Friends of Refugees is an independent, nonpartisan citizens group monitoring the U.S. refugee resettlement program.
Posted by Christopher Coen on April 10, 2012
Nickel City Smiler Movie – Karen People of Burma Refugee Documentary Film
Nickel City Smiler will be screening at San Francisco State University on Thursday April 19th at 4:30pm in Burk Hall, room 408. For those of you in the area, come out and support Prof. Lee, the Burmese Youth Association, and the Burma Family Network.
Posted in Buffalo, Karen, San Francisco | Tagged: Buffalo, Burma, Burma Family Network, Burmese Youth Association, CEP Films, Myanmar, Nickel City Smiler, refugees, resettlement | Leave a Comment »
Posted by Christopher Coen on March 18, 2012
It seems that the New York City Police Department (NYPD) has focused on Buffalo-area Muslims and Somalis (including people and citizens resettled as refugees), not based upon on known criminal activity, but instead based upon these people’s ethnicity and religion. Although the NYPD, unlike the FBI and the U.S. Justice Department need not predicate domestic surveillance on information that their target is engaged or about to engage in criminal activity, the NYPD did not fully consult with local police and other federal security agencies about its activities in Buffalo. There is no sign that the Strategic Intelligence Unit announced its activities to the Buffalo area’s Joint Terrorism Task Force, a cooperative effort that includes federal, state and local law enforcement agencies. There is also the concern that actions by the NYPD could be jeopardizing the good relationship that local law enforcement authorities have with the local Somali and Muslim populations, including US citizens. An article at the Buffalo News explains:
The New York City Police Department’s focus on Buffalo-area Muslims continues to this day. Further, an internal document indicates the surveillance began even before NYPD detectives met with the Erie County undersheriff in December 2008 to describe their “Somalia Project.”…
…At the same time, there is no sign that the Strategic Intelligence Unit announced its activities to the Buffalo area’s Joint Terrorism Task Force, a cooperative effort that includes federal, state and local law enforcement agencies.
The Associated Press in recent months revealed the NYPD’s covert efforts to examine Muslim businesses, infiltrate mosques and keep an eye on Muslim students on college campuses, not just in New York City but in locations around the Northeast. The Muslim Student Association website at the University of Buffalo was among those monitored, a separate NYPD document shows.
The NYPD calls its surveillance and intelligence-gathering legal and necessary and does not apologize for the program. The department after 9/11 determined it “could not rely solely on the federal government” for its defense. Says Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly: “Our primary mission, our primary goal, is to keep this city safe.”
Yet ethnicity and religion, not criminal activity, seem to have sparked the NYPD’s interest around the Northeast, including Buffalo…
…Unlike the NYPD, the FBI and the U.S. Justice Department must predicate domestic surveillance on information that their target is engaged or about to engage in criminal activity.
“I can tell you that we don’t predicate any investigation based on somebody’s race, or color, or national origin, or on the exercise of their First Amendment rights,” said William J. Hochul, U.S. Attorney for the Western District of New York. “In terms of the bigger picture, why was the NYPD doing what it was? I don’t have all the details.”…
…If the NYPD did not provide a heads-up on its activities to the Joint Terrorism Task Force, it should have, said a former agent-in-charge here for the FBI.
“If I had still been up there that would have bothered me a lot,” said Peter J. Ahearn, who headed the FBI office in Buffalo from 2001 to 2006 and now works as a consultant helping businesses deal with government. “With the reputation the NYPD does have, and I know this factually, they will do different things in cities around the country and not even let law enforcement know they are there.
“There are reasons to be concerned,” he said. “If you are not talking to law enforcement, and the local police department rolls up on you, it creates an officer-safety issue. Also it can prove detrimental to the efforts that the local law enforcement community is making in the Muslim community. We had some very good community outreach up there.”
Dr. Khalid Qazi, president of the Muslim Public Affairs Council of Western New York, agrees.
“This is all related to the security of the homeland, I don’t have any doubt about that,” he said of the NYPD’s foray into Buffalo. “The only question in my mind is, when we are working very cooperatively, and in a very proactive fashion for the security of the homeland, whether these types of actions are counterproductive.
