If you live in New York’s North Country, beware, because the great minds at the Adirondack North Country Associationhave invited Mayor Christopher Louras down from Rutland to tell them all about how to best get some refugees for themselves (for your towns!).
I’m sure the folks in Rutland will be tickled to see what their mayor says about them when he leaves home. “…ignorant by design!”
KEESEVILLE — The outcry over Syrian refugees has shaped much of Rutland’s discourse this summer.
The dispute over whether to accept 100 asylum seekers has cleaved the city, pitting Mayor Chris Louras against constituents, city aldermen and other elected officials.
Rutland Mayor Louras told the gathering he got the idea to invite Syrians to Rutland from Gov. Peter Shumlin. Here the governor thanks seven of Vermont’s eight mayors for supporting his re-election bid, in Montpelier, Vt., Monday, Sept. 24, 2012. That is Rutland Mayor Christopher Louras to his immediate left. This photo identifies Louras as an Independent, but the Sun article says he is a Republican, which is it? Photo: http://bigstory.ap.org/photo/governor-mayors-1
As the five-term mayor waits for the Department of State to sign off on the expansion of the Vermont Refugee Resettlement Program into his city — a roadblock thrown up by peeved aldermen — Louras ventured to New York last week, where he briefed local leaders on his push to make the state’s third-largest city a host for escapees of the war-torn nation.
A decision may come as soon as 10 days, he said, with the first family arriving as early as December.
Bringing refugees into the city, he said, goes hand-in-hand with urban revitalization efforts.
Their entry, Louras believes, would breathe new life into an ailing city.
[….]
But the road to get here wasn’t easy. The mayor has come under fire for a perceived lack of transparency. Earlier this summer, city aldermen asked the department of state to examine the issue. A former political opponent also circulated a petition, which was nixed, asking the issue be brought to a vote.
Louras admitted he could have been more open.
“I keep trying to go back to the human element,” he said. [So is he saying secrecy and lying are o.k. if one is moved by one’s emotions to save the world’s downtrodden and in this case Syrian Sunni Muslims—ed]
[….]
The crowd at the Adirondack North Country Association’s annual meeting, the daylong workshop that acts as somewhat of an experimental laboratory for regional leaders to tinker with economic solutions to rural problems, was perhaps more receptive.
Louras joined other officials in Keeseville last week to share his experiences — and to offer advice for other communities exploring similar efforts.
When resettlement agencies zero in on a possible relocation site, they look at three main areas, Louras said:
Safe and sanitary housing, the availability of entry-level jobs and the English-language learning opportunities necessary to build skills.
Rutland, a city of about 16,500, has all three, the mayor said.
“We’ve got a workplace problem,” Louras said, “not a jobs problem. Our employers are looking for employees.”
There it is readers, once again, they hide under the humanitarian white hat, but it is all about labor (I’m guessing the Rutland Chamber of Commerce backs Louras?). Beware residents of the North Country, you could be the next resettlement site:
Discussions on accepting refugees have percolated this year in the North Country, and a number of organizations have been formed to explore the feasibility of the concept, including several in Essex County.
Then you can’t make this up, we have an immigration lawyer, Anas Saleh, a Syracuse-based lawyer who works directly with asylum seekers, telling us that refugees pay more taxes than they get out of the system in the form of welfare. Be sure to see this postfrom last year where we told you that a study by the Center for Immigration Studies tells us that each Middle Eastern refugee costs the US taxpayer over $64,000 per refugee over the first five years in the U.S. The Sun continues:
Saleh said refugees don’t pluck jobs from Americans.
Contrary to public belief, immigrants actually pay into social welfare programs more than they receive, he said. [He is flat-out lying!—ed]
Louras then tells the gathering that he doesn’t want to get into politics, but proceeds to call other elected officials and citizens opposing him in Rutland “ignorant by design.”
While Louras said he wanted to avoid politics during the roundtable discussions, he admitted to taking hits and incurring damage from a “small-but-vocal” group of opponents on his home turf.
Expect the national negative discourse to be replicated at the local level, he said.
Could he have facilitated the discussions more transparently?
Sure, he admitted.
But some people are ignorant “by design,” he said, and would have sabotaged the process — including the city’s treasurer, who the mayor said circulated misleading information about the impact of asylum seekers on property values.
“She’s helping create that fake narrative,” Louras said.
[….]
