Fewer hours, fewer flowers: Denver's migrant crisis threatens to overwhelm its compassion

DENVER − No more flowers in the medians. Cuts to rec center hours and at the DMV. A hiring freeze in some city departments.

After more than 40,000 migrants arrived Denver in less than a year, city officials are struggling to help the new arrivals and serve their taxpaying residents amid skyrocketing rents and a housing shortage. A self-described sanctuary city, Denver has found shelter for the migrants, helped their kids get into schools, provided emergency food assistance and taught them how to fill out paperwork.

It's a vast, expensive effort in a city unaccustomed to managing such challenges.

And now cracks are beginning to show in the city's generosity.

Denver has already spent more than $60 million aiding the migrants, and officials are planning budget cuts to keep the aid flowing. A hastily built coalition of churches and nonprofits has stepped in to help, but several surrounding cities have refused to assist or accept migrants.

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"We overextended a while ago," said Ismael de Sousa, a longtime Denver bakery owner who grew up in Venezuela and has struggled with whether to open his own home to newcomers. "It's tricky because you don't know who you're opening your door to for an indefinite amount of time."

In Denver, the newcomers have erected ramshackle tent cities near upscale apartment buildings, flooded medians to offer windshield-washing services and staked out street corners with signs begging for money. Unlike migrants arriving in years past, most of the newcomers are penniless Venezuelans without the typical informal social support system that can find them housing with friends or family and get them work under the table.

De Sousa, 39, said he has seen a steady stream of migrants seeking work at his Reunion Bread bakery, even though they have no baking experience, don't speak English and have no permission to work. He said it's heartbreaking to turn them away, knowing they have few options. He recently organized a community fundraiser to feed migrants.

"I had to do something," he said. "But I'm just a small baker, so there's not a ton I can do."

Many of the migrants have been bused to Denver after crossing the Mexican border, shipped 600 miles north via Texas Gov. Greg Abbott's Operation Lone Star, which disperses migrants to sanctuary cities. Abbott's efforts have put Denver on the front lines of the nation's emotionally charged immigration debate. City officials said Denver has received more migrants per capita than any other big city outside Texas in the past year.

In his State of the Union speech on Thursday, President Joe Biden urged Congress to pass an immigration reform law toughening border controls while speeding up the process by which migrants receive hearings to determine whether they can remain in the United States. Republicans killed a bipartisan border bill in February that aimed to achieve those goals.

Former President Donald Trump has vowed to launch widespread deportations nationally if reelected, and he has accused migrants of "poisoning the blood of our country."

Biden said that such language demonizes migrants and that the United State should remain a welcoming country: "We are the only nation in the world with a heart and soul that draws from old and new."

For many Denver residents, the migrant arrivals are an increasingly obvious population in a city that is markedly whiter, wealthier and better educated than the country as a whole. Some Abbott supporters say that's the whole point of the operation: forcing Americans to personally grapple with the problems caused by the nation's broken immigration system.

The migrant arrivals have pitted neighbors against one another and prompted Democratic mayors like Denver's Mike Johnston to demand Biden's administration respond more forcefully. In January, Johnston said the city was on track to spend 10% of its entire annual budget aiding migrants, although it has since scaled that back.

"What we don't want is people to arrive here at 1 a.m. in T-shirts and sandals with two young kids and end up homeless on the street in 10-degree weather," Johnston told USA TODAY. "We don't want that to happen, but we also know we can't provide an infinite amount of services. We're having to pull back the amount of services we can provide, the number of people we can serve, and figure out how to balance the budget to get there."

Different views of how much aid government should provide

Abbott has sent more than 104,000 migrants to Democratic cities, primarily Chicago, New York and Denver, which have declared themselves "sanctuary cities." Although the term has no legal meaning, a sanctuary city usually provides safe harbor to migrants regardless of their immigration status and declines to assist federal immigration authorities in tracking them down.

