Reader comments
Board set up to aid refugees

Few people realize the drain this is on the tax payers of Utah ! Few realize the magnitude unless you work in the healthcare profession as I do.

Is this the role of government or the private sector?

This is a wonderful idea!! I do think that six months is an overly aggressive goal. I am a neighbor to a family from Burundi, Africa. They arrived in America September 2007.These are wonderful people with very limited knowledge of the civilized world. In the beginning, they had no concept of what was to be kept in the fridge or what a washer or dryer are for. The parents and the 18 yr old now work, but after the housing and utilities are paid, there is less than $75.00 a month left over. Without state assisted day care and some food stamp assistance I don't know what they would. They still need to learn English and figure out how they will pay back the $9,500 used to get them here within the three year term of the loan. True self-sufficiency in six month seems difficult to achieve. You just can't cut them off from help because the clock alarm goes off. The other option is to step up training refugees receive. I hope this program will be able to do that. Each family need so much help.