Syracuse Somali-Bantu community group spreads out in larger quarters

The Somali-Bantu Community Association of Onondaga County now has its own center, where it can offer more programs and better services to the refugee families who turn to it for help. So many of them have been doing that the association outgrew the space it shared with the Boys & Girls Club at the Central Village housing complex.

 

In a few years, the number of people it serves has grown from 20 to 60 clients a year to more than 200, Executive Director Abdullahi Ibrahim said.

 

When a Syracuse Housing Authority building opened up this winter, the nonprofit association and authority struck a deal on rent.

 

In February the center moved into 302 Burt St. and what has to be five times as much space as it had before, Ibrahim said.

 

The nonprofit association, with support from other organizations, uses the center as a platform to provide a wide range of free services to refugees, among them English and citizenship classes, help with paperwork, rides to appointments, and classes in basic skills they need to land a job.

 

“We are trying to bridge the gaps,” Ibrahim said.

 

Before the move, center staff and volunteers had access to one office, now they have several, plus two big open rooms for classes and a kitchen.

 

“Getting this office space has meant a lot to us. It really changed the way we are helping people,” said Haji Adan, literacy program coordinator and office manger.

 

As many as 10 people used to work out of the same single office, jockeying for computer and desk time. In the old space, Adan could work with eight to 10 people a day, now he can see 20 to 25, and in the other offices, other staff are doing the same.

 

The center survives on volunteers, donations, grants and other community support and has an annual budget of $40,00 to $60,000 mostly in in-kind services, Ibrahim said.

 

“We have a great partnership with different organizations like Syracuse University and also Syracuse City School District, Boys and Girls Club, Junior League of Syracuse,” he said, to name a few.

 

The association can use the help.

 

Refugees typically arrive in Syracuse with few resources of their own after years of life in camps, where they found shelter after violence and strife forced them from their homes. Many have had little or no chance formal education and are illiterate in their native languages.

 

On Friday morning, a dozen men and women, some with children at their sides and others middle aged, sat at two tables in front of volunteer teacher Martha Bonney to work on their new language.

 

“Are you a student?”

 

“I am a student.”

 

“Is Bhadra a student?”

 

“Yes.”

 

“Are Ambika and Bhadra students?”

 

“Yes they are students.”

 

When Omar Ahmed arrived in the U.S. in 2003, he spoke no English and could not write his own name. Now he is an outreach worker at the center, one of five part-time staff. He works full time hours to help refugees who are where he was once.

 

The center serves people from many ethnic groups and countries, Nepal, Burma, Yemen, Bhutan and more, but it was the leaders of the Somali-Bantu refugee community, Ibrahim included, who founded the association in 2004.

 

Even as they were building a life in their new country, they wanted to create an organization that would help others like them.

 

“When we grow up, while we’re young, we used to see that our leaders, they are doing the same thing we are doing right now – helping each other,” said newly chosen association president Sheikhnoor Adan. (He is not related to Haji Adan.)

 

You ask your neighbor if he has food for dinner and if he doesn’t, you share what you have, he said.

 

“We hope our kids follow us,” Adan said.

 

The majority of clients are Somali-Bantu or other Somali refugees. Syracuse Housing Authority has 217 Somali tenants from 78 families, which is why it helps support the center and its move to larger quarters, said authority resident services director Michelle Haab.

 

“We had never anticipated how quick the service part would grow,” she said.

 

After only a couple of months in the new building, Haji Adan, who was sworn in Thursday as a U.S. citizen, is looking toward the next step up for the center.

 

“The next step is to get even a bigger space than this because we are improving, we are progressing, day by day. The number of different ethnic groups that seek for help in this office is increasing daily,” he said.

 

He’d like a building with office space to accommodate staff from other ethnic groups.

syracuse.com