Refugee center to open in Pa.

    A central Pennsylvania service organization is raising money to open a community center for refugees.

    The Rotary Club of Lancaster hopes to raise $100,000 to renovate three first-floor rooms at Reynolds Middle School in Lancaster. Children of refugees account for nearly 10 percent of the school’s student body.

    Lancaster Newspapers reports a total of 318 refugees were resettled in Lancaster County in the first six months of 2014, more than a third of them from Burma. Large numbers also came from Cuba, Somalia and Bhutan.

    Plans call for medical screenings, language instruction, adult education, citizenship classes and activities ranging from gardening to swimming lessons at Franklin & Marshall College.

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    The center could open with limited services as early as January, with a full-service center by September 2015.

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