Immigration Task Force

    8:59PM Nov 9, 2023

    Speakers:

    Muthanna Alhanooti

    Nourel-Hoda Eidy

    Sameh Elhady

    Maria Rathur - USCRI - Dearborn, MI

    Olu Martins, Center For Employment Opportunities

    Oliva Graciela Diaz Melgarejo

    Amelia

    CHIDI NYECHE

    Emma Davis

    Keywords:

    detroit

    work

    survey

    community

    organizations

    hear

    meeting

    folks

    city

    ietf

    share

    residents

    immigrants

    language

    year

    events

    office

    pass

    michigan

    update

    an extra challenge.

    Hi everyone. We'll get started in just a moment. We're gonna give people just one more minute to log in. The agenda is on your calendar invite and it's also in the chat so take we have a chat and we'll get started in just one minute

    yeah it says briefly state Okay. Presentation upcoming survey is in focus groups. That's 15 minutes. Okay. Then Gabrielle is in San Diego. Gonna give us a brief okay. Yeah.

    Nora Oh, are you presenting on behalf of Google Detroit? Can you confirm when you look at the bottom are you able to click Share Screen when it's time?

    Was that

    just I was just asking normal. Oh,

    okay. I'm not it's just the host is disabled participant sharing. Um,

    I'm not sure who's on from Gabby's office from the council members office, but can you add Norrell Hoda and as approved as able to present please and then let me know when you see that come through.

    So this is our long meeting till five o'clock, okay.

    Yeah, yeah.

    of the year. Okay. See, I was talking to someone I know. He's undocumented, but he has a New Yorker driver's license, which is nice, you know, so at least he can survive.

    So have you gotten

    in? Presenter Host? Yeah.

    So I should be able to share? Yeah, I think I am able to now. Okay.

    Great. Wonderful.

    All right. Well, let's go ahead and get started. So we'll start with introductions. And so briefly, we'll state one state, your name your organization if you represent one, and one thing you're looking forward to doing before the end of the year, so I'll start us off. I'm Christine Solvay. I lead community engagement communications and policy work at the Michigan Immigrant Rights Center, and I'm one of the co chairs for the Detroit immigration Task Force. And one thing I'm looking forward to doing before the end of the year is taking a little time off. It's been a busy year. So with that, I'll pass it to my one of my co chairs is high and yet Great. Yes.

    I just joined Yes, I was pressing the previous meeting we had like, anyway, hi, everyone. I'm Michael shuck. I'm, I'm a professor at Wayne State, where I am now and also co chair of the task force. I also direct the Michigan Media Coalition of ethnic and minority media in this region and I pass it on to Roberto.

    Good afternoon, everyone, political voters. I'm the director of the Mayor's Office of Immigrant Affairs and economic inclusion. And one of the things that I'm looking forward to is actually doing shorter races. I just ran the Marine Corps Marathon just last weekend. So that was on my list to do before the end of the year. So now he's just doing a couple of Turkey runs and jingle bell run. So those are smaller five ks. So looking forward to that. And I'm going to pass it on to Muthana.

    Yeah, my name is McDonough and UTM with the community and government relations, and Islamic Center of Detroit. Also part of my my big task is working with the grants and funding from government and other nonprofit organizations. I'll pass it to neurologia Maybe. Yeah. Okay.

    I'm newer. I'm a consultant with global Detroit and I'm supporting the community engagement work for the strategic plan, which we're doing a presentation on today. And then I'm going to pass it to Emma.

    Folks, Mr. Davis, also from global Detroit. One thing I am looking forward to Yeah, also a couple of vacations coming up, so I'm gonna drive out to see an art I haven't seen her in a few years for Thanksgiving. I'm looking forward to that. I will pass it to Roland.

    Roland fed in the chat. at all.

    or if it's your breaking up shop for

    Roland said he is muted. I don't know if that was done by an organizer or if that's an issue with his computer. Yeah,

    it's not showing up as muted on our end as if, as in we didn't do it on the co host side. So Roland will come back to you or feel free to make a note in the chat. He might be muted on his end on purpose. Shalom, why don't you go ahead and introduce yourself?

    Oh, yeah. Oh, hang on one second. I was actually writing a no oh, he's driving. Okay. Roland is driving nevermind. I'm sure fine Achmed. I'm with the city of Detroit in the grantor while I'm looking forward to before the year is getting this rehab project done. Mostly. Oh, get the finish line.

    It was a little choppy. But I think there's a rehab project in your future.

    Thanks for finishing a rehab project.

    Yes, great. Thank you. We'll pass it to I believe councilmember is actually in a meeting at the moment. So we'll come back to council member a little bit later. So I'd like to pass it to Office of Global Michigan.

    Hi, I'm Carmen portea with the Office of Global Michigan. I'm sorry for some reason I cannot use the name. And I'm looking what I'm looking forward to. I have a couple of work projects that I'm very, very excited about. And I'm hoping to have them up and running before the end of the year and on a personal level to take some time off and see some friends that I have not seen in a long time.

    All right, and then let's see we can go to Sammy next maybe and Sammy pass it to someone else.

    Yes, yeah, we can.

    Okay, hello, everyone. This is Sam Hill howdy. I am the Refugee and Immigrant navigator for some car Michigan Works, which is serving buena Monroe County except the city of Detroit on papers only we work with Detroit partners on all the time. Happy to do so. And my last wish of this year is to complete and launch in the new version. We just it just muted if you're able to unmute Sammy. You're looking forward to something I'm not sure what

    he might have meant more more words in Spanish, because I know he was taking Spanish.

    Yeah, we learned that meaning?

    Oh.

    All right. Well, with that we'll pass it to someone else who hasn't gone let's see Marya.

    Hi guys, my name is Maya rather I work at USC ri. I'm in Dearborn. I'm the attorney here. What I'm most looking forward to is vacation. I have two weeks off at the end of the month and I'm really, really excited about that.

    Could you just remind us what the UNHCR is

    yeah, it's the US committee for refugees and immigrants. So our organization resettles and provides legal services to immigrants, although right now the legal services are centered on just the people from Afghanistan.

    Okay, great.

    Great. Thank you, Maria, Clarissa.

    Hello, everybody. Greetings. I'm with Southwest Detroit immigrant and refugee center. And what I'm looking forward to this, as we approach the end of the year is returning home to Panama with my daughter for wedding plans.

    Dating great thank you, Clarissa. Let's see. I'm looking to see who hasn't gone yet. I see. Oh, Lou Martens.

    Hi, I'm Oli Martin's. I work for a local nonprofit in Detroit. I'm an immigrant myself which is why I'm on this call. I don't necessarily work with immigrants but I am. And I am I think the question I started like late I think the question was, what are you most excited about?

    What are you looking forward to it before the end of the year or before the

    end of the year? Oh, I am looking forward to a full house. Everyone coming in from everywhere. And then under the same roof and the chaos of the holidays? Believe it or not, I'm looking forward to the chaos of the holidays. It's been pretty quiet.

    Nice. Thank you for joining us. Let's see who hasn't gone yet? A lever.

    My mo Liva. I am an intern at American communications and community engagement. And I'm looking forward to the end of the semester. I can have some time off. Thank you.

    Great thank you. I'll turn it to Amelia. Hi,

    my name is Amelia benna VITAS cologne and I'm here on behalf of Detroit. documenters just keeping track of everything today.

    Great, thank you and I'll pass it to Brianna Washington.

    Hi, I'm Brian.

    And I'm with documented meaning today.