The mayor, a Republican, said his greatest frustration surrounding the debate was what he referred to as a “dearth of empirical analysis” among refugee populations. [We have some analysis, impact on taxpayers is $64,370 per Middle Eastern refugee over first five years in US. Middle Easterners use welfare at a higher rate then some from other regions of the world—-ed]
“Those numbers are validated through academia, but there’s not a lot of studies,” he said.
While his decision to make Rutland a beacon for Syrians stemmed from a discussion with Gov. Peter Shumlin following last year’s terrorist attacks in Paris — Louras said he was further miffed by a letter sent by 30 governors barring refugees from their states — he warned attendees that their efforts shouldn’t lean on the government, but rather a constellation of nonprofit agencies.
Grassroots efforts like Rutland Welcomes, the mayor said, were critical in laying down early infrastructure, creating “action-driven” plans that explored everything from transportation to language learning.
I urge all of you to visit The Sunarticle, especially all of you Vermonters and Upstate New Yorkers, it is really full of enlightening information that I couldn’t possibly analyze if I worked on this post all day. They use the really refugee-overloaded/stressed cities of Syracuse and Utica as model cities even! Sheesh!
Update September 2:Vermont Diggertells us the original story was taken down and that there is no truth to any of it. Rutland is still a target site.
There is breaking news in Vermont that the controversial resettlementof 100 Syrian Muslims to Rutland has stalled in Washington.
But, local reports say that US State Department grants (contracts?) for resettlement have stopped nationwide. We are trying to track down that assertion. The only thing that makes any sense to me is that they have run out of funds for the final weeks of this fiscal year. If that is the case, it makes my point that money matters. No money=no refugees. Is the Vermont refugee resettlement contractor out of (your) money?
In the meantime this is from MyChamplainValley in Bernie-land (hat tip: Don):
A plan for 100 Syrian refugees to settle in Rutland, Vt. starting this October has hit a snag.
The U.S. State Department has halted its grant approval process for all resettlement programs nationwide.
The Vermont Refugee Resettlement Program applied for the grant.
Without this money, Rutland Board of Alderman President WIlliam Notte says refugees cannot be received. [Of course not, because there is no real charity here, it is all about taxpayer dollars!—ed]
Notte estimates the grant amount to be about $9,000 per refugee. However, he says lack of transparency has been an issue and he is not sure exactly how much it will cost.
Notte expects to hear back from the State Department about the status in September.
Wherever you are, don’t relax now. You have not won. They will be back!
Editor: As regular readers know, Rutland, VT citizens are not taking kindly to a plan to resettle 100 Syrians in their town—a plan the mayor made in secrecy with a federal resettlement contractor. For background, please click here for our Rutland archive. And, for future reference, this post is filed in our ‘Comments worth noting/Guest posts‘ category.
With grateful appreciation to Ann Corcoran and Refugee Resettlement Watch, it is with pride and pleasure that I attempt, here, to provide you all with the saga of RUTLAND VERMONT, a struggling, proud community facing the importation of even more needy refugees when our welfare overload is choking us even now.
STRAIGHT TALK—–with Don Chioffi
VERMONT’S AREA 51—THE SECRET RESETTLEMENT PROJECT
The proud, struggling city of Rutland, Vermont has been fighting against seemingly insurmountable odds to even get public information about the secret Refugee Resettlement Program since late April. Here it is now in late August and we have no more information than in April, despite numerous FOIA requests. The arrogance, impudence, and outright defiance by the USCRI, the secular agency responsible for this Refugee resettlement Program, with the compliant secret help of Mayor Chris Louras and his crony President of the Board of Aldermen, William Notte, would be more appropriately associated with some third world country, in fact it is headed by a woman that is, in fact, from one of those countries. Amila Merdzandovic, one of Lavinia Limon’s dutiful henchman, has stonewalled, lied outright, and threatened even those in our own state government for releasing even the most pitiful of information to the citizens of our state and of Rutland, and our mayor vowed to reject a lawful petition submitted by his own citizens requesting a moratorium on this program until facts were forthcoming.
Our three state senators from Rutland county, Peg Flory, Kevin Mullin, and Brian Collamore (all Republicans) have even tried to gain information from the State Health and Human Services department and were met with the response that even HHS was not provided with the complete Application and Abstract, a document that is supposed to have the coordination and cooperation of state and local government bodies and the public prior to even being sent to the US State Department. Our state senators were not even informed that this program was being instituted at the state level by our ultra liberal governor, Peter (lame duck) Shumlin. They were also rebuffed by US Sen. Patrick Leahy, who, to date, has also refused to produce the documents. It sure looks like all the Democrats at every level are closing ranks to protect the secrecy of these documents.
