Comment worth noting: Iraqi refugee speaks out in Utah

Our ‘comments worth noting’ posts are to bring to your attention comments we receive to mostly older posts that readers would be unlikely to see.   This comment came to us yesterday from Vav who identifies himself/herself as an Iraqi refugee resettled in Utah.  We have written many posts on Utah’s struggling Iraqi population most recently reporting that some Iraqis are packing up to return to the Middle East.   Here is what Vav had to say at this post.  He/she is blaming the volags (see top ten contractors here) hired by the State Department to resettle them for their difficult situation.

I am an Iraqi refugee here in Utah. Many of the problems we face are because of the incompetency of the Catholic Community Services (CCS), International Rescue Committee (IRC) and Asian Association. These three NGOs are consuming funds provided by tax payers and deliver very poor services in return to their Iraqi refugee clients in the aspects of integration and employment. Actually, I am shocked how did they hired this unqualified staff here in Utah, the case workers are almost with zero experience and so unmotivated to assist and help. Iraq is not safe for us to go back to, and most of us have been through too much to come here, we really like to become good citizens of USA/Utah. We do not ask for special treatment, and we do not want to add more burdens on the tax payer’s shoulders. We only ask the community, to assist us on putting more pressure on NGOs funded by the federal government to resettle us here.

State Department, what is going on?   Our poor economy can’t be entirely to blame for the continuous stream of unhappy and angry Iraqis we are hearing from, or hearing about.

Coincidentally, just this a.m. I came across this article from a Vermont publication about a very happy Iraqi Christian couple.  He was an interpreter for American forces and the couple hopes one day to take all of their American education back to Iraq to help their country.  One thing noticibly missing from this article is any mention of help from a volag, a government contractor.   They seem to have been completely taken under the wings of Americans—at a University and at a church and in a small town—and express their deep gratitude for all the help they received.

I don’t know what the answer is to these widely divergent stories from Iraqi refugees.  I do think Americans are generally privately charitable, but when charity becomes a government program and funded by the federal (and state) government, with little oversight to boot, it becomes not much better that the Motor Vehicle Administration at providing services.  And, frankly any incentive for private charity is removed—afterall, the government is taking care of it, right?

End note:  Lest you think that maybe it has to do with the state—that Vermont is more ‘welcoming’ than say Utah—it doesn’t.  Just last month we told you about the angry Iraqis in Burlington, VT, let down by their resettlement agencies.

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