    Okay, thank you for joining. Let's see who hasn't gone. I see a couple of AI note takers on if you haven't gotten if you want to unmute yourself and please say your name your organization and one thing you're looking forward to before the end of the year.

    John Ross Itano home with Merck. And one of my best friends gets married on Saturday. So I'm looking forward to that let him

    good. Well thanks John. And Sean speaking notes for us today. So big props to Sean. Thanks, John.

    Appreciate

    Robbie Robinson, also from Merck, managing attorney in our Detroit office and I'm looking forward to cold weather so I can make a fire my fireplace.

    Nice. Thanks, Ruby. Elizabeth. I think maybe you haven't gone yet.

    Elizabeth if you can hear us. Okay, maybe we'll come back to her anyone else who hasn't introduced themselves last call.

    Hello, yeah, there's Roland long.

    Hi, Roland. We saw the note you're driving so thanks.

    So yeah, I'm with American citizens for justice. And still driving so I'll go back on mute.

    Okay, thanks, rollin, stay safe. And Elizabeth says she has some audio issues but we I do know that she's at Freedom House Detroit. Okay with that. We will go ahead and get started here. Thanks, everyone, for making time. I'm going to very quickly turn it over to our guest presenter here. So many of you are familiar with the strategic planning process that we started with the Office of Immigrant Affairs. We're very excited about this. So at our August meeting, you heard from the consultants about the overall plan. And this month to this meeting. We have Noryl here who is a consultant with golden Detroit, and she's going to tell you a little bit more about the community engagement part of the plan. And this is so important for our taskforce members to engage in because the only way we'll get great resident feedback and information to inform the strategic plan is with all of your help to make sure that folks know about the surveys are able to fill out the surveys and they'll be doing some focus groups as well. So we'll really need all hands on deck on this for over the next couple months. I'll turn it over to Norrell and she can go ahead and present if you have slides to share and take it away. And we'll have questions at the end. I think if that works for you. No.

    I'm just making sure that it allows me to share. It's not letting me press on any of my desktops. Hmm I'm missing Can I share the

    slideshow with you? Yeah, if you send me that real quick by email or something or if you have a link and then I can try and do the screenshare.

    Yeah, and my end shows you're a co host so beyond that.

    I just when I go to share the actual screen doesn't let me press on any of my desktops. I just shared it with you

    all right, bear with us one second folks.

    Perfect All right. Can everyone see that? Yep. All right. Take it away. Perfect.

    Hi, everyone. Once again, I'm nude. I'm joining global Detroit as a consultant to support the community engagement piece primarily on the strategic plan. So I know Kristin gave a really great introduction. You all are familiar with the strategic plan and have received an introduction on kind of like the project purpose and so I am hoping today to talk more about the community engagement piece and really seek out your partnership for the next few months as we launch the survey and get into the focus groups. So just a quick agenda. I'm gonna do a really brief overview and then really jump into global Detroit's role specifically and then what we're going to do in community and how you all can participate, to proceeding to the next slide. Yeah, so really quick background welcoming America did an audit of the city of Detroit using the seven certified categories you see listed and then so the city is responding with, you know, developing the strategic plan that prioritizes the opportunities identified in the audit. And I know we have some representatives from the city office here with us so excited about that. We can go on to the next piece. All right, so I know you've heard from public sector consultant consultants last time, I believe, and so we're really working in partnership with public sector consultants. Global Detroit will be leading the community based engagement and research plan and PSC will be facilitating the strategic path planning process using the insights that we gained from the community research. So we're really informing and shaping. The community engagement piece is really informing the strategic plan development. So that's really the overarching overarching piece and then so if you want to go to the next slide we'll talk about global Detroit's role specifically. So we'll be responsible for leading the community engagement and research components. And, you know, we have found it at global trade to be best practice to work through trusted connectors and anchor institutions. So really, you all your organization's to reach our populations of interest. And so we are hoping to work with folks and seek invitation to community events and spaces that you all are hosting in order to reach your population of interest and we can get more into what we hope that can look like. In the next coming month. Yeah, so, Christina, if you want to go to the next slide for me, please. Okay, so our research goals include this 300 survey responses, and hosting 12 focus groups. And so the 300 surveys, we're hoping to launch the survey in December. And that's really our priority right now is to get the survey to go live and begin distribution and then really focusing on developing the focus group protocol. So we're anticipating the surveys to go to go live in December till maybe around February and focus groups, hopefully to start in February around up to around March. And just some more information I want to give you on the surveys and the focus groups is we do understand the communities we are working with and we're making sure we provide safety measures and our research protocol. So the service will be anonymous. And the focus groups will be recorded, but only for the purpose translating because the focus groups won't be happening all in English. So we will be recording the focus groups with the purpose of translating them and will identify participants through like demographics. So for example, we would say maybe like a middle aged Bengali man or a middle aged or Arab man, but we will not use names or any sort of identifiers. And then once we translate the survey, we do hope to destroy the recording of the focus group. The focus groups will be kept around 15 participants per focus group, and we're prepared to implement single gender focus group spaces. That's our plan. As we develop the protocol. Focus groups and and surveys of we will be compensating everyone who participates in either or both as a small gesture of gratitude for their sharing their stories and their time. So to really dig into who we're targeting, or who our participants we hope our participants to be, because this is a city of Detroit strategic plan. We are focused on Detroit residents. We will not be looking for and Tremec or Highland Park residents although I know I understand culturally there might be a lot of intersection but we are focused specifically on folks who are Detroit residents, and they must be 18 years or older. So they can be 18 and then anything older and that's really our only our only limitation is that we know we're not working with any minors, they have to be 18 or older. But after that, we are looking for a very diverse set of participants. You know, we're looking from 18 and up and really there's no cap at what the age is. And we're really looking for residents who are you know, married unmarried with children. without children. We're looking for people with different abilities, statuses or caretakers for folks, for residents with different ability statuses. So we're really seeking to create a diverse participant pool. And then another piece of eligibility is the strategic plan is focused on participants who speak any of the languages listed so Arabic, Spanish, French, Bangla, Pashto or Dari and then English. So all of the surveys will be translated into all of those languages. And the focus groups will be hosted in those languages. We're still developing the focus group protocol but the plan is to host what an appropriate amount of focus groups per language so then we're able to reach the number of people we're hoping to, to hear from so those are kind of like the background and the research goes into participant eligibility. I also want to add a final note that we are focused on these six languages. We're not focused on any particular country of origin. We're really going after, you know, we're really trying to hear from people who speak any of these languages regardless of their country of birth. Or country of origin was not our focus at all. So just want to make that clear. So I think for the next slide, yeah. So where we hope to partner with you all. So, again, our surveys hoping to go to launch in December. So we are hoping to meet with you meet with organizations who are interested. Sorry that noise keeps distracting me. We are hoping to meet with organizations who are interested in partnering with us in the next week, week and a half or so to hear from you about different community events that you may be hosting in our December, February timeframe that you think would be appropriate for us to come to and distribute the survey. So our plan for the survey is to distribute it at community events that you will host or are interested in hosting in order for us to come in spaces where community members feel comfortable in spaces that they are familiar with. And we hope to hire a trusted connector per language of interest that will come with us to be able to answer any questions to help folks fill out the survey if there are any questions, surveys. At the events, we hope to set up a table where the trusted connector will be there and staff members from the global Detroit project team will be there and we will have both digital copies and hard copies in the translated languages depending on the events. So that's our and we hope to find some space to give people some privacy to be able to complete the survey and that's really our plan. So we're hoping in the next few weeks to really have a one on one meetings with the different organizations to hear if there are any orgs any events that you know, we seek an invitation to or is it appropriate for us to come to or if there are any events you'd be willing to partner with us on in order to reach the our communities of interest or our populations of interest? Yeah.

