Norman Nakamura, state coordinator for Refugee Resettlement for the Utah Department of Workforce Services, "is doing a good job, but he doesn't represent the health department, the school districts and so on. Nobody has overall oversight," Mangum adds.

The refugees did not ask to come to Utah; instead we invited them to come, Geo-JaJa says. That's why "we have a moral and social obligation to them," he says. Other cities and states, most notably Chicago, Pennsylvania and Texas, are doing a better job of integrating refugees, he says.

Geo-JaJa and Mangum have been participating in the refugee working group convened by Gov. Jon Huntsman Jr. and Salt Lake County Mayor Peter Corroon, and have shared their recommendations with the group, as well as with every member of the Legislature. "I would say we're probably on the same page," says the mayor's diversity affairs specialist, Rebecca Sanchez, about the ideas presented in the study. The working group's recommendations are expected to be ready in several months.

Dignity and cultural sensitivity need to be part of the solution , says Geo-JaJa. And refugees need to be "active participants in the process of resettlement."

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E-mail: jarvik@desnews.com