Over the past year, Denver has assisted migrants through tens of thousands of hotel vouchers, hot meals and millions of dollars in cash assistance, a move that has upset some locals already struggling to pay rents that are 30% above the national average.

Abbott and other Texas officials say the number of migrants crossing from Mexico is too much for border communities to handle, and they're simply spreading the burden to cities that have gone on record as being willing to protect and support migrants. Chicago has formally enshrined its policies in a "Welcoming City Ordinance," although Denver has never formally adopted a similar policy.

"Texas will not stop until President Biden secures the border," Abbott vowed last month.

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In Denver, city officials say they're trying to carefully balance their legal responsibilities with humanitarian needs. And Johnston said he has been surprised at how gleeful some Texas officials appear to be about having caused problems for Denver.

Johnston has called for other mayors to help Denver by accepting migrants, but many have outright refused or just ignored his calls. Other cities have simply handed out bus tickets and sent migrants elsewhere.

"I was surprised I would ever see elected officials who seem delighted at the prospect of Americans suffering, or cities suffering," Johnston said. "That's not how we're built (here), and that's not how we'll proceed.

"In Denver, there really is a bipartisan effort to succeed. I wish we had that around the country, but we will figure it out regardless because we're not the type to point fingers or to make excuses. We just work harder and work together."

Churches try to figure out the best way to serve

Racing around the dingy church gym as people tried to sleep on foam mattress recently, two young brothers tossed balls, batted a balloon, zoomed a plastic toy firetruck across the carpet and flopped down to watch videos on their mother's phone. They snuggled up to their father, spilled cereal on the floor and insisted that strangers play patty-cake.

Their mom looked exhausted. Their dad looked exhausted. The church pastor looked exhausted. Everyone around them looked exhausted. But the boys were excited for this adventure, their new toys and this new temporary home in a quiet Denver neighborhood.

"Eat more," Will Daniel Garcia Torres, 4, urged a visitor in Spanish, offering a cup of crispy chocolate cereal flakes as his brother, Wisler Fabian Garcia Torres, 6, sprawled quietly on the floor. "It's for you."

Along with their parents, the two boys trekked nearly 3,000 miles from South America to the Mexican border, crossed into Texas, surrendered to federal authorities, then were released to await an immigration court date in 2025.

The boys' parents believe their dangerous, lengthy journey to the United States will bring them better work, better pay and better lives than what they left behind in Venezuela.

"Venezuela is my horror," said their mom, Lisbeth Torres, 42. "This country is better."

Once they were in Texas, authorities put them on a bus to Denver. Torres doesn't know who those officials worked for or why they fastened a GPS tracker anklet on her husband's leg. Right now, all she knows is the kindness of strangers, virtually none of whom speak her language. Torres said they have no family here, no connections and no prospects for work. And she's worried about the boys' education.

"The kids aren't studying," she said in Spanish. "We don't have jobs. We don't have a stable home. It's sad they have to be in this situation."

Still, she's glad they came to the United States, she said, where the opportunities are greater even if the struggles now are hard. Before Torres and her husband left Venezuela last October, their two grown children left to work in neighboring Colombia and Ecuador. Conditions at home kept worsening, and her husband, a butcher with his own small business, faced extortion even as the local currency was all but worthless.

They could barely feed their boys, so they headed north toward the United States.

“It’s not right that they have to go hungry,” she said. “We had no option but to emigrate.”

Torres said she is thankful to the Denver church for the shelter and the hot meals. But what she really wants is to find work, for her kids to go to school, for her family to find its footing in their new country.

“As long as we have faith in God and we keep fighting, this is a country where we can make it. It’s hard, but we Venezuelans are legendary. Do you know what we’ve been through to get here? You think we can’t learn English? Fabian is already my translator,” she said, laughing.

She called to her son. “How many numbers do you know?”

