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You are here: Home / News / Des Moines area may receive up to 1,300 Afghans for resettlement

Des Moines area may receive up to 1,300 Afghans for resettlement

November 18, 2021 By O. Kay Henderson

Officials say as many as 13-hundred Afghans who were evacuated from their Asian homeland this summer could be relocated to central Iowa by June of 2022.

Three weeks ago, the Pentagon announced nearly 6700 Afghans had been resettled throughout the country, but more than 53,000 remained at U.S. military facilities in six different states.

“I know that the military bases are wanting these folks off military bases ASAP,” Polk County Supervisor Robert Brownell said earlier today, “and so time frame keeps getting compressed a little bit because they want these folks resettled.”

Brownell indicated the coalition working on the resettlement project has secured warehouse space for beds and other furniture. “My understanding is Catholic Charities is about out of beds, if not out,” he said, “so we’re in the process of going through our procurement folks to see what it would cost to get a lot of beds in here for our future Afghans.”

Brownell spoke near the end of an online forum for Polk County employees that was held over the noon hour.

Pashto and Dari are the two official languages of Afghanistan and Brownell said they’re also working on a contract with a call-in translation service so Afghans can communicate with English-speaking Iowans as soon as they arrive.

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