Extensions of Remarks

12988 EXTENSIONS OF REMARKS June 8, 1982 EXTENSIONS OF REMARKS FEDERAL AID REDUCTIONS The exodus of refugees from the North the $225 monthly rent on the tiny apart SPUR REFUGEES TO FLEE PA west has particularly upset officials in ment they share is due. CIFIC NORTHWEST Michigan, where the unemployment rate is They sat in an upstairs room of the Seat 17 percent but where relatively generous tle YMCA and watched as an instructor welfare benefits cannot legally be denied to with the private nonprofit International HON. LES AuCOIN refugees who decide to resettle there. Rescue Committee showed them how to OF OREGON Paula Stark, Michigan's coordinator of write a thank-you note after a job interview, IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES refugees, said her office had reports of refu "If hired, I will learn fast, come to work on gees arriving from Washington and Wiscon time, and become a loyal employee," the Tuesday, June 8, 1982 sin, She said "we are very fearful" of the same note on the blackboard said. • Mr. AuCOIN. Mr. Speaker, I, and possibility of a major influx. "Every day we walk around Seattle look many of my colleagues in the House, Greg Hope, a job developer for the Inter ing for a job, but there is none," Vilaysack national Rescue Committee here, said he said. The committee has advised refugees are continually concerned with the was stunned when a refugee friend first re plight of refugees. Thousands of Indo that their landlords must give them proper vealed his moving plans: notice before eviction, hoping to delay fur chinese .refugees come to our country "I'm going to Meechigin," he quoted the ther housing problems as long as possible. with hopes of finding good living con man as saying. When the two young men run out of money ditions, something they don't have in "Mexico?" Hope said. or food stamps,"we'll go to some Laos family their own country. Instead, they find "No," the man repeated, "Meechigin." Hope said he and the rescue committee's we know and eat with them, Vilaysack said." high unemployment rates and a Fed Laotian interpreter Maeseng Saechao "have Relief officials said young, single refugees eral Government which made a deci been to refugee houses where they are load like them may be able to find jobs soon. But sion to allow them into this country ing up the cars." He said they pleaded with Veunho Saelee, the 40-year-old refugee with but which recently cut back drastically the refugees "not to go to Michigan. If you a wife and two sons, faces a more difficult on refugee assistance. have to go anywhere, go where there is em dilemma. He also has thought of leaving Se This morning, the Washington Post ployment." The largest recorded migration attle. "I know people in our building who to date has involved 1,500 members of the have moved to Michigan," he said, "but I carried an article describing the criti have no money to move." cal situation refugees face in the Pa Laotian Hmong minority who have moved from Oregon to California since December. His final government welfare check for cific Northwest. I call this to the at Amelia Torres, of Catholic Charities Inc. in $531 arrived last month, and his family has tention of all Members of Congress so Fresno, Calif., said hundreds of Hmong have nothing but $50 worth of food stamps. The they may better understand the press descended on the Central Valley city. "It is refugees will still be entitled to food stamps, ing need for refugee aid. going to make a severe impact on our wel but rent and health care is another matter. Saelee's tiny one-bedroom apartment is part [From the Washington Post, June 8, 19821 fare system," she said. Kuxeng Yongchu, president of the Hmong of a 45-unit building in a run-down section FEDERAL Arn REDUCTIONS SPUR REFUGEES TO Family Association of Oregon Inc., said he of Seattle's Capitol Hill. The 12-by-8-foot FLEE PACIFIC NORTHWEST expects the migration to California <as well living room has an old couch, a small table, <By Jay Mathews) as to Texas where many clan members have two kitchen chairs and a telephone. Posters SEATTLE.