“And I guess the issue always will be, where do we stop so we don’t compromise the civil rights and civil liberties of innocent Americans?”…
…Yahye Y. Omar, chairman of the Imams Council of Western New York, also is active on the West Side, especially as executive director of HEAL — Help Everyone Achieve Livelihood — a nonprofit that helps immigrants and refugees.
He is engaged in a long-standing effort to make the Islamic way of life less mysterious to outsiders, and to encourage Somali youth to consider how they can enrich their community.
In 2010, he helped establish a law enforcement education program for Somali high school and college students. It brought in representatives from the FBI, Immigrations and Customs Enforcement, and the State Police to speak about the role of law enforcement, and careers. On a wall of his office, Omar has proudly placed a photo of a local Somali now with the Baltimore Police Department…
…Omar expressed [his] sentiments about the NYPD surveillance…why does the New York police force need contacts in the Somali and Muslim community here after its members have cooperated so much with local authorities?… Read more here
Posted in Buffalo, Dept of Homeland Security, Dept. of Justice, FBI, Islamic, NYC, security/terrorism, Somali | Tagged: Buffalo, Joint Terrorism Task Force, Muslim, New York City Police Department, NYPD, profiling, refugees, resettlement, Somali, Strategic Intelligence Unit | Leave a Comment »
Posted by Christopher Coen on March 8, 2012
CEP Films, the small film group from Buffalo that made the Nickel City Smiler documentary film about refugee resettlement in that city just put out a press release. The group is trying to raise $100,000 in 60 days to fund a project to screen the film in places around the world where refugees are being resettled and in the refugee camps. The details are found at Kickstarter.com:
About this project
What is our Kickstarter campaign?
We are trying to give refugees a voice. Nickel City Smiler tells the story of refugees determined to make a better life for themselves and their children. Our goal is to screen the film in places around the world where refugees are being resettled and in the camps where refugees wait for the chance to start over in a new country. We hope that individuals throughout the world will gain a new understanding of the challenges refugees face everyday and help aid in their determination for a better life. Nickel City Smiler can also educate refugees on what to expect once they arrive in America from the perspective of refugees currently living here… Read more here
Posted in Buffalo, Burma/Myanmar, Karen | Tagged: Buffalo, Burma, documentary, Karen, Kickstarter, Myanmar, Nickel City Smiler, refugees, resettlement, Smiler Greely | Leave a Comment »
Posted by Christopher Coen on February 29, 2012
This is an extra scene from Nickel City Smiler, a documentary film about Karen refugees in Buffalo. Donna Pepero, head of the Refugee School Impact Program in the Buffalo Public Schools, talks about a resettlement agency in Buffalo that dropped off a refugee family to an apartment furnished with just part of a sectional sofa – not even any beds:
Posted in Buffalo, Burma/Myanmar, Catholic Charities of Buffalo, furnishings, lack of, International Institute of Buffalo, Jewish Family Service of Buffalo & Erie County, Journey's End Refugee Services, Journey's End Refugee Services, Karen | Tagged: Buffalo, documentary, Donna Pepero, Nickel City Smiler, Refugee School Impact Program, refugees, resettlement | Leave a Comment »
Posted by Christopher Coen on October 29, 2011
The Nickel City Smiler documentary film will be showing next weekend in Buffalo. It gives refugees their own voice, describing their experiences in the resettlement process – something the refugee resettlement agencies regularly ignore, and even suppress.
Screenings are scheduled for:
Friday, Saturday & Sunday (November 4, 5 and 6) at 7pm at the Market Arcade, Film and Art Centre, located a 639 Main Street, Buffalo NY.
Hand-made bags by Karen refugee Ma Dee, who is featured in the film, and other Karen goods will be available for purchase at the screening.
The Nickel City Smiler documentary film is also available for purchase on DVD — here.
