Dear APA Resettlement Partners-
Standing Weekly APA Call
USCCB is looking forward to our first weekly standing APA call this afternoon at 2pm EST. If you have not yet registered, please do so here.
Handling APA Case Placements/Assurances:
As you know, there currently is no interface between the Hummingbird APA case allocations platform and MRIS. In the absence of an interface, USCCB is creating a new process for informing affiliates of APA case placements through a dedicated, secure OneDrive folder that each affiliate and community partner can access. Beginning yesterday, all affiliate staff you indicated should have access to APA case placement information will receive an email from the APA_processing@usccb.org mailbox sharing your agency’s APA OneDrive folder. The OneDrive folder will include two spreadsheets and each spreadsheet will contain a separate tab for each day of the week. The spreadsheets are as follows:
-
USCCB Biodata (Assurance Received) – this spreadsheet will contain a list of all APA cases/individuals that have been assured by your agency. The report is cumulative and will grow as you continue verifying case placements. The report will be updated and shared on a daily basis and will be stored in the appropriate date tab in the spreadsheet.
-
USCCB Biodata (Selected by RA, Not Assured) – this spreadsheet will contain a list of all APA cases that have been placed with your agency and are pending your verification. The most current information will be saved to the current date tab in the spreadsheet. If there are no case placements for your agency to verify on a particular date, the spreadsheet in the relevant date tab will be blank. Each daily tab will be cumulative, meaning if we have placed several cases with your agency over a few days and your agency has not verified the cases, the current tab will reflect all case placements requiring verification.
USCCB requests that affiliate staff designate at least one person to check for case placements in the appropriate date tab of the USCCB Biodata (Selected by RA, Not Assured) spreadsheet on a daily basis. We anticipate uploading case verifications by 2pm EST each day, so you should have access to your most recent case placements by each afternoon. After reviewing all case placements pending verification in the current date tab, we request that affiliates send an email to USCCB’s shared mailbox APA_processing@usccb.org at your earliest possible convenience, ideally within 24 hours, indicating your decision. If you are only accepting some cases and not others, please clearly state the case numbers of the cases you are either accepting or rejecting (case number format is HB-123456). If you are accepting all case placements, it is not necessary to include all case numbers, however, please reference the specific date tab (eg. “Catholic Charities Arlington can accept all case placements in the Sept 13 tab”). By specifying the date, we hope to avoid erroneously assuring cases in the subsequent day’s date tab.
Action Item: APA City Powerpoint Slides
PRM is taking a multifaceted approach to diversifying the final destinations of APA arrivals. One approach is a marketing campaign aimed at Afghan arrivals currently at military forts. In the campaign, USCCB is joining with other resettlement networks and CORE to highlight all the wonderful cities participating in the APA Program and the vibrant culture and opportunities that exist throughout the US.
Each resettlement provider should produce 3 PowerPoint slides describing their community, using this template as a guide. In areas where there is more than one resettlement program in a location, agencies should work together to produce these slides. The slides should be pictorial with simple yet informative information in English, translated into Dari and Pashto on the same slide. Images used in the slides must be original and appropriate attribution must be documented (see guidance here). In addition, any identifiable humans in the images must sign the IRC Consent Form.
The idea is that the slides will be compiled and played on a loop on TVs at each military installation as well as on CORE’s new Afghan Facebook page at: Settle In Facebook
If you are the only resettlement provider in your service area, send your completed slide deck directly to COResourceExchange@rescue.org with the subject heading: Welcoming Slides for [city name].
If you have multiple providers in your city, please work together to complete the slide deck and send them to COResourceExchange@rescue.org with the subject heading: Welcoming Slides for [city name].
CORE has requested that these slides are submitted by Friday 9/17. If translation into Dari and Pashto are not available to you in that time frame, you may keep your slides pictorial. USCCB recognizes that this request is an incredibly quick turnaround at a time when you are very busy and appreciates whatever effort you can direct towards this initiative.
In solidarity,
Rachel Pollock, MSW
Director, Resettlement Services
USCCB | Migration and Refugee Services
