How more of your money flows out of Washington to non-profit groups that ‘help’ immigrants and refugees

10/31/2018 ~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

The grant program is known as the ‘Ethnic Community Self-help Program’ run out of the federal Office of Refugee Resettlement (HHS).

At one point I followed their activities closely and began a file on it, see here, but too much breaking news pushed the subject to the back burner.

Money machine

First, as you know, nine federal resettlement contractors*** are hired by the US State Department to place refugees in your towns and cities. Their job is to help the refugees settle in and get them signed up for their ‘services.’

You also know that the nine are paid by the head to place those refugees, but in addition the Office of Refugee Resettlement doles out many millions more each year to non-profit groups including those nine in the form of discretionary grants.

But, what you might not know is that an entire cottage industry of non-profits have sprung up which get federal grants in most cases to benefit their specific ethnic group—Ethnic Community Based Organizations (ECBOs for short).

The grants are ostensibly to help the refugees integrate into a community, but one might wonder then why the funding is specific to groups that are maintaining their own cultural identity.

If such a helping hand is needed in certain cities, why isn’t the money given to local government agencies to help all ethnic groups, all races and all religions, instead of favoring one ethnic non-profit group over another? Seems to me that the present system creates division rather than integration.

Here is what ORR says about the grant program.

Pay attention to the list of what you are paying for—getting refugees their resources, building their community, getting them involved in local “civic participation” (aka voting!), and getting local citizens minds right about the immigrants’ presence in the community!

In other words, you are paying for ethnic non-profit groups to organize in your community. Remember ACORN? Well these are little ACORNs!

(Don’t you just love this deceptive language!)

The Ethnic Community Self-Help program supports ethnic community-based organizations in providing refugee populations with critical services to assist them in becoming integrated members of American society.

Program Description

The Ethnic Community Self-Help program provides assistance to refugee community-based organizations and other groups that:

Address community building
Facilitate cultural adjustment and integration
Deliver mutually supportive functions
Information exchange
Civic participation
Resource enhancement
Orientation and support to new and established refugees
Public education to the larger community

Ethnic Community Self-Help programs connect newly arrived refugees to community resources [aka welfare!—ed]. Ethnic Community Self-Help programs target all ORR populations, and all U.S.-based governmental and certified non-profit organizations are eligible to apply.

What is up with ORR that much (maybe all!) of their grant information is out of date!

Over the years, I’ve visited ORR and found lists of who was receiving grants and for how much, but that information is not available now.

Oh sure, you can get the old ECBO grants list. But those grants have expired. Check it out and see that they passed out nearly $4.5 million to a list of ECBOs around the country. Those grants expired in 2017.

So, maybe the Trump Administration has cut out the program?

The answer is NO!

Just this month the ORR put out a notice of two upcoming grants. One of those is for ECBOs. Although the money is less than in the past—$2 million instead of over $4 million—13 non-profit groups will rake in $100,000-$200,000 each.

Here is the information on the ECBO grant offering:

Screenshot (771)

An aside: For all of you who have ever tried to get a conservative non-profit group/Tea Party up and running you know that this is one heck of a lot of money. Of course, grants like this are not available to you!

When I couldn’t find an up-to-date list of grantees right now, I emailed ORR and was sent the list below. However, it is lacking in information—no grant amounts and no end date—so who knows if these little ACORNS are still enjoying your tax dollars.

Screenshot (769) — Your tax dollars went to grants ($100,000-$200,000 each) so they could get their ethnic group established, and for refugees to get their “resources” in your cities.

Just a reminder: When you see something here at RRW that you are concerned about, let the President know how you feel, here.

***Below are the nine federal refugee resettlement contractors.

The present US Refugee Admissions Program will never be reformed if the system of paying the contractors by the head stays in place and the contractors are permitted to act as Leftwing political agitation groups, community organizers and lobbyists paid on our dime!

And, to add insult to injury they pretend it is all about ‘humanitarianism.’

The number in parenthesis is the percentage of their income paid by you (the taxpayer) to place the refugees into your towns and cities and get them signed up for their services (aka welfare)! And, get them registered to vote eventually!

From my most recent accounting, here. However, please see that Nayla Rush at the Center for Immigration Studies has done an update of their income, as has James Simpson at the Capital Research Center!