Posted in Buffalo, Catholic Charities of Buffalo, dangerous neighborhoods, faith-based, household items, missing or broken, housing, housing, overcrowding, International Institute of Buffalo, Jewish Family Service of Buffalo & Erie County, Journey's End Refugee Services, Journey's End Refugee Services, Karen, language, population levels, using refugees as pawns to boost, safety | Tagged: Buffalo, dangerous neighborhoods, documentary, Nickel City Smiler, population decline, refugees, resettlement, Smiler Greely | Leave a Comment »
Posted by Christopher Coen on September 29, 2011
The pro-refugee documentary Nickel City Smiler, which refreshingly does not do the usual towing of the line of refugee resettlement contractors, is now set for an early November showing in Buffalo. The documentary film, produced in Buffalo, chronicles the life of a Karen refugee family (from Burma/Myanmar) after they have been resettled to a tough inner-city Buffalo neighborhood. The film documents the refugee family’s hardship and their incredible determination to one day live in peace and ensure a better future for their children.
Local refugee resettlement contractors were involved in having the
documentary removed from a neighborhood film festival last summer.
The film will be shown at:
Note: The Nickel City Smiler DVD is also available for purchase.
Posted in Buffalo, Burma/Myanmar, Catholic Charities of Buffalo, dangerous neighborhoods, furnishings, lack of, household items, missing or broken, housing, substandard, International Institute of Buffalo, Jewish Family Service of Buffalo & Erie County, Journey's End Refugee Services, Journey's End Refugee Services, Karen, population levels, using refugees as pawns to boost, safety | Tagged: Buffalo, Burma, documentary, federal contractors, inner-city, Karen, Myanmar, neglect, Nickel City Smiler, refugees, resettlement, Smiler Greely | Leave a Comment »
Posted by Christopher Coen on August 28, 2011
Ariel Roberta at the Buffalo Rising newspaper released her last installment of a three-part series on refugees in Buffalo (see Part l and Part ll). She notes local resettlement agencies’ involvement in the removal of the “Nickel City Smiler” documentary film from a local film festival, with the film festival organizers writing, “a number of our partners were passionately angered by the film, and were offended by our screening of it.” Apparently, these “partners” decided that they would not let the public decide for itself what it thought about the issue. Although the film was the only locally-produced documentary in the series, promoters screened another refugee documentary from Tennessee, though it too was controversial. She also quotes an AmeriCorps worker as saying she believed the censorship may have been due to, “the agencies preference to look ahead, not backward.”
It must be nice to have that kind of power – to control what the public is able to know – nice, although not particularly ethical. Although, perhaps the public has a right to look at both the past, present and future. Arial Roberta also quotes a Buffalo schoolteacher saying, “Some of my [adult refugee] students have been reduced to tears after their caseworker didn’t return phone calls or was rude to them.” The teacher also told her that although getting by in Buffalo is often a harrowing task, none of her students have complained about housing quality, and that anything is a step up from huts in the jungle.
…Heart of the City Neighborhoods, Inc. (HOTC) is a non-profit group that focuses on creating programs that improve the quality of housing along with promoting sustainable projects for the Lower West Side. HOTC hosted their first ever film series at Buffalo’s Theater of Youth during the months of June and July. Their goal was to have public screenings of documentary films relating to sustainable housing in order to create discussions around the films.
Chance Encounter Productions (CEP) was invited to show their film “Nickel City Smiler”. A short time after they sent their materials, however, they were informed via email from Heart of the City that their film was regretfully not going to be shown. The Heart of the City Community Outreach Coordinator stated in the email that “a number of our partners were passionately angered by the film, and were offended by our screening of it.”
NCS was the only locally made film slated to be featured in the series. Documentaries from other parts of America were shown, including one titled “Welcome to Shelbyville”, which has some of its own controversy swirling around it. CEP believes that they were censored by resettlement agencies, some of which are partners with Heart of the City.
“The goal of this film has always been to get the community involved,” says Director Scott Murchie. “My hopes were that the film would make its way from the heart of the city out to the surrounding communities, inspiring those people who can really make a difference. Instead, what we are seeing is overly defensive resettlement agencies thinking the film is about them. It’s not.”
