Resettlement agencies need to change.
June 11, 2018
June 11, 2018
Fixing a broken system means that people stop using the excuse that lack of affordable housing is a justification for putting people in dangerous housing. It means that people stop using the excuse that families wish to live in dangerous housing because there are others like them there from the same country and culture.
The "make do" and "get by" attitude is no longer defensible when others have labored hard to build pieces into the System that have worked or can work. Off the top of my head I can think of a few "pieces" that work, such as the documented complaint process, the very careful minutes kept by the City's Minimal Housing Standards Commission, the Greensboro Housing Coalition, the Housing Hub, the International Advisory Committee. I suspect every "piece" is under-resourced and needs more help, but that's a political process that we know how to do.
What works against a strong system from emerging are agencies which keep feeding poor, very vulnerable people into Greensboro's dangerous housing problem. One dramatic moment in the collapse of Lutheran Family Services was its failure to properly oversee Iraqi refugees who were so upset about their inadequate housing (at Hunters Glen) that they wanted to return to Iraq. If I remember, the state DHHS people came to see for themselves. That was eight years ago and while it seems agencies have not learned from that incident, others have.
Agencies, refugee allies and well-wishers put tremendous energy into meetings hosted by Holy Trinity that quickly sputtered out. By all accounts, refugee agencies welcomed the attention but weren't interested in change unless it meant money and resources flowing their way. A coalition proposal coordinated by Mark Sills came to nought, essentially undermined by the agencies themselves. I think City people finally realized that refugee agencies were accountable to NC DHHS, but not to local officials. Eventually the City figured out that the IAC was actually needed. We put a lot of energy into bringing it back to life and fending off attempts to stock it with agency heads and representatives. Even so-called allies of refugees and immigrants were of the opinion that newcomers could not be trusted to speak for themselves and their communities. But elections went forward.
With the death of little kids at Summit Cone, it is easy to point fingers at the usual suspects. The Agapions deserve whatever punishments can be handed out on earth or in the life beyond. But the attitudes and insular culture of the resettlement agencies must change or they'll go the way of LFS. The welfare of their clients has to be better divided, coordinated and overseen. They can't leave them off at MDA (as I witnessed them do in the past) or at Summit. No one actually knows who is determining when they achieve self-sufficiency, one of the major goals of resettlement. For as long as I have worked in this field, this has been a difficult issue for agencies to discuss.
Now they must change.