    So to give kind of like an overview, we did a mapping so public sector consultants did a mapping analysis of the languages of interest that we're hoping to reach and it really helps us identify where our populations of interest live within the city of Detroit. And from there, we identified some priority neighborhoods, and then we looked at the IETF organization list and try to identify which organizations we kind of noticed were doing work either in these neighborhoods or with this demographic. So there was really like a three way intersection here between where the communities live and the work that the IETF organizations are doing either on a geographical level or demographic level. So these are the maps for our Spanish speakers. I just want to give you all a second to look at the maps. I'm happy to also share the slides later for folks who are interested. And then Christine, if you want to go to the next slide. I just want to go through each of the communities. So these are the neighborhoods and the identified organizations. And these are just the organizations from our analysis that we noticed we're doing work in either the neighborhoods or with you know Spanish speakers that were hoping would be interested in partnering with us but if you do not see your name listed, if you don't see your if you don't see your organization's name listed in the identified organizations, but you know, you work at this intersection with any of the communities. Please also, send me a chat and let me know if your organization would be interested. We would love to also schedule a meeting with you all and for the organizations listed. If you could also message me letting me know that you would want me to follow up and schedule a meeting with you Oh, that would be great. Just because I'm not sure who is interested in who is not and I would love to hear from you all if you are so I can follow up next week and schedule our our meetings.

    I'm just gonna pause on that point just to say I did give Elena the list of members so you can reach out to folks directly and in conversations as well. Yeah,

    got a couple of questions if possible.

    Yeah, do we want to do Yeah, we can do questions now. Go for it. Okay, so

    I understand that the participants should be resident in Detroit, but for example, some co host a few events, job fairs and other things similar in our American Job Center in Dearborn. So, we meet and serve some of the customers from Detroit area. Can you maybe participate in this event and or it has to be also physically the event in Detroit.

    I don't think that the event has to be physically in Detroit, but if we do survey there, we would have to we wouldn't be a lead surveys from non Detroit residents. So I'm happy to also take this specific question to our project team. But we would love to partner we would still love to have that conversation if you know you find that Detroit residents come to your events as well. Okay, so

    just that when they do the survey that at the beginning, there's some screener questions to make sure that folks are Detroit residents and are eligible to take the survey. So I think there could there should be a way to as they're engaging with people to kind of make sure they're eligible before proceeding with the survey. Okay,

    that's very nice and very good to secondly, what is the compensation for participating in the survey?

    Oh, yeah. Thank you for that. It is going to be $10 for compensating for a $10 gift card for either the survey or the focus group. That's our current number if there is you know, um, don't want me to everything Oh, like to a tee things could change as a project changes, but I know right now, it's 10 of us.

    Okay, so if we if we have an event, we're gonna like, send it to you or someone else.

    If you're interested, just send me a message. chat me if you could chat me in zoom. And then I can either reach out and schedule a meeting where we can talk about when your events are so I can put it into our calendar of events. Awesome.

    We'll do so in a minute in the center. We'll be happy to assist and partner with you guys in this event. And your point of contact in this case or reviewing even the text in Arabic will be myself if you want. That's

    perfect. We do plan to have our survey validated with trusted people and within the community for cultural context and other things. So definitely. Great. Thank you. Rebecca, do you wanna? I think, yeah,

    yeah, I just saw the the reference to one Michigan and wanted to just throw support behind friends of ours at one Michigan for immigrant rights. So that's an organization you don't have they weren't with our undocumented community and are not often on the screen. So just wanted to share that. And I'm sure that with Chris, the lift that Christina is going to share with us, it's inclusive, but just wanted to make sure that they're included.

    That's perfect. Yes, they're on the list.

    That's perfect. And then proceed, you can keep going. So then these are the maps for our Arabic speakers. Just give you a second and then proceeding. Yep. And then these are the neighborhoods and identified organizations. And again, this was just the identified organizations was just a preliminary kind of scanning of the IETF list. But again, there's no limitations to who and how many want to partner we would love everyone's partnership. So yes, Christine, you want to go to the next one. So this is our French speakers. I would say that this is the community that's the most scattered. So I do think that that was an interesting finding from the maps. And then yeah, so then these are the neighborhoods in the identified orcs, first French speakers and then our next one are Bongo speakers. And then proceed.

    Can you can you go back to the French speaking from an Yeah. The map just the list Okay, the list because I'm trying to see if we have a Senegalese Islamic Center.

    I think Sadie was making the introduction there. Okay. With Musa Musa Yeah. Okay. And Sadie being at a visa just to clarify for folks. Okay.

    One thing for the Bunglow speakers I just wanted to highlight the small tweak. Islamic Center of Detroit is in a different neighborhood. I think you guys met Islamic Center of north of Detroit. So mustard AlFalah is is Alexandria from north to Detroit.

    Because the owner is just part of the Wayne State University.

    No, that's mustard AlFalah their official name Islamic Center of north of Detroit. Yeah, that's

    a big one. That's a major Yeah, yeah.

    But right now it has your mustard listed with them. Thank you. Yeah, no problem. I'm from that neighbor.

    That's perfect. Thank you. Okay, and then are pushed on to orders speakers. And then

    and then our next slide. Yeah, so this is kind of like an overview of all the ways we could use your help. So the community events is one way for us to help for us to distribute the survey through attending these community events, the other ways through social media and your trusted networks. We will not be sending the survey link publicly because it needs to be the transit and there's different versions. For it, we won't be sending it we won't be sending a public link to it. But we hope to use social media and your trusted networks to recruit for the community events for attendance at the community events and for the focus groups for participation in the focus groups, which we'll hope to do. In a few months. We won't start recruitment just yet. So really, we're looking we are looking for a partnership to span from maybe just November to I would say like March or April through us completing the focus groups. And then another kind of request is as we start to identify dates and times for focus groups. We're also trying to identify spaces because we are planning to host some of them in person and so we are looking for organizations with physical spaces and communities to host the focus groups. I think that we it would make participants feel more comfortable to be in spaces they're familiar with and see people from organizations that they trust and are familiar with as they share their stories with us. So these are really are our ways. Ways in which we secure partnership and we can go once we meet we do our one on one meetings, we can go into more details about logistics for the community events, our role, and we can offer resources around like talking points for social media materials and things like that and offer any resources you may need as you support us. So

    yeah, and then just wanted to chime in that I thought in our previous meeting we had discussed sending the survey link by email, so we might so we might want to we'll check back on how it's going to actually go out before it does so you'll get plenty of advance notice and then just to normalise other point, PSC will be putting together some communications materials so graphics and info and things like that that you can share. Easily to help get the word out. Yeah, you don't have to make those on your own

    or you can do that on your own would hope to provide that toolkit for you. Yeah, and so these are just kind of the next steps. If you're going to organization is interested whether listed in the mapping analysis or not just let me know and we'd hope my hope is to start contacting everybody by Monday and kind of have those conversations before the Thanksgiving holiday. Our goal is to have our confirmed list of community events by December 8 knowing that things could change we might add community events as we need and another thing one other way I think we are looking for support which we'll discuss as we launch the surveys as we monitor the responses for the survey if we find that we are missing or we're not able to reach a specific population. You know from from the ones we have listed, we might reach out to the orcs who are interested in partnering with us to really create an intentional plan to get the responses we need from from folks. There'll be another way. And I think my last slide is just any question.