Claire Essley, an AmeriCorps/Houghten College summer Jump Start coordinator at school 45, believes the censorship may be due to the agencies preference to look ahead, not backward. She thinks the resettlement agencies didn’t want to be ”showing issues that had been resolved… and addressed.”…
…[a Buffalo schoolteacher] who contacted me after reading my previous two articles in Buffalo Rising, wished to remain anonymous because she also had some criticisms about the resettlement process. ”Basically my experience with adult students is that their resettlement agency starts off with a bang (placement in apartments, getting clothes, etc.) but then fizzles out,” she said. “Some of my students have been reduced to tears after their caseworker didn’t return phone calls or was rude to them.” The teacher told me that although getting by in Buffalo is often a harrowing task for many of her students, none of them have complained about housing quality. According to her, anything is a step up from huts in the jungle… Read more here
That last part about any housing being a step up I will have to disagree with. Resettlement contractors sign contracts with the federal government to find housing that meets — at the least – some minimum standards (see Operational Guidance). I suspect agencies use similar reasoning each time refugees are assaulted or killed in some of the urban locations our refugee program resettles them too – “well, they might have died anyway if they had remained stuck in dangerous locations overseas.” But isn’t that a cop-out? It seems to me like a handy excuse for poor planning and poor services – and the refugees don’t deserve that.
Posted in Buffalo, housing, Journey's End Refugee Services, Journey's End Refugee Services, Karen, Operational Guidance | Tagged: Buffalo, CEP, Chance Encounter Productions, documentary, Nickel City Smiler, refugees, resettlement, Scott Murchie, Smiler Greeley, Welcome to Shelbyville | Leave a Comment »
Posted by Christopher Coen on August 24, 2011
Smiler Greeley, the Karen refugee from Burma resettled to Buffalo and featured in the Nickel City Smiler documentary, says that community gardens draw his fellow refugees because they used to make their living planting. Besides, the gardens are fun and it saves money. An article in Buffalo Rising gives us another glimpse into refugees’ lives in that city.
When PUSH (People United for Sustainable Housing) planned the community garden on Hampshire Street, they only had one requirement in mind: gardeners looking for a plot to sow…
…More than half of the gardeners to apply were Burmese refugees.
The piqued interest from the refugee community made sense. The majority of the refugees coming to Buffalo from Burma and Nepal were farmers in their previous countries, according to Chelsea Wagner, of Journey’s End Refugee Services.
“They used to make their living planting, so they’re interested in this kind of stuff,” said Smiler Greeley, a Burmese member of the community garden, and cultural liaison at Journey’s End Refugee Services. Greeley was speaking at a public forum on Tuesday held by the Partnership for the Public Good (PPG) addressing the potential of community gardens and urban farms to serve the refugee community…
…Due to the combined success of the garden and an apparent interest expressed by much of the refugee community, many groups such as the PPG and Journey’s End are working to expand community gardens in locations with high refugee populations, particularly those of Burmese and Nepali origin.
“You can’t make your life on this, but this is fun. It’s fun and it saves money,” said Greeley. Read more here
The Nickel City Smiler DVD is available here.
Posted in Buffalo, Burma/Myanmar, community/cultural orientation, Karen | Tagged: Buffalo, Burmese, community gardens, Karen, Nickel City Smiler, refugees, resettlement, Smiler Greeley, urban farms | Leave a Comment »
Posted by Christopher Coen on July 14, 2011
Chance Encounter Productions (CEP), which produced the Nickel City Smiler documentary, was invited to show their film at the “Building a Movement: Nickel City Film Series” – a series of film screenings by the Heart of the City Community Development Corporation to encourage public discussion and involvement in issues hindering strong, sustainable communities in Buffalo. Nickel City Smiler was to have been the only locally produced film to be shown. It illustrates refugees’ plight with local slum lords, crime, as well as some frustrations with the resettlement agencies.
