New Americans in Greater Minnesota seeks to provide thoughtful coverage on the realities of the immigrant experience in cities, towns and rural areas throughout the state — to examine the challenges and successes of New Americans and the places they call home in Greater Minnesota.
In addition to finding workers, many challenges continue to perplex small dairy farmers in Minnesota: an unusually wet growing season, competition from large-scale dairy operations, changing consumer habits and, perhaps most significantly, volatile milk prices.
“I think it’s going to be a well-needed service,” said Willmar chiropractor Jon Haefner. “The whole goal is to make Willmar a healthier place.”
Chavez-Cruz, a first-generation American, left the Twin Cities for the College of St. Scholastica. As a Latino, he felt different in Duluth and missed his extended family, but soon five of his siblings and cousins took the leap as well.
Rochester’s Intercultural Mutual Assistance Association is a 35-year-old nonprofit dedicated to helping newcomers find stability, self-sufficiency, independence and community in a new country.
The Rural Immigrant Access Clinic is a for-credit class that offers law students the opportunity to learn firsthand how to help vulnerable immigrants understand potential avenues for relief, including protection claims like asylum or family-based petitions.
Like many young people from Greater Minnesota, Andrea Duarte never planned on going back to her hometown after finishing college. But then the St. Kate’s student had a revelation.
Most of the area’s immigrant Kurds, like business owner Talib “Tony” Salman, left their homes after Saddam Hussein used chemical weapons on the Kurds in the late 1980s.
As demographic changes transform the student makeup of many classrooms around the state, they have also impacted the state’s high school sports scene.
“We have had an influx of new families that have managed to come to Long Prairie, and they have their kids in our schools, which is absolutely great,” said Mayor Don Rasmussen.
Over time, an estimated 4,000 Somali residents have put down roots in Faribault. Some of those families have now lived in the Rice County city for more than two decades.
Ghana-born Eunice Adjei-Bosompem wants to ease the transition for other immigrants in St. Cloud, to help them make a home — and an impact — in their city.
Nonprofit leaders usually hear three main reasons for immigrants moving to Greater Minnesota: access to jobs, affordable housing and desire to have a slower pace of life.
During decades of the 19th Century, a third of Minnesotans were immigrants. Today, it’s closer to one in ten.
Encountering a foreign-born doctor in Greater Minnesota once might have been unusual. If the state’s health-care trends continue as they have, it won’t be much longer.
