Synthesis of Findings From Three Sites
Acknowledgments
This evaluation would not have been possible without the contributions from a wide range of administrators and staff.
This report synthesizes findings from three separate site reports: the Houston report, authored by Randy Capps of the Urban Institute, the Miami report authored by Nancy Pindus of the Urban Institute, and the Sacramento report authored by Sam Elkin of the Lewin Group.
At the Office of Refugee Resettlement (ORR), Pamela Green-Smith and Susan Kyle oversaw the evaluation and provided valuable guidance throughout the project. We thank Martha Newton, Nguyen Van Hanh, Josh Trent, and Ken Tota for their input. We also thank those from the Office of the Director, Division of Budget, Policy, and Data Analysis, Division of Community Resettlement, and Division of Refugee Assistance who reviewed drafts of the report and provided their expert comments. We are indebted to Gayle Smith, who provided us with refugee data and helped us understand some of the more complex aspects of the rules and regulations regarding refugees.
From the DHHS Office of Policy, Research, and Evaluation (OPRE), Emily Ball and Moushumi Beltangady (now at ORR) participated in numerous conference calls and meetings and provided us with suggestions for improving the project. We fondly remember Richard Jakopic, who passed away last year. We benefited greatly from the advice and input he gave us on this study as well as other projects on which we worked with him.
Special thanks go to the three states that agreed to participate in the evaluation. State and local staff provided us with administrative data, patiently and candidly discussed their experiences with refugees and the Refugee Social Service and Targeted Assistance programs, and helped arrange interviews with refugee participants and employers. In particular, we thank Thuan Nguyen and Roy Kim in California, Jane Criswell and George Lewis in Florida, and Caitriona Lyons and the Texas Consortia of Refugee Providers in Texas, and all of their staff who contributed to our study, as well as the directors and staff of the service providers and community organizations with whom we met during our site visits.
A number of individuals were instrumental in providing the data analyzed in our study, including Eloween Ivey, Todd Snell, Alex Granchukoff, Walter Lott, Kelly Newell, and Lisa Vang in California; Pat Brown, Nancy Faircloth, John Herndon, and Nagesh Tirumalasetty in Florida; and Joel McCorquodale, Margo Kaiser, Robert Patterson, Ross McDonald, Del De Los Santos, and Belai Andarge in Texas.
Experts in the field who were consulted and who reviewed the survey instrument or drafts of the reports include Raqiya Abdalla, Jane Bloom, Diana Bui, Tom Hart, Becky Jordan, Max Niedzwiecki, Charles Shipman, Ed Silverman, Alex Stepick, and Anne Wilson. Their input was invaluable; however, the opinions in these reports are the authors’ own and do not necessarily reflect the preferences of the reviewers.
Thanks also go to other team members who played instrumental roles throughout the study. These include Mike Fishman of Lewin, who guided the study; Michael Fix of Migration Policy Institute and Doua Thor of Southeast Asian Resource Action Center, who served as senior advisors; Burt Barnow of Johns Hopkins University who oversaw the statistical data analysis; Demetra Nightingale of Johns Hopkins University, who provided helpful suggestions throughout the study and drafted a report on ways to evaluate these programs in the future; and David Herda and Lauren Doerr of National Opinion Research Center (NORC) who oversaw the refugee assistance survey. Other key staff who contributed to this study include Deborah Mullins and Everett Henderson of the Urban Institute, who participated in some of the site visits; Rachel Wright, Asaph Glosser, and Kara Gillis of Lewin who reviewed several drafts of the report and provided other assistance; Fiona Blackshaw of the Urban Institute, who edited the reports; and Julia Graffam who assisted with the report’s production.
Finally, we sincerely thank all the refugees who agreed to participate in the survey and focus groups. Their willingness to spend time with us and share their information and experiences made this report possible.
Acronyms
- Administration for Children and Families (ACF)
- Bureau of Population, Refugees and Migration (PRM)
- Cuban Haitian Entrant Program (CHEP)
- Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS)
- Department of Homeland Security (DHS)
- Department of Human Assistance (DHA)
- Department of State (DOS)
- Employment Authorization Document (EAD)
- English as a Second Language (ESL)
- English for Speakers of Other Languages (ESOL)
- Executive Office for Immigration Review (EOIR)
- Immigration and Nationality Act (INA)
- Legal Permanent Resident (LPR)
- Mutual Assistance Association (MAA)
- Office of Refugee Resettlement (ORR)
- Public/Private Partnership (PPP)
- Reception and Placement Services (R&P)
- Refugee Arrival Data System (RADS)
- Refugee Cash Assistance (RCA)
- Refugee Medical Assistance (RMA)
- Refugee Social Services (RSS)
- Southeast Asia Resource Action Center (SEARAC)
- Social Security Administration (SSA)
- Supplemental Security Income (SSI)
- Targeted Assistance Formula Grant (TAG)
- Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF)
- Unemployment Insurance (UI) wage records
- United Nations High Commission on Refugees (UNHCR)
- U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS)
- Workforce Investment Act (WIA)
- Voluntary Agency (Volag)
Executive Summary
The Refugee Social Service (RSS) and Targeted Assistance Formula Grant (TAG) programs provide services to refugees and members of certain other eligible groups with the objective of helping them achieve economic self-sufficiency soon after entering the country. The Office of Refugee Resettlement (ORR) within the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS) administers these programs and sponsored the evaluation to assess how program services are delivered and how refugees who receive these services fare over time. The Lewin Group and its partners, the Urban Institute, Johns Hopkins University, National Opinion Research Center (NORC), and Southeast Asia Resource Action Center (SEARAC), conducted this evaluation focusing on three sites: Houston, Texas; Miami, Florida; and Sacramento, California.