    I have a question. Yeah. So the survey, is it going to be written or is it going to be oral? So

    it's going to be so once we do it when we're distributing a community events, we're going to have a digital copy and a hard copy. All of the questions are more quantitative. So they are more like a one to five rating or like timeframes of like 10 hours to 20 hours so they are more like a selection than it is like a fully written survey. There are there are some questions I don't want to say it's exclusively that because there are some questions that have like an other option. That might be a quick right. But our hope that that is more like a selection style survey to where we'll use the insight from the survey to develop the questions for the focus groups. We'll be able to talk to folks more during the focus groups, so that would

    be verbal. Then my next question is that a lot of these clients I mean, considering that they're immigrants, they have these language barriers. So what the survey and like would it be in their native language? Or would they have to be answering these questions in English?

    We will not be answering them in English. We are translating all of the surveys into the languages we've identified are of interest. So Spanish, Arabic, French bungalow, Pashto and Dari. So they're gonna be translated into all of those. And so they will be available at the community events they will be available in the translated format.

    Okay. One thing we had brainstormed before is that if community partners want to assist folks who might either have trouble filling out the form or you know, difficulty with reading level, we can work with partner organizations to kind of train someone to help walk someone through the process of filling out the survey. Well still keeping their answers confidential. So by doing it at in person events, there'll be someone to kind of help guide the person through it.

    And that's something that would help to talk to our one on one meetings and then we are also hiring five trusted connectors who are from these communities. And to be at these events and also help that in the event that the org doesn't have the capacity or nobody's available to go to the event then. We will have trusted connectors hired and designated to do that at the events

    Okay, thank you.

    I have a question. I saw that you identified about five languages that will participate in this survey, that 10 An parama led entry into the conversation because I was you know, doing something else before coming in. I did not notice my I don't know population wise I did not notice EBO language. I did not notice Yoruba language coming out of Nigeria or West Africa in particular, other than the French the Senegalese, you know, French speaking, folks, but that does not remove quite a few of them speaks English. It's a matter of fact. But we have the evil Cultural Association, a large group of a concentration of Nigerians from the evil side in the state of Michigan and in particular, in Detroit. I don't know if this survey or the data that has been generated so far, highlighted any potential for reaching out to those community folks, because every month they meet i There is a the president of Uber cultural organization that we are aware of that is also the Euro bad group that we are aware of. The majority of them grew up from Detroit, before they moved to the periphery of Detroit as a matter of fact, but a lot of them are still living in Detroit area. What we're even encountering is that when they come, they bring in their mothers and they bring in their fathers that are elderly at this point and majority of them doesn't speak the English, but they can hear English. But what are we doing? And I think that was a point of concern to me that previously. So can you give me a little bit into what we've done in a try in other languages other than the European language?

    Yeah. Judy, I think we did talk about this last time and so the office of Immigrant Affairs so your colleagues Roberto and chiffon together we had worked to draft the RFP initially and due to you know, the financial constraints of in the budget in terms of how much we had for this strategic planning process. We had to limit the languages to the most commonly spoken in Detroit in terms of largest numbers. So that's unfortunately, you know, there is some limitation there. So, but then, secondly, when we were consulting with folks, it sounded like most people thought from the Nigerian community, folks would be able to access the English language survey. If that if you are aware, and this issue came up in our August meeting as well. I don't know if Henry's on today. I haven't seen him but we had talked with rising voices as well. There are a small number of folks in the city that speak Vietnamese and so we had talked through possibilities. If Oregon if ITF partners want to translate the written survey, this wouldn't be an option. For the focus group. But for the written survey, folks could volunteer to translate the written survey into a needed language so that we could get an additional written survey out to communities that were not represented in the in the those largest language groups unfortunately, we have other language groups that also weren't represented some mom's speakers and other languages that we know folks are here. But again, then, we had due to the constraints we had to settle on a certain number due to the budget. So if you have Nigerian organizational contacts in the city of Detroit, who would be willing to translate that for folks that they think would not be able to access the English language survey? I think we're happy to follow up with them are speaking for global Detroit but in our conversations, previously, we had talked about creating that as a pathway to help folks access it. Roberto shuffle I don't know if you want to add anything to that.

    Yeah, I think, again, it really comes down to budgetary constraints, what are the things that we even talked about that we had to limit the presentation with our directors and managers and we had to limit that to just a singular one versus multiple ones because of that time consumption. And the other thing was that it didn't preclude communities to to participate as much as it precluded any additional community events being scheduled. So I Nora, when you when you mentioned when Sammy said, perhaps we could do this event. There's a there's a differentiation between community events and and the gathering for this for the community town halls. Right. So it's like, we're very specific about how far we can extend the these these town halls and these surveys so it is it is limited and we're trying to capture the major groups at the city recognizes as languages.

    Any other questions?

    And if anyone was interested in the maps, those will become part of the final strategic planning products that we get at the end, which will be like in June or something when we get our final report. So So just to reiterate, the main takeaways are that stay tuned for outreach from global Detroit. So they're the consultants who are working on connecting with IETF members who can serve as connectors and help get the word out about the surveys. So they'll talk to you to formulate a plan that works best for your community. So that might mean you know, calendaring, a new event that you think would be best or looking at existing events that you already have coming up and the survey period will go into February, I believe normal. Timelines might shift but right now if we launch in December, the plan is that the survey would be open into February. So stay tuned and the exact details about that. And then after actually midway I believe in the period of the survey collection, the focus groups will start and so focus groups will take place at community locations and so the other piece of assistance that they're looking for is great community locations to host those focus groups. So those are the big pieces that global Detroit will need help with and just extra encouragement to everyone to please help as much as you can. Because if you want to ensure that your community's voice is represented in this planning process, this this is this is the time this is the opportunity. So through the surveys and focus groups, we'd love to capture as much input as we can from Detroit immigrant residents any other questions are for normal.

    Okay, I'm not seeing any hands raised. Okay, well, thanks so much Norrell for joining and we'll follow up I feel free to Yeah, feel free to grab any emails that you needed if people shared those with you in the chat. Otherwise, a we will shift to the next part of our agenda. And just in case folks didn't see that, I'm just reposting it in the chat. And so next up we're going to hear from the council member.

    potentate just walked into her office so she is not able to give an update herself but as far as our involvement with with immigration taskforce and Ally A we have been Detroit ID. I apologize. I also I don't know if we've covered those topics. before I before I even move forward, Christine Can you let me know which topics Detroit ID strategic planning.

    We just covered strategic planning. Detroit it is in the IETF update section coming up. So

    we can wait for that as far as just Council specific business then I'll just stick to that scope. We do have a budget season is coming up. So as far as departments are concerned, their budgets are due towards the end of this year. And we are trying to get meetings with each department. One to follow up on our requests that we had from last year's budget and any amendments and reallocation that we requested and then also trying to figure out what we can incorporate in their budget before we get into full fledged budget season which starts at the end of February so that we don't have to reallocate any funds. As far as funding specifically for the IETF. I spoke with Christine about this already and trying to figure out what type of budget it is

    your voice

    we can hear you. Okay. Um, what the IETF budget is looking like

    Christina cannot to hear.

    I think everybody else can. Can you not have

    that might be on your end with Anna we can we can hear her.

    You're cutting a little in and out for me as well.

    Okay, um, well, I'll keep this short, is just requesting what type of budget IETF would like as far as personnel, resources events that we want to host in the next year. So even though it's the next fiscal year is in July, we have to prepare that and we'll need that budget finalized. By January.

