Katia Iverson and Abdirahman Abdullahi have 90 days together.
For Katia, the case manager, that’s the time she gets to usher newly arrived refugees into life in Minnesota. For Abdi, a father of five who landed here this spring, those days whirl by after years in the languid limbo of an Ethiopian refugee camp.
“What if we’re not ready in three months?” Abdi asks Katia. “Will you just leave us alone?”
Most days, that debate is muffled background noise for Katia at the Minnesota Council of Churches, one of five private resettlement agencies that contract with the federal government. She measures her job in those 90-day increments — time she gets to give Abdi the lay of his north Minneapolis neighborhood and an American grocery store, sign the family up for public benefits, enroll his children in school, connect him with a job counselor and later pull back and give him a taste of fending for himself. http://www.startribune.com/years-with-no-nation-90-days-to-become-a-minnesotan/391310421/
So, they come right off the bus, plane or train and they already getting government benefits without doing an ounce of work.
I don't if you come from Serbia, Ethiopia or China, if you are not ready to work or subsidize yourself the minute you get to your new hometown in the U.S., then just stay home.
These families have not contributed 1 penny in tax money but they get thousands in benefits.
And then they may take jobs from Americans already here.
How fair is this?
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