The report summarizes findings from two components of the evaluation: an implementation study examining how RSS and TAG programs operate in different settings and an outcome study examining refugees’ receipt of services and employment and public benefit outcomes over time. This report synthesizes findings from three separate site reports that provide more detailed information on program implementation and outcomes. Another component of the study—the continuous evaluation design study—examines potential steps that can be taken to support continued program improvements in the future. The continuous evaluation recommendations are contained in a separate report to ORR.
A. Findings in Brief
This report focuses on refugees who entered the country between the years 2000 and 2004, were between the ages of 18 and 55 at entry, and who received RSS or TAG services at some point in one of the three study sites. It relies on administrative data and a client survey conducted between September 2006 and March 2007. The report’s key findings include the following:
- The refugee programs operate under diverse circumstances and adapt their processes to serve the groups of refugees they resettle. Refugees come to the United States under very different circumstances and with a wide range of education and work skills. Some communities, such as Houston, resettle a continually changing population, requiring the service agency to be adept at understanding newly arriving refugees’ cultural experiences and helping them attain self-sufficiency within a short period of time. Other communities resettle a population that varies less over time and can rely on family and community support to assist with service delivery.
- To provide services to refugees, the communities rely on a cohesive group of experienced service providers and community support. All three sites have a long history of resettling refugees and have developed intricate networks of providers that meet regularly and discuss how best to serve the refugees. Many staff members providing services came to this country as refugees themselves.
- The welfare context matters. Refugees in Houston and Miami, two communities in states that provide low TANF and other welfare benefits relative to benefits provided in other states, cannot subsist on public assistance. The TANF programs in these two states also have a strong work-first emphasis. The TANF program in Sacramento, on the other hand, provides comparatively high TANF benefits; provides more government assistance in the form of child care, Medicaid, and disability assistance; and is flexible in allowing TANF recipients to pursue education activities, including English as a Second Language (ESL), to fulfill their work requirements. Perhaps as a result, Houston and Miami have higher employment rates than in Sacramento, especially in the first year after entry. However, Sacramento refugees have higher incomes overall owing both to higher average public assistance and earnings.
- The vast majority of refugees who receive RSS and TAG services are able to find employment. At the time the survey was conducted, from 70 to 86 percent of refugees reported being employed, depending on the site. Virtually all refugees in Houston and Miami (96 and 97 percent, respectively) and 84 percent of refugees in Sacramento had had a job at some point since they had entered the country. This is especially noteworthy given the lack of education and work experience among some groups, especially those resettled in Houston. Overall, family income was modest for all three sites (from $21,000 to $25,000 a year).
- Different philosophies exist regarding the emphasis of ESL instruction versus rapid employment. Sacramento encourages its refugees to learn English and gain an adequate command of the English language before moving into the workplace.1 In contrast, Houston and Miami emphasize rapid employment as a way to self-sufficiency. In these two sites, ESL instruction is available in the community, but refugees need to find a way to take these classes during times when they are not working. In all sites, non-English-speaking refugees have been able to find employment; to advance in the workplace, however, they need to learn English.
- Refugees’ wages increase over time. Among those working, refugees experienced increases in their hourly wages (from an average of 9 to 14 percent a year) and overall quarterly earnings (from an average of 5 to 25 percent a year), depending upon the site. The largest gains were in Sacramento.
B. Background
A refugee, as defined by the Immigration and Nationality Act, is a person who is outside his or her country of nationality or country of last habitual residence and in his or her own country faces “persecution or a well-founded fear of persecution on account of race, religion, nationality, membership in a particular social group, or political opinion.” A number of other related groups are eligible for and receive the same services that refugees receive, including those funded through RSS and TAG. These include asylees, Cuban/Haitian entrants, Amerasians, and victims of a severe form of trafficking. For ease of reference, this report generally uses the term “refugees” to refer to all such groups that qualify for RSS- and TAG-funded services.
Refugees are provided a myriad of benefits and services to help them successfully transition to life in the United States. These can include reception and placement (R&P) services during their first 30 days in the country, cash and medical assistance, RSS and TAG services, and other assistance provided by other discretionary programs.2 Cash assistance is provided by the Refugee Cash Assistance (RCA) program, the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) program, or the Matching Grant program (which also provides employment services). Other assistance is provided by Food Stamps and Medicaid (or Refugee Medical Assistance). Voluntary agencies (Volags) provide R&P services, through contracts with the U.S. Department of State.
Refugees are eligible for employability and other services funded through the RSS and TAG programs during their first five years of residence in the country. RSS provides funding to states with allocations based on the previous three years of refugee, asylee, and Cuban/Haitian entrant arrivals. In contrast, TAG assists counties “highly impacted” by large numbers of refugees. Allocations are based on the number of new refugees, asylees, and Cubans/Haitians entrants in the previous five years.
1 In the context of providing ESL, Sacramento’s program addresses employment issues, including the job search process, transportation, safety on the job, and on-the-job communication (following directions and clarifying instructions).
2 R&P services are funded by the Department of State. Asylees, Cuban and Haitian entrants, and victims of a severe form of trafficking are not eligible for R&P services.