Leader Bringing Syrian Refugees To Dallas Speaks
Follow CBSDFW.COM: Facebook | Twitter
DALLAS (CBSDFW.COM) - For the past two weeks, leaders of the Dallas refugee assistance agency tied to Syrian refugees said little.
Requests for television news interviews were declined. Word had spread throughout the NE Dallas Vickery Meadow neighborhood in late October and early November of preparations for housing of families fleeing the terror of civil war in Syria.
Countries in Europe were being overwhelmed by the influx of desperate Syrians. National newscasts showed footage of children drowned after overcrowded boats sunk. The U.S. government announced plans to accept thousands of Syrian refugees.
"We have a 40 year history of helping," Daley Ryan recounted, while sitting in his Upper Greenville Avenue office.
Ryan is Deputy Director for International Rescue Committee in Dallas.
IRC Dallas set in motion a plan to accept a family waiting for two years to resettle in America. The family of six is in Dallas now. But IRC Dallas did not anticipate a wave of opposition against the family's Texas resettlement.
Gov. Greg Abbott issued a letter to President Obama, and the state filed a lawsuit aimed at putting a halt on Syrian resettlements in the state. The actions were taken after terrorists attacked and killed dozens in Paris.
Despite the Governor's actions, Wednesday, Ryan confirmed the IRC plan to follow the directive of the Obama Administration , and continue Dallas resettlement of refugees from Syria.
"They're fleeing terror themselves," Ryan said. "They're afraid of the same thing you, I or any American are, and that's why they're here."
Ryan said despite voiced concerns of terrorists slipping through the refugee system, Texas residents need to understand the extensive screening process taken.
"Syrian refugees are the most vetted people in the country, bar none. There is no more secure , more reviewed, more checked way to enter the U.S. than as a refugee," he said.
Yearly, 600-800 refugees are resettled in the Dallas area by IRC. Families from Iraq, Burma, Afghanistan, Bhutan and other war-torn nations now populate apartment complexes that line theForest-Audelia and Fair Oaks sections of NE Dallas.
The family is six from Syria still has other relatives in camps in Jordan. IRC Dallas is willing to help them, too.
(©2015 CBS Local Media, a division of CBS Radio Inc. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.)