“Ethnic self-help” groups still getting boodle from Trump ORR

10/18/2017 ~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

I haven’t mentioned the taxpayer-funded subsidiary industry beyond the resettlement contractors much lately, but a story from Rochester, NY reminds me to tell you about it again.

Acorn flag — Ethnic self-help groups that you fund are just little ACORNs!

I call these ‘ethnic self-help organizations’ little ACORNS.

Do you remember the community organizers of ACORN where they ostensibly helped the poor get their services (aka welfare), but also made sure they were properly indoctrinated, registered to vote and were voting for the Dems.

If a problem cropped up, they were also the advocacy media arm for THEIR people!

Well, these ethnic non-profit groups, just for refugees (funded by you), are doing the same. The federal Office of Refugee Resettlement shells out about four million of your bucks every year for this.

I contend that this activity of the ORR actually fosters division, setting certain groups of people up as somehow special and separate. Why should any class of immigrant be given special attention and federal grants?

Notice for all the yakking about Trump switching out the word ‘integration’ and replacing it with ‘assimilation,’ the ORR hasn’t gotten the message.

From the Office of Refugee Resettlement website:

(Emphasis below is mine)

General Background

Throughout the history of the United States, the involvement of refugees and their community-based organizations in resettlement has been critical to integration. Today, these organizations continue to enhance the provision and effectiveness of refugee services. For refugees, their active participation in resettlement is empowering and plays an important role in the integration of the entire refugee community.

Program Description

The Ethnic Community Self-Help program provides assistance to refugee community-based organizations and other groups that:

[Check out this list! They are so good at making it all look and sound so benign!—-ed]

Ethnic Community Self-Help programs connect newly arrived refugees to community resources. Ethnic Community Self-Help programs target all ORR populations, and all U.S.-based governmental and certified non-profit organizations are eligible to apply. [Community resources is code for welfare, but isn’t that the job of the contractors we pay millions to each year, for that very same work!—ed]

There is a list of grantees at the ORR website, but it is old. It is not the new list that includes the payola to a Rochester, NY ethnic community group. Why can’t these federal agencies keep websites up to date?

Rochester ETHNIC self-help group gets $200,000 crows Congresswoman! (Take that Donald!)

Here is the news from Rochester, NY where a former Somali group, now supposedly open to all refugees, has been awarded a $200,000 renewable grant to put former volunteers on a taxpayer funded salary!

House Cmte Meets On Formulating Rules For The Repeal of Obamacare Act — Sticking it to ‘the man.’ I guess (nearly 90-year-old) Rep. Louise Slaughter’s message to Trump is that she and her fellow Dems can still get money out of taxpayers’ pockets to fund community organizing activities for refugees to be sure they become good voting Democrats.

From the Democrat & Chronicle:

The Rochester nonprofit agency Refugees Helping Refugees has received a $200,000 federal grant to support the various services it provides for newly arriving refugees, Rep. Louise Slaughter announced Monday.

The grant comes from the federal Department of Health and Human Services’ Office of Refugee Resettlement.

Refugees Helping Refugees was founded in 2002 as the Somali Community of Western New York, but since has expanded its reach to help all refugees, not just Somalis.

[Many of the specifically Somali ‘ethnic’ groups (and there are boatloads of them) have had to expand their base because it was becoming unseemly that taxpayer dollars were being directed at one very special group of refugees.—ed]

It offers English classes, job training, benefits assistance and activities for senior citizens, among other things.

The grant will allow the organization to pay salaries for several positions that, until now, had been handled on a volunteer basis, including a case manager and coordinators for its various programs, director Meredith Keller said.

The $200,000 grant is renewable for three years, meaning it could total $600,000. Until now, the agency’s annual budget has been about $150,000, Keller said.

[….]

In a statement, Slaughter, D-Fairport, used the funding announcement to get in a dig at President Donald Trump, who has pushed for policies to trim refugee arrivals and services.

“This federal award for Refugees Helping Refugees is a testament to the inclusive, important work happening right here in our community,” Slaughter said in the statement. “This funding will help further that critical mission at a time when the Trump administration continues to use travel bans and shortsighted policies to prevent refugees from finding safety in our country.”

More here.

