Refugees, Immigration, and Sanctuary Working Group Annual Reports
The text of recently received Annual Reports are below, with the most recently received at the top and older reports below. To jump to a particular report, simply click the year listed below.
| 2017 Report | 2018 Report | 2019 Report | 2020 Report | 2021 Report |
2021 Refugees, Immigration, and Sanctuary Working Group Annual Report
No report received.
2020 Refugees, Immigration, and Sanctuary Working Group Annual Report
No report received.
2019 Refugees, Immigration, and Sanctuary Working Group Annual Report
The Working Group operates by sharing information as to various Monthly Meetings’ local efforts to assist refugees and immigrants. The following notes are from the Working Group’s most recent meeting at BYM’s April 2019 Networking Day workshop, facilitated by Lauren Brownlee:
1.) We learned about Midlothian Friends’ Meetings Welcome All Statement as well as their work with the Virginia Interfaith Center for Public Policy. They have been raising money through private donations to help people get from their area to immigration court in northern Virginia. They have found that What’s App and Google Translate can empower people who are less than fluent in communication.
2.) Patapsco Friends Meeting’s partnerships with both CASA de Maryland and Catholic Charities’ Immigration Legal Center
3.) Alexandria Friends Meeting is engaged in interfaith immigration support in Fairfax
4.) Stony Run has supported a Syrian family that started a catering company. The Meeting raised the money to send the children in the family to Catholic school.
Queries: How can we best collaborate? Transportation support/coordination between different parts of Virginia would be helpful
Queries: How do we build effective networks to support the work already being done? How do we most effectively build reciprocal relationships with effective communities? How do we provide opportunities for storytelling about the immigrant experience?
Query: How can the working group be most useful?
Find foundations with which Quakers can partner on this work, particularly to get funding. Provide information about local, state and national policies that BYM should support. Maintain a strong web presence.
Working Group on Racism is a good model
Support networking - provide resources, such as tracking what meetings and other organizations are doing what is doing what in which areas of BYM.
Friends Meeting of Washington (FMW) Highlights
We hosted a Detention Visitation Orientation on two different nights with about 30 persons total attending.
There is a core group of FMW persons continuing to visit the Howard County Detention Center normally on Thursday evenings. Some persons are also actively engaged with the Pen Pal program with Howard County Detainees. Others visited the mother of a detainee for the purpose of requesting that some of the detainee’s art work be borrowed to be viewed for a public display.
Several persons from the Meeting have organized an orientation session program for June 29th for members and attenders of Midlothian and nearby Meetings for the purpose of preparing them to visit the Farmville, VA detention center on a regular basis
Sandy Spring Meeting’s Peace Committee hosted an orientation for the Detention Network on February 10, 2019. About 40 people from diverse faith communities attended. We continue to visit at the Howard County Detention Center regularly.
Two Syrian families continue to receive support, tutoring and transportation. They have gotten their “green cards” and both have moved to better housing. We await court dates for several other asylum seekers.
We celebrated World Refugee Day at little early this year. On Friday, June 7th, we hosted an event called “Many Origins, One Home”. Working with a group of local teens to organize the event was a good experience for all. In addition to speakers from International Rescue Committee, CASA de Maryland and Lutheran Social Services, there was a panel of teens speaking from their experience as immigrants. People left with a myriad of opportunities for volunteering and making a difference.
2018 Annual Report
No report received.
2017 Annual Report
No report received.
