Eight-hundred-forty refugees are expected to come to Maine in the fiscal year 2024, according to the Office of Maine Refugee Services.
That’s double the number from 2023 when the state received almost 420 refugees. Refugee service groups say they’re scrambling to prepare as best as they can.
Rilwan Osman, the executive director of the Maine Immigrant and Refugee Services in Lewiston, says this is what his group is all about: welcoming refugees with open arms.
“We’re prepared to welcome new refugees into our state,” Osman said.
Three resettlement groups are splitting the incoming refugees. Catholic Charities of Maine in Portland will take about 500. The Jewish Community Alliance in Portland will take about 140.
Osman said Maine Immigrant and Refugee Services will get around 200 refugees.
“It’s not going to be easy,” Bonnie Titcomb Lewis, Maine Immigrant and Refugee Services’ director of housing said. “We have families of eight, families of nine.”
With more refugees they’ll need more housing, she said.
The organization is scrambling to connect with more landlords, but if they don’t have enough housing available, Titcomb Lewis said refugees will be put in hotels.
“Every night that you have a family in a hotel, we have to be accountable for that cost,” Titcomb Lewis said.
Titcomb Lewis said the organization will need more volunteers to help pick up refugees from the airport and connect them with housing and jobs.
They’ll also need more donations to help refugees furnish apartments.
“There’s a list we have to go by. We can’t leave out that fire extinguisher. You have to have smoke alarms. You have to have clean bedding and new pillows,” Titcomb Lewis said.
Refugee service organizations say Maine is getting among the smallest number of refugees compared to other states, though Maine also has one of the smallest state populations.