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Each year, refugee agencies find homes or apartments for refugees once admitted to the United States. It is a tedious process that often takes place months before a refugee arrives. But the frenzied evacuation of Afghans from Afghanistan has turned the process upside down, with agencies trying to find housing for refugees who are already in the United States with limited funds.
“As a resettlement agency, we are supposed to do the work over the next three to four months that we have done over four years,” said Jenny Yang, senior vice president of advocacy and policy at World Relief.
The difficulty is compounded by the fact that refugee agencies were already under pressure after years of low admissions under the Trump administration, forcing them to close their offices and lay off staff. This meant that they had also lost some existing relationships with the owners.
The federal government makes a one-time payment of $ 2,275 for each Afghan an agency serves, of which $ 1,225 is available for agencies to use for direct assistance such as housing and basic necessities, including furniture and l ‘silverware. The other part of the money goes to cover administrative costs.
Although foreign aid and donations can be added to these funds, the rent remains expensive. The national median rent rose to $ 1,302 in September, up 15% from a year ago, according to a report from Apartment List, a rental listing site.
“The housing crisis is basically what Americans are going through, but imagine tackling it when you don’t have a nest egg, you don’t have a secure income yet, you don’t have credentials or history. owner, ”said Krish O’Mara Vignarajah, president and CEO of Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Services, a refugee resettlement agency.
So far, few Afghan evacuees have left the eight military facilities that are used to house Afghans while they complete their treatment, ranging from a few dozen to a hundred a day, according to an administration official.
“Obviously, thousands of people are going to have to leave per week,” a senior administration official told CNN. “We are also aware that if we move people too quickly before they have adequate housing and the other additional services that people need, they could find themselves in a situation where they are not successful from the start. their new homes, so we’re trying to find the right balance. ”
Others should be ready to move into their homes in the next few days as they complete treatment and go through medical checks. “We’re all nervous that they are pulling out too quickly, but we understand they need to do it as quickly as possible,” said Mark Hetfield, president and CEO of HIAS, one of the nine resettlement agencies that work with the US government.
The challenge: find rental properties and hire new owners.
Finding accommodation for refugees is always a challenge, Hetfield said, but the recent housing market has made it even more difficult.
“Doing it during a pandemic, during a housing boom, during a housing shortage for large families who tend to concentrate in cities where it is not cheap to live – it’s a difficult constellation,” Hetfield said.
The White House told state governors in mid-September how many Afghan refugees they could expect to be resettled in their states in the coming weeks.
Allocations to each state were made under the new Afghan Placement and Assistance Program (APA) and were based on the initial 37,000 arrivals. Under this plan, California and Texas will have the highest capacities – 5,255 and 4,481, respectively. Washington, Oklahoma, Arizona, Florida, Georgia, Maryland, Michigan, Missouri, North Carolina, New York and Virginia are also expected to resettle more than 1,000 Afghan refugees. Mississippi and Alabama are expected to resettle the smallest number of Afghans: 10 each.
A unique program
The nine refugee resettlement agencies that work with the federal government will ultimately determine where Afghans are resettled, whether they have ties to the United States or where their local affiliates have the capacity to accommodate them. Agencies receive federal funds to provide housing assistance to refugees.
“When people first arrived, we didn’t know where they wanted to go or where in the United States might suit them best,” the senior administration official told CNN. “We have learned that a lot of people have ties to specific regions of the country.”
The Biden administration is in regular contact with the private sector and state and local governments to try to scale up efforts, including targeted campaigns, and to identify potential outbreaks, the official said.
Refugees and holders of special immigrant visas – a visa for Afghans who were employed by or worked for the U.S. government – have access to a range of short and long-term services to get back on their feet, from housing and employment assistance, money and medical assistance. But parole, while providing some respite, does not unlock the services refugees receive and many of those who fled Afghanistan have been paroled in the United States.
In an attempt to address this problem, the State Department set up the so-called Afghan Aid and Placement Program, extending some of the aid provided to refugees to parolees. This is a unique program in all cities, despite varying housing costs.
Resettlement agencies are considering how they might get refugees to live in a city in the United States that might not be their first choice, either because the family lives elsewhere in the United States or there are communities. Afghan women they might want to join, covering rent longer, matching them with a job or simply educating Afghans on the different costs of living.
Kristyn Peck, CEO of Lutheran Social Services in the National Capital Region, said her team relied on community housing leads.
“People say, ‘I have an apartment that I’m ready to rent,'” Peck told CNN. “This is where a lot of housing leads come in. Typically we work with preferred landlords. Right now we depend on the leads in the community due to scarcity.” The local Afghan community is contributing to this effort by helping to organize the leads and following them to discern what is viable.
When there is no immediate rental property available, some have had to go to the hotel. In Sacramento, a city with high rents, a family of seven had to be divided into two rooms in a hotel until a property became available, according to Yang. They have been there for three weeks.
Resettlement staff have been working with Afghan refugees since they began arriving at U.S. bases at the end of August. While these bases were supposed to provide temporary accommodation for Afghans as they finalized treatment, the bases have become semi-permanent homes for the refugees who have now lived there for almost six weeks.
“I think the leaders and the soldiers are doing their best to try to provide as much hospitality as possible,” said Democratic Representative Veronica Escobar, who visited the base at Fort Bliss.
But living in tents for months is not a lasting solution, she added.
“There will come a time when the families you know have to be in a normal community, not in a military installation where they can go to a grocery store, where they can interact with the larger community and enjoy the amenities in a larger community and go. work, ”Escobar said.
Push for additional resources
In addition to funding the government until Dec. 3, the interim bill “will provide funds to help treat and resettle Afghan refugees and ultimately provide critical disaster assistance to Americans stricken by storms and storms. forest fires this summer, ”Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer said Thursday morning. .
Advocates have repeatedly stressed the urgency of pushing through the continued resolution to provide additional benefits to Afghan parolees.
“We also know that without significant resources there is a real prospect of homelessness for some of these families,” said O’Mara Vignarajah.
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