They (Jewish Family Services) are concentrating “poverty on top of poverty!”
(Mayor Domenic Sarno)
We told you about Democrat Mayor Domenic Sarno a few years ago when he asked the US State Department to place a moratorium on refugees being deposited in his beleaguered and over-loaded city. Of, course he was ignored as mayors have been ignored in Amarillo, TX, Lewiston, ME and Manchester, NH.
His pleas to the Obama State Department were ignored, will Tillerson’s agency treat him better?
Democrat Mayor Sarno standing up for veterans and the American flag at Hampshire College last fall. Maybe Trump should bring him in to the Administration. Put him in the State Department. He has common sense and he has experience on the receiving end! http://www.theblaze.com/news/2016/11/28/at-least-1000-veterans-descend-upon-college-to-protest-american-flag-removal/
(See our archive on Springfield, here)
So this past week he learned that Jewish Family Services was quietly placing more refugees in the city and he came out firing with both barrels!
From MassLive:
‘Enough is enough’: Springfield Mayor Domenic Sarno critical of new ‘influx’ of refugees to city
SPRINGFIELD — Mayor Domenic J. Sarno, after learning that several refugee families are expected to arrive in the Springfield area this week, has renewed criticism of local resettlement agencies, saying “enough is enough.”
In a prepared release, Sarno raised a series of questions about the arrival, saying he had received no advance communication from the Jewish Family Service of Western Massachusetts***, the resettlement agency.
“Once again, these resettlement agencies with no prior contact and/or coordination efforts with our city departments, use our Springfield as their ‘designated resettlement site,'” Sarno said. “Yet when these resettlement agencies are asked to assist these families in need in their own cities and/or towns — they state they do not have the capacity. Maybe they should try to create their own capacity.”
Sarno had also been critical of resettlement agencies in 2013 and 2014, urging the federal government at that time to put a moratorium on new refugee families settled in Springfield.
Sarno restated his claims of the past that the resettlement of refugees in Springfield was a situation of concentrating “poverty on top of poverty,” with low income people added to low-income areas.
Check out this story! They weren’t hunting rabbits or deer, but birds, turtles and frogs! With slingshots! What the heck, where is their resettlement agency? Doesn’t it teach them that this isn’t done in America? Aren’t they being fed enough, they get food stamps!
And, what must the environmentalists of Massachusetts be thinking? Where is PETA, by the way?
Burmese Karen refugees arrested for killing animals with slingshots: From left are Hsa Wah, Kehney Moo and Patty Poo
Longtime readers know that Springfield, MA (in the land of Ted Kennedy the ‘brains’ behind the Refugee Act of 1980) has been a ‘pocket of resistance’ to more refugee resettlement as the Mayor has beggedthe resettlement contractors to slow the flow to the overloaded town.
See our complete Springfield archive here.
Previously we learned that the resettlement agencies working in Springfield included Jewish Family Service of Western Massachusetts and the renamed Lutheran Social Service of New England (see here where the CEO of Ascentria Care, the new name, says refugee resettlement is BIG BUSINESS!). Clearly they are doing a pretty awful job of assimilating the refugees they resettle!
Here is the news at MassLive.com (hat tip: Jill):
SPRINGFIELD – Three men were arrested and charged with illegally hunting in Forest Park Wednesday afternoon after police allegedly found them in the park shooting animals with slingshots.
The three men, Patty Poo, 54, of 211 Oakland St., Kehney Moo, 38, of 83 Acushnet Ave., and Hsa Wah, 60 of 85 Acushnet Ave., were each charged with cruelty to animals, hunting without a license, violation of Forest Park hunting ordinances, and breach of the peace while armed with a sling shot.
According to Springfield Police spokesman Sgt. John Delaney, police were called to a section of Forest Park at about 2:15 p.m. after receiving calls about people seen hunting birds in the park.
Officers responded to the area and found Wah, Moo and Poo with a bag containing dead turtles, frogs and birds, Delaney said.
The three were armed with slingshots and were apparently using small rocks and auto lug nuts for ammunition, he said.