I have a category, not used lately, called ‘Ethnic Community Based Organizations.’ That was the official name for them at the Office of Refugee Resettlement when I first started writing about them, but now they call them Ethnic Community self-help groups. This post is filed here.

You should look around where you live and see if you have a community organizing group where you live specifically for refugees.

North Dakota: Summer study bill on cost of refugees to the state moving along

08/05/2017 ~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

You know I get alerts each day on a variety of news involving refugees around the world. Honestly I wasn’t planning to post on this news simply because it is frankly ho-hum. But, for some reason the story of the North Dakota legislature’s effort to get to the bottom of the question of what it costs taxpayers to ‘welcome’ refugees, including many Somalis to the state, is being reported all over the place, so I thought I better mention it too!

Lutheran Social Service’s director, Shirley Dykshoorn, testified on Wednesday. Did she turn over important information like how many refugee children entered the school system and how many refugees use Medicaid or public housing?

Here is a report in the Bismark Tribune. If nothing else, the legislature’s effort has an important educational value.

Eight days after a racially fueled confrontation in a Fargo parking lot, North Dakota lawmakers began examining the state’s refugee resettlement program Wednesday.

The interim Human Services Committee’s study was prompted by legislation passed earlier this year that sought an examination of various aspects of resettlement, and the committee was tasked with reviewing the impact on workforce, government services, human services, education and health care.

The study bill received some backlash during the legislative session over concerns it singled out refugees, and didn’t account for the economic and cultural benefit they bring to their new communities. Committee Chairwoman Rep. Kathy Hogan, D-Fargo, said the panel should weigh the costs and benefits of resettlement, although some data may be hard to come by.

[….]

The number of refugees resettled in North Dakota every year has roughly tripled over the past decade, according to a Legislative Council memo. Last year, 558 refugees were resettled in the state, down from a recent high of 590 in 2014. In 2006, there were just 182.

Lutheran Social Services runs the show in ND:

The state Department of Human Services moved most refugee-related services to Lutheran Social Services of North Dakota under then-Gov. John Hoeven in July 2010, according to the Legislative Council. LSS is the only federally recognized and approved refugee resettlement organization in the state.

[….]

Wednesday’s meeting came about a week after a confrontation between three Somali-American women and a white woman at a Fargo Walmart parking lot, where a parking dispute descended into an anti-Muslim outburst that went viral. The two sides later made up after Fargo Police Chief David Todd brought them together.

Now, this is what I want to address—the community organizers!

“The state and the city asking for how much it costs to have refugees in the community, while a sensible question from the financial standpoint, it has negatively impacted our image in the community,” Hukun Abdullahi, the head of the Afro American Development Association, said at the Fargo City Commission’s meeting on Monday. “And it also has increased the number of hostile incidents against the refugees.” [Does he have data to back that up?—ed]

I think North Dakota’s Somali community track record with crimes and terrorism might have more to do with the public attitude toward refugees than some financial study!

More here.

This is how Leftwing community organizing works!

Here is Abdullahi apparently being guided by some white guy community organizers on what to say at that demonstration against a local TV station’s report (May 2016) on TB in the immigrant population in ND. http://www.inforum.com/news/4038410-refugees-elected-leaders-denounce-fargo-tv-station-bad-journalism

Here we have one Somali guy (some media reports put him at 21 years old), Hukun Abdullahi, who runs an organization incorporated in 2014 (basically a one man show it appears) that has virtually no funding and he becomes the spokesman for the “community.”

Most people on the conservative side of the political spectrum don’t do this, something George Soros has promoted—create many ‘groups,’ with a handful of people in each one, making it appear that there is widespread support for whatever it is they are promoting.

And, of course, when it comes to Somalis and Muslims generally, there is always a victim theme to their organizing. Simply wanting more answers about the cost of the US Refugee Admissions Program makes one a racist, xenophobic Islamophobe!

Has anyone in the mainstream media ever looked into ‘groups’ like Abdullahi’s to see who is behind it, who helped him incorporate as a 501(c)3? Someone had to pay for the legal work to set up the ‘non-profit’ group.

When I attempted to search for background and a website (I didn’t find one) all I got was this, from Tax Exempt World.

He has no requirement to file a Form 990 because he takes in less than $25,000 a year.

