Suzanne Allison

As a voting 50 year resident of NH and as a nurse who has worked in both community and public health, I urge committee members to oppose this cruel bill, HB 1706. Refugees are people who are literally fleeing for their lives. If they could be resettled in their home countries, they would. No one wants to or chooses freely to upend their lives and leave everything they have ever known and loved to go to a foreign land. Instead they go through a long and arduous vetting process and may finally get a chance to leave a refugee camp (sometimes there for a second generation!) and come to the US to try to start over. Our refugee resettlement agencies have few resources already, often relying on a network of good hearted volunteers, to find affordable housing and a few basic necessities and provide limited support for a very limited period of time. This bill would take away that pittance. Why? I ask why? If anything, these agencies need more resources not less. Pleas oppose this cruel and uneccesary bill. Thank you for the opportuinty to voice my concerns.