    I think March might be and then Kristen, do you want to briefly give folks an update on the redistricting for the city districts? Yes.

    So um, the legislative policy division did come up with a few options for redistricting. I believe there were three total, of course, becomes members. One a fourth option where they can work together and actually engage the community on what they would like to see. And so they're our office. I can't speak for any other office. We're going to be hosting listening sessions, early December and trying to just share the information of what is going to be taking place and then January or and then have community members take that information, talk to other neighborhood associations and black clubs and get feedback that we can collect by early January. Because they want to finalize this redistricting map by the end of January within Council.

    Anyone have any questions for Kristen about Council before we were running a little ahead of schedule. So before we move to the next section.

    The only other thing that I wanted to mention is that our council members working on a resolution a ceasefire resolution and working with all her colleagues to try to get it finalized by this Friday and introduced at city council on Tuesday. There is a lot of engagement and community engagement. Regardless of like where you stand on the issue. We do want to hear from from everyone and so before we finalize and in this language is in draft form, so we can't present it to the public yet. But um, but there's things that people would like to see in us a resolution please feel free to share that with us at councilmember Gabriela at Detroit mi.gov. We just got finished with a meeting with pro tem Tate's office and saying that you know, this is a resolution but we want to actually do more. And so between his office and our office, we're trying to collectively figure out how, what the best way is to kind of bridge any divides, and have inner faith community work and so whether it's a series or a symposium, we don't know what that looks like, but trying to figure out who what organizations already do that work that interfaith communication and trainings and and then go from there. So if anybody has any organizations, I know Michigan roundtable and then the interfaith Detroit Interfaith Council, I believe, but if there's anybody else, please let us know.

    And last update, if you want to mention the street sign, the Vincent Chin street sign up.

    Thank you. So I just have a question. the feedback we just in the feedback in order for the city to approve it, like from every h1 or ceasefire, I'm talking about Yeah, yeah.

    If um, if you have any language like if you have seen other cities or municipalities and you like what they've done our past please send that our way. So we can take a look at it and see what we can can

    incorporate Yeah, I can send one tomorrow. No problem. Okay. Okay. Thank you this email to the council Gabriella. Okay.

    And then, lastly, the Vincent Shin street signs so this is the second year that we've tried to get Vincent Chin to be a designated street sign, where the old Chinatown areas and Peter whirl and Cass and the first year you know, we had our all our application information and they didn't incorporate it into the process. And now, since then we met with each tab over a dozen times to see if we were good to go and they did say that we were up until the week of some amendments to the secondary street sign ordinance was taking place. So at that point, it was too late. It Vincentian one of the requirements is for the person being honored and recognized to be a resident of the city of Detroit for at least 10 years. He lived in Highland Park but has been buried in a cemetery in Detroit for 40 over 40 years, but we're trying to get an accent And to that, that particular criteria, because there is an exception to another criteria of being having to have been deceased for at least five years. So trying to just take that same language for that deceased criteria and add that to the residency requirement and then ascension would be eligible. Fully and officially and that's going to the amendments the to the ordinance is going to take place in the beginning of 2024. And then the actual application is due April 30. And I'm told that we don't have to pay for the application fee again, and then it's going to be recognized and considered an October. A lot. Once we get closer to that October date, a lot of advocacy has to happen because for instance, this year, there was 16 applicants, nine of them went through to be considered and there's only five slots each year.

    So I see Roland has his hand up and I know he has to go teach a class at four. So take it away, Roland. Well,

    I was just wondering if it would be beneficial for the immigration Task Force to weigh in the proposed ordinance amendment? Would that be of any value of Christmas?

    I defer to Kristen we did do a letter of support for the street sign itself. I haven't seen the ordinance language yet. So

    it's really just the issue of residency for 10 years, even though we would make the point that being interred at Forest Lawn for 40 years should qualify but

    yeah, great. Kristin, if you want to let us know if there's a role for the task force.

    I'm sorry, what was the question

    that the immigration taskforce can play in regard to the amendment or proposed amendment.

    Yes. So um, if I could share the portion of the ordinance with with whoever wants to participate in this process and see what best language is you should be used for the exception part. I would greatly appreciate any any eyes and assistance on that. I don't know that it needs to be like a whole task force upper or if like a few people who are interested in this can step forward. Thanks.

    Okay, so if any interested in working on that, maybe please put him in the chat. Thank you, Kristen. And thank you rollin and now I think we'll turn to our next section. So next up, I believe is Roberto our update from the Office of Immigrant Affairs?

    Yeah, sure. Good. Good afternoon, everyone. So some of the topics I'll defer to other parts of the presentation because we partner with the IETF on the Detroit idea and I'm sure you're gonna get a full report on that. You just received a report on the the comprehensive plan. Just Just to add to that, that, like my colleagues have been very supportive of being a being a being attuned to the different matters with a comprehensive plan. So we have kept up with our provider, our contract agencies and and find out with with some of the, the accounting that goes with the with the comp plan, so very current with all the invoices that are coming in, so very, very happy with that. So as they're doing the work. We're reviewing that and in getting those approved, so that's moving along just fine. And would echo what Christine said about having the having the this, the IETF assist with the with a lot of the surveys and then also following that, then the individual sessions that will be scheduled so looking forward to that. A second piece of of our office is currently in transition with our entrepreneurship training program. So this is the second year that we've done it with the National League of city. They are moving off of funding from Kauffman Foundation. So we're looking to find additional funding in the coming year to do that. Immigrant entrepreneurship training. It's a partnership with the International Institute. We've gotten some great results from from that program. And looking forward to providing a report here at the end of the year. We've got till the 31st the 31st of December to actually conclude that project. It's a small goal that they have from the National League of Cities to actually complete the program. They anywhere between three to five we actually are looking to have between 25 and 30. So very, very happy with the work that's being done there. We also recently had a meeting with with welcoming new mayor America. So we had Anthony solace and Daniel Valdez come in. I didn't walk them in America national to actually meet with Visit Detroit global Detroit and our office regarding the upcoming welcoming interactive, so during the planning for 2025. But it's important to to actually hit the ground running early. There is a portion that that we as a local have to support as part of the as part of the budget. So we're putting some thoughts to that and who could we get as a as a sponsor for the the welcoming interactive, they took a tour of some of our facilities, hotels of the Conference Center. And so it's looking like we've got the capacity to be able to do this and we'll be employing some of them partners with the city to be able to provide some support services to get people to and from hotels to the to the convention center, and then also to be able to host networking events. So really excited about that. You'll hear more about that as we move forward. But initially, they were just looking at facilities and they were in town last week for that purpose. The other thing that we've been working on is support for for the incoming migrant population that's coming into the city. And I'm sure that you'll get a report from Elizabeth on that but just flat out just want to just share that, based on on what we had heard from many in the community. We have actually been supportive of various areas to include housing, support services, and and food for the population that's arriving. In fact, I've got to leave in a couple of minutes so that we can do the the afternoon feeding portion for our population. So you know, we're responding to that and and happy to have a great partner in in Freedom House to be able to to serve the population that's coming into our area.

    Roberto maybe on that had a meeting altogether since August. So maybe if you could just give it a just say a little bit more about you know, how the city's supporting for housing, what the situation looks like, what the support services are, etc.

