Massachusetts Immigration and Refugee Advocacy Coalition It’s Time for Legislators to Deliver for Immigrants! In Washington and on Beacon Hill, it’s time for our representatives and legislative allies to show their commitment to immigrants and to people of color.  Both Congress and the Massachusetts legislature are now considering legislation that would change and uplift the lives of immigrants everywhere: Congress allocated $100 billion toward immigration in the current reconciliation bill. Our legislators must use this opportunity to create a path to citizenship for our undocumented communities. Legislators are debating options that would only provide temporary work permits and protection from deportation through parole. But MIRA supports a proposed path to citizenship through the “registry” process, which granted green cards to millions of immigrants without status in the 1980s and could be extended again.Here in Massachusetts, Haitian frontline organizations are hopeful that the state Senate will allocate ARPA funds for resettlement assistance to the hundreds of Haitian families that have arrived in Massachusetts in recent weeks.Lawmakers also have the opportunity to pass the hugely popular Work and Family Mobility Act, which would allow all qualified state residents to apply for a standard driver’s license, regardless of immigrant status.The Safe Communities Act is still pending before state lawmakers. It’s a critical bill that would allow immigrants and their families to safely access police and court protection, as well as medical care, without fear of deportation. Finally, state lawmakers have a once-in-a-decade chance to correct decades of gerrymandering on the South Coast by ensuring that proposed Congressional district maps unify the New Bedford and Fall River into a single district that builds the power of immigrant and working-class communities. All these initiatives require political will and bravery. It’s time for legislators to take action. Immigrants can’t wait!   – Get Involved! – Support the Pathway to Citizenship! We’ve created an action that makes it simple and easy for you to let members of Congress know how important doing the right thing for our immigrant communities is, and to urge them to do everything they can to ensure that the final reconciliation bill includes a pathway to citizenship for as many of our community members as possible. Join Today! Help Us Make Safe Communities a Reality! Help protect immigrants here in Massachusetts – Sign the Safe Communities Coalition petition today! Passing the Safe Communities Act will communicate loud and clear that in Massachusetts, everyone can seek help, protections and treatment without fear of deportation. This is a message that immigrant communities desperately need to hear. You can also join us on November 18th for a Safe Communities Act Virtual Town Hall at 3:30PM! The event will feature immigrant workers, immigrant survivors of domestic violence, and advocates talking about why the passage of the Safe Communities Act is essential and what you can do to take action. Interpretation will be provided.   Sign up at bit.ly/scath21. Get Involved With Redistricting! The Redistricting Committee Co-Chairs released their draft maps for Congress and Governor’s Council this week. While the Congressional map adopts Drawing Democracy’s recommendation to make Fall River whole, it fails to unite the immigrant communities of Fall River and New Bedford in the same district. You can make your voice heard and ask the Committee to unite Fall River and New Bedford by testifying at the public hearing on Tuesday, November 9th at 11 am, submitting written comments through the 9th, and/or emailing your legislators.  – Announcements – Congratulations to MIRA Board Member Mossik Hacobian, who was honored at the Thompson Island Outward Bound’s Evening Expedition Gala with the North Star Award for his service in Boston and on behalf of immigrants around the Commonwealth.   Mossik has served as Executive Director of Higher Ground Boston, a non-profit organization focused on bringing resources and services to Boston’s most challenged neighborhoods, for more than 10 years.   – News – – Associated Press: Massachusetts lawmakers release congressional district map – Boston Globe: Michelle Wu wins historic Boston mayor’s race, marking a new era for the city  Immigrant groups coalition demands Michelle Wu ‘engage Boston’s Black and brown immigrant communities with the respect they deserve’    MIRA Member Spotlight – Each week, we’ll be using this space to spotlight our outstanding MIRA members and the work they do for their communities. This week, we’re highlighting Casa Myrna!   Casa Myrna is Boston’s largest provider of shelter and supportive services to survivors of domestic violence, providing safety, resources, advocacy and information since 1977. Casa Myrna was founded in 1977 by neighborhood activists in Boston’s South End to provide a safe haven for women and their children who were being abused by their husbands and partners. The organization was named for Myrna Vázquez, an actress and activist who organized members of South End’s Puerto Rican community around housing, education and civil rights.  Each year, Casa Myrna serves over 1,600 survivors through three residential programs, housing assistance and advocacy, financial literacy education and job readiness, individual and group counseling, legal advocacy and representation, children’s services, and community-based advocacy. Thank You! Don’t forget to follow us on Social Media!Donate to MIRA Today!Want to change how you receive these emails?You can update your preferences or unsubscribe from this list.

