Refugees – The Right Thing to do

1. Refugees – The Right Thing to do Presented: Sept 29/15 Revised: October 10/15 Revised: November 25/15

2. Goal • Sponsor 50 families (250 people) to start • Then do it again as we see we can handle it

3. What needs doing • Government red tape (REMOVED) • Billets for 6-8 weeks • Housing after that • Clothes, furniture, houseware • ESL • Jobs

4. Needed • 6 sponsors per family • Some financial risk • De-risk by sharing the guarantees • Government red tape – actually getting them here

5. Housing • Loans for last month rent • Source housing • Help move

6. Congregation Asks • Billet for 8 weeks • Clothing (lets be specific) • linens • Housing (but not expecting it) • Furniture • Houseware • Driving

7. Congregation Asks • Mentors • Drivers • Moving help • Weekly pot luck rotating

8. Other simple things • ESL • Bus passes (City of Guelph will provide for 6 months) • Government Grants (INAC will do any applications) • Transportation and first few days meals

9. Jobs (Jim Estill) • I have friends • We will loan/microloan anyone with appropriate business experience to start a business

10. Much of this is not charity(Jim Estill) • We may need some $ • I have friends • We can ask congregations

11. What I can do(Jim Estill) • Jobs • Finance • Business start up assistance • Some community/government credibility

12. I need help(Jim Estill) • Getting them in • Orchestrating • Ideally someone takes it over

13. Questions? • How to get the paper work done? • Muslim Society of Guelph (MSOG) took the lead and spoke with Citizenship & Immigration Canada (CIC) and other friends in the community to figure out the steps. • A Community Group like MSOG can sponsor refugees with a sponsorship of Sponsorship Agreement Holder (SAH) • There are 45 SAH in Ontario and MSOG has contacted three of them, Afghan Women Association, World Renew and IFT

14. Answers • A Community Group being formed with MSOG, Salvation Army, Christian Reform Church, LIP, Refugee Forum and Jim Estill • A Community Group can sponsor refugees from Syria and Iraq. • MSOG has decided to work with IFT as their Constituent Group (CG) to handle all paper work. • Community groups will work with Local Immigration Practitioner (LIP) to engage all the interested smaller groups in Guelph to join hands to make this initiative successful • Several meetings and coordination efforts has been made and now we have a very food idea about all the things.

15. Getting them in • Helping with Sponsorship of Family Members or filing applications for requests received from abroad from Syrian Refugees • Select from ProfilesBoth the option will take up to a maximum of 6 months for processing as per our understanding, as the cases are being expedited. • Select from the group being air-lifted.  In this, as there will be a mix of categories, we do expect certain funding. More details are to come.Our Constituent Groups have the choice of selecting any of the above or a mix. 

16. MENTORS • Could be a family from group of five or another family with passions to help others • Could be professionals (Doctors, Business owners, professionals, social workers, community leaders, Imams, leaders, etc.) • Arabic speaking mentors would be preferred • Mentors job to be with the family and help them settled down. No financial commitment is required from mentors.

17. DRIVERS • Each New family has to go through certain steps after their arrival, especially conventional refugees has added steps. Some of those steps included by not limited to; • Pickup from the Airport to Welcome House or Billet family • Meeting with CIC Office in Kitchener • Registration with Immigration Services Guelph • Registration with Community Outreach Group • SIN, OHIP, DRIVER LICENSE, Other IDS • SCHOOL registration for younger kids, Adult Education

18. MOVING HELP • Families will be in need of moving to their houses from their billet families or temp residence • Trucking may be needed • Volunteers needed to setup new house

19. Billets for 6-8 weeks • Families with larger houses or spare bedrooms • Food and other necessities will be provided to keep the expense of host minimum • Drivers needs to take families out for Lunch and dinner at the community centre or drop their food at their billet family house. • Several offers has been made by community members to free up their houses for up to one year • Furniture and all the other necessities will be provided to hosting families if needed

20. Sourcing Houses • Check to see if there are some large houses or multiplex units in the market which some investors could buy and reserve for newly arrived families • Check within the community who has houses with multiple units if they can sale or reserve their houses for these families • Already in discussion with developers, builders, and property management groups to secure apartments in close proximity for refugee families • Any other ideas are welcome..

21. Sister Christine Drop in Centre • Confirm the capacity for serving daily meals • Have Better Beef, Sergeant farm, and other meat suppliers to provide Halal meat for the kitchen so newly arrived families • Contact Grocery Stores to contribute for the cause and make sure all the Halal items are labelled properly. • Contacts has been made with several super stores in the city for their contribution for the cause • Response has been phenominal

22. Volunteers & Donation Coordination • MSOG is compiling a list of volunteers from their congregation plus anyone who is contacted them for volunteering time or in-kind donations. • Refugee Sponsor Forum is also working with MSOG to create a list of volunteers and putting together a database with all the information available for everyone. • A dedicated phone number and email address has been created for volunteers and supporters. • refugeelifeline@msofg.org / 519.265.5352 • An email can be sent using SUBJECT with your area of interest; i.e; In-kind donation, volunteer, driver, mentor, etc

23. Government AssistanceLlyod Longfield, MP Guelph Area • Llyod has been brought up to speed with the efforts by local community. • He will be speaking at the parliament about that • He is hoping to get some fondling in place for coordination and volunteers efforts • He has already allocated 20 hours a week from his budget towards coordination position/efforts.