He answered by counting excitedly in English: “One, two, three, four, five …”

Pastor Keith Reeser was moved to open the shelter at Denver Friends Church in November for families like the Torres clan after he saw city officials struggling with the new arrivals. Because the church once housed a preschool, fire officials were quick to let Reeser open its doors to migrants, and now up to 29 people a night sleep on mattresses in the gym after getting a hot meal.

Reeser said it's clear the federal immigration system is broken, and it's also clear Denver is overwhelmed. But he said it's also important to remember that each migrant is a person with hopes and dreams, not just a number or a stereotype.

"What we're doing for them affects them for generations," he said. "We're talking about an eternal impact. Their kids' kids' kids will grow up here."

Reeser's church has limped by on donations and volunteers, and he said there has been plenty of internal debate over whether providing an overnight shelter is the best way to help. Some Denver-area churches have declined to offer shelter to migrants, citing insurance and staffing costs, preferring to let city officials instead spend taxpayer money to rent hotel rooms.

He's committed to doing what he can, given the lack of a comprehensive approach what should be the "United" States.

“I would dare any person with a heart to stand at the door of our church and say 'good riddance, get out of here,'" Reeser said. "We say that we follow Jesus. We say to love those who are hurting or homeless or widowed or the children ... and right now we have cities that are saturated and people starved of the basics of life."

Nonprofits, residents help migrants with housing, money, skills

As Denver city officials have struggled to finance their assistance, nonprofits and other businesses are helping.

A group of moms in the city's Highlands neighborhood has for months used Facebook to coordinate hot lunches, home stays, informal work opportunities, English and computer classes, and help filling out paperwork. In the group, migrants offer housecleaning services and seek landscaping jobs, while moms collect donations to buy tools and equipment for the new arrivals.

The group also offers tips on food donations ‒ avoid peanut butter or hummus because the migrants might be unfamiliar with that ‒ and what kinds of clothes or personal goods are most in need.

Organizers say they try hard to remember how privileged they are compared with the migrants. They have homes, jobs, health insurance and the cultural background necessary to navigate life in the city. Several members of the group also have called out wealthy churches that have so far done little to assist.

De Sousa, the baker, said his fundraiser is the best way he can help, using his baking skills and connections with suppliers to raise money for migrants. He said it's important to remember each person comes with their own hopes and dreams, and he worries migration opponents will use the arrest of a Venezuelan migrant in the death of Georgia nursing student Laken Riley, highlighted at the State of the Union, to turn public opinion against them.

"That could easily turn into hatred and xenophobia," he said.

The neighboring city of Aurora passed a resolution last month symbolically blocking migrants from being moved into its boundaries. City officials said they were unwilling to sacrifice their budget to help migrants.

In Denver, Andreina Gomez, 30, a digital marketer, volunteers as a translator with the Highlands Moms group. Born in Venezuela, Gomez moved to Miami with her family as a child, then made her way to Colorado, drawn by the Rocky Mountains.

In between ski trips and remote work, she has advised migrants on connecting with immigration attorneys and jobs. Like many Denver residents, Gomez was taken aback as the numbers of migrants swelled, hearing their Venezuelan accents on the street near her apartment. She said some of her friends have griped about the costs and the consequences, from housing costs to cuts to hours at the DMV.

"I hear the frustration, don't get me wrong," she said. "But I think it comes from a lack of understanding."

Gomez said her own mother, who lives in Florida, has wondered aloud why the new arrivals can't just get jobs like her generation.

Depending on how and when they crossed the border, many of the migrants arriving in Denver face yearslong waits for immigration hearings and monthslong waits to hear whether they'll be allowed to work. Some migrant assistance groups have hinted they think Abbott and Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, who has also shipped migrants to other states, have specifically picked people who lack work permits to send to Denver, New York and Chicago.

"'Well yeah mom, your governor is one of the ones shipping people around like boxes,'" Gomez said. "It makes me sad that it's on us to fix this. But I am proud to be part of a community that is stepping up. We are treating these people like people."