Winooski, VT: We love our refugees, but….

Update October 12th:  USCRI says everything is great for refugees in “welcoming” Vermont, here.

This is a very funny news story.   Funny because one gets a feeling that the poor reporter and the town officials are struggling to report and discuss problems with the large immigrant influx into their “welcoming city” while still attempting so very hard to be politically correct.  No, surprise I suppose, this is Vermont afterall!

From the Burlington Free Press:

A continuing influx of immigrants and refugees is enlivening the cultural life of the city even as it crowds the schools, challenges teachers and police, and raises questions among residents about the mix of rental and owner-occupied housing in the city.

[…..]

Winooski is among the most urban places in Vermont, with a large number of relatively inexpensive rental units near jobs and public transit. The Vermont Refugee Resettlement Program often places its clients in Winooski for those reasons.

About a third of the students in the Winooski public-school system are English language learners, School Superintendent Steve Perkins said last week. That’s up from about 20 percent of the student population four years ago.

So the number of English language learners has jumped dramatically.  No problem.

Perkins said he sees the refugee influx as an opportunity and a challenge, but not a negative.

No, not a negative.

The growing number of students threatens to fill the school buildings to capacity, and the school district is beginning to investigate alternatives, such as holding classes for some students after regular hours, Perkins said.

It is all worth it!  All those multicultural kids kicking soccer balls in the streets!

At Monday’s meeting, City Councilor Jodi Harrington acknowledged the refugee influx presents challenges but said they are worth it.

“I really see a beauty in all these people coming to Winooski,” Harrington said, adding she enjoys seeing children from various backgrounds kicking soccer balls around her West Street neighborhood.

But, maybe we should start limiting the conversion of homes into apartments so we can slow the number of refugees coming.  And, hey, maybe it’s time for some other towns to step up and take these people and share the joys of multiculturalism.

School Board members asked the City Council to look into city planning to limit the pace at which homes are converted into apartment houses.

[….]

“We are creating so many rental units, they’re bringing everybody here,” School Board member Douglas Isham said, suggesting other communities accept more refugees.

But, this is really worth it!

We’ve written about Vermont a bunch of times.  Here is one post in which a heated exchange occurred between a critic of the Vermont Refugee Program and its defenders.

Australia: Bhutanese refugee woman found dead, hanged

Who knows what was going on in this poor woman’s life.  One report I saw mentioned possible suicide.  The story reminded me of another story I heard about a Bhutanese woman right here in the US.   Here is the whole short article from Adelaide where the cause of death is still under investigation:

Adelaide,October 7: Mon Maya Ghimirey,29, a Bhutanese refugee resettled in Adelaide in Australia was found dead today afternoon in Marion .She was spotted hanging in the garage of her tenant house at around 4.30 pm local time when her children had gone for outing.

Ghimirey was resettled from Sanischarey Bhutanese refugee camp in Nepal on March,2009 .

She is survived by two under-aged children of her own and two step children.The cause of her death is not yet known.

This is the story that was relayed to me, and the question my friend asked:   This friend had an occasion to be in the apartment of a recently resettled Bhutanese refugee in a major US city.  The apartment was in the worst neighborhood in the city and the woman, alone it seemed, was fearful of setting foot outside.   It was discovered she wasn’t alone but was living with a girl (hiding in a closet) perhaps in her late teens who appeared to be mentally impaired.  My friend asked, what sort of life does this woman have?  Would she not have been better off in the UN run camp where she had lived for nearly two decades among her own people and her own culture?   What would America be able to do for her?

Reforms needed!

I raise this because I want readers to at least consider for a moment that willy-nilly hauling people to the US (or any westernized country) may sometimes not be the best thing for the refugee.  And, I propose that the US State Department set up a return program where after a certain time to adjust any refugees wishing to be returned (as the Iraqis have been doing recently) to their original location be provided airfare to do so.   Some of that airfare cost should be picked up by the volag that resettled the refugee in the first place.

Recently I wrote about the good and bad resettlement story from the Bronx and just now went to check Journalism in Exile to see if he had more on the woman in Australia.  Nothing so far on Australia, but in his latest post he does report that the NYPD has made a concerted effort to protect the 170 or so Bhutanese refugees living in one building in the Bronx.

A large number of new immigrants (like we Bhutanese refugees in Bronx, NY) dwelling in the same building could sometimes turn out to be a point of attraction for those involved in taking best-advantage of their innocence and struggle during their initial days. Visits of police authority officials, no doubt, will discourage those elements from attempting to fraud/attack or sometimes daring to occur even unexpected crimes on new immigrants. Thanks to NYPD for your visit in our building.

In July we told you about a promising young Bhutanese man being murdered in the parking lot of his apartment building in Jacksonville, here.

The US plans to resettle 60,000 Bhutanese (really Nepalese) from camps in Nepal over 5 years.

Did Bill Ayers admit writing Obama’s “Dreams” book?

Much to my surprise this morning I see old posts I wrote (here and here) on whether Bill Ayers is really the author of Obama’s very well-written “Dreams from my Father” are being visited anew.   Why do we care at RRW?  First, I find the subject interesting as hell and think it’s very funny that some conservative faux intellectuals actually supported Obama because he was a good writer.  And, secondly (if it’s true) because I believe the subject adds more evidence to my theory that this President has followed assiduously the Alinsky theme of the ‘means justify the ends.’

So, how does that fit with the subject of this blog?  I think there are some ‘brains’ at the top echelons of the Far Left who practice Alinsky’s theory of creating chaos to bring “change” by fueling the war of the “have-nots” against the “haves.”   To them the poor and angry immigrants and refugees are just pawns—more have-nots.  It is really the only reasonable explanation for why we are bringing in tens of thousands of refugees (especially in the recession) then, in many cases, not caring for them properly.

I’m digressing, but just check out Detroit, a city that is at least one third Arab today with more immigrants arriving daily.  Yesterday, thousands lined up in that city to claim a piece of the redistribution of wealth coming from Obama’s stimulus bill (Cloward and Piven anyone?).

Okay, now back to what I wanted to direct you to—at American Thinker, James Simpson, posted this article this morning about a chance meeting a blogger had with Ayers in Washington.

Anne Leary of  Back Yard Conservative was passing through Washington, DC’s Reagan National Airport yesterday, and was surprised to come across Bill Ayers at Starbucks: “scruffy, thinning beard, dippy earring, and the wire rims, heading to order.”

She struck up a conversation with him and snapped the accompanying photo.

So, what did Ayers tell Ms. Leary?  Go to American Thinker and Back Yard Conservative and then decide for yourself whether Ayers was just having fun or whether he was coming clean.

This post is appropriately filed in our growing “community destabilization” category. My apologies to readers who think I’m off track posting on this topic—I just can’t help myself!