    Well, I can I can only give you certain details, so I will share this. So since August of 2022. We have been anticipating some type of presence. At that time we were hearing that it was going to be a large presence of of bargains that would arrive. It hasn't. It hasn't appeared like that in our community. It's been more a trickle effect that has the hit continue to arrive in our community. And so it got to the point where you know, the our partners over at Freedom House, we're over capacity. And so initially we were looking to serve the population that was there at Freedom House with their overcapacity. It went beyond that. So we had to find additional housing support, and so and so we move forward to actually do that. So we're actually providing housing support for over 80 individuals and, and then food and shelter for or food for over 80 individuals outside of Freedom House and then within Freedom House. So it is a population that we're currently managing. And I know that Elizabeth will will provide more details that she can provide. outside of myself. We we have been providing assessment support for with with Freedom House and their team, their partners. So that's, that's about as much as I can share. It's not it's not something that we're employing to to to target for an even larger population if we're managing the situation

    Okay, um, maybe we can pause there for questions.

    I can't say I can't say this, Christina. So there have been some organizations that have indicated that they have encountered individuals or families and they've been referred over to Freedom House those organizations have referred families over and so that that would be the appropriate that would be the appropriate protocol is to is to notify Freedom House.

    When you say that encountered individuals What do you mean by that?

    They may show up at their organization. There may be people that will show up at their organization and, and would be looking for the assistance and so they're referred to, to to freedom often that may or may not be the place where they should actually be referred to. But the assessment will will will, will will then refer them to the right agency or right organization that they should be at. Okay,

    I just want to clarify Elizabeth if you're on this sounds like a centralized referral.

    I would like to hear from Elizabeth that that's something that they have the capacity to receive more people to filter through them. I texted her as well, so she might be busy. Okay, well,

    let's see. Sorry, sorry. Sorry. I am like I've been trying to restart things and all of that same time so but I can actually get my audio to work. Am I on the air brown yet? No,

    but we can hear you so go ahead.

    Okay, all right. There we go. Um, yeah. So, so like Roberto said, I wasn't sure where we were on. Being able to share with the IETF on what we've been doing here at Freedom House. So we have been seeing an increase of migrants come to us and so it has required us to put people in an hotel with the help of the city. So we've been providing emergency services, you know, so very basic services, nothing to the extent that Freedom House typically provides to its transitional housing clients, but emergency services to many new arrivals which includes, you know, food assistance, very basic case management, very basic medical access, and then some legal services so So, yeah, as far as referring people over to Freedom House, we hadn't discussed anything yet as far as what that would look like on referring any new arrivals across the city. So I'm not sure what that system would look like. But if we do open that up for everyone to refer here, I feel like I'd like to create a system and then give that out to the rest of the IETF. To be able to do that in a in a more organized manner, if possible, especially for my staff, probably a referral form that we would have use, you would we would have you fill out for us that typically our staff would fill out here and that would just help us with any new arrivals that are being referred over here as well as coordination with my staff. So I if, if this is some, this is the direction that we're moving in. I would like to do it in a very different way. So I I will reach back out with a process for everyone and Christine, if you could. If you could make sure that that gets to the entire group. That would be great that way I can. Again, I just don't want 80 people to arrive in one day and us having to kind of figure what that looks like. I want an organized and clear process. And something for you guys.

    Sounds like a centralized referral system is not ready to for any kind of deployment. So hold off on that until Elizabeth can send us more information on what that would look like.

    Yeah, I'll try to have something to you guys by the end of this week, because I know that people I'm hearing all of these different organizations that you guys are seeing new arrivals that are needing housing assistance. So I hear that and so let's let me make sure that I can get you something to put in place and to talk to my team to see what that would look like. So I will try to hand something out to Christine by Friday, potentially look at something for Monday to start. But for right now I'm just asked for everybody's patience. Okay,

    sounds good. I see two hands. I might have got the order wrong. So I saw Ruby and Clarissa

    Ruby, I can go first. So I thank you, Roberto. And thank you, Elizabeth for providing that context. I guess my big question is like is the city's plan now essentially to rely on Freedom House to provide all these services and we'll just say DB, continuing to support Freedom House, I only expect the numbers to be increasing. So like, what does that mean? Is there any discussion or coordination with other like Ben, so are other kinds of homeless service providers? Like I don't know why the city necessarily needs in some ways to segment this population, differentiate it from others who are housing insecure in and around the city. So I guess that's kind of my first big question.

    I think I'd like to get into that. If you don't mind political just based on Go ahead.

    Go ahead. I'll fill in if you if after your response, but sure,

    so yes, so we have actually been working with other other shelters and the shelter system on you know, in coordination with the city. And they are all in overflow as well. So they're actually way beyond capacity themselves and none of them are able to take on whether that looks like language services. Any of the trauma needs and special services that these other populations have also what we found is that these populations are not are not hitting the shelters and, and or refusing to go to the shelters based on their experiences in Chicago and New York. And so mainstream shelters even if we set them up to become overflow shelters, these populations do not want to go there. And so we are looking at at ways to expand this in a very careful and methodical manner. Not necessarily just because it's it's trying to be segmented yet. The problem is going to grow but we need to make sure that we do it in a very organized fashion, I guess Thank you.

    Yeah. And then Clarissa

    answered a lot of my questions, but I decided I want to ask you so I can often frequently we get some people who are on the street. Am I hearing you say that we should hold up that Freedom House has the capacity right now, for us to send them there? I know we're going to work on this referral system. But you know, we have the NSO and other places, but we do have the ability to say go to the freedom go to Freedom House is that what I'm hearing you say? Not

    Know I will say this I will say this what you are hearing me say is this is the only thing that I'm saying right now. I cannot say anything more than what I am saying right now, for various reasons. I am saying I will come up with a referral system. So that when you do come across issues like this, we will make sure that that gets to the rest of the IETF and then hopefully either Monday or at a designated date. We can start referrals but outside of that I cannot say anything else if

    that. If that helps. Thank you.

    Okay, all right.

    Okay, I did hear Roberto say he has to log off in a little bit. So there any other questions for Office of Immigrant Affairs while we have them with us?

