Who we are

Our work falls into three broad categories:

• We have an immigrant resource center (IRC) serving residents of northwest Washington.  We offer resource navigation, assistance with basic needs and occasional one-off workshops, clinics and seminars on specific topics. 

• We also engage majority culture community members in this work via trainings and seminars, discussions on immigration-related topics and awareness-raising activities.  We desire our local community to grow more informed, empathetic and equipped to seek the wellbeing and flourishing of all community members regardless of cultural or political differences.

• A medium-to-long term goal is to have a supply of transitional housing available to assist immigrants experiencing homelessness or facing eviction.

Our focus is on immigrants who have been in the area for five years or less, and who do not yet have US citizenship or permanent residency.  Exceptions may be made based on extenuating circumstances and availability of resources.

As a border community, Bellingham has always hosted people on the move, some briefly in transit between Canada and the United States, and others who choose to or are forced by circumstances to remain longer.  More rural areas of Whatcom and Skagit counties are also home to sizeable populations of immigrants, both migrant workers and long-term residents. 

Recently, efforts have been made to strip humanitarian protections from millions of immigrants. The need has never been greater.  Families and individuals who were once self-sufficient have been forced out of work or tipped into extreme poverty overnight with the detention or deportation of wage-earning family members.  Our local community is a welcoming and compassionate one, with a range of service providers and generous, concerned citizens; however, coordination of services and a central hub for receiving newcomers and making informed referrals would greatly enhance our ability to support these resilient-yet-vulnerable members of our community

A range of nonprofits and community-based organizations already provide much-needed services for immigrants and low-income residents. Renew Northwest works alongside these and other organizations, seeking not to duplicate but rather to enhance and coordinate the services being offered in the following ways:

• Many organizations providing services to immigrants operate remotely or by appointment only. Renew Northwest fills a need by providing a walk-in location accessible by public transit, with services and basic needs support available in a variety of languages. 

• Renew Northwest also seeks to serve as a hub organization providing referrals to other organizations. We desire to be a convening organization for immigrant-focused service providers to connect and share, helping to coordinate the efforts of multiple entities into a more cohesive whole.

• Finally, we hold community engagement as a key priority, realizing that welcome and support for immigrants needs to be a community-wide effort. 

The three staff members most involved in this effort have a combined 12 years of experience working professionally with refugees arriving in the local community through the US Refugee Admissions Program, as well as other recent immigrants (Ukrainian humanitarian parolees, asylum seekers, etc.)  They have a wide range of connections with local service providers, former program participants, interpreters, faith groups and interested community members.

We have made an effort to build a board of directors which is representative of the breadth of our local immigrant community, with at least half of our board members having lived experience as immigrants.

Renew Northwest is an acronym referring to Resource Navigation, Education and Welcome.  It also speaks to our desire to see a renewed community, nation and world in which the full humanity of immigrants is respected and celebrated.  Throughout history, immigrants themselves have renewed, revitalized and rebuilt civilizations into which they have been welcomed.  Our beautiful community is made a stronger, more vibrant place due to their presence here and the gifts that they bring.

Stable housing is a vital, basic need for many of the families and individuals we have interacted with.  It is almost always the first piece of the puzzle which needs to be stabilized before other services can be effectively offered.  We would seek to provide short-term transitional housing (from several days to several months) to participants in need by utilizing host homes, under-utilized housing units (such as ADUs and tiny homes) offered by community members and possibly adding to the overall pool of affordable housing ourselves by building additional units.

No, we are not a faith-based or religious organization. That said, many of those who launched Renew Northwest were moved by their Christian faith to engage in this work. 

We create connections and partnerships with churches as well as groups of other faiths, and non-religious community organizations.

We happily share with those who are interested in learning about the ways that immigration and Scripture intersect. But we don't have a statement of faith that is required of board members or staff members, and we don't proselytize, provide religiously-themed programming for clients, or discriminate in how or to whom we provide services.