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Tackling Vaccine Hesitancy In Massachusetts, One Conversation At A Time06:29

The blue bus stands out on this narrow street running through a neighborhood of subsidized housing in Revere. If you miss the banner announcing “Vaccine Information” or the mounted TV scrolling through vaccine FAQs or the table stocked with masks and hand sanitizer, maybe this announcement will catch your attention.

“Good afternoon neighbors, we are here with the City of Revere and Mass General Brigham distributing the free food boxes.”

04:00Mar 18, 2021

As you pick up a box, someone from Massachusetts General Hospital is there to help and strike up a conversation. How are you and your family doing? Have you been touched by COVID? Have you thought about getting the vaccine?

This is vaccine outreach as the state and nation race to stop the spread of the coronavirus and mutations that could trigger another surge, restrictions and more deaths. At least one national poll shows growing interest in the vaccines with Blacks exceeding whites. Thirty-seven percent of Latino respondents still say they don’t plan to get vaccinated.

When can I get a vaccine? Is it safe? What are the side effects? Get this info & more in your inbox each week. Sign up now.

Massachusetts has funded a vaccine campaign that will focus on 20 communities with the highest rates, but some hospitals, health centers, churches and other groups are already out — looking for residents who are hesitant, and encouraging them to talk about why with people they trust, in places where they are comfortable.

In Revere, a woman in an orange Ford Fiesta pulls up next to the blue Mass General Brigham van. Someone slides a box of produce and dried goods onto her back seat then asks if she has any questions about the vaccines. Nope, she’s on board, just waiting her turn for a shot.

Khadija Sona, who stops to pick up a box of food, says she doesn’t want a COVID vaccine.

“If I have to do it, I will do it to work or go to my country, Morocco,” Sona says, “but I would rather not.”

Sona says she’s heard the vaccine is not healthy. She doesn’t want to elaborate. A nurse steps over to talk about why some people feel sick after getting the vaccine; it’s because their body is building immunity to the coronavirus. Haroon Sidiqi has heard similar concerns about side effects from hesitant co-workers but says he trusts the vaccines.

“We live in the best country on the planet,” he says. “This country will not give something to their own people if it’s not safe enough.”

Dr. Joseph Betancourt, the senior vice president for equity and community health at Mass. General, has been out with the van, talking to residents in Chelsea and Revere.

“We’ve had a lot of conversations with people, and here’s the stereotype breaker,” he says. “In many communities we’ve been in, people are actually very eager to get the vaccine. The questions we’re getting are more about where can I get it, when is my turn.”

Vaccination rates are slightly lower in Revere compared to the state as a whole. As of last week, 9% of Revere residents were fully vaccinated, compared to 12% statewide. Among white residents of Revere, 13% are fully vaccinated. The rate for Black residents is 8% and for Latinx residents it’s 3%.

Betancourt says that lower vaccination rates in some hotspot communities are less about hesitancy and more about the lack of easy access to a vaccine. There are two pharmacies that offer vaccines in Revere. Beth Israel Lahey Health has a clinic for patients in that system, and there’s a public clinic one town over from Revere. But the two closest mass vaccination sites are about a 30 minute drive, much longer via public transportation.

“Until we’ve made vaccine available in communities, made people aware and been able to facilitate scheduling, it’s only until then and we see low numbers that we can say it’s because of vaccine hesitancy,” says Betancourt. “Today quite frankly, vaccine has not been readily available, in easy ways, in hard hit spots across the state.”

Betancourt and other doctors say easy access means more local clinics, where people can walk in without the hassle of online registration, in familiar places. Six Boston churches are testing something like that model this month.

At Pleasant Hill Missionary Baptist Church, Pastor Miniard Culpepper leads a team of volunteers in prayer before opening the door to the basement social hall for a pop-up vaccination clinic run by Whittier Street Health Center.

“The church is in the business of saving people, that’s what we do,” Culpepper says. “We save people, we save lives. Now we’re trying to save lives in a much different way.”

That’s not an easy sell for some parishioners who wonder why they should trust a drug the U.S. government is urging them to take.

“If you look at the history of how the government has treated African Americans,” Culpepper says, “how we were tricked, it’s a challenge to help folks understand that the coronavirus doesn’t discriminate against anybody.”

