LDS Church operations offer fresh start, job training for refugees in Utah

Marcilina Lodongi spends her days in the cavernous LDS Humanitarian Center in Salt Lake City sorting 5,000 pounds of used dresses, shorts, pants, sheets, bras and sweatpants, camouflage gear, tablecloths, ski pants, bikinis and other assorted discards into 10 giant barrels.
    The Sudanese refugee scrutinizes each item, searching for stains, missing buttons, tears or other imperfections that would relegate it to the unacceptable -- "wipers" -- category. She peers at the brown labels on pockets to divide Levis and Lucky jeans from the other denim pants, having been taught that thieves often hold up humanitarian shipments looking for the expensive and coveted brands.
    Even with all the demands on her, Lodongi is one of the center's fastest sorters, knowing that every second of delay is money from her pocket. Workers who can only get through 4,333 pounds a day make $6.55 an hour. Those who reach 6,000 pounds can earn up to $9 an hour.
    The center's back-breaking work is a far cry from Lodongi's dream job as a nurse, but the 30-year-old woman isn't complaining. It is, after all, better than living in the brutality of her African homeland, which is locked in a decades-old civil war. She joins hundreds of others from more than 24 countries doing menial labor at the center, the first American job for waves of newcomers to Utah.
    Refugees resettled in America must agree to take the first job they're offered, regardless of their previous qualifications, if they hope to receive governmental assistance. Federal law explicitly dictates that "employable refugees should be placed on jobs as soon as possible after their arrival," according to "Struggling at the Golden Door: International Refugees in Utah," a report by Macleans A. Gero-JaJa and Garth L. Mangum.
    The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints LDS Church employs most refugees initially, the report says. The newcomers work at Deseret Industries, stores that collect and sell donated clothing, furniture, books, and other items; a manufacturing center that produces some of those items; and the Salt Lake humanitarian center, which sorts, packages and prepares items that don't sell at D.I. for shipment to needy parts of the world.
    The church has been involved in welfare services since 1938, when the first D.I. was built, says Bill Reynolds, the center's director. The mandate was threefold: to help the poor and needy, foster self- reliance and encourage giving and service.
    The D.I. training program, expanded in 2006, "is a bull's eye on two of those objectives," Reynolds says.
    More than half of workers at the D.I. and the humanitarian center are refugees. Some, like Lodongi, sort clothes. Others are stationed at the receiving dock or fill hygiene kits, while still others price merchandise, work the cash registers or do janitorial work for Deseret Industries. Those with no English skills at all sort shoes into color-coded piles.
    None of these workers gets health or retirement benefits, but they are enrolled in English classes, taught interview skills, customer service and how to navigate from their homes to work on city buses. They also get free off-site training in a field of their choice, whether it be electrical engineering, truck driving or hair styling.
    "We don't want them to think of this as their job," Reynolds says. "It's a paid training program, just a stepping stone to something better. Our goal is permanent job placement within a year."
    At the first meeting with a refugee, a job coach assesses the person's work and language skills, then assigns them to one of the classes that meets four days a week. The center also enlists the help of full-time "missionaries," typically senior couples who work as church volunteers for 18 months to three years.
    "Some refugees must have tutors before they can go to the first class," says Wendy Millet, a supervisor at the center. "We teach them simple words, what we call, 'survival English.' "
      Millet directs them to the work and grooming rules posted on a white board: Have nice clean clothes, shower, brush teeth, look your best, no children, no cell phones, smell good, no gum. Few of them know how to open a checking account or operate a stove or a washing machine.
    "Sometimes they bring their lunches in steel containers, then put them in the microwave," Millet says. "We lost a lot of microwaves that way."
    Lodongi is surrounded at the center by other refugees with similar stories and lofty aspirations. They have developed a pleasing camaraderie and mutual support team as they sort and study together.
    Eh Say Patow, 29, originally from Burma (now Myanmar), hopes to be a teacher. She lived in a Thai refugee camp for 21 years. Catholic Community Services provided furniture, rent and food stamps for three months, she said through an interpreter, while Mormon volunteers helped her "how to be friendly and fit in with the culture."
    Her life is good in America, Patow says. "I like everything except pizza."
    Maun Myo Mye, Patow's translator, a 21 year old Burmese man, who was born and raised in a Thai refugee camp until he was 19. He has been living in Utah for a little more than a year. He's studying math, English and geography at Salt Lake Community College and hopes to return to Myanmar to work as a businessman.
    Despite language and cultural differences, Lodongi relates easily to her Burmese and other African counterparts.
    She escaped the hostilities in Sudan with her family at 22, arriving in Egypt where she trained to be an operating room nurse. A few years ago, she moved to Canada where she married another Sudanese refugee. Last year, the couple came to the United States.
    Without money, job experience or English, though, Lodongi had little hope of being a nurse. The International Rescue Committee helped the couple get an apartment and paid the first month's rent and then directed her to the center, which immediately hired her.
    Now she works long days sorting clothes, studying English and computers, and caring for her 18-month old son. She hopes to be fluent enough soon to resume her nursing studies. Until then, the Humanitarian Center is like a mini-United Nations, where she has friends from every conceivable country, a chance to be an example to newcomers and coaches always ready to show her the way.
    "I like to do this job," Lodongi says. "I like to help people."

    Peggy Fletcher Stack writes about religion and spirituality. Contact her at pstack@sltrib.com or 801-257-8725.
   
   
    Refugees and religion
    The one thing the LDS Church-owned Humanitarian Center does not do is proselytize. The staff is forbidden to give out copies of the Book of Mormon or can only answer questions about their LDS faith if refugees ask.
    "We don't track how many join the church," director Bill Reynolds says.
    The center hosts a weekly devotional for the staff and workers that includes a "spiritual thought," prayer and song. Muslims, Buddhists, and Christians all participate, he says. "We have a fair number of Muslims. We allow them prayer time throughout the day."
    -- Peggy Fletcher Stack