Be sure to see this storyat MassLive about how much commentary this story has generated. And, note that the case is on holdbecause a proper translator must be found! Remember ‘welcoming’ communities! You must pay for interpreters when your refugees get in trouble with the law, have problems with medical care, and have issues in the school system!
Maybe the resettlement contractor responsible for the trio should be billed for their court costs instead of the taxpayer!
About the Burmese refugees….
We are told that these three are Karen (Christian) Burmese. They make up most of probably the largest ethnic group we have resettled since 2005. (Although Iraqi refugees are catching up).
How many Burmese refugees are we taking?
The mostly Christian Burmese are one of the largest (if not the largest) ethnic group of refugees we have resettled since 2005 (I checked the datafrom January 2005 until May 1, 2015).
This is what I learned: We resettled 140,812 Burmese refugees since 2005.
This surprised me: In that number were 12,615 Burmese Muslims!
Thanks to everyone who has sent me one version or another of this story about calls for refugee resettlement moratoriums in Springfield, Mass, Lewiston, Maine, and Manchester, NH.*** Regular readers here know the problems in those three New England cities well, so it is not news to us.
However….
What is news is that the news (mainstream media) is actually paying attention and making connections! I don’t know which came first, the Fox News story(Fox does credit AP), or the AP story.
But, I’m thrilled to see the word “moratorium” used other than on the pages of RRW!
I haven’t enough time to analyze the articles for you, so please read them! There is one thing that caught my eye, however, that needs to be mentioned. The US State Department and its contractors choose resettlement cities with virtually no input from the locals (elected or otherwise), any reference to “stakeholders” usually means only FRIENDLY stakeholders (for the record, I hate that word)!
Daniel Langenkamp (right) Public affairs adviser at US State Dept. PRM http://www.linkedin.com/pub/daniel-langenkamp/1a/197/563
Once they have established a seed community of certain ethnic groups they then throw up their hands and say—what can we do? Families must be reunited and we can’t stop refugees from moving where there are ethnic enclaves of their kind of people. You see their cop-out in these stories when State Department spokesman Daniel Langenkamp says this:
Such requests [for a moratorium—ed] are rare, said Daniel Langenkamp, a department spokesman.
“We make every effort to work with local officials and other stakeholders to ensure the resettlement of refugees is acceptable,” he said. [If everything went so well there would never have been a RRW!—ed]
The Department, he said, does not place refugees unless an area is equipped to handle them. [LOL!–ed] The government’s work with refugees in Springfield is mostly about family reunification, and it cannot keep families from moving there if they are placed elsewhere, he said.
Note to any city contemplating “welcoming” refugees, remember this! Once a seed community is established, the extended family comes, and there is no stopping it! Any elected official calling for a slow-down or outright moratorium will be demonized!
See my ten reasonswhy a MORATORIUM is needed! —all the more important now that the border is being overwhelmed with mostly teenaged boys seeking “asylum.”
*** Search RRW for each of those three cities and find dozens of posts (spanning several years) on problems in each.
The family of twelve was recently removed from their roach infested rental property where the electric bill had gone unpaid as well. MassLive File photo / John Suchocki
Massachusetts (home state of the ‘brains’ behind the refugee program—the now deceased Ted Kennedy) has been a “welcoming” state for refugees, as was the city of Springfield (originally!), so I guess they knew what they were getting in to, but I’m not so sure the taxpayers there were fully aware (until now!). See Springfield mayor wants moratorium.
SPRINGFIELD – A lawyer for the city’s Housing office said Friday that the city remains committed to helping two refugee families that were left homeless two weeks ago when their Union Street apartment was condemned.
The two families, originally from Somalia and consisting of three adults and 12 children, have spent the last two weeks in a Greenfield hotel. Some assistance has been provided to the families by local and state agencies, officials said.
“The city remains committed to assuring that the families are afforded safe and sanitary housing,” said Lisa C. DeSousa, associate city solicitor. “We are looking forward to working with social service agencies that are charged with assisting refugee families in these types of situations.”
[…..]
The school-aged children have been transported daily from the Greenfield hotel to their Springfield schools.
The state Department of Children and Families and state Department of Transitional Assistance are believed to be helping the families.