    Okay, hearing none, hearing none, thanks, Roberto. Thanks for the update. And Thanks, Elizabeth for chiming in as well. I think we'll we'll shift then to the next section here. And not to steal the thunder but I think we pretty much covered the new arrivals update there then we I will say we have been hearing from other IETF members as well that they're seeing increased numbers of folks seeking services generally. So we've been hearing in some of our external affairs meetings from a visa ACD and other folks so thanks for letting us know what the situation is like on your end and we'll continue to monitor this and as soon as I get any information from Elizabeth or from others to share with the whole IETF I will I will do so so watch for further communication on that point, but we will be working collectively together to make sure that folks are are welcomed with dignity and provided the support and resources that they need just as we do for all of our community members to the greatest extent that we can every day so with our with our limited needs. I know how much work everyone puts in in their day to day efforts. So thank you, everyone for for doing all of that effort. Um, quick update on Detroit ID. So we've been meeting the with the Health Department, the RFP closed so a new RFP was issued to find a new vendor for the program. And that just closed at the end of October. So we are looking at having a vendor selection committee review the proposals and hopefully there's a good one in there. That'll be happening over the next month or so. If not, sometimes this happens where we have to re issue an RFP and look for additional vendors. So fingers crossed. I don't have more of an update on the vendor just yet. We're hoping to meet I think the first meeting will be next week with the vendor selection committee. I will be participating on behalf of the IETF as an outside observer of the process. So that is helpful that the Office of Procurement procurement in the city contracting and procurement and the health department have worked with us and with the Office of Immigrant Affairs to make sure that we're able to participate in that vendor selection. So stay tuned there otherwise the health department has been proceeding with preparing for the program generally so you know hiring appropriate staff preparing, reviewing and preparing materials, making sure office locations would be ready for when the program launches. We're still a little bit ways off we have been hoping to you know relaunch in January. But given that we're doing vendor selection now, it may be a little bit longer. So stay tuned for more news on that but that is the latest update on Detroit. Id wanted to give folks a quick update on some statewide policy issues that affect immigrant residents in Detroit and statewide so many folks are familiar with the driver's license bill package the Drive Safe bills that would ensure every Michigan resident has access to apply for a driver's license regardless of immigration status. Those bills still have not come up for a hearing yet in committee. If you click the link on the website at Dr. Michigan forward there is an opportunity to contact lawmakers to help move those forward. So take a look at that. The legislature may be ending early this year. So we may not see that action happen this fall. But we're hoping to still keep forward. Then a bit of good news on language and the latest language access bills. Those have passed the state and the house. Yay. And they are now headed to the governor's desk for signing. So this is a huge achievement. We've been working on those language access bills for many, many years. And it's very exciting to finally see them so close to being finally realized so many thanks to Office of Global Michigan for the support on that and for the lawmakers who supported those bills. Many community members and some IETF members, you know, gave testimony and supported those and contacted their lawmakers about it. So we appreciate all that effort. And we'll send a note as soon as we hear that that has been signed. The there was a bill to bills in the legislature that we at Merck gate worked with partners to give some feedback on and so a FAFSA bill that would require every key every graduating high school senior to submit a FAFSA in order to be able to graduate. We did give some feedback on how that bill could be improved so that it doesn't negatively impact especially immigrant students. So if folks have questions about that, I'm happy to talk with you offline and give me more information that Bill has not it passed out of committee in the Senate and has not gone to a full floor vote yet. There's also a build proposing mobile driver's licenses. We also had some concerns about the current language in that bill. That bill has not come for a vote before the committee just yet. So we're at Merck. And in partnership with ACLU, we're working with lawmakers to help improve the language in that bill as well. So stay tuned. No more updates on that. At this time. The new Americans fund folks now called the new Michigander fund, may recall that passed in the state budget earlier this year. And so watch for a message about the community outreach grants that we'll be launching as well as a portion of the funds for immigration legal service providers. So that's very exciting. And then last but not least, at the state level, the newcomer rental subsidy program launched. They're having two info sessions. I think one happened today already. And one will be coming up next week so we can share information about that if folks are interested in participating otherwise, check out the link and you can get more information online about the program. Any questions on any of those statewide updates?

    Okay, hearing none bear with us. I know this is a long action packed meeting here. I will then shift to our next section where we do our working group updates. And I will pass it over to Ruby to give the icbp update. Is Ruby still with us. Okay, I do know that he had a sick kid maybe had to looks like he had a meeting but it's tough to put stuff in the agenda. Okay, wonderful. Shawn, do you want to read off the notes that he added there? Oh, I love to

    do there was a small meeting on October 5. No family expedited removal management or firm yet in Michigan, about 300 average daily population in detention in Michigan, which is much lower than the average daily population before the pandemic ICR l was considering parole for some Venezuelan nationals who may be eligible for TPS. The next meeting is at the Detroit border patrol station on December 14. So let Ruby know if you'd like to attend

    great and if anyone's not on that list already. Please put your email in the chat and I can make sure you are included in those email invites. Okay, thank you, Shawn. And Ruby. I can give the update for external relations. So since our last full IETF meeting in August, we have worked together with the Office of Immigrant Affairs and Creo planning and immigration one on one training for all city employees. So this is just for city employees. But this is great because so many when we do our outreach meetings with the different city departments so often they ask us a lot of questions about immigration generally. And so we really hope this will give them the information they need to better serve all Detroit residents and clarify some of those myths and misconceptions. We have previously had these immigration one on one trainings for the health department and Detroiters. I believe it was Detroit Detroit at work right John? Yeah. So we're excited for this one will be open to all city employees. So thanks to Chef Juan for helping us get the word out to different city departments. We hope to have a good crowd for that training. Just a reminder, you know from our last meeting with Creo They just really want in time feedback about any language access shortcomings that you find if you have folks that want to participate in city meetings, or city activities or events and they're having difficulty doing so because of lack of translation or interpretation, please flag that for us. And we will follow up with the Creo staff to make sure that gets corrected or figure out what were the communication gap was so for example, you know, sometimes the city is holding meetings about figuring out a new bus route or planning for a new streetscape design. You want to make sure that your community members are able to attend those meetings with interpretation and the flyers translated, please. If you see that and you're like, hey, I want to share this with our community but it's not translated. Please let us know as soon as you see that and flag it in real time so we can get that feedback to Creo and Creo is the Civil Rights inclusion and opportunity department and that's who handles language access for all the city departments. And then we worked on a proposal for an immigration themed mural for the city's mural program. So excited about that. And then we also met with DDOT. So again, we meet with different city agencies and other other groups outside of the city, letting them know about Detroit's immigrant communities and issues that our communities encounter and do that. So the Department of Transportation for the city. We met with them and gave them you know, you may recall our August meeting. We collected some feedback at that time, in preparation for that meeting, and we heard from a number of you about a lack of language access on bus wrote materials and that sort of thing. And so we did share that feedback. So they will be looking at how to improve that. And we had also passed along and you know, as many Detroiters hoped for for more routes and expanded coverage, we shared that as well. Any questions about any of those items from external affairs? Or about Ruby's update? I guess I can't remember if we saw if there was any questions for the icbp group. Okay, hearing no questions, I will I'll pass it to Sean to give the Detroit our city because you've been hearing from me a lot.

    Well, all I have is that I've done research on creating a version of my city Academy, which is a very popular thing in Nashville, Tennessee, for Detroit. And basically it's just a program that is very intentional about bringing immigrants together and just teaching them about a lot of different city things, how you can be engaged civically, and with your community and a lot of different things. So we've been working on the research still need to put together a proposal for the budgets. That is where we're at, for Detroit, our city

    and the nice thing about that program is that it combines foreign born residents with longtime US born residents and create that natural communication and relationship building that we had hoped to seek through the Detroit our city working group. So that would be very helpful to meet both of those needs. Okay, with that we're running ahead of schedule, which I'm sure everyone's happy about, because it's a long meeting. So I'd love to turn it over to any of our members who might have announcements. I will kick it off, though with two announcements about two of our members. So earlier in September, Elizabeth at Freedom House was received recognition from the Tigers the Detroit Tigers for Hispanic Heritage Month, and then just recently, Roland, one who had to hop off early. He is going to be recognized by Governor Whitmer as part of the governor's Community Service Awards coming up. So congratulations to both of those members. I know everyone in our task force is award winning, but just wanted to share the good news for those recent recognitions with that, and we'll open the floor so feel free to unmute yourself or raise your hand if you have an update from your organization. Go ahead. Muthana.

    So minor issue but on the 18th of this month, we're going to have a jerky distribution to the community. We're going to provide the promo flyer to you hopefully next week, you know as soon as we get we and also we still have the weekly Saturday food pantry for all you know, the residents in our area between two o'clock and four o'clock every Saturday. We have food pantry distribution Okay.

    Great. Thank you for that.

    Yes, this is a busy time for food distribution. I will say ACC couldn't be on today. They also have some food had some food distribution updates. So if you're looking for that resource, check them out. As well.

