Discretionary Social Service Initiatives -30 ORR discretionary funds support initiatives aimed at aiding refugees to achieve self-sufficiency. The principal programs funded are listed below. Key States Initiative. In FY 1987, ORR established the Key States Initiative (KSI) to provide special funds to projects to reduce cash assistance utilization by refugee families in States with high welfare utilization. Implementation of KSI has involved changes in the State systems for refugee services, as well as within the system of service providers and the refugee communities. Over $2.6 million was awarded in FY 1991 to five States pursuing innovative welfare reduction strategies under KSI. Savings from welfare reductions and terminations are now substantially exceeding the KSI grant amounts. Job Links. The purpose of Job Links is to provide supplementary social service funding to qualifying States in which resettlement of refugees is encouraged based on the experience of refugees already in those communities, or where a special initiative is proposed to significantly improve the potential for self-sufficiency. The program seeks to link employable refugees with jobs in communities which have good economic opportunities. All States except those with KSI cooperative agreements or targeted assistance grants are eligible to apply. General program objectives include: - Increased employment and self-sufficiency; Active job development with employers offering job opportunities at Retention of refugees in communities with good job opportunities; Initial resettlement of refugees in communities with histories of effective early employment and self-sufficiency; and Promotion of secondary migration of refugees to these communities from areas of high refugee impact and high welfare utilization. Planned Secondary Resettlement (PSR) Program. The Planned Secondary Resettlement (PSR) program provides an opportunity for unemployed refugees and their families to relocate from areas of high welfare dependency to communities in the U.S. that offer favorable employment prospects. Secondary resettlement assistance and services are provided to refugees who participate in a planned relocation. Eligibility is limited to refugees who have lived in the U.S. for 18 months or more and who have experienced continuing unemployment. -31 Eligible grantees include States and public and private non-profit organizations which have had demonstrated experience in the provision of services to refugees, such as refugee mutual assistance associations (MAAs) and national and local voluntary agencies. As of the end of FY 1991, there were seven PSR grantees, with the Lao, Cambodian, and Hmong communities the most active in recruiting refugees for relocation. The average cost of resettling families through PSR is less than $8,000 per family while average welfare cost savings to the government are estimated at $987 per month per family. At this rate, PSR families, on average, repay the cost to the government in just eight months. Amerasians. A high priority of ORR is to assist in the successful resettlement of Amerasians and family members expected to arrive in the U.S. 15,000 Amerasians and accompanying family members are expected in FY 1992. ORR will extend its participation in a national planning effort for clustering free cases in selected locations. "This planning effort involves coordination with the Department of State, national voluntary agencies, State refugee coordinators, refugee leaders, and various other organizations. ORR will again make funding available in localities with significant Amerasian populations. The purpose of the funding is to encourage community coordination and to provide counseling and case management services to deal with family disruption and social adjustment problems that may occur in the Amerasian community. Former Reeducation Camp Detainees. About 21,000 former Vietnamese reeducation detainees and family members are expected to arrive during FY 1992, with more expected in future years. This population is expected to have a variety of special problems, creating a need for special social services beyond the initial resettlement period. In a special initiative, ORR made one million dollars in discretionary grants available to support local community efforts to enhance the services provided to former reeducation detainees from Vietnam and their families. The grants, to 16 States and counties expecting to receive large numbers of former detainees, are designed to provide enhanced orientation, peer support, peer counseling, referral, employment services and vocational English, short-term vocational training, and mental health services. Although the grants are awarded to States and counties, they are required to contract with refugee mutual assistance associations where possible for the actual delivery of services. -32 III. DOMESTIC IMPACT OF REFUGEES A. DEMOGRAPHIC IMPACT Population Composition The demographic characteristics of refugees to be admitted to the U.S. in FY 1993 are likely to be similar to those of refugees admitted in FY 1991 and FY 1992 while