Photo By John Hughel | U.S. Air Force Reserve Senior Master Emmett McDowell (right) assigned to the 514th Air...... read more read more
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JOINT BASE MCGUIRE-DIX-LAKEHURST, N. J. - When U.S. Air Force Reserve Senior Master Sgt. Emmett McDowell, assigned to the 514th Air Mobility Wing here is not on the flight line checking in with his team of KC-10 Extender and the C-17 Globemaster III maintainers, he works in the real-estate business as a sales consultant in the local community.
Over the past month, McDowell has been activated to support Operation Allies Welcome (OAW) here at Joint Base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst. When two of his civilian co-workers, Bill Boswell and Ron Aiosa from Keller Williams in Wayne, New Jersey took time to check in on McDowell, the conversation helped generate some much-needed items for many of the Afghan guests at Task Force Liberty.
“They [Boswell and Aiosa] asked me, “How are you doing, do need anything…is there anything we can do for you?” McDowell said, recalling the conversation as more of venting than talking. “Yeah, we need strollers and blankets, mostly for the [Afghan] ladies to help move their kids around the village and stay warm in the morning hours.”
Boswell and Aiosa told McDowell that they would put out the word as a community outreach response for donations. Pequannock New Jersey Police Chief Daniel Comune and his officers responded with nearly 100 new and used strollers and several boxes of blankets within a few days.
“The outpouring that I’ve heard, just through the few calls I’ve gotten, and just from the agents’ side has been outrageous,” McDowell said. “People have wanted to do something and don’t know what to do. I think there’s a lot more out there based on this one simple conversation I had with a few co-workers.”
Local groups have started pitching in clothing and personal hygiene items or making financial donations to larger international aid groups. For service members at Task Force Liberty, they see the impact of these donations first hand.
“To me, where do you go? You go to the community. It’s hard to explain the entire evacuation process [from Afghanistan] to others,” explained McDowell, who is the deputy Senior Enlisted Leader for Liberty Village 3. “Many of them had an hour or two to leave their homes forever, grab a couple of things and run. Then to landing here, and we’re building a city and occupying it at the same time.”
The entire ‘city’ that McDowell described had to be set up from scratch. “The infrastructure, the building, the power, the sewer, the food…it’s phenomenal what our contractors and Airmen have built in just three to four weeks.”
Tapping into another community relationship McDowell has cultivated over the years, he connected with Evgueni Brusov of the New Jersey State Police. The two serve in the 514th AMW together and share a law enforcement background as McDowell served for 25 years as a police officer in Bergen County, New Jersey, before retiring in 2016.
“Hey, we have trailers and trucks. We’ll just bring it all down for you,” said Brusov, after coordinating it with his department and getting clearance to help out. Along with Detective II Mudduser Malik and Detective Sergeant First Class Jason Payman, also of the New Jersey State Police, and the Pequannock Police Department, they delivered the first donations on Sept. 20 at Liberty Village 3.
“Starting on a Friday afternoon (Sept. 17) we started making the arrangements and got the entire donation here in just a few days,” said McDowell.
The success generated an even larger donation that was dropped off at Liberty Village 3 on Sept. 27, nearly filling the clothing storage area.
“Now that we got the ball rolling there are others that want to help... I got a call from the V.A... the New Jersey State Police, The Muslim Officers Society of New Jersey, and others that want to step up and help,” said McDowell.
For Payman and Malik, this project is just one of the ways they have been part of helping assist the Afghan community here at Task Force Liberty. On a much deeper level, both men connect to the resettlement of refugees through their cultural backgrounds too, as both their parents emigrated from the same region.
“When I was a five year old my family fled Afghanistan when the Soviet Union invaded in late 1979, early 1980,” said Payman. “I moved around a lot before settling down in the New York and New Jersey area, joining the N.Y. Police Department right after 9/11 and then followed that up with joining the New Jersey State Police.”
With a resilient sense of pride in his own story, Payman can connect to the abrupt changes that occurred with his family, which fosters a strong desire to help those now arriving here in the United States.
“So in the beginning when we had so few linguists in place, I would help with translations on the buses and welcome them with the greeting of ‘Salam Alaikum (peace be upon you), which would identify me right away as a native speaker,” said Payman, who is fluent in Farsi and Dari dialects.
This connection right away facilitated in opening a door Payman said, “to help build an immediate sense of trust and security.”
Working in concert with Payman at Liberty Village was Officer Malik. Both were brought in early to assist the State Department and the military with translations and interpretations. They also could help field many of the culturally sensitive issues as the rapid pace of Afghan guest arrivals increased from overseas.
“This slowly evolved into assisting the Muslim and Afghan community in New Jersey with donations, to the refugees here on base,” said Malik. “This included going from village to village at the Task Force to see what the early shortcomings were.”
Networking has been the key to nearly every aspect of this rapid and unrehearsed evacuation of vulnerable Afghans. Malik was grateful for the chance to give back to the broader Muslim community.
“In addition to being Jersey Troopers, Jason and I belong to the New Jersey Muslim Officers Society, New Jersey Muslim Officers Society, New Jersey’s first and the nation’s second fraternal organization representing American Muslim Law Enforcement Officers. We’ve been engaging with our community-based partners and relaying to them what the needs of the people in the village are,” said Malik, detailing many of the ongoing concerns.
Though Malik was born and raised in Brooklyn, New York, he has a keen sense of how to assimilate to different communities, having later moved to the suburbs of Bergen County, New Jersey. His parents originally emigrated from Rawalpindi just outside of Islamabad, Pakistan.
“So I understand some of the cultural challenges it takes to integrate over time,” he said. “Even when we first came down here to the villages, we weren’t sure what to expect and there was a lot of uncertainty of what our role would be.”
“Ultimately though, working through these first few challenges, I think this is a true testament to the versatility of being a New Jersey State Trooper,” Malik said.
Both Payman and Malik are aware of how some of the early challenges have been beneficial to everyone helping support Operation Allies Welcome.
“We continue to relay that information to the Muslim community as well. We want them to understand the concept of America. This is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for us in our careers to take part in something like this and it’s very fulfilling,” said Payman.
Payman also emphasized how networking has been integral for all parties involved in establishing Liberty Village, noting the vital role service members are providing to the Afghan guests for many of the daily essential amenities.
“I really want to acknowledge the military members working here,” said Payman. “Having had the opportunity to work alongside these guys has been absolutely phenomenal, especially seeing the generosity and kind-heartedness towards the refugees.”
| Date Taken: | 09.27.2021 |
| Date Posted: | 09.30.2021 09:01 |
| Story ID: | 406386 |
| Location: | JOINT BASE MCGUIRE-DIX-LAKEHURST, NEW JERSEY, US |
| Web Views: | 549 |
| Downloads: | 1 |
This work, Networking fuels community outreach and support for Afghan guests, by John Hughel, identified by DVIDS, must comply with the restrictions shown on https://www.dvidshub.net/about/copyright.
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