Having nothing of it, the local refugee resettlement agencies got to work to have the film removed from the film series. CEP reports that Heart of the City later contacted them to say that the film would not be shown. CEP says that Heart of the City admitted that they based the eleventh-hour rejection on the anger that the agencies and other groups of Heart of the City had about the film, and their wish that the public not see it.
Apparently, along with placing refugees with known slum lords, not providing refugees with essential household items, forcing two refugee families to share one small apartment, and not being available to help a refugee woman while her husband was dying, these groups also have no problem engaging in censorship.
Note: The Nickel City Smiler DVD is available for purchase
Posted in Buffalo, dangerous neighborhoods, household items, missing or broken, housing, housing, overcrowding, housing, substandard, International Institute of Buffalo, Jewish Family Service of Buffalo & Erie County, Journey's End Refugee Services, Journey's End Refugee Services, Karen, language interpretation/translation, lack of | Tagged: Buffalo, Burma/Myanmar, Catholic Charities of Buffalo, CEP, Chance Encounter Productions, International Institute of Buffalo, Jewish Family Service of Buffalo & Erie County, Journey's End Refugee Services, Karen refugees, Nickel City Film Series, refugee, resettlement | 1 Comment »
Posted by Christopher Coen on July 11, 2011
Sometimes I get the feeling that many refugee resettlement agencies have never heard a criticism of them that they agreed with. This does not, of course, refer to the agencies that are doing exemplary work, but to the many agencies that continue to get caught offering less than quality services – or even neglecting and abusing refugee clients. Buffalo refugee resettlement agencies continue this tradition by attacking the documentary filmmakers who first produced a film based on information supplied by the agencies, but then did another – the Nickel City Smiler documentary – centered more from the refugees’ perspective, which included some criticisms.
What would have been a great opportunity to learn from refugees who offer their constructive criticism, and thereby gain refugees’ and the public’s trust, the agencies instead squander it with unseemly and baseless accusations.
Ariel Roberta’s second part of a three-part series in Buffalo Rising reveals more details from the story.
I had a chance to meet with the directors of three of the four resettlement agencies in Buffalo. I asked them about their view of the film, and if it represents the refugee situation fairly, and how they feel about the refugee situation in Buffalo…
As required by the [U.S. Department of State] DOS, the agencies provide assistance to refugees to help them become productive members of society. The agencies are responsible for such things as providing housing, turning on utilities, shopping for groceries, applying for community programs, enrolling children in school, and finding employment.
As required by the DOS, the agencies provide assistance to refugees to help them become productive members of society. The agencies are responsible for such things as providing housing, turning on utilities, shopping for groceries, applying for community programs, enrolling children in school, and finding employment.
According to [Catholic Charities, Jewish Family Services, Journey's End, and International Institute], they are audited regularly to make sure they are doing a good job.
“I think there’s an opportunity to cut and paste in things the way that you want,” remarked Marlene Schillinger of Jewish Family Services, when I asked about the accuracy of the film.
“There were a number of ways where [refugees] in the film were mislead,” said Molly Short, when I asked about some statements made by refugees pertaining to their resettlement agencies. Marlene said some refugees, including then 11 year old Moe Joe, were probably coached. After meeting with some Karen refugees, it is fair to say that they are a shy bunch, but to say they had been coached may be inaccurate. I had a few interesting conversations with Moe Joe, now 12, and I think he may be better versed in politics than I am. To say he was coached into talking about “street animals” in his neighborhood, and how the violence and crime in his neighborhood upsets him, is to underestimate his articulacy… Read more here
Posted in Bridge Refugee and Sponsorship Services, Buffalo, Catholic Charities of Buffalo, dangerous neighborhoods, International Institute of Buffalo, Jewish Family Service of Buffalo & Erie County, Journey's End Refugee Services, Karen, language interpretation/translation, lack of, population levels, using refugees as pawns to boost | Tagged: Ariel Roberta, Buffalo, catholic charities, CEP Films, constructive criticism, International Institute, Jewish Family Services, Journey's End, Karen, Marlene Schillinger, Molly Short, Nickel City Smiler, refugee, Scott Murchie, State Department | Leave a Comment »
Christopher Coen
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