Tent Foundation makes refugee hiring guide
available to corporations, by Ann Corcoran, 10/7/18.
In
November of last year, information came to us from a confidential source about
Chobani Yogurt CEO Hamdi Ulukaya’s personal foundation, The Tent Foundation, contracting with Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Service(one
of nine federally funded resettlement agencies) to produce a guide for
businesses to help them find refugee labor.
Here
is just a bit of the background I gave about LIRS contract with Tent in a post almost a year ago: For new
readers, Lutheran
Immigration and Refugee Service (LIRS)
is one of nine federal contractors hired and funded (on a per refugee-head
basis) by the US State Department and the Office of Refugee Resettlement in HHS
to place refugees in towns where citizens have no say in the matter and are
generally kept in the dark about the process and plans for their communities.
Linda Hartke’s sudden departure from
LIRS has never been explained. LIRS, approximately 96% funded by taxpayer
dollars, is at the moment in a tight spot due to internal turmoil. We have also recently reported on two other LIRS side ‘deals’ with
global corporations— the meatpackers JBS Swift and Tyson Foods.
Now
we hear that Ulukaya’s personal foundation, The Tent
Foundation, has hired
LIRS to write “a
15-page resource toolkit for employers laying out why they should hire refugees.”
According
to a signed contract seen by RRW, the finished product was to be delivered
to The Tent Foundation by
the end of October. Go to that post and see what an excited Linda Hartke
said about their new funding source.
LIRS hiring guide for the Tent
Foundation is here: https://www.tent.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/01/Tent_Guidebook_FINAL.pdf
Hartke has since been removed as CEO of LIRS, a full explanation about
her departure was never forthcoming.
In
light of all the internal turmoil going on at LIRS over the last year, I had
wondered if The Tent Foundation ever got its guide. But, sure
enough, here it is!
It
is a useful guide for not only businesses looking for refugee labor, but
serious students of the US
Refugee Admissions Program will
find it full of information that could come in handy.
Although,
Tent works in Europe, the guide is entirely devoted to finding and hiring
refugee workers in the US. I especially found useful the ‘Where to find refugees’ table
that begins on page 17. Below is just a small portion of the table that goes on
for two additional full pages. See
which cities are the top ‘welcoming’ cities in America from 2007 to 2016
(mostly Obama years):
UN Refugees by City 2007 to 2016:
San Diego CA 27075
Dallas TX 26950
Atlanta GA 26322
Phoenix AZ 22811
Los Angeles CA
Houston TX 19958
Chicago IL 18538
Detroit MI 18163
Seattle WA 16882
Minneapolis MN 16255
Denver CO 13583
Miami FL 13420
Buffalo NY 12509
Indianapolis IN 11549
Portland OR 10250
Salt Lake City UT 10250
Louisville KY 10129
Columbus OH 9957
Nashville TN 9871
Syracuse NY 9532
Kansas City KS 9387
Tucson AZ 8397
Washington DC 8384
Sacramento CA 8061
Jacksonville FL 7452
Milwaukee WI 7338
These are
the top 26 US Cities in the list
There are a total of 136 locations on
the list. Apparently towns and cities receiving less than 100 are not
included.
In
addition to less tangible benefits like feel-good bragging rights (corporate
virtue signaling!) there are some economic reasons (besides wage issues) to
bank an economic gain from hiring refugees. Here is one! A tax break!
Remember
I mentioned that there was a tax break for businesses being touted as a way to
encourage companies to hire people on welfare (here yesterday).
I see that on page 14, here at the Tent/LIRS hiring guide, the break is further explained.
Readers
may not know that although most legal immigrants to America are not permitted
to tap into welfare for several years, refugees are exempt from that
prohibition and are able to almost immediately, with the help and guidance of
their federally-assigned resettlement contractor (ie LIRS), sign up for myriad
social service programs.
Here
is what the guide advises….Go here to
read the whole guide.
Norb Leahy, Dunwoody
GA Tea Party Leader
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