Overview • Cuban/Haitian • US Reception and Placement • Legal • Matching Grant • Religious Services • Florida Center for Survivors of Torture
A recent arrival through the Cuban Visa Lottery
begins to get oriented to U.S. life in an information session for
parolees at the CWS Miami Office.
Photo: Carol Fouke-Mpoyo |
CWS / IRP Miami Program
CWS/IRP Miami Office
1924 NW 84th Ave.
Building 10, Beacon Centre
Miami, FL 33126
305-774-6770
Take action on policy
decisions affecting immigration and refugees.
The Church World Service Immigration and Refugee Program (CWS) opened an office in Miami, Florida, in 1960 in response to the needs of refugees fleeing Cuba in the aftermath of the revolution. Since that emergency, the office has responded to subsequent waves of Cubans, Haitians, and other groups by providing needed services to refugees, asylum seekers, and immigrants.
Through the years the Miami Office has adapted its response to different refugee movements. In addition to its fee-for-service Legal Program, it also currently manages seven programs funded by the Department of State, the Department of Homeland Security, the Office of Refugee Resettlement, the State of Florida, and the member denominations of the CWS Immigration and Refugee Program. CWS Miami also shares space with the UNHCR regional office for the Caribbean and with the Miami staff of the Florida Center for Survivors of Torture, with which it works in partnership.
The CWS Miami Office in FY2007 resettled 92 refugees (including 90 Cubans and two Burmese) through the U.S. Refugee Program, and provided cultural orientation and referral services to another 9,072 Cuban newcomers through the U.S. Cuban-Haitian Program.
The latter included 6,399 “parolees” joining family members in the United States and 34 physicians and their families admitted as Cuban Medical Parolees.
It also included 730 Cuban Lottery arrivals and 1,909 Border Patrol arrivals. Of these two groups, 754 were “free cases” without family already living in the United States and were resettled to seven CWS Cuban-Haitian Program sites across the United States.
Read more: Miami Office fundraising dinner a celebration of lives saved
Visit CWS Employment Opportunities for openings in our office.