The Application has all the back-up information concerning Rutland’s ability to sustain the number of refugees intended for resettlement during 2016 and forward. Information on housing availability, law enforcement, medical capacity, social service capacity, the burgeoning drug problem in our community, the availability or lack of jobs in our community, and the severe drop in population over the last 15 years are all supposed to be in that document—-yet no one, I repeat, no one, has been able to see what has been put into that document as justification for hundreds and hundreds of refugees from a war torn country infested with terrorists being planted like seeds in our community.
Rutland City Treasurer, Wendy Wilton, shocks Rutland with a 35% tax increase prediction in 5 years if USCRI gets its way.
Indeed, USCRI (US Committee for Refugees and immigrants) AND VRRP (Vermont Refugee Resettlement Program) have treated the refugees like a commodity, at around $4,000 each, that will sustain their own taxpayer funded VOLAG (90% government funding), while adamantly refusing to release Rutland’s own application data, which we the people cannot even therefore verify as being accurate and appropriate as justification for the settlement of hundreds of needy individuals into an already impoverished region with a staggering welfare load and severe unemployment or under employment problem.
We, the people, constituted as RUTLAND FIRST, have been struggling on our own to do the research necessary to answer questions and develop information relative to this invasion of our community in the guise of “welcoming humanitarianism”. We have been battling for four months now against the “welcome wagon” which has literally shut its eyes to the costs, the security challenges, and the lack of quality jobs in our region, while at the same time labeling us as racists, islamophobes, or any other vile descriptive adjective in their lexicon of “Global Worldspeak” that they can conjure up, including un-American. This, in spite of the fact that our group boasts several retired and active service personnel who have fought for their country, professional leaders in the community, and active government personnel in both elective and appointed office in our community.
So, yesterday, August 29th, RUTLAND FIRST conducted a forum to attempt to inform our local legislators, state senators, candidates for higher office, and also the general public. Attended by well over a hundred people, the dynamic presentation was riveting in its focus on facts. That alone put it in great contrast to the so called forums presented by the Mayor and the settlement agencies, which characteristically were devoid of anything but emotional statements of support. Today the Rutland Herald had not one word on the dramatic presentation—but managed yet another full column welcoming editorial.
Rutland City Treasurer, Wendy Wilton presented some pretty startling financial impact data, including the most shocking prediction based on present and future costs associated with these programs. When she told the crowd there that based on her calculations, within five years City property taxpayers would be facing an increase of 35%, there were visible signs of multiple jaw dropping in the audience. With a steadily declining population base in the City, the remaining property taxpayers have been facing the high tax burden with no signs of a break and an ever increasing unmet Pension Benefit obligation. Recent comparative studies done by the city have shown that based on its population the number of city employees far exceeds other cities in Vermont. The very dramatic decrease in population has not, however, been met with anywhere near such a proportional drop in personnel.
Gary Shattuck, a local lawyer and a former prosecutor and investigator who worked for the US Department of Justice in Kosovo and Iraq as a legal advisor, presented a pretty bleak picture of any prospect that Syrian Refugees could be properly vetted, citing many qualified opinions by high level US officials specifically stating that there is no empirical data base left in Syria with which to compare any biometric, historical, or verifiable sociometric information. In other words, no matter what name they give the fact checkers, there is no data left in Syria to even check that name, let alone relatives, friends, operatives, or terrorists who may or may not have been associated with the applicant. Shattuck spent substantial time and expertise setting up a system for vetting Iraq’s 850 judges and prosecutors following the breakdown of order in that country to determine if they were, in fact, friend or foe.
David O’Brien, former VT Public Service Commissioner former director of the Rutland Economic Development Corporation (REDC) and presently a consultant in the Energy industry, presented some economic data relevant to the job prospects for refugees, and it was not a pretty picture. Dave cited the dramatic loss of manufacturing jobs in the entire Rutland Region and the tremendous shift from quality long term employment to a model featuring under-employment and service oriented jobs exclusively.
There were letters at the event to be signed by citizens and presented to the State Department, and a local attorney, Judy Barone, Esq. and Don Chioffi, as Rutland First committee members, presented a stinging letter*** to the local and state legislators demanding that they get answers to all the questions posed at the forum. Those present left with plenty of finally answered questions and the clear impression, if not a mandate, that this program should be stopped right now, in its tracks, until and as when the cloak of secrecy is removed and Rutland’s ability to assimilate hundreds of refugees is fully justified.
