Latest news with #ThriveInternational
Yahoo
28-05-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
WA gives $2M towards group's effort to buy Tacoma motel for refugee housing
An organization working to assist asylum-seeking refugees will receive $2 million from the Washington State Housing Trust Fund to help purchase a permanent home in Tacoma. However, the organization still is looking to fill a multi-million dollar funding gap over the next couple of years. In September, Thrive International brought nearly 200 refugees to a Quality Inn on Tacoma's South Hosmer Street. On Sept. 24, vans and trucks brought troves of suitcases, strollers and garbage bags full of possessions into the parking lot. The refugee families previously lived in an encampment on a field next to a motel in Kent. Some of them had been living there for months, coming from as far away as Venezuela and Angola to escape economic instability, political unrest, and, for some, violence. Thrive International leased the Quality Inn to serve as temporary shelter for the families while they worked to find permanent housing solutions. Since then, the former Quality Inn has hosted more than 350 refugees and asylum seekers. The organization reported dozens of residents have successfully transitioned into permanent housing in recent months from the Hosmer location. On May 20, Thrive International announced it would receive $2 million from Washington state's budget to help complete a $10.7 million purchase and renovation of the 115-unit hotel, now called Thrive Center Tacoma, to become a permanent transitional housing site. Thrive International executive director Mark Finney told The News Tribune the organization is fund raising to close the roughly $7 million gap needed to purchase the hotel. He said even though they have secured some funding from donors, the organization still has a lot of work to do before they are able to purchase the hotel at the end of their three-year lease. Finney said the hotel will cost roughly $9.8 million to purchase, with an additional $900,000 needed to maintain and renovate the building. During a Jan. 16 House Capitol Budget Committee hearing, Jim CastroLang, director of policy and advocacy for Thrive International, requested $2.1 million from the legislature to purchase and 'stabilize' the Tacoma Thrive Center. 'Our Thrive Center model in hotel-type spaces is the lowest cost, highest impact way to support refugees from surviving to thriving,' he told the committee. At the beginning of 2025, CastroLang said a transitional housing site in Spokane assisted 965 residents into permanent housing since it opened in 2022. Along with providing a safe place for refugee and asylum-seeking families to stay, Thrive International provides wrap-around services. It hosts clinics with lawyers to advise families through the immigration process. Local hospitals provide vaccination clinics. It helps parents build resumes and apply for jobs. Local school districts like Clover Park and Franklin Pierce send buses to transport children staying at the hotel to school. In January, Finney told The News Tribune his organization wants to establish a 'pipeline' for those fleeing their countries for a better life here. Thrive International reported an average stay of six to nine months under the hotel model used in Tacoma and Spokane. Finney told The News Tribune it usually takes a few months before families start to gain momentum. Since the families arrived at Thrive Center Tacoma, the former hotel has hosted more than a dozen weddings, and several babies have been born. 'The people living here are not just passing through — they're becoming part of the fabric of this neighborhood,' said Anna Bondarenko, Director of Thrive Center Tacoma, wrote in a statement. 'We've seen a sense of belonging emerge, not just inside Thrive, but across Hosmer.'
Yahoo
19-03-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Ukrainian refugees in Spokane want to stay in America. Baumgartner promised to plead their case to Trump
Mar. 18—About 60 Ukrainian refugees sat in rapt attention asking their congressman a simple question: "Can we stay?" Republican Michael Baumgartner was not able to give them a simple response. "I hope so," he told them through an interpreter. The meeting was held Tuesday night at nonprofit Thrive International, where many refugees are staying. Many of the Spokane-based Ukrainians who fled their country amid war have their temporary status running out in mere months. They said the renewal process is frozen, and President Donald Trump has threatened to remove temporary protective status to Ukrainians. As their parents pleaded for their continued legal status, many young children played loudly in a nearby room. Baumgartner promised to plead their case to Trump and anyone who might have the president's ear. "I speak for all of us in eastern Washington. We are pleased that you are here. We want you to be safe. We hope you get to stay and continue to build your families and build this community," Baumgartner said. "When I communicate to the president and to the administration about your situation, this was what I will be advocating for. Your stories that you shared today about your families and your situation and what you're trying to do, and that you're hard workers following the law." Baumgartner called on Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy to resign last month following the leader's tense meeting with Trump over ongoing military aid for the nation, but the congressman said Tuesday he hopes the two governments can cooperate. "The two countries will grow closer together through this process," he said. The congressman promised to return and meet with the refugees again. But he also warned that his influence as a freshman congressman only went so far, and he could not guarantee their protection. Earlier this month, Reuters reported — citing four unnamed sources, including one Trump administration official — that the president was planning to revoke legal status and make the Ukrainians subject to deportation. The White House later disputed this claim. Eighteen-year-old refugee Tymofii Shamota said after the event the congressman's words "gave him hope." "He gave me hope that I can be the person I want to be in America," Shamota said. "At least I hope that we can stay in here for a longer term. And maybe — just maybe stay here forever. It is crucial for us to stay here, because we have nowhere to go." His family has been fleeing from place to place since conflict initially broke out in 2014. They lived in the far east portion of Ukraine that has been in conflict with Russia then. Shamota's mother spoke out publicly against Russian's annexation of Crimea, and the family fled to Kyiv. While they lived near Kyiv until 2022, the family faced discrimination from many other Ukrainians who suspected those from their providence could have Russian sympathies, he said. When Russia invaded western Ukraine in 2022, the family was trapped in their home for three weeks by Russian forces until they were able escape to Poland. Shamota and his parents have been in the United States for a little under a year. There is a discrepancy in their immigration paperwork, so they are unsure if they will be able to stay through 2026 or be forced to leave sooner. It was a common story for the refugees at the meeting. Kristina Skadorsk said her temporary protective status was set to expire in May and reapplications through the program are currently frozen. Baumgartner told the refugees that their status was complicated by the United States' overwhelmed immigration system. He claimed federal agents were having difficulty distinguishing between legitimate refugees and criminals because of Washington state's sanctuary state status, which prevents local law enforcement from working with ICE. "If (Washington state) were communicating and following the federal law, who should be the law on this issue, then they could focus on the truly most dangerous people, but instead, they have to cast a wider net in the communities and more just normal people are getting caught up," he said. Thrive International director Mark Finney said the refugees he works with are living with a "tremendous amount of uncertainty" and thanked the congressman for meeting with them directly. "I think it's really significant that the Congressman came down here and was willing to go in front of the cameras and assert his support for the Ukrainian refugee community. I think that's really an important message right now. When we're not hearing a consistent message across the federal government, it's very important that our representative speaks out loud and clear about the government's belief, or at least his personal belief, in the value of those folks who are here right now," he said after the meeting.