24. Next Steps – CoordinationHours on Furniture Drop off • A warehouse on Whitelaw road has been secured • Many requests has came for volunteering which we could use some of those to staff the furniture.  • Additional FOB are provided to Danby for convenience, Furniture can be dropped off during Danby office hours. • All congregation groups could appoint certain volunteers to staff the in-kind donation at warehouse

25. Next Steps – CoordinationMentor Program •  Need to set up a mentor the mentor program with reporting.  Equip the mentors with what they need to know and a person they can go to.  We need an organizational structure. • Ideally there should be 50+50 (or is it 50 plus 5 backups)? Or should we allow 1 mentor to do 3-4 families? • Financial, health, psychological, housing, job monitoring. We need a scorecard for each family. • Banking set up, health card, drivers licence, registering for child credit, getting children in schools, daycare, get library cards, show them how to use the computers there etc.

26. Next Steps – CoordinationMentor Program • Bus passes and how to use them.  Even ride the bus with them. • ESL - we need to grade and have remedial plans. • Jobs/education - Need resumes and try to figure out who we can place where. Accountant • We need to monitor financial health.  In-Kind must be measured & tracked.  And there is some real $ being spent (EG - paying utilities on the Salvation Army extra space)

27. Next Steps – CoordinationList of Volunteers • MSOG is preparing a list of volunteers with their availability and tasks they can performs. Currently list if divided in following areas • Drivers, Mentors, Staff for warehouse, Furniture Movers, Other volunteers. • All the other congregation has been asked to do the same • We have several emails to volunteer, we can place them in one of the above area • Volunteer care is critical as we don’t want to burn our main resource out.

28. Next Steps – CoordinationESL Timing and Space • Ideally ESL should be made available for the refugee families during the day, some evening and some weekend. • In touch with Sheila Nicholas, Manager ESL and LINC programs at St. George’s Centre for ESL • There are morning, afternoon, and Saturday classes • They are willing to start mobile and even Sunday classes • Capacity is not an issue.

29. Next Steps – CoordinationJob Placement and/or Skills training • Multiple offers of jobs have been extended • Once we know who we have to place, Will make specific calls.  • Need to catalogue them.  • Perhaps work with 2nd Chance or Lutherwood? (same issue of capacity and slowness will hammer us as they will give 2-3 months later appointments) • Or best to do our own? Indeed

30. Next Steps – CoordinationHousing catalogue • Multiple offers of housing has came. • Should built a catalogue by distance (address), capacity, availability and compensation. • May need to issue receipt for in-kind donation as a rent

31. Next Steps – CoordinationPress management • The Mercury will do weekly stories if we have news.  This is an opportunity to thank our sponsors and ask for things.  So when someone does something good, we can point that out.  Cannot be a list of names but we could say "Holiday Inn has agreed to ..."  Companies want good press so lets give them some. • A committee is being formed by MSOG and other sponsorship groups along with Llyod Longfield to issue press releases to overcome any negative response

32. Next Steps – CoordinationDiscuss "pooling" of some donation • There are offers of free apartments for a year.  • We should charge the people we put in there and apply it to reducing rents of others?  EG - ask for $800/month donation and then apply that across the other houses we rent at full price to reduce rent from $1200 to $1100 etc.  • Needs discussion.  Same even with the car donation?  

33. Next Steps – CoordinationHealthcare Professional Catalogue • A chiropractor and a dentist willing to do work for free.  • Two Medical Group of doctors has extended their help • Two Dental offices has extended their help • Several Pharmacists and other healthcare professionals has extended their support. • Need to catalogue them and make plan for mobile clinic as Doctor’s office are over booked. • We are already experiencing problem with agencies doctors who take only 40 new patients per year 

34. Next Steps – CoordinationEvents Planning • Weekly potluck to introduce and integrate the new families in the community • Need good planning and coordination • Number of people attending • Who is catering or supplying food • Where we are holding events • How are we compensating those who supplying space • Any other idea….?

35. Next Steps – CoordinationDaily Food/Meal Distribution • Need to coordination committee for drivers to deliver / pickup food for the families or drive the families to food.

36. Next Steps – CoordinationBig Donations • A donation of 500+  beds, bedside tables, desks, some chairs and all towels and sheets being delivered • Need to catalogue by sizes so it can be delivered to the families or houses in timely fashion. • We can offer to furnish the apartments for those who are willing to give us their apartments on a subsidized rates. Thoughts?