varying somewhat from those of refugees admitted in the 1980s. For example, the higher proportion of refugees from the former Soviet Union in the flow since 1989 has meant more adults and fewer children compared to the 1980s, when refugees from Asia predominated. At the same time, refugee populations will continue to vary in age and sex composition from the resident American population as well as from each other. Indochinese refugees, for example, are younger on average than the resident U.S. population. The median age of the Indochinese arrivals from 1975 through 1991 was between 20 and 21 years. Nearly 40 percent were under age 15, compared to 23 percent of the American population. In this same period, the percentage who were age 65 and over remained roughly constant at less than two percent. About 55 percent of the arriving Vietnamese in recent years were males, in contrast to the general U.S. population in which about 49 percent are males. Because of the large proportion of children among the Indochinese refugees, the ratio of dependents will continue to be higher than in the general U.S. population, although the low proportion of elderly Indochinese is a significant mitigating factor. The young age structure means that a large number of young children from these refugee families will be entering the schools each year for some years to come. Refugees from the former Soviet Union were the largest single nationality group to arrive in FY 1991 and one of the oldest, with a median age of 31. New refugees from Ethiopia and Eastern Europe averaged in their middle twenties in 1991, while those from Afghanistan and Iraq were only 20 on average. Cuban refugees were the oldest, with a median age in FY 1991 of 33. Male refugees outnumber females in most groups, but the former Soviets are an exception, with a slight female majority. Because these nationality groups differ from each other in their background characteristics, any change in the source countries of the refugee flow means a corresponding change in the demographic impact of the refugee population. B. GEOGRAPHIC DISTRIBUTION -33 During FY 1990, 73.1 percent of newly arrived refugees and Amerasians were placed in ten States. Ten leading States received 71.6 percent of the FY 1991 placements (Table III). Four of these ten States (California, Texas, Washington and Georgia) received a higher share of the arrivals in FY 1991 than in FY 1990. The most notable trend is the decline from 19 to 14 percent in the proportion of refugees going to New York coupled with the increasing share going to California. The California proportion fell from 45.6 percent in FY 1988 to 29.1 percent in FY 1989 and to 25.3 percent in FY 1990, before rising slightly to 28.9 percent in FY 1991. Much of this change occurred because the large numbers of Soviet Armenians who arrived in FY 1988 and settled near relatives in the Los Angeles area have been replaced by Jews from the former Soviet Union settling in New York and other cities in the East. Together, California and New York continue to receive more than 40 percent of all newly arriving refugees. Table IV displays the number of refugee arrivals in every State during FY 1991. Generally, refugee communities in areas of current resettlement will continue to grow with admission of additional family reunification cases. As Table V shows, the geographic distribution of the Indochinese refugees is now well established, with nearly 40 percent living in California, and the rest distributed widely. The more than 430,000 refugees who have arrived since FY 1980 from areas outside Southeast Asia have a residential distribution different from the Indochinese. This has tended to diffuse the impact of refugee arrivals upon local communities. Large numbers of these other refugees have been resettled in cities in the Northeast and the Midwest. Table VI shows the placement locations of the non-Indochinese refugees who arrived during the most recent nine fiscal years. California received the largest number, over 87,000, with New York in second place at nearly 77,000 and growing rapidly. The percentages in this table show the wide variations in ethnic composition of States' refugee populations. While 44 percent of the arriving refugees were non-Indochinese, 17 States resettled a refugee population composed of more than 50 percent non-Indochinese; and three States and Guam resettled a population of 90 percent or more Indochinese. Among the States with the largest refugee populations, Florida, Illinois, Michigan, New Jersey, and New York have majorities of non-Indochinese refugees. As the ethnic composition of the arriving refugee population shifts in response to new needs, so will the geographic placement patterns of the new arrivals. In FY 1991, only 34 percent of the arrivals were from the former Soviet Union, compared with 41 percent during FY 1990. Other refugees arrived in about the same proportions as in FY 1990. This means that States that were slated to receive large numbers of refugees from the former Soviet Union saw their FY 1991 arrivals fall below expectations. |