    Along the

    those lines and was wondering, with the increase in new arrivals coming from warmer climates, there were local organizations that are already doing clothing drives for for warm clothes, boots, hats, scarves, mittens, clothes, and if you know of any, we potentially partner with them and set aside some some donations for

    for that demographic.

    Yeah, I did. I feel like I saw something recently a partnership. From a I want to say it was mana Detroit and Freedom House maybe working together on that or maybe it was southwest Detroit Business Association. Someone was working with Freedom House on a clothing drive. So we'll get we'll track down the details and then we can share it with the group. Does anyone else have any clothing drives coming up? Especially with winter coming?

    Yes. Because you have to speak. We have ICD also we do we did. Clothes I mean when to arrive early in September. But we still have some items though. Those who need can contact us too. We have children jackets, up to high school. We have school supplies. We have a winter kit. Which is like a hat gloves you know, Scar sock so that plus we have the hygiene kits available.

    Great. Thank you for that. Okay, good. To know that's happening in ICD. Thanks Sufian. Anyone else? General updates or anything about clothing drives?

    In general like the updates, Thank you Christine for mentioning the the newcomer rental subsidy program. Yes, we had a info session today that was very well received with a demo on how to fill out the application and the second one is coming up on Monday, the 13th at 2pm. I can share that information with you and you can share with all or I can put it in the chat

    let's say definitely put it in the chat now and then we can also make sure it gets notes and gets out to all members.

    Okay, and also, Kim was on the call on the phone but she could not unmute but she messaged me to let you know that she will send a flyer for the food pantry and there is a thing is Thanksgiving special one coming up too. So

    Okay, wonderful. Great. Yeah. Anyone else have any other updates to share with the group?

    Christine's Alright, it's fun. I don't know. If you mentioned it and perfil Hang on. For ya answer full. But I don't know if you mentioned the immigration one on one training that you and the IDF officers calls in for City of Detroit employees. But I just wanted to highlight that. Yes, we

    did mention that in the external affairs update. So we're very excited about that. And I saw your messages today. So thanks for helping spread the word to the other city departments and to your colleagues. We're looking forward to it. It's been a long time coming. We've talked about it for several years. So very excited.

    Yeah.

    Any other questions? Dates songs on the iPhone. Is that Kim maybe?

    Hello, hear me? Oh, sorry. This was Kim. Yes, this was Kim Sorry, I had to hop on and off for travel. But I am here and I couldn't unmute earlier. So thank you for the shout out about the turkey and food distribution. I'll send a flyer for that. Great,

    wonderful. Thanks, Kim.

    Thank you. Sorry.

    Okay, any other final comments, questions or updates?

    Yes, I have a question.

    Yes, go ahead.

    And can you state your name and organization?

    I don't have organization I'm all Detroit citizen.

    Okay, go ahead. Okay.

    My question is, how many migrants have came to the city of Detroit this this year, and also what has been done, so that the city of Detroit will end up like Chicago

    as well. It's a difficult question to answer. There isn't one centralized place where newcomers check in or connect with so. So we just know from hearing from our taskforce members, what organizations are seeing. And so as we talked about earlier, you may have heard some of this. We do know that the organizations that serve immigrants and refugees are seeing increased numbers but we don't have a hard and fast number of all the new arrivals to the city. There's no centralized tracking for that, and that's with good reason to protect folks civil rights. So that said, there are a number of folks who come to the city as refugees and the refugee resettlement agencies do have numbers for for that shift lOn. I don't know if you have the latest numbers there or Carmen from Office of Global Michigan. i We don't as a task force. We don't get those numbers directly on a regular basis. But generally, there's about 36,000 immigrants total in the city of Detroit.

    And so I'm not speaking about the immigrants that's that's been here. I'm speaking about the new ones this that's coming.

    Yeah, I heard your question. Unfortunately, we don't have. We don't have a centralized

    I don't think is fear. That's what's going on in this country. Bringing in all these people, but you neglect their citizens.

    Well, I we definitely support making sure that all Detroit residents have the services and resources that's needed to thrive so that is definitely something that many of our organizations, I think, work collectively on serving not just immigrants and refugees but funtime Detroit residents as well. But I will say so. So this taskforce is dedicated to this is the Detroit

    then I'm done. Okay. days ago no, it was a thing it was no days ago. There was supposed to be a reparations task force meeting at the last minute. They canceled it. Right? They keep doing studies on reparations, but all I hear on this meeting is stuff getting passed for immigrants and all over this country, every immigrant that came to this country, black folks help fight for.

    Yeah, I think many of us are in the reparations Taskforce. Unfortunately, this the focus of this task.

    If, if I understand that if they back then it would have been passed. All I'm here and stuff

    emigrant

    All right cut out at the end Could your

    bass discrimination

    you're cutting in for who is that not?

    Your connection is a little shaky, so we couldn't quite hear the question there. If you want to try one last time to repeat the question

    sir, we can't hear you unfortunately.

    Discrimination.

    I heard the word discrimination but Shin sorry, we just couldn't hear

    okay, I can't I couldn't if there was a full question, but I did hear the word discrimination. So I'll just comment briefly on that. I think many of us who are our task force members and so again, the focus of this task force this is a city council authorized Task Force focused on immigration. And so the the task force members are organizations that serve immigrants and refugees in the city of Detroit. And many of our members are very attuned to matters of discrimination. So for example, I know that the organization I work at, we regularly you know, take complaints and advocate for residents of all backgrounds when their civil rights may have been violated. I know that's you know, an issue that's very near and dear to many of the members on this call making sure that discrimination is stopped in its tracks and isn't active in the city of Detroit. I will say, you know, I again, I think that many members of this taskforce support the efforts of the reparations Task Force and look forward to whatever actions come from that effort.

    All I can speak to is nothing gonna come up there's nothing gonna come up. Nothing.

    Yeah, I hear you there. I'm gonna have to direct to our council member staff. Kristen, I don't know if there's any liaison work happening with the reparations Task Force. But

    yes, if you want to just share your name and contact information, or if you're not comfortable, I could give you hours so we could follow up with your particular issue already

    went online. I didn't email them. Okay. They don't email back as far as the reparations the meeting. At the last minute, I know that

    they're going through restructuring. And so Council President, as you know, is leading that task force and she would say that you know, the committee

    I'm not in it. I'm not in this meeting for reparations. I'm in this meeting, to ask questions about resources,

    right to the particular resources that your

    I also resources I'm seeing as people come across the border and get free stuff. Okay. And the citizens, the citizens are paying for

    this. This is a conversation that we could actually have offline because I know that we do have an agenda that we're trying to get through. It's getting close to the end of this meeting. So if you want to have a conversation more at length, we could do that as a sidebar, just to respect everybody's time. Yep. Okay. So if you want to email me, you could actually email our council member gabriela@detroit.gov Yep. And our number is 313-224-2450. Thank you. Thank you.

    Well, thank you for joining us, sir today. Appreciate your joining us and learning more about the work that we do. Are there any other comments or questions or updates from members? Before this is our last quarterly update quarterly meeting of the year, so we'll be working to schedule new meetings in the new year but we don't have that scheduled just yet.

    Okay, well Hearing no more updates from members. I want to thank everyone for staying with us till the end here. Really appreciate it. Stay tuned for all those updates on the items that we talked about today. And look forward to working with you in the new year as well. If I don't see you before then. Thanks for all of your hard work and what you're doing for all Detroiters. So thank you appreciate it.

    Great job, Chris. And thank you so much. Thanks, McDonough.

    Thank you for seeing it all. Thank you

    we're gonna need to recreate a new link. So I don't know who it was. They didn't identify themselves.