Utah, refugees facing challenge of diversity

0 Comments | Deseret News (Salt Lake City), Apr 13, 2003 | by Diane UrbaniDeseret News staff writer

Worlds keep colliding to form a city within Salt Lake City: More than 30,000 refugees from across the globe have come to live in the Salt Lake metropolitan area, and Utah refugee coordinator Norman Nakamura estimates about a thousand more are resettled here each year.

"Refugees can be found in virtually every county in Utah," he said. Yet as public funding for refugee services dwindles, the state's native-born residents will be called on to find ways to live peacefully with the multicultural wave of newcomers. That was the mission of "Partnerships for New Americans," the refugee conference sponsored by the Salt Lake City Mayor's Office and other Utah agencies. Nearly 250 teachers, social workers, community volunteers, police and mental-health professionals gathered Friday and Saturday at the Marriott University Park Hotel to grapple with the effects refugees have on Utah society at large.

People from Congo, Sudan, Somalia, Bosnia and Croatia, for example, finally arrive at the Salt Lake City International Airport after waiting for years in refugee camps -- and most have experienced war trauma. Many have seen family members killed, been tortured themselves and have been forced to move from place to place, with no access to schooling.

Yet "first and foremost, the refugee's responsibility is to get employed and become self-sufficient," said Nakamura. "We expect them to get a job and support their families, even if they have little or no English skills."

Thousands of newcomers to Utah have done exactly that, evidenced by the panel of refugees who spoke during the conference. "Refugees have a very strong work ethic," said Phay Pahn, a native of Cambodia who now works for the state Department of Workforce Services. "Their goal is not for themselves: It is to educate their children."

"My mom had no one to talk to," added Ahmed Samatar, a Somali refugee who arrived in Utah in 1994. Yet "she taught us the things we needed to learn."

Even as Samatar adapted to life in America, learning the laws, the health-care system and how to get through high school, he said, his parents reminded him to look out for other Somalis. Samatar established a Somali youth leadership training program and is now in his third year of study at the University of Utah.

Another panel, this one of police officers, acknowledged some of the problems that have come with the arrival of refugees in Utah's schools and neighborhoods. Highland High School resource officer Scott Peck talked about the clash, "at a school located in a country club area, (where) mainly white, LDS students (faced) a thousand students of color," when Highland became a magnet school for English- as-a-second-language pupils.

"We expect them all to get along," despite their parents' antipathies toward one another. Refugees who belong to differing religious and political groups are expected to immediately "enjoy each other's company," as Peck put it.

Along with workers from the National Conference of Communities and Justice's Salt Lake office, Peck has begun to make peace at Highland. "The youth are empowered to make change," he said, while "adults can be really set in our ways."

People from places such as Sudan are often terrified of the police, so they try to elude them, added Phoenix Police Lt. Warren Taylor, another panelist. "When the Sudanese are pulled over, they think they're dead. That's it," he said. And when neighbors were harassing them or others preyed on refugees by selling them non- functional kitchen appliances and cars, "they never called the police." Taylor and his police department then organized dozens of workshops, "so we could get to know the refugees. And we brought the youth together, to discuss their problems."

While refugees, especially the dark-skinned people from Somalia, Congo and Sudan, are more visible in a community -- especially when police are called to tone down a late-night party -- they don't constitute a significant portion of Salt Lake's crime landscape, added west-side detective Mike Hamideh. "They want to assimilate," he said. If neighbors hold meetings including newcomers, community peace becomes far more likely.

"Establishing a social network," a group of friends, "is probably the most important healing mechanism" for a newcomer, said Cynthia Willard, a Salt Lake doctor who recently began the Utah Human Rights Project. During her session at the refugee conference, she gave some startling figures: Up to 80 percent of Bosnian refugees suffer from post-traumatic stress disorder; nearly three-fourths of all refugees have experienced war trauma.

Befriending such a person doesn't mean he or she will want to talk about what happened -- but if you do offer to listen, "you may hear stories that are absolutely shocking and horrific," Willard said. Just listen, she advised. "Any consistent, respectful relationship is therapeutic," and whatever you do, "you cannot express disbelief." Offer to help with basic things like learning more English, learning to navigate public transportation, grocery stores, medical care and the search for better housing.