Speech #870253153

Recommendation 5 called for the Department to make better known its policies on public assistance to resettled Cubans and a provision that such assistance would be based on the standards of the new communitybut in any case no lower than that provided at Miami. Fla. Here the Department has done an outstanding job and less than 2 percent of the resettled refugees have needed further cash assistance. A recent change in policy has been adopted whereby all persons on the public assistance rolls who are being resettled are given an additional 1 month assistance payment. This payment is designed to encourage resettlement through assuring a small amount of assets to the relocatee and at the same time relieving the sponsor of some of the costs related to relocation. The sixth recommendation of the committee called for extension of public assistance to Cuban refugees anywhere in the United States. whether they got there by way of resettlement or not. Both the Department and the voluntary agencies have agreed that this idea would be unnecessary and unwise since it could have a tendency to encourage aimless. fruitless wandering of the refugees. Further. it is felt that such a policy would upset one of the basic objectives of the resettlement programnamely. to relocate persons in such a way that they are selfsupporting. primarily through employment. The present systemwhich provides public assistance to registered refugees in need anywhere in Florida. insures the participation and the continuing assistance of the voluntary agencies. and their countless local counterparts in churches and nonsectarian service organizations. in finding homes and jobs and in easing the adjustment to new locations. Recommendation 7 called for the recruitment of additional social workerspreferably Cuban refugeesto "permit closer supervision of the program of public assistance to prevent abuse" and to provide social services. Since November of 1961. the Department has. on three separate occasions. authorized staff increases for the State department of public welfare. The committee. in its eighth recommendation asked for the establishment of a second refugee center. away from Miami. if the resettlement figure did not equal new arrivals by May 1. 1962. The Department made a thorough study of this recommendation utilizing New Orleans as the theoretical site of a new center. It was determined that such a site would not be advisable on a number of grounds: the cost would run into the millions without any substantial additional benefits to the refugees or to the community. it would not produce additional resettlements and might actually produce fewer. legal considerations would make the bypassing of Miami difficult if not impossible. compulsory bypassing of Miami for a second center. even if it were possible. would entail a lessening of the humaneness with which the program has been handled. The ninth recommendation called for assurances to those being resettled that their return to Cuba will be "facilitated" upon the establishment of a free and democratic government in Cuba. This assurance has been given. in Spanish and in English. by the Department and by the voluntary agencies with the substantial growth of a willingness to relocate. In the 10th recommendation. the committee stated that a program of resettlement to Latin American countries should be encouraged. In this light. to date. resettlements have been effected by the Department in 23 countries in Central and South America and Europe. The 11th recommendation urged an amendment to the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1952 which would permit refugees accepting resettlement abroad to be assured that they could gain readmission to the United States should their situation overseas not work out. Here the initiative on legislative changes lies with the Department of Justicehowever. the Department of HEW has worked out a procedure. within the present legal requirements. which facilitates but does not assure reentry into the United States. Since the Cuban refugee center first opened in Miami in February of 1961. over 124.000 Cubans have registered. Over 32.000 of these homeless people have been resettled on a program that has seen the resettlement rate increase from 252 persons per week in June of 1961 to an average of 864 persons per week in June of 1962. Cubans continue to flee Communist Cuba and arrive in Miami at the rate of some 1.600 to 1.700 per week. In the face of this tremendous problem. the performance of the citizens of south Florida and the actions of the Department of Health. Education. and Welfare in the management of the Cuban refugee program are. to borrow words from the conclusion of the committees report. "in keeping with our democratic and humanitarian traditions."