RUTLAND FIRST—-is—-RUTLAND STRONG!
For those of you in ‘pockets of resistance,’ Rutland citizens’ work should serve as a model for you to use to craft strategies where you live. If you have questions, you can reach Mr. Chioffi at this e-mail address: donsreelsports@comcast.net
***Here is the letter sent today to local and state lawmakers demanding they get answers and express their opposition to a plan created in secrecy! Your local and state elected officials may be telling you they can’t stop the federal government and its NGO contractor, but they sure can add their voices in demanding their constituents be given all the facts and that the federal government follows the law!
Mr. Don Chioffi of Rutland Town has worked with me to compose this letter and address you as our State Legislators, understanding your responsibility for representing the people of Rutland City and surrounding communities on matters affecting State Government.
We herein seek your attention and ask for your help to ensure that the Application for Resettlement of Refugees in Rutland is opposed by the State of Vermont for the reason that the Application is flawed.
Mayor Louras’ ‘letter of support’ submitted with the Application was without legal authority from the Rutland Board of Alderman, the governing entity. The Mayor misrepresented himself as having authority to act for the City as the City’s governing entity when nothing was further from the truth. The planning, information about Rutland and ‘letter of support’ signed by the Mayor alone, was done behind the backs of the City’s governing entity (the Board of Aldermen), secretively. The Mayor was not authorized to provide his ‘letter of support’ misrepresenting that the ‘City’ had a cooperative relationship with the Resettlement applicants, which relationship did not exist.
It is important that each of you act quickly on your oath to uphold the law and insure the Mayor’s unauthorized misrepresentations are not relied upon by the State due to lack of your complaint.
A collaborative effort between federal, state and local authorities is required for successful refugee resettlement and the governing entity’s cooperation is required to insure ongoing support. It is the responsibility of the Vermont Agency of Human Services (AHS) (Ms. Lamoureux), to ensure coordination of public and private resources in refugee resettlement in the State of Vermont. (See; U.S. Code, Title 8 and State Plan forVermont Refugee Resettlement, AHS Refugee Office, AHS Refugee Office, AUGUST 12, 2017). You may not be aware, but access to Ms. Lamoureax has not been possible on this issue and it needs to be made clear that the State of Vermont will not support the flawed application, and the secretive process under which it was orchestrated, planned and submitted.
We ask that each of you make clear to the Governor and Ms. Lamoureax and the State’s Agency of Human Services (AHS) AND our U.S. Senators that no resettlement can or should be approved for Rutland on the pending flawed Application being there is no support or cooperation of the Rutland City’s governing entity. The Board of Aldermen has been denied information it has sought including a copy of the FULL Application to examine and vet the facts represented about Rutland (apparently provided by some people in Dorset Vermont) upon which the Application will be judged.
Failing your intervention under the power of your offices, the Application, as flawed as it is, could be funded anytime in September even where it fundamentally fails to meet the requirements of Federal law and the Vermont Plan for Refugee Resettlement. Your surveillance and intervention is urgent and important to assure nothing is funded and the State is not called upon if the Application has not met the required standards in the law.
Failure on your part to intervene could well be interpreted as your support for the flawed Application and the secretive process that has left Rutland City and the City’s government in disorder and confusion. There is division, fear and mistrust in the City’s government and in our community concerning how government has acted.
Should you have information different than we herein represent, we ask that each of you please contact me or Don Chioffi and explain. On behalf of the people we write soliciting each of you to help us protect our government under the rule of law and afford the cities in our state the process instrumental to good governance .
Kindly copy me with any correspondence you have with AHS and the Governor, U.S. Senators, and others on this request made of you.
Thank you for your anticipated quick attention to this matter as it is urgent before the Application is decided on facts not vetted for accuracy about Rutland. If you can obtain the full Application, we ask that you send that to us, too.
We anxiously await your work, your questions and your replies.
It is with the deepest gratitude to the citizen activists in Rutland, VT that we are bringing you a broader understanding of the process by which your town is ‘chosen’ to become a new ‘welcoming’ resettlement site.
