IMMIGRANT

INTEGRATION SERVICESIntegration Viewed from an EconomicDevelopment LensAs noted in the introduction, immigrant economic development work is a rapidly emerging field with more thana dozen independent regional programs and initiatives having launched in the past half decade. These localinitiatives have brought a wealth of new partners to the field of immigration —economic development practitioners,chambers of commerce, corporate leaders, universities, and even community and economic development armsof philanthropy—which are developing new regional economic development programs to tap into the regionaleconomic opportunities created by immigrants.While most of the programs developed by these initiatives focus on traditional economic development strategiescovered in other chapters of this guide, many of these initiatives also have sought to improve regional integrationof immigrants and receiving communities. Their work in no way supplants the decades of research, insight, andlearning in traditional immigrant integration community. Rather economic development has emerged as a newon-ramp and a new lens from which to consider the imperatives for and approaches to immigrant integration.A growing number of locally-led efforts are now using an economic development perspective.Private NonprofitIntegration NetworksFor over a century, U.S. nonprofit institutions (including many international institutes) have been built to helpintegrate immigrants and refugees to the fabric of the nation by teaching English, providing legal services,preparing residents for the citizenship exam, providing job training, and performing a myriad of other integrationtasks. The federal government has provided funding for some of these organizations through the Office of RefugeeResettlement and its programs, as well as modest support for citizenship and adult education funding for Englishclasses, that have been fairly modest in scope. In April 2015, TheWhite House’s Task Force for New Americans created a federalstrategic action plan on immigrant and refugee integration. Taskforce recommendations focus on building welcoming communitiesand strengthening civic, linguistic and economic integration. Thishas the potential to help usher in a new era of greater federal supportof local integration efforts.WELCOMING AMERICA | GUIDE TO IMMIGRANT ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT | CHAPTER 1487A growing number of locally-ledefforts are now using an economicdevelopment perspective.As economic development initiatives focused on immigrants have sought to make their region more welcoming toimmigrants and refugees, many have contributed to the region’s integration infrastructure. Nonprofit-led immigranteconomic development initiatives have largely focused their integration efforts on three areas: (1) development ofguides to assist immigrants and those serving immigrants to navigate the array of integration services; (2) case managingimmigrants through the array of integration services; and (3) fostering relationships with volunteer connectors,cultural ambassadors, and/or mentors to build relationships with more established community members.A. Integration Services GuidesSeveral immigrant economic development programs have developed online guides or searchable databases toconnect newcomers to integration services providers that can meet the vast array of service needs that newcomersmay have. These online guides serve the needs of working-class immigrants, refugees, business and professionalimmigrant workers, international students, as well as the needs of their spouses and other family members. Theseonline integration services guides are a relevant advent in integration services, as traditionally most metros have notdeveloped comprehensive networks of integration service providers or any form of local inventory of their services.Immigrant economic development agencies have been developed in an age where developing the online tools tomake searching for integration services are relatively easy to develop.