People ask me all the time what they can do—-spend a few hours at your computer and research community organizing ‘groups’ like this one.

You can find their incorporation papers on line, their board members’ names, figure out who was behind creating the ‘organization.’ Research their finances, are any local businesses contributing? Any government funding? And, most of all expose them as Leftwing community organizing grievance ‘groups,’ just so the average taxpaying citizen knows who is being promoted by the media as the voice of the “community.”

I have written many posts on North Dakota, see here.

It was also on my 2016 summer roadtrip to see refugee controversy hotspots firsthand.

Federal refugee grants to special ethnic groups "to promote community organizing"

03/20/2017 ~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

Community organizing for their group of people gratis the US taxpayer!

This morning, I was going to write about how elder refugees (yes, we admit many over 65 years old) are eligible for SSI, but I stumbled on the $millions in grants taxpayers give to ethnic groups across the country so they can help “their” special ethnic group of people integrate and become civically engaged.

Buffalo Imam Yahye Y Omar is listed as the agent for an ORR community organizing grant. Photo: https://www.hiiraan.com/news4/2017/Jan/140081/trump_crackdown_on_refugees_hits_home_for_somali_community.aspx

These grants previously were gifts to ECBOs (Ethnic Community Based Organizations) for which I had created a whole category a few years back, see here.
I likened them to mini-ACORNS.
Do you remember ACORN which taught poor Americans how to get their stuff (welfare) and then organized them to vote, etc? These groups are like that!
Now they are called Ethnic Community Self-Help groups (not really self-help are they if you are funding them?).
Because many are for specific ethnic groups, I believe they foster non-assimilation as they identify their people as somehow in need of special treatment by the government.
Here is what the Office of Refugee Resettlement says about these grants and groups.

Program Goal

The objective of this program is to support ethnic community based organizations in providing refugee populations with critical services to assist them in becoming integrated members of American society.

General Background

Throughout the history of the United States the involvement of refugees and refugee community based organizations in refugee resettlement has been critical to refugee integration. Today, these organizations continue to enhance the provision and effectiveness of services available to refugees. They allow the refugee experience to flow into refugee resettlement plans and decisions. For refugees, their active participation in resettlement is generally empowering and plays an important role in the integration of the entire refugee community.

Program Description

This program provides assistance to refugee community based organizations and other groups that address community building, facilitate cultural adjustment and integration of refugees, and deliver mutually supportive functions such as information exchange, civic participation, resource enhancement, orientation and support to newly arriving refugees (and other refugees that maybe in need of such assistance regardless of their resettlement date) and public education to the larger community on the background, needs and potential of refugees. In short, the purpose is to promote community organizing that builds bridges between newcomer refugee communities and community resources.

LOL! Building bridges to community resources=finding taxpayer-funded welfare goodies!
I thought the refugee contractors‘ job was to ‘orient’ new refugees and take care of their ‘needs,’ but nevermind, there is a whole cottage industry of non-profit groups sucking from the federal teat for their special ethnic ‘community.’
Here is a screenshot from the 2015 ORR Annual Report to Congress showing the $6,096,190 in grants sent out that year.

Sure hope the Trump team targets these for de-funding!

Homework assignment!
You should find out more about any of these special groups for special people (you fund them!) working near you.
The last one on the first page jumped out at me. I wondered what is Helping Ensure Africa Looms International Inc. I didn’t even find a website or any description of what it does, just this NY state charity profile. There I learned that the principle agent is one Yahye Y Omar of Buffalo.
We assume he is the same Yahye Y Omar who is the imam at the Buffalo Islamic Community Center who is quoted in this Buffalo News story entitled:

Refugees and immigrants reminded of legal rights at Buffalo event

Guess he is busy “community organizing!”
I didn’t have any intention of going farther with this, but be sure to see a recent Form 990 for ‘Helping Ensure Africa….’ Pretty much the only money they take in is from ORR and almost $70,000 went to salaries and $10,000 + went to rent.
But, I was still not ever able to find out what exactly the recipient of $170,103 in 2015 actually does!

North Dakota: Bill introduced to try to get some local/state control of refugee program

01/19/2017 ~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

And, Somali community organizer issues a warning!

