With Heart and Soul: Closing a Faith-Based Refugee Resettlement Office

The U.S. refugee program is implemented almost entirely through national and local nonprofit and faith-based organizations that are highly dependent upon limited government funding and uneven refugee flows. This paper reports on a study of a large North Carolina nonprofit agency that closed down its longstanding refugee resettlement office in Greensboro in 2010. The research questions addressed are: What were the reasons given for the closing according to different participants? What were the consequences of this shutdown? This study helps to illuminate not only the organizational dynamics within a large, multi-service agency, but it also exemplifies the challenges faced in refugee resettlement services. The research is based on formal interviews with employees, agency executives, former employees, and representatives of the agency's national office that has a contract with the U.S. State Department to resettle refugees in North and South Carolina. The issues of leadership, financial management, and organizational culture are central to understanding why Lutheran Family Services in the Carolinas closed one of its key refugee resettlement offices. While the effects on the local community of volunteers, community agencies, and refugees are still unfolding, this closure had a profound impact on how the community viewed itself, as well as on the agency’s reputation.