Day: June 23, 2011

ORR grants $250,000 for welcoming program for LGBT refugees

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

Yes, in this time of financial crisis for many in the US, we are granting a non-profit group a quarter of a million dollars to set up a program for lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender (LGBT) refugees.   The grantee is the Heartland Alliance* which we have reported on several times here at RRW including when they’ve placed refugees with slum landlords in Chicago (here is one such post).

These federal contractors whine that they don’t have enough money to properly care for refugees whose care they have been entrusted with, yet we have money to give them to train people about gays.

From a recent press release from the Office of Refugee Resettlement:

The Administration for Children and Families today announced the creation of a first-ever resource center to support the resettlement of lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender (LGBT) refugees. The Office of Refugee Resettlement (ORR), a division of ACF, has awarded a $250,000 grant to the Heartland Alliance of Chicago to create this training and technical assistance center.

“The Obama administration has issued a clear mandate that comprehensive human rights include the elimination of violence and discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity,” said ACF Acting Assistant Secretary David A. Hansell. “Addressing the protection and resettlement challenges faced by lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender (LGBT) refugees is a priority for ACF and ORR, and we are pleased to bring on Heartland Alliance as a partner to support this key initiative.”

They go on to say:

The focus of this initiative will be to provide:

~Resource and capacity development in key resettlement locations;

~Sensitivity training to network staff, including overview of key issue regarding newly arriving LGBT refugees;
Technical assistance in service delivery; and

~Development of best practices and orientation materials for refugee service providers across the country.

“As many of these refugees left their homelands specifically because of persecution related to their LGBT status, it is particularly incumbent on us to provide a safe and welcoming environment,” Hansell added.

There is no doubt that many gay and lesbian people are persecuted in their home countries—heck in some Muslim countries they execute them—but this is turning into the latest asylum scam.  Recently it came to my attention in Maryland that El Salvadorans here on Temporary Protected Status (another scam I’ve addressed at my other blog, here is an archive on those posts) are attempting to ask for asylum on the grounds that they are gay and would be persecuted if we returned them to El Salvador.   And, who is to determine if they are gay or not?

* I think it would be useful for readers to return to this post from 2008 about how the group “Friends of Refugees” got its start after a run-in with Heartland Alliance.  Visit Friends of Refugees blog here from time to time as well.

Refugee program should be run exclusively with private charity/sponsorship

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

We have argued on these pages for years that refugee families should be sponsored privately in the US—as it was in the old days before the whole system was re-ordered by the Refugee Act of 1980 (Kennedy/Biden/Jimmy Carter) that set up this supposed public-private partnership where taxpayers pay “church” groups and others to do the work.

The “charitable” group was supposed to share the cost with the government but now we see refugee contractors, like the ones we wrote about recently in Tennessee and Idaho, here and here, being supported with 95% taxpayer money.  It is really an employment service for Leftwing do-gooders who can’t find other work.

In Canada they do have a taxpayer supported refugee program and another privately sponsored program where the “charity” is given freely to the refugees, not taken from a taxpayer and redistributed.

When I saw these numbers today from Canada they told me what I already knew—if the program is run with private charity the number of refugees arriving would be greatly decreased.  Why? Because when people have to use their own money for charity, instead of taxpayer money, we learn how charitable people will be.

As a matter of fact, those people collecting signatures in Maryland to try to halt a recently passed law to give in-state tuition to illegal aliens silence critics every time with the simple suggestion—if you want to send an illegal alien to college, open your own wallet and send one!   Shuts ’em up every time!

This is the statistic from Canada about ‘putting one’s money where one’s mouth is’ that I found interesting:

In 2010, Canada granted permanent resident status to 24,693 refugees, including 4,833 pledged by church groups and community organizations.

So in the US, where the taxpayer pays for 70,000-80,000 refugees a year, if the refugees were to be privately sponsored then that would drop the number arriving by about about 80% (if we were as charitable as Canada’s “churches” and community groups).   But, most importantly the refugees would not place a strain on our welfare system and probably be better assimilated in the end.