of the 80,000 that the Obama Administration authorized.

Posted in capacity, children, Connecticutt, funding, school for refugee children, schools | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a Comment »

International Institute of Connecticut refugee clients go without furniture, clothing, pots & pans

Posted by Christopher Coen on June 2, 2010

Accounts are starting to come in already that the International Institute of Connecticut is not providing even minimum basics for newly arriving refugees (here) . The Institute only recently reopened for business after supposedly losing it’s State Department refugee resettlement contract in May 2008 for repeated abuses and neglect of refugee clients (here).

Khatiwada, his wife, Chandra Kala, and their four children were relocated to Ansonia from a refugee camp in Nepal this past March.

…When they first arrived in America on March 17, they didn’t have appropriate clothing for the cold air.

Today, they still lack furniture, clothing and even dishes, pots and pans.

So the State Department lets this refugee agency back into the refugee program after just a short stint out for bad behavior, and with the same board members running it, and now the group is right back to failing to supply its refugee clients with basics?

Posted in clothes, Connecticutt, furnishings, lack of, household items, missing or broken, International Institute of Connecticut, moratorium / restriction, neglect, Nepali Bhutanese, New Haven, State Department | Tagged: , | 4 Comments »

International Institute of Connecticut back in the refugee resettlement program

Posted by Christopher Coen on May 22, 2010

People in Ansonia, CT, outside of New Haven, are worrying that schools cannot handle an influx of refugees brought to the area by the USCRI’s International Institute of Connecticut (see the Valley Independent Sentinel article here). People voiced other concerns back on March 3 (here).

School officials are worried they won’t be able to adequately educate a group of refugees that have arrived in Ansonia from Nepal.

This week the city’s tax board recommended a zero-percent increase for the school district.

At a school board meeting Wednesday, school Superintendent Carol Merlone worried about the combination of low funding and refugee students in the district.

School officials said the school district only has one English as a Second Language teacher per school. They’re worried about the ESL teachers being overwhelmed due to the arrival of the refugee students who do not speak English.

While the new students have been welcomed with open arms into the district, “We don’t want to overburden the school system,” the superintendent said. “I’m worried about children getting gypped.”

Refugee families have been arriving in the lower Valley since March. In all, about 10 families are expected to arrive by June.

Merlone’s comments came after Jeremy Marshall, a case manager with the non-profit International Institute of Connecticut, made a presentation to the school board about his organization and the arriving families.

So far, 15 people have arrived in Ansonia, Marshall said, including eight children in the school district.

Another family is expected to arrive next week.

Many of the new residents have spent 20 years confined to refugee camps. Marshall urged the board to support the new arrivals.

“[The Nepalese] are very much dependent on some institution to help them out,” he said.

He said volunteers would be on hand so the school district wouldn’t have to should the responsibility alone.

Marshall’s organization uses several sources of funding, including government grants, to support the families as they transition to a new life in the U.S.

The goal is to make the families self-sufficient within six months.

“Within one year they can have a green card,” Marshall said.

School officials wanted to know why it seems all the families are arriving in Ansonia, where the school district already faces a number of challenges, including large class sizes.

To date, no refugee students have been placed in the neighboring Derby school district.

Marshall said there is an oversight committee has strict criteria in deciding where to place refugees. Number one on the list — “Housing rates have to be low,” he said.

Representatives from Marshall’s organization told the Valley Indy in March that they were looking to place people outside major cities. The refugees assimilate better in smaller communities that have accessible public transportation.

“There is an overflow of refugees already set up in Waterbury and Bridgeport,” Marshall told the school board.

While there is another refugee family due to arrive in Ansonia next week, Marshall said it is unclear whether more families will be coming to Ansonia.

About four members of the public spoke on the refugee issue. Most of the speakers expressed concerns about the situation.

Ken Plavnicky, co-chairman of Axe the Tax, a citizen group, said the city cannot afford to absorb the refugees.

“Bringing families into Ansonia is going to cost a lot of money, why couldn’t they reach out to a more wealthy community, such as Fairfield or Darien?” he asked.

Terri Goldson, the principal of John C. Mead School, asked the school board to “have an open mind and have an open heart,” concerning the refugees.

Of course USCRI’s International Institute of Connecticut lost its State Department refugee resettlement contract just two years ago in May 2008 due to repeated severe neglect of refugees, including placing Burmese refugee clients in poor housing, fractious relationships with volunteers, missed immunizations for refugee students, and insufficient help for refugees with daily tasks (here). The State Department inspected the agency in 2006 (here) and warned them to clean up their act, but apparently they were unable or unwilling to do so.

Then, why are they resettling refugees again when they proved repeatedly that they could not be entrusted to care for vulnerable refugee clients? It makes me think that the State Department’s cancellation (now revealed as a temporary revocation) of the Institute’s contract was just a dodge to divert attention away from this agency after the series of newspaper articles documenting the repeated neglect of refugees, and do little government oversight agencies (see a series of articles under CT in our Document Library page, here).

By the way, in 2007 the International Institute of Connecticut board of directors approved the agency’s executive director, Myra Oliver (now deceased), paying herself $99,893 (see 990 form), while she placed her refugee clients in squalor, even though the State Department had just admonished the group for doing the same thing just a year earlier. In 2006 the board approved payment to Oliver of $100,016 (see 990).  According to these 990 forms the International Institute of Connecticut in 2006 was getting 90% of its operating funds from the government, and 87% in 2007. So the great “public/private partnership” was a 9 to 1 split in this case, with refugees going wanting for basics while the board paid the executive director handsomely with our public funds.

In addition, the current Board of Directors officers listed at the group’s website (here) are the same people as listed on the 2008 form 990 when the Institute lost its refugee contract due to the abuses — Sharon Kish – President, Robert Maresca, Esq.- Vice President, Fr. Richard Ryscavage- Secretary, and Jorge Atencio.

So why did the International Institute of Connecticut get their refugee resettlement contract reinstalled so soon and with the same people overseeing it? Why should we ever trust this group again?

Posted in Burma/Myanmar, Connecticutt, education, ESL & ELL, household items, missing or broken, housing, substandard, International Institute of Connecticut, moratorium / restriction, neglect, Nepali Bhutanese, New Haven, school for refugee children, State Department, USCRI | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 2 Comments »

 
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