Top posts for the last week, and road
trip news by Ann Corcoran
8/5/16
I can hardly believe it! I have been on the
road for 3 weeks today, have made stops in 8 states and have put over 4,000
miles on my car! In nine more days I’ll be home in Maryland. The trip to see
some refugee overloaded towns (and some proposed resettlement sites) has been
beyond my wildest expectations in terms of confirming things I already
suspected and for learning some
new things as well. I haven’t figured out
yet how best to report, but here are a few impressions (broad
generalizations!):
·
Refugee
resettlement is largely being driven by money! In most places where refugees are
deeply entrenched they were directed to a particular site by some industry
looking for cheap legal labor. Very often local elected officials are in on it because
they too are looking for financial rewards.Those local officials who object are left pretty much in the dark
(they don’t know about R & P Abstracts or stakeholder meetings). We have some great activists investigating, comparing notes
and becoming ‘community organizers.’
·
Those
promoting refugee resettlement have basically two weapons: the first is secrecy in the way they
operate. The other weapon they have is that they hide under the white hat of
humanitarianism and blast any opposition as racist, haters and just plain
mean-spirited.
·
There
is fear among people in some of these communities (besides fear of being called
racists)—fear for their safety and fear for their children and grandchildren.
·
And, finally one other common thread in many places I
visited is that
neighborhoods are being changed as Muslims buy up property and put mosques in
suburban neighborhoods.
Now to the top three
most-read posts of the last week: Lowell,
Massachusetts: Alleged sexual assault by Syrian refugee puts refugee program in
the spotlight. Calls
for Angela Merkel to step down at huge demonstrations across Germany yesterday. Lobbying
arm for refugee resettlement contractors wants US to take 200,000 refugees
in FY2017 By the way, top daily posts (those trending are in the
right hand side bar).
For new readers!
I had planned to list some resources
here at RRW for those of you visiting for the first time, but I am now out of
time because I will be hitting the road again this morning. If you are new here, visit my FAQs
(frequently asked questions) above on the header.
Click here. There are important links there to help you figure out
what is happening near you. See especially ‘Ten things your town needs to know’ here. Also, be sure to use the search window! Type in a few key words
(start with the name of your state) to see if we’ve previously reported on
things where you live. For past weekly and monthly reports go
here. Apologies as always! I don’t
want you to think I am rude, but I can’t answer all the e-mails I receive!
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