Refugee resettlement services at Resettlement and Immigration Services of Atlanta (RRISA), a joint site of Church World Service (CWS) and Episcopal Migration Ministries (EMM), is the focus of a recent article by a college student who did an internship at the organization, here. While having a good heart and trying her best to help the refugees the young woman also has obviously good critical thinking skills, and notices what works and what doesn’t work well in refugee resettlement.

For example, although she had never taught English before, RRISA assigned her the task of teaching English to Haitians.

One of my major tasks at RRISA was taking over the adult Haitian Medical Evacuees’ English classes. RRISA was the only resettlement agency in Atlanta assigned Haitian clients. I had never taught English before, and to make matters worse, I don’t know a word of Creole or French. One of the Haitians was fluent in Spanish, and when the barrier of communication was too great, I would translate into Spanish, and she would translate into Creole for the rest of the class.

This is one of the two most common complaints we hear from refugees – trying to learn English from people who do not speak their language. (Imagine sitting in a classroom and trying to learn Japanese from a someone who speaks no English at all.) The other most common complaint we hear is refugees who speak some English being placed in classes for beginners that are too easy for them and a waste of their time.

The intern also discusses RRISA caseworkers not even noticing when refugees’ Medicaid ran out, and not assisting refugee clients with serious health matters, even though these have a major impact on self-sufficiency.

Besides the Haitians, there are many refugees that come into the U.S. with chronic illnesses. Because RRISA’s goal is to encourage refugee self-sufficiency, case managers often do not address or have knowledge of the steps needed to ensure a client’s long-term medical care. Refugees are eligible for eight months of Medicaid upon arrival into the U.S. After that time, most are working and ineligible for public health benefits under current policy. For clients not receiving health benefits through employment, or needing procedures that Medicaid does not cover, Atlanta’s Grady Health System is a supposedly viable option for patients in need of specialist care. In my time at RRISA, I was assigned several health cases and acted as an advocate for clients.

Grady was a major source of frustration for my clients and me throughout the summer. Imagine waiting eleven hours in a Grady satellite clinic as a walk-in because your Medicaid ran out. Your case worker didn’t notice, and you have no more medication for your Hepatitis B. You wait, only to have the doctor see you for five minutes. Because you can’t speak English to him, he fails to read your file, which states that you still need treatment for your communicable disease. And to top it all off, you can’t work because of the illness.

I looked up the State Department monitoring report for RRISA and it is just unbelievable. Whereas some reports end with just 3-4 recommendations/criticisms of a resettlement agency, this report has 17.

Among the State Department’s findings: culturally appropriate ready-to-eat food was not provided to refugees upon arrival, staff retention was poor, financial records documenting expenditures for refugees were unclear and often inaccurate, in family reunion cases the agency showed a reliance on refugees’ relatives to give basic resettlement services, and RRISA acknowledged that their relations with the State Refugee Coordinator’s office was strained.

When the State Department inspectors requested to visit four refugees cases, RRISA notified them that all had out-migrated from Atlanta. (This often indicates poor services. Refugees will flee to new locations when their basic needs are not met.) The inspectors then requested to visit four other refugee families. The inspectors noted that RRISA delivered basic furnishings to three of the four refugees families, dressers and lamps, only the day before the State Department inspection (RRISA’s executive director acknowledged that it can take months for them to give refugee clients basic furnishings). All four of the refugees’ apartments also had insect infestations. A Somali refugee said that her young son had been repeatedly ill due to either insecticide inhalation or ingesting insects. The apartment RRISA placed her in was substandard – a non-working smoke alarm, a toilet seat broken in half, non-functioning appliances (dishwasher, freezer section of the refrigerator, and two stove burners), peeling paint, water leaking in from the door leading to the patio, and an inadequate seal on the from door (see Operational Guidance for minimum standards of services for refugees). She said that both RRISA and the apartment maintenance staff had been unresponsive to her complaints.

The Somali woman as well as an Iraqi refugee woman were both unemployed. Both claimed that RRISA had pressured them to find jobs immediately without regard to their circumstances (child care in the Somali case; home health care for the Iraqi woman’s ill elderly mother). The Somali refugee woman was unable to take English classes since she lacked childcare. Both women also said that they had never used public transportation nor had anyone at RRISA showed they how to use it. Another refugee family said that RRISA did not give them any baby food for their infant upon their arrival.

The State Department also found that RRISA had been improperly charging refugees for moving vans, apparently for delivering furniture to their apartments, from the State Department money intended for the refugees, and not charging it from the money the State Department pays for the agency’s overhead. One case had an outstanding balance due to the refugee at nearly 180 days after the refugee’s arrival. RRISA was also regularly stretching State Department funds for refugees beyond the 90 day maximum time limit (resettlement agencies must give refugees any remaining balance of their funds at the end of the 90 day State Department contract period).

There are many more deficiencies noted. Read the report, here.