But a fear of COVID trumps vaccine resistance for Pleasant Hill community members in line today.

“That doesn’t mean I don’t take into account the history of what happens to African-Americans, but I don’t want to die from COVID,” says Nazaleem Smith, a retired teacher who got a walk-up appointment.

Lucille Culpepper-Jones, the pastor’s sister, says she never gets shots, including the flu vaccine. But Culpepper-Jones has had several lung surgeries.

“I would rather take the chance with the vaccine than with COVID,” she says. “And oh yeah,” she’s nervous.

Vaccine outreach and the questions posed by residents will vary. Many younger people are less worried about dying from COVID but still have concerns.

“Does it do anything to your reproductive system?” asks Gabriela Wood during a routine appointment at the Lynn Community Health Center.

“I’m very comfortable that it’s not going to affect fertility or even a pregnancy, I’m fairly certain that’s not going to happen,” says her physician, Dr. Kiame Mahaniah.

Mahaniah started this appointment with Wood, as he does now with many patients, by asking if she’ll get vaccinated.

“I don’t know, it just scares me,” she says. “There’s so much out there and so much misinformation, it’s hard to know what to believe.”

Mahaniah asks Wood more about why the vaccine is scary, where she gets information and whether her family and friends plan to be vaccinated.

“The thing that really influences people whether or not they’re going to get the vaccine is what their social circle is doing,” he says, after the appointment.

Wood has some skeptical family members. She’s eligible for the vaccine based on some high risk medical conditions but has declined so far.

Mahaniah is having a lot of open-ended discussions with patients about their health and vaccines. He says it’s pretty clear that giving people more data is not persuasive. Instead, he uses a technique known as motivational interviewing as he would with patients who smoke or who are due a screening test they’re avoiding.

“I don’t approach these [conversations] as me being able to provide them with the right information to make the right decision,” Mahaniah says. “I’m really approaching these as, let’s try to create a space in which a conversation can happen where they can evince their doubts, their uncertainties.”

There may be data that’s useful at some point, but the initial conversations are about the patients thoughts, opinions and world views.

“So instead of me being pro-vaccine and the patient being anti-vaccine, it’s really about eliciting the parts in the patient’s own thinking that are pro-vaccine,” Mahaniah says.

It’s a time-consuming process but one that is unfolding in clinics, hospitals, pharmacies, churches and many other sites as we get closer to a time when there will be access to vaccine appointments for a broader swath of the public and rising pressure on people who are still hesitant.

This article was originally published on March 14, 2021.

By Deanna Pan Globe Staff,Updated March 9, 2021, 7:56 p.m.168

NEW BEDFORD — A year ago, they were hailed as heroes, risking their lives for little pay in supermarkets, warehouses, and food-processing plants so Americans could stay well-fed and fully stocked during the deadliest pandemic in a century.

But now many essential workers, despite bearing an outsize burden of coronavirus infections, worry they have been forgotten in the rush to vaccinate an eager populace against COVID-19, as the state and federal government continually reprioritize who should have access to the coveted doses.RELATED: See more COVID-19 vaccine news, resources, and guidance

“We’re really feeling like we’re being left out,” said Adrian Ventura, executive director of Centro Comunitario de Trabajadores, a nonprofit that advocates on behalf of immigrant workers.

A former fish house worker, Ventura has built a reputation in this coastal fishing city as a problem-solver among the immigrant workforce and a “piedra en el zapato,” or a stone in the shoe, to the seafood-processing plants that employ them. Lately, he has turned his attention to the local health department with one urgent question: When will our workers be vaccinated against COVID-19?

“People are very worried,” he added, speaking to the Globe through a Spanish interpreter. His organization alone has recorded coronavirus infections in more than 280 local families and at least nine deaths in connection with the local fishing industry.

“This has been very hard because for those who remain, who is going to pay the rent, buy food, or pay for the funeral?” Ventura said. “People have ended up with big hospital bills.”

Massachusetts initially prioritized essential workers early in the second phase of its vaccination plan, which began Feb. 1. But in late January, Governor Charlie Baker moved residents 65 and older, a cohort of more than half a million people, to the front of the queue in Phase 2, alongside people with two or more qualifying conditions. Now the state is opening up eligibility to teachers, child-care workers, and other school staff in keeping with a new Biden administration directive to inoculate all educators with their first doseby the end of the month.

