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A new start

Refugees finding support to help them succeed in Mid-Missouri

By Joe Gamm [email protected]

The first Afghan refugees to resettle in Jefferson City arrived a month ago.

In total, 16 individuals, mostly spread among two brothers’ families, have found new homes in the Capital City, said Dan Lester, executive director of the local chapter of Catholic Charities. At least one more family is expected to settle in Jefferson City by the end of January.

Meanwhile, the first arrivals are getting used to their new home.

They’ve been polishing up their English language skills and are preparing for their next steps.

“This is a transitional period, where they’re starting to look for employment, and they’re starting to learn to navigate the grocery store,” Lester said. “(Jobs and schools) are the next level. That’s what we’re sort of transitioning into right now.”

As U.S. airplanes left Afghanistan this summer at the end of a 20-year war, the Taliban overran the country. The Biden administration said it expected to settle about 125,000 Afghans in the United States.

Thousands arrived in August and found temporary shelter in U.S. military bases. Central Missouri cities are among the 200 communities across the nation that are supporting the newcomers.

Catholic Charities of Central and Northeast Missouri is bringing in more than 270 refugees in a 12-week period, Lester said, to settle within a number of communities the nonprofit serves. The nonprofit’s previous 12-month high for refugee intake had been 229, in 2016.

“Our focus has just been on, ‘Do they have a safe, sanitary home? Do they have some culturally appropriate foods? Do they have enough warm clothes to see them through this Missouri winter? Do they have some beds to sleep on?’” Lester said.

Catholic Charities has helped refugees from around the world integrate into Missouri for the past 40 years, Lester said. Many of the 4,000 refugees the organization placed over the decades have found homes in the Columbia area. It has placed them in other communities as well, such as Sedalia. The Rotary Club of Fulton was the first Central Missouri sponsor to prepare for an entire Afghan family and helped settle in a family of 13 late last fall.

There is potential to find homes for refugees anywhere in the nonprofit’s 38-county area — which is the same as that of the Diocese of Jefferson City.

The nonprofit’s Refugees Services Team, based in Columbia, incorporates case managers who work daily with folks when they arrive, helping them navigate their new homes. The team includes an employment specialist, who works directly with local employers to make sure staff can find good, stable employment for the community’s new arrivals.

When refugees arrive, their new homes’ cupboards and refrigerators are stocked. Catholic Charities provides families with dry rices, beans and lentils. Canned tomatoes, canned unseasoned beans, sugar, 5-pound bags of flour and honey. Caramel candies are requested. Homes are stocked with dry yeast for baking, and spices — turmeric, paprika, curry powder, ground cumin, ground cloves, black pepper and salt.

“A lot of families bake their own bread,” Lester said. “We can hardly keep them in enough flour. What we’ve found so far is that they’re not big fans of our processed breads that we have here. They would so much rather be baking their own.

“It’s so much a part of their culture.”

The foods are culturally things refugees are really comfortable with and used to, he added.

Don’t forget tea.

Black or green.

“Anytime you go to any of their houses to have a visit, even to just drop something off, they say, ‘Come in, come in, come in,’” Lester said. “‘Have some tea, have some tea, have some tea.’”

Contact Catholic Charities at 573635-7719 to find out how you can donate specific food items. Those that aren’t distributed to refugees may be offered during the nonprofit’s upcoming food pantries.

You may also visit the organizations website at cccnmo.diojeffcity.org to find ways to contribute.

As the newcomers arrive, they also need household items. A full list may be found on the Catholic Charities website. Some commonly needed items are table utensils, dishes, pots, pans, mixing bowls, cooking utensils (spatulas, spoons, knives, can openers, vegetable peelers, etc.), towels, bedding, loose leaf paper, notebooks, pens, paper towels, dish soap, cleaners, laundry detergent and trash bags.

Agencies welcoming the refugees don’t want refugees to be reliant on them forever, Lester said.

However, another big food item shortage that agencies have struggled to resolve is where to find Halal meats — a staple of Muslim diets.

The meats are processed in ways that are consistent with Muslim beliefs.

Halal has to do with who is there performing the slaughter of the animal and who is doing the prayers over it. Halal means permissible in Arabic. The Islamic form of slaughtering animals requires the animals are alive and healthy at the time of slaughter. (Certain animals, such as pigs, are forbidden.) Halal animals must be killed in a certain way (stunning is not allowed). The specially trained person performing the slaughter must drain all the blood from the carcass. A Muslim recites certain prayers during the process.

There has been this large influx of people from Afghanistan into Missouri, and Halal is just another shortage of products affecting the community. Some of the newcomers have backgrounds in preparing Halal, Lester said. So, Catholic Charities and others are trying to connect Afghan butchers with local farmers.

“We’re working to figure out some local means of making that happen for us,” Lester said.

Agencies bringing refugees into the Jefferson City community have focused on meeting basic needs. Catholic Charities anticipated challenges finding housing for families because of the tight housing market, but was fortunate to have a number of people and organizations offer use of single-family homes.

For instance, Lester said, a family at

First United Methodist Church bought a second home. They lived in one while work was being done on the other.

The charity’s “long-established relationships” with landlords and community partners has helped it to find potential homes for all the newcomers, he said.

“We also recognize that we get some support to help pay for that housing for a certain amount of time. That helps as well,” he said. “Knock on wood, we haven’t had as much of a crunch as we thought we would have finding initial housing for our refugees.”

The nonprofit is through the peak of bringing about 300 refugees into local communities, he said. Now, its workforce development team is kicking in. The team is assessing refugees’ skills, finding opportunities within the community and setting up interviews.

“When they found out we had this need, they said they would love to have these new Afghan neighbors live in their home. They made the home available to us,” Lester said.

First United Methodist did much more.

It essentially sponsored one of the families coming to Jefferson City, the Rev. Steve Buchholz said.

Buchholz and his wife, Becky, like the rest of us watched as U.S. troops pulled out of Afghanistan.

“These families really helped America. We felt compelled to be able to participate in their resettlement,” Buchholz said.

Becky Buchholz and David Moen, co-community sponsors, took a sevenhour course through Catholic Charities to prepare teams from First United Methodist Church and other area faith organizations to assist in refugee integration.

It took a lot of cooperation between organizations from the very beginning to get other churches onboard,” Steve Buchholz said. “We realized it was too big for our church.”

Volunteers used the First United Methodist Church van to pick up the first family to arrive at the airport, a family of 11. The volunteers delivered them directly to their new home.

They’d been living in camps and military bases since the evacuation, Steve Buchholz said.

“We continue to be inspired by the rewards of helping these people,” he said. “It’s a terrible culture shock for them. They don’t speak the language, but they are beginning to learn how.”

Communication is among the next steps Catholic Charities is focused on.

The nonprofit is now looking at refugees’ English skills and willingness of employers to use translation services.

“It’s a little too early to say we’ve got everybody placed in jobs and employment is happening,” Lester said. “But it’s going to start happening over the next few weeks.”

The nonprofit will also begin getting children started in schools within the next few weeks.

Afghans can now start making some connections in their new communities. The Islamic Center in Jefferson City held a dinner for the families after they arrived.

“It was wonderful. The Muslim community here in Jefferson City is fairly small and fairly tight-knit,” Lester said. “They were so excited to have these families here.”

Folks from several Christian denominations attended the dinner.

They got to hear the refugees’ stories. “They were so grateful they’re here,” he said. “They want to make the best of what their new reality is.

“They want to work. The kids want to go to school. They want to do sports. They want to be engaged.”

They’re going to be successful, he said.

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