If you haven’t already, please let us know if you want to continue receiving Noorani’s Notes by clicking this link, or any other link in this e-mail. Thanks!
Afghan families are finding "a warm welcome" in their resettlement across small-town America, reports Nina Strochlic for the National Geographic.
Lancaster, Pennsylvania, "a quaint town of brick row homes with painted shutters, hosts the second-highest ratio of refugees in America, surpassed only by Clarkston, Georgia, and trailed by Bowling Green, Kentucky," writes Strochlic. While big multicultural cities like New York and Minneapolis may have taken in more refugees total, she adds, these three towns have "take[n] in more refugees per capita than anywhere else in the country," per APM Research Lab’s latest data.
At the same time, for refugees resettling in small towns, navigating unfamiliar places is made more complicated as resettlement agencies and volunteers face limited housing options, reports Miriam Jordan of The New York Times.
Still, community leaders like Diana Ford are getting creative in Owensboro, Kentucky, "[tapping] business and faith leaders and local foundations to help find Afghans housing, cover their motel rooms and feed them."
"Investing in someone new is a low investment," added Marjan Nadir, a former Afghan refugee who now works with Clarkston’s Refugee Women’s Network, in the National Geographic piece. "And the next thing you know, they are the resources. Tomorrow, those individuals and their children are the talent pool that takes the community further."
Welcome to Thursday’s edition of Noorani’s Notes. If you have a story to share from your own community, please send it to me at [email protected].
|
|
NEW BEDFORD — In partnership with El País and The New Bedford Light, The Marshall Project’s Julia Preston and Ariel Goodman tell the story of dozens of New Bedford, Massachusetts, tenants — many of them Mayan immigrants from Guatemala employed at the city’s seafood packing plants — who were displaced after their apartment building caught fire. The community’s challenges were compounded by their
exclusion from most federal pandemic relief, which "meant that aid did not reach an especially vulnerable group of Americans: their children, most of whom are citizens because they were born in the United States," explain Preston and Goodman. "Since we don’t have papers, we can’t just go ask for any kind of aid," said T.S., who asked that her full name not be published due to her immigration status. "Thank God, I went back to work again." This story brings back a lot of memories: I first met Preston in New Bedford when she was with The New York Times in the aftermath of a massive March of 2007 immigration raid that I wrote about in the Boston Globe. New Bedford is a special community.
‘THE FUTURE WILL BE OK’ — Catholic Charities caseworker Sarwar Hawez is often the first (and most frequent) person greeting new Afghan arrivals at Nashville International Airport before taking them to a hotel and then on a quick grocery run, Brad Schmitt reports for The Tennessean, with photos by Stephanie Amador. As an Iraqi American who fled Iraqi Kurdistan in the 1990s, "I know how they’re feeling, even the angry ones," said Hawaz, 64. "They come in here scared, and that’s part of my job, part of my commitment to tell them the future will be OK. Don’t be scared, you are in a safe place."
- Trinity Reformed Church in Bloomington, Indiana, is raising funds at its 15th annual Christmas Sing-Along to help permanently resettle Afghans currently living at Camp
Atterbury. (Carol Kugler, The Herald-Times)
- With help from a local fabric store, Janeane Vickers of Mount Vernon, Indiana, and others donated 100 hand-sewn prayer rugs and headscarves to 180 Afghan refugees in Owensboro, Kentucky. (Nathan Havenner, Messenger-Inquirer)
TEXAS AND LOUISIANA — Advocates and civil rights groups are calling on the Department of Justice to investigate Texas Gov. Greg Abbott’s (R) border enforcement operation, "alleging the program is discriminatory and fuels
anti-immigrant hatred," reports Arelis R. Hernández of The Washington Post. "Virtually all if not all of those arrested to date are Latinx and Black men and are migrants. And the nature of the program — state-sanctioned targeting of immigrants — has further fueled racist, anti-immigrant rhetoric and action …" the complaint reads. Separately, an investigation reveals that DHS twice this year recommended ICE stop sending migrants to Louisiana’s Winn Correctional Center, citing "a culture and conditions that can lead to abuse, mistreatment, and discrimination," per Hamed Aleaziz of BuzzFeed News.
ALTERNATIVES TO DENTENTION — The Biden administration will no longer hold undocumented families in detention centers, shifting instead to "remote tracking technology such as ankle bracelets as alternatives," Stef W. Kight reports for Axios. "As of Friday, the
U.S. had zero migrant families in detention facilities, according to internal government data obtained by Axios — with the last and largest facility used for the practice now being slated to hold only single adults," writes Kight. As of Monday, per DHS data, there were about 150,000 migrants enrolled in alternatives to
detention (ATDs).
GLOBAL OPINION — A global survey conducted by YouGov and Global Progress reveals that immigration continues to be a
contentious issue around the world, John Halpin writes for The Liberal Patriot. "Most citizens in 20 leading democratic countries believe that the number of immigrants coming into their country is too high. ... Consequently, people in different national contexts express a strong desire for clear and consistent rules about who is allowed to enter the country and what immigrants must do once they arrive," Halpin explains. "People across the world are open to humane immigration policies but clearly want well-managed systems and stronger border enforcement above all else."
|
|