Whittier Street Health Center Launches Covid-19 Mobile Vaccination With Community-Based Groups in Communities of Color in Boston

The Whittier Street Health Center (WSHC), a comprehensive and innovative health care and wellness center championing equitable access to high-quality, cost-effective health care for diverse populations, proudly announces its partnership with community-based organizations in Boston, including the Brazilian Worker Center, Hyde Square Task Force, Agencia ALPHA, León de Judá and Lawyers for Civil Rights, in launching a mobile COVID-19 vaccination unit.PRESS RELEASE  UPDATED: MAR 16, 2021 09:00 EDT

BOSTON, March 16, 2021 (Newswire.com) – Through this partnership, WSHC’s Mobile Health Vans will bring life-saving vaccines directly to Boston’s hard-hit BIPOC communities, focusing on critical site-based interventions, including León de Judá’s bilingual congregation, the Brazilian Worker Center’s headquarters in Allston, and Hyde Square Task Force’s headquarters in Boston’s Latin Quarter. Hundreds of individuals will directly receive vaccines as a result of this innovative partnership. More BIPOC congregations and community groups, including those affiliated with the Greater Boston Latino Network, are fully expected to join the partnership as it deepens and expands to meet the urgent need for vaccination. The partnership is designed to leverage trusted community partners to help close the racialized vaccine gap experienced by Black, Indigenous and People of Color (BIPOC) communities.
 
WSHC’s innovative and community-focused model of mobile vaccination alleviates the need for people who are elderly, high-risk or living with disabilities to travel to distant mass vaccination sites. Critically, WSHC also embraces the cultural and linguistic diversity of BIPOC populations and provides multilingual healthcare services through its Mobile Vaccination Clinics. The first clinic will be held at the Lion de Juda Church on 68 Northampton Street, South-End, Boston on March 18 from noon to 6 pm and at the Brazilian Workers Center at 14 Harvard Street, Allston, MA 02134 from 10 am to 4 pm. 
 
In response to alarming racial inequities in vaccine distribution, WSHC and Lawyers for Civil Rights joined forces to convene grassroots groups to explore community-based interventions such as setting up vaccination tents and hosting mobile vaccination units. Lawyers for Civil Rights applaud the leadership and community-focused priorities demonstrated by WSHC’s incredible partnership with the Brazilian Worker Center, Hyde Square Task Force, Agencia ALPHA, León de Judá, and other organizations. Lawyers for Civil Rights stands ready to support and facilitate such collaborative efforts to bring vaccines to the hardest-hit neighborhoods.

WSHC and Lawyers for Civil Rights are encouraging other hospitals and healthcare providers to establish similar partnerships with grassroots and non-profit community organizations in Greater Boston, Worcester, Springfield, and across the Commonwealth. 

For future weekly schedules, please visit: www.wshc.org

To learn more contact:

Frederica Williams
Frederica.Williams@wshc.org

617 989 3221

Ivan Espinoza-Madrigal
iespinoza@lawyersforcivilrights.org 

617 989 0624

Samuel Acevedo
sacevedo@bostonherc.org
617 733 2329

Designación de Venezuela a TPS e Implementación de la DED para Venezuela El Departamento de Seguridad Nacional publicó hoy una notificación en el Registro Federal (FRN) que anuncia la designación de Venezuela al Estatus de Protección Temporal (TPS) por 18 meses, efectivo el 9 de marzo de 2021 hasta el 9 de septiembre de 2022. La FRN detalla los criterios de elegibilidad que los nacionales venezolanos (y personas sin nacionalidad cuya última residencia habitual fue Venezuela) deben cumplir, y describe los procedimientos necesarios para presentar una solicitud inicial a TPS y solicitar un Documento de Autorización de Empleo (EAD). Además, la FRN proporciona información acerca de la Salida Forzosa Diferida (DED) para los nacionales venezolanos cubiertos por esta (y personas sin nacionalidad cuya última residencia habitual fue Venezuela), además de instrucciones sobre cómo solicitar EAD relacionados con DED. Más Información Estamos planificando oportunidades de enlace comunitario relacionadas con la nueva designación de Venezuela al TPS para proporcionar información y contestar preguntas del público. Para la información más reciente relacionada con asuntos humanitarios de USCIS, por favor visite uscis.gov/es/programas-humanitarios. Para más información sobre USCIS y nuestros programas, por favor visite uscis.gov/es o síganos en Twitter, Instagram, YouTube, Facebook y LinkedIn.