A family of nine Afghan refugees will be taken in by Catholic Charities in Jefferson City,
"They're coming here because if they were to have stayed, their lives were in jeopardy," said Dan Lester, the non-profit organization's executive director for Central and Northern Missouri. "It could be days, I would be really surprised if we didn't see anybody before the end of September."
Many of the details on the family are being kept under wraps, in an effort to protect the family's security and safety before relocating to Missouri. Lester said he knows the family consists of a mother, father, and seven children.
Lester said the family would come under a Special Immigrant Visa, or SIV.
"Those are folks who worked specifically with the U.S. government, oftentimes with our military," Lester said. "And so they are then forced to flee because of fear of retribution in their home country because they provided assistance to us."
A report from the Associated Press says as many as 1,200 Afghan refugees could be coming to Missouri.
"The U.S. State Department has notified the State of Missouri that federal authorities intend to re-settle screened and security vetted Afghans through nonprofit contracted agencies within the state," a representative from Governor Mike Parson's office told KRCG 13. "The background checks on these Afghans is to have included extensive background checks and the collection of biometric data prior to arriving in the state. Afghans who are resettled under the Special Visa program are those who assisted the U.S. military effort to defend freedom in the War on Terror and deemed ‘at risk’ to stay in Afghanistan under Taliban rule."
The governor's office gave estimates on the number of Afghan refugees to be resettled in Missouri. Those numbers include 300 in Columbia with the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB), 250 in Kansas City with the Ethiopian Community Development Council (ECDC), another 300 in Kansas City with the U.S. Committee for Refugees and Immigrants (USCRI), and 350 in St. Louis with USCRI.
"Our preparations have included hiring two new staff, male and a female, who are Afghan natives, themselves," Lester said.
And while these could be some of the earliest refugees from the Afghanistan evacuation coming into the state, Lester says they won't be the last.
"From October through the end of the year is when we're really expecting to see the big push," he said. "We expect to see upwards of a couple hundred coming into Mid-Missouri through our Catholic Charities agency."