This is a story I missed almost a month ago from Manchester, NH (Mr. Parker, you should have sent it to me!). I only learned about it yesterday when I had a private e-mail from a woman whose daughter and son-in-law are both developmentally disabled and cannot get government supported housing (they have been on a waiting list for years) because Manchester is once again the destination for hundreds of refugees.
I say ‘once again’ because after a huge public outcry a few years ago and a city completely overwhelmed with Somali refugees, the city demanded a moratorium on resettlement. Obviously, there is no longer a moratorium in place!
Here we have Bhutanese refugees (we are taking 60,000 altogether) unable to find work, and based on the extensive comments, we have loads of local people expressing anger. However, much of the anger is displaced. It should not be toward the Bhutanese, but toward a refugee resettlement system rotten to the core and in need of complete reform. Angry citizens*, direct your anger at the US State Department (the Obama Administration has set the levels for FY2010 of admissions as high as they have ever been since 9/11), the resettlement agencies including the pseudo-church government contractors, and at your state and local governments which can both say NO!
And, disregard the guilt-trips and bullying from “humanitarians” who attempt to place their values on you and expect you, taxpayers, to pay for their ‘good deeds.’
From the Union-Leader:
The American Dream hasn’t reached the living rooms of Pema Tamang and Bhakta Dhital. Job rejection letters and public-assistance checks have arrived instead.
“There are no jobs and nothing to do,” said Tamang, a Bhutanese refugee who arrived in New Hampshire last December.
The Concord resident worked three months at Walmart before his temporary job ended, and he hasn’t received one callback from any of the 150-plus businesses with whom he’s left applications. Tamang recently had his electricity turned off briefly after he fell behind on his payments.
“It’s not like I don’t like to pay for the bill, but I have no money,” said the father of two.
“I’m just trying to have a better time and a better life,” said Tamang, 27, who attends English classes twice a week. “I hope that this bad time doesn’t go like this forever.”
Refugees arriving in the United States in the past year have run straight into strong financial headwinds.
In New Hampshire alone, more than 51,000 workers went jobless last month, nearly 23,000 more than a year earlier.
New Hampshire had 561 refugees from nine countries settle here during the fiscal year ending Sept. 30, including 462 from the Asian nation of Bhutan, where thousands fled more than a decade ago and relocated in nearby Nepal resettlement camps. Since the early 1980s, more than 6,500 refugees have made New Hampshire their new home.
Refugees receive a variety of government assistance when they arrive here, including at least four months of rental help, as well as food stamps and medical care.
“Refugees historically would get jobs within three to six months after arrival,” said Amy Marchildon, director of new American services for Lutheran Social Services of New England, which settles refugees in the Concord-Laconia area.
“Now, it’s probably taking between eight and 12 months. Because there’s a higher competition for jobs, the refugees might be at a disadvantage if they don’t have the same level of skills,” she said.
Well, where the heck did the refugees get high expectations?
Marchildon said refugees need to learn to become self-sufficient.
“I think a challenge for resettlement agencies is managing refugees’ expectations. Many, but not all, have higher expectations than what the service delivery is,” she said. “It’s a new system that they have to learn. Refugees have been in situations where other agencies are supporting them and keeping them alive and haven’t had to make decisions for them.
“The feeling we should be doing everything for them can be a blow when we’re trying to teach them to do things for themselves,” Marchildon said.
“With the downturn in the economy, the hope of starting their lives sooner rather than later is exacerbating their feelings of frustration and anger,” she said.
I hate to see this when a refugee agency spokesperson talks like they are participating in some sort of important psychological initiative by telling refugees they are on their own after a few short months. These government-funded resettlement agencies are supposed to be public-private partnerships and should be putting their own additional funding into helping the refugees. There is no law that says they can’t help support refugees after the government money runs out.
They really ought to shut up about that—about pushing refugees out of the nest, so to speak—it makes them sound like they don’t even really like the people they resettle, and I’ll bet it makes the local people even angrier. I imagine local people saying, what the heck, it sounds like these Lutherans don’t even love the people they bring to our city!
Be sure to read the comments at the Union-Leader!
We have written on many occasions about Manchester, NH, here are just three of the posts (here, here, and here).
Endnote: For readers wondering why on earth we are doing this, importing poverty and unemployment, consider a method to the Left’s madness—learn about the Cloward-Piven strategy here.
*An afterthought: You could also tell the Congressional Refugee Caucus how you feel about the refugee program, here.