-Indochinese refugees who fled found electronics industry jobs) will contin of Kung Fu superstar Bruce Lee and a pho to the state of Washington two to three ue. "The job situation in California is about tograph of a water buffalo in Puerto Rico years ago are fleeing once again, from eco as bad as it is in Oregon, but in California decorate the walls. Mattresses fill the 10-by- nomically depressed Seattle to economically there is a market for truck farming Ca favor 10-foot bedroom. One is screened off with devastated Michigan and California, which ite Hmong pursuit> and the welfare is better cardboard so Saelee's 18-year-old niece can has more refugees than any other state. than in Oregon," Yongchu said. have some privacy. His 14-year-old son has The welfare benefits are higher. In March, 587,149 refugees from the com one tiny mattress. Saelee and his wife Kex Officials in Washington and Oregon, with munist takeover of Vietnam, Cambodia and iang, 38, share the largest mattress with few available jobs and little local money for Laos lived in the United States, and 309,000 their 10-year-old son. welfare, say as many as 2,000 refugees have of them were receiving rent, food and medi The $225 monthly rent is due now. Sae joined the exodus. cal support from the federal government, lee's only hope is a stopgap state program " If I had known it was so bad, I would not according to Oliver Cromwell of the federal that may pay him about half of his usual have come to this country," said Veunho office of refugee resettlement in Washing benefits for the next two months. After Saelee, a 40-year-old refugee from Laos who ton, D.C. The decision to help ease the fed that, no more welfare will be available to has no job here and no money for rent for eral budget deficit by reducing the promised him in Washington. Mike Auyong, Saelee's his family of four. " I would have just died in three years of support to 18 months forced landlord, said many of the tenants, almost Laos." 70,000 of those refugees out of the program. all of them refugees, have been unable to The sudden migration follows the federal Benefits to Cuban and Haitian entrants into pay the rent recently. Auyong said he does government's decision to cut off benefits to the country also were cut. not plan immediate evictions, "but we only refugees who have been in the country When Indochinese refugees began to come have about a month" before his own debts longer than 18 months-despite an initial to ·this country in 1975, Washington state are so great he will have to take some promise of 36 months of benefits when they attracted an unusually high portion because action. arrived. In Washington and Oregon, where of its large Asian community and because Saelee crouched on a tiny stool in the the unemployment rates exceed 12 percent, state and Seattle officials were particularly corner of his living room and smoked ciga the cutoff has exacerbated a desperate situ receptive. In March, Washington had 27 ,285 rette after cigarette as he described his ation of each refugee "competing with 50 Indochinese refugees, third highest in the fruitless search for work. "I go looking for unemployed Oregonians for work" said Pa country after California's 197,131 and work every day," he said through an inter tricia Rumer, Portland's refugee coordina Texas' 53,368. preter. " In the last week I applied to 16 tor. But the cut in federal aid left 10,750 of places, but none of them called me back." Rumer said refugee aid officials in Oregon Washington's refugees (39 percent) without Before leaving Laos in 1976, he was a initiated special training for counselors in funds, much higher than the national farmer, and at the refugee camp in Thai suicide prevention after news of the cut cutoff rate. In Oregon, 5,500 or 32 percent land he ran a little roadside drink stand. backs late last year caused a wave of distress of its 17 ,068 refugees were cut off. But he has never been able to read or write in the refugee community. Seattle officials Keo Vilaysack, 26, and Keopraseuth his own language and English is completely report marked increase in reports of wife Aikham, 20, two friendly but somewhat be beyond him, despite what he said were 540 beating and heightened racial tension as wildered Mien nationality refugees from hours of classes in the two years he has hundreds of refugees have suddently ap Laos, were getting $288 each a month under been here. " If I studied until my hair peared at long-established food banks for the federal program when it ran out last turned brown, I still could not understand," the poor. Tuesday. They have $35 between them, and he said. e This "bullet" symbol identifies statements or insertions which are not spoken by the Member on the floor. June 8, 1982 EXTENSIONS OF REMARKS 12989 "It is not that I am lazy. I am eager to CFrom the York News-Times, May 26, 19821 allow this system to collapse in shambles work, but when I go out for a job they say I SYSTEM NEEDS REFORM through those who aren't politically strong cannot speak English and I cannot work for America's Social Security system is in enough to stave off the special interest them," he said.

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