Many of you have gotten your R & P Abstracts for FY2017 and we dissected one herelast week. After having seen one for Reno that is 16 pages long and knowing most of you were getting 3-pagers, I figured they were keeping more information secret from you. Lavinia Limon is the Director of the US Committee for Refugees and Immigrants, a non-profit group over 95% funded by you which wants to determine the future of Rutland. Learn more about her here at Breitbart: http://www.breitbart.com/big-government/2016/08/02/revolving-door-sends-millions-refugee-resettlement-agency-run-former-clinton-obama-appointees/
But, I did not know that they are keeping documents that are over a hundred pages from you—a document that serves as the supporting rationale that the US State Department is using to decide if your town is worthy. Holy cow!
Think about this! If you live in Missoula, MT, Charleston, WV, Ithaca, NY, Aberdeen, SD or any one of a number of new sites, there is a massive document prepared SECRETLY about your town! So, when they throw a 3-page document at you, they are throwing you only a bone to shut you up!
These documents are prepared with your tax dollars and they propose the spending of millions (billions!) of tax dollars and you aren’t allowed to see them!
RUTLAND — Some residents and elected officials in Rutland County say they’re frustrated they’ve been unable to obtain the full 126-page application for local refugee resettlement that the U.S. State Department is weighing.
Rutland County Sens. Kevin Mullin, Peg Flory and Brian Collamore will participate in a meeting Monday at the Rutland Free Library to discuss issues related to refugee resettlement, including the application.
The group hosting the meeting, Rutland First, has challenged the plan to bring refugees to Rutland and the process by which the decision was made. In a news release announcing Monday’s event, it said residents and members of the Board of Aldermen have made Freedom of Information Act requests for a copy of the application from the State Department and other agencies involved but have been rebuffed.
[….]
Mullin said he’s not opposed to refugee resettlement and doesn’t want Rutland to be perceived as unwelcoming but thinks the application should be a public document.
“It’s hard for us to get answers too,” he said. “That’s what’s frustrating.”
The application is written and submitted by the U.S. Committee for Refugees and Immigrants, a nongovernmental organization. The committee’s Vermont affiliate is the Vermont Refugee Resettlement Program.
The committee has made public a three-page section of the application known as the abstract, which provides some information on housing, employment and other resources specific to Rutland.
There is much more and every one of you working on digging out information in your states must read this! Bidding for bodies!
Remember I told you that the nine federal contractors*** are bidding for bodies (they are paid by the head to resettle refugees), well that is what USCRI is basically admitting. The contractors say they don’t want to let out their trade secrets and new locations to the other federal contractors. This is outrageous! So who gets s******? You, the taxpaying citizen. This is a federal program, no matter how awful your US Senators and your Congressman are, complain to them that this secrecy must stop! Tell them you want all funding stopped until Congress reviews this entire program!
***The nine federal resettlement contractors (participating in the rally Sunday) which are almost completely funded with your tax dollars:
With mayors like these who needs enemies! Update: Refugees now a hot topic in gubernatorial race, see here.
As I travel around the US meeting with citizens concerned about the UN/US Refugee Admissions Program, patterns are developing and one of those is that there is no doubt that when your town is targeted for a new resettlement site (or expansion of an old one) it is done with the utmost secrecy and very often involves an over-zealous elected official (a mayor or city council member).
I have no time to write before I hit the road again this morning, but I want you to see this! This should resonate with everyone I’ve met with in 6 states so far. Rutland, Vermont residents were shocked to learn a couple of months ago that their mayor had quietly “welcomed” the resettlement of 100 Syrians to the town for later this year.
To catch up, see our Rutland archive here.
Here is the latest from Watchdog.org, story titled:
‘Lone alderman in on refugee secret ‘stunned’ at speed of decision‘
A secret plan to make Rutland a permanent refugee resettlement community has divided residents and put the mayor’s political future in doubt. But at least one member of the Board of Aldermen knew about the secret, and that official told Watchdog he is “stunned” at how fast the plan was carried out.
Prior to announcing the resettlement of Syrian refugees, Rutland Mayor Louras held secret meetings with representatives of the Vermont Refugee Resettlement Program, the State Department, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, U.S. Committee for Refugees and Immigrants and Gov. Peter Shumlin. He also consulted with a single alderman: Board of Aldermen President William Notte.
In this interview, Notte answered Watchdog’s questions about his role in the backroom deal to make Rutland a refugee resettlement community.
Continue reading here for the interview.
The lesson I’m learning is this—-as it is confirmed to me repeatedly that refugee seeding plans are done in secrecy, you must be working locally to get the right people elected to political office and get mayors like this one out!