Maybe it’s time for the cost of saving these impoverished families to fall on the US State Department and the Office of Refugee Resettlement (in Health and Human Services). Maybe if the cost came out of their federal budget hides, instead of state and local taxpayers’ piggy banks, Congress would begin to pay attention.
I know, I know, it still comes from the taxpayers ultimately, but it’s about sending a message to the one government body that could stop the insanity.
Update May 29th: Jewish Family Services which initially resettled the Muslim Somalis says it will work to rectify the situation, here.
Mayor: “No mas, no more!”
Wyomingare you listening! Does anyone wonder anymore how “pockets of resistance” are building to this program that is overloading your cities and towns with impoverished third-worlders?
Somali family (father, two women, 12 kids) relocated from roach-infested house with no electricity! The two women are said to be sisters—Ha! Ha!
SPRINGFIELD – City officials said Tuesday that Somali refugees including 12 children were found living in deplorable conditions in a Union Street apartment that had a heavy infestation of roaches and no electricity.
The duplex apartment at 515 Union St. was condemned Thursday by the city, and the tenants — believed to number three adults and 12 children — were relocated after Code Enforcement and Housing officials were notified and conducted the inspection, city officials said.
“It was the heaviest infestation of roaches I have seen in years,” said David Cotter, the city’s deputy director of code enforcement in the Housing Division. “They were all over the walls, floors, ceilings, window areas, doorways. I ordered all the inspectors out of there until we could get a full extermination report.”
According to police, one child was doing her homework outside the building under a street lamp on Wednesday night due to the lack of electricity, Cotter said.
Mayor renews call for a halt to any new resettlement in Springfield. The only way to get the attention of the State Department and the arrogant contractors is to make a huge publicity stink, so readers, help Springfield by spreading this news far and wide across America!
Mayor Domenic J. Sarno, who has been critical of the refugee resettlement policies in Springfield in the past, renewed his criticism on Tuesday. Refugees have not received adequate follow-up services from the resettlement agencies, from the federal level on down, leaving them to be a strain on city services, Sarno said.
“Where is the accountability?” Sarno said.
The residents were living in poverty and in crowded, unsafe conditions, Sarno said.
Sarno had urged the federal government to stop locating new refugees in Springfield last year, and called for a moratorium again on Tuesday.
“No mas, no more,” Sarno said.
Contractors are surely saying among themselves, but wouldn’t dare say so publicly at this moment: NOT our problem, we were only responsible for them for up to 8 months in 2003! Surely even the bureaucrats at the US State Department and the Office of Refugee Resettlement (in HHS) are saying—people don’t understand, it’s not our job to take care of refugees for years. But, you know what! Whose fault is that that the public doesn’t understand the program?
The complexity and secrecy surrounding refugee resettlement in the US for over three decades now has shielded the federal program from public understanding and scrutiny—until now that is!
Wandering Somalis!
Robert Marmor, president and chief executive officer of the Jewish Family Service of Western Mass., said his agency resettled the initial family in Springfield in September 2003.
The family later moved to Nashville, Tenn., and then returned to Springfield in 2008, and asked for and received assisted then, Marmor said. The family then moved to Utica, N.Y., in 2011, before returning to Springfield, he said.
In Minnesota, 63% of Somalis live in poverty and I will bet in every state where they are congregated a similar statistic is available.
By the way, Mayor Sarno is a Democrat and the irony is that it was none other than the former Senator from Massachusetts—‘Don’t bring-em to Hyannis’ Kennedy who is ultimately responsible for the mess now in Springfield.
Ted Kennedy, Joe Biden and Jimmy Carter brought us the Refugee Act of 1980 and the present system that doles out your tax dollars to unaccountable “non-profit” contractors to drop off the refugees in overloaded cities, care for them for a few months and then walk away.
Our complete archive on Springfield, Mass is here.
Massachusetts is a ‘Wilson-Fish’ state and the program may ultimately be found to be illegally administered.
If you have read this post on May 28th and are infuriated, take a few minutes and write to the US State Department by tomorrow (Thursday) 5 p.m. Go here for more!
