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Washington New Americans is a two-pronged policy designed to secure our state's economic future by integrating new immigrants into the economic, civic, and social fabric of Washington.  Immigrant integration—a two-way, collaborative process involving both immigrants and receiving communities—has proven to be among the most effective state-level economic development strategies, and our rapidly growing foreign-born population (the nation’s 10th largest) makes it critical for Washington to adopt.  We are pleased that Governor Gregoire has already agreed to the first prong of the policy, issuing an Executive Order creating a Statewide Policy Council to spur immigrant integration.  We need to build on that success for the second prong of the policy:  new funding of $2M per year for three years to spur statewide economic development by broadening the network and capacity of organizations across the state that provide naturalization assistance, and expanding their outreach beyond those on public assistance.  This funding is urgently needed—there are 135,000 legal permanent residents eligible to naturalize in Washington, but state funding now helps only 3,000 public benefits-eligible immigrants per year to naturalize.  Addressing this need is a priority for the Church as the ELCA's Message on Immigration calls for "reasonable access to nationality and citizenship for all immigrants admitted for permanent residence."

Take Action!

Send an email to your legislators and let them know of your support for $2 million in the supplemental budget for 2009 to help organizations provide naturalization assistance to immigrants in need!