Editor: Everyone is asking me what I think about various bills being introduced in state legislatures that seek to get some control over the UN/US Refugee Admissions Program by states and local governments when the federal government is sending refugees from around the world to unsuspecting communities. Truthfully, I am not a lawyer and the type of bill introduced depends on the present structure of the program in that state. In North Dakota, Lutheran Social Services is pretty much calling the shots with Washington. I can’t give legal advice. I’m a blogger, an opinion journalist!

However, this is what I do know. This program must be ultimately reformed, rewritten or trashed in Congress with a bill signed by the President. The best opportunity to do that is right now, starting tomorrow. Even if Trump temporarily pauses the program, if nothing follows in Congress then there might be a slowdown for a few years, but another president could just begin it again (and make up for lost time with a huge admissions number).
Everything you do at the local and state level to generate publicity, to stimulate debate, and to put pressure upward—to your US Senators and Members of Congress, and to Trump of course, is vitally important.
Here is the news from North Dakota:

BISMARCK – North Dakota lawmakers have proposed a bill that would create a way for communities to request temporary bans on new refugee resettlement and would grant the governor power to impose such a ban statewide.

fowzia — Somali community activist, Fowzia Adde, warns that THEIR voting power is growing. See who partners with her group located in Moorhead, MN http://www.idcfm.org/our-partners.html

The proposal was welcomed by Dave Piepkorn, a Fargo city commissioner and resettlement skeptic who has been pushing for more local input on where refugees are placed and more data about their impact.

“Right now, a lot of people are afraid to ask any questions at all because they’re accused of being a racist or xenophobe,” he said. [You all have to get over this, get a backbone, all they have is words!—ed]

If House Bill 1427 passes, local governments could apply to stop refugee resettlement in their communities, either through the governor’s office or Lutheran Social Services of North Dakota (LSSND), the group federally contracted to resettle refugees in the state. A ban could last up to a year and so could an extension of the ban, the bill says.

Before applying for a ban, a local government would have to hold a public hearing and issue a finding that “further resettlement of refugees in the host community would result in an adverse impact to existing residents,” the bill states.

Such a finding would be based on what the bill calls a community’s “refugee absorptive capacity.” This capacity would be determined by various factors, such as local availability of housing, jobs and health care, as well as the ability of social services, schools, police and other government agencies to meet refugees’ needs, according to the bill.

With a similar finding, the governor could issue an executive order for a statewide moratorium on refugee resettlement, the bill says.

Learn more about the bill here.

Now this is revealing!

Somali activist confirms what Khalid Sheikh Mohammed said during his enhanced interrogation by the CIA. They want to defeat us through immigration and out-breeding us, or otherwise why would Fowzia Adde be so interested in THEIR voting power? What is it they want that is different from what any good and patriotic American would want?
The Grand Forks Herald story continues:

Fowzia Adde, a Somali leader in the Fargo area, said it would be North Dakota’s loss if refugee resettlement is banned. “They’re going to be shooting themselves in their own leg,” she said. “It’s actually improved the economy to have the new Americans.”

Adde said refugees work hard, pay their taxes and succeed quickly. “We are doing all the work that nobody else wants to do,” she said.

She cautioned that the bill could come back to bite lawmakers, given the state’s increasing number of refugees. “Our voting power is growing,” she said.

Sounds like it is definitely time to stop the flow to ND before voting power for their people gets too great!
Continue reading here.

Immigrant Development Center

Fowzia Adde is the Director of the Immigrant Development Center and they are one of those federally supported immigrant-focused ‘non-profits’ involved with microloans. The IDC’s non-profit status was approved in August 2006 and 2 years later they hit the jackpot according to USASpending.gov.
In fiscal year 2008 they received $687,000 from the Dept. of Health and Human Services. In 2012, the Dept. of the Treasury granted them $99,999 and in 2015 they got $50,000 as a federal sub-grant from some agency that is not recorded at USA Spending. Ms. Adde is effectively being paid by you to do her community organizing!
In addition to working on legislation, citizen activists need to begin to expose the federal money that is flowing in to non-profit groups that then work against the interests of your communities by, as Ms. Adde says herself, growing their voting power.
See our North Dakota archive here. I visited North Dakota on my 6,000 mile tour of refugee hot spots last summer.