Rent for Venezuelan Refugee Families Just Arrived

Allison Benner is organizing this fundraiser.

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Hi Everyone. My name is Allison Benner and I live and work in the Highlands/Jefferson Park neighborhood of Denver. Since May, I have noticed an increasing number of Venezuelan refugees in my neighborhood. They have recently crossed the US border seeking asylum after a long and arduous trek on foot and by migrant train fleeing Venezuela. Many of these refugees were provided their first 30 days of shelter by the city of Denver at hotels near my office. That is the end of direct government support for asylum seekers until they are much further along a long bureaucratic process toward citizenship. Families with children then received an additional 30 days from various organizations and were set up with first month's rent and a security deposit for an apartment. Denver has been inundated and has no more housing resources to offer. The rent is now due and most of the adults have not been able to procure jobs yet. These families have been working hard to find employment and are ready to work and just need a bit more time. The eviction notice for these 3 families I have befriended comes this weekend. Rent is $1500 per family per month. This GoFundMe will cover 2 months rent for 3 apartments. 26 people will have safe shelter for the next 60 days.

This is where we come in! I am hoping together we can provide a softer landing for these folks as they navigate this new terrain of being away from their homeland, recovering from a harrowing journey, and arriving and orienting to somewhere totally new while parenting their young children and not yet speaking English. I am hoping we can prevent the profound disruption that is homelessness for people just starting to find some semblance of stability.

A group of friends and I spent Saturday at the park getting to know these families. I can assure you these people are an asset to our community. I am very moved by their resilient nature, phenomenal trust in the dream of a new life, and their culture of friendliness (these folks have never met a stranger). They share a deep sense of family whether that means they are bonded by blood or through the struggle of the journey, it is powerful to watch how committed they are to one another's wellbeing. THESE ARE SPECIAL PEOPLE! They are the kind of people who laugh a lot and are available to possibility, love, and connection and carry unrelenting faith. The kind of people who walk through the most dangerous place on earth for 7 days carrying their young children on their backs (the Darian gap between Columbia and Panama) and rode "La Bestia. " This train is nicknamed the death train and immigrants jump on top of it to cross the entire span of Mexico. These are the kind of people who remind you what it means to be awake and mobilized in your own life. And I reflect on how bad it must be in Venezuela that all those sacrificial and hard choices were made.

Most of the kids are scheduled to start at Brown Elementary here in the Highlands/Sloane's Lake in August. The twelve kids range in age from 3 to 18. Yessika is a single mom to 6 of them. Osnel, Yessika's nephew, is a single dad who has the two youngest children of the group. Dani has three children and Rafaella has one. Dani and Rafaella are here with their husbands Juan Luis and Antonio. Abel and Hector are 24 and 22 respectively and became family along the way.

Please jump in on this with me! You are most definitely invited to the next park party and might get schooled in a game of "futbol" or learn some amazing Bachata salsa dance moves.

A sincere thank you to you all,

Allison Benner

[email redacted]

303-621-4028

*As an aside- A goal of this project is to connect these folks with jobs. I will be reaching out to see who in our community might have ideas and leads around employment for them and who feels called to get involved. In particular, opportunities are needed for the women as the men have some leads on construction work. Please reach out to me if that is you.