DENVER’S HIDDEN GEMS OF HUMANITY CREDIT: GILES CLASEN CREDIT: GILES CLASEN struggling with poverty. The need for basic supplies was incredible. Garcia connected with a few different Navajo individuals and organizations to learn what he could do to help. Then, he posted his plans to help on Facebook. “The community of Colorado caught on to what we were doing and came out big with donations,” he said. Like the Pied Piper, Garcia started drawing in others to his cause. Among them was Ashlee Lewis, who learned about what Garcia was doing from a friend on Facebook. She had never met Garcia but felt compelled to join his cause. “I was making masks for anyone who needed it,” Lewis said. “A friend said they saw a Facebook post about getting things to Navajo Nation, so I reached out to Lucas. I knew I had to get involved.” Lewis has been involved in nonprofit work for many years and is the executive director of The Initiative, a Denver-based nonprofit that advocates for individuals with disabilities who are the victims of abuse. Her nonprofit experience helped build an organizational structure for Garcia’s work. The two created a donation website to make it easy for individuals to send supplies to Native Americans. Compassionate Colorado now has 25 volunteers along the front range who collect donations from individuals then bring the donations to Garcia’s house right before scheduled delivery to the reservation. Once the items are collected, they are loaded onto trailers and a camper and towed to communities on reservations in South Dakota, New Mexico, Arizona, and Utah. Every step of the process is completed by volunteers, including towing the items to where they are needed. The most difficult part of the process is the delivery. “It has been a lot of work to rent a truck,” Lewis said. “We did not anticipate how heavy our loads would be. We did not expect the difficulty of getting through the mountains. The cost of the truck rental is really expensive. The travel times are much worse than we anticipated. Something that should take 7 hours ends up taking us 12 hours to get there. We expected it to take 12 hours to drive to Arizona. Instead, it took 17 or 18 hours. We are so grateful for our wonderful volunteers.” The most difficult part so far has been getting over Wolf Creek Pass. “I was afraid we all were afraid to go over it,” Garcia said. “Halfway down we had to stop and take in the beauty, take pictures, take a deep breath, and take in what that area had to offer. We had to stop to let our brakes cool down, too.” Alicia Martin is one of Compassionate Colorado’s contacts in Page. She and her dad, Franklin Martin, have gathered the donated water and items from Compassionate Colorado and have been getting the donations to individuals and families living on the reservation. They live in the Bodaway-Gap chapter of the Navajo Reservation, where few people have electricity in their homes, and fewer have plumbing. The reservation has been shut down since the early days of the pandemic, and many families have moved back to the isolated reservation to escape possible exposure to the virus. The Martins are driving water, food, cleaning supplies, and hand sanitizer down unmarked roads to deliver what Compassionate Colorado has collected to houses that have no addresses. “We’re trying to keep people home,” Franklin Martin said. “We’re delivering food. We have disinfectants and Clorox to help them clean everything. We clean everything they get [from Compassionate Colorado]. We inform them not to go anywhere. This virus is not good.” So far, Compassionate Colorado has delivered more than 3,000 gallons of water as well as thousands of food and cleaning items. When a delivery is made, every single item is disinfected by hand, using a bleach mixture to ensure the coronavirus won’t inadvertently be carried onto the reservation. “Our biggest fear is taking COVID to the reservations,” Lewis said. “So, we are making sure we are taking all the safety precautions we can. Masks, gloves, and we are starting to implement getting ourselves tested before and after each trip.” The organization’s work is starting to have an impact for communities on the Navajo Reservation. “Since compassionate Colorado – there is a tiny relief,” Alicia Martin said. “Groups [on the reservation] reached out and asked for help. People I know have reached out or given us the names of family members they want us to check on. We have supplies to help.” For Compassionate Colorado, the work is just getting started. They have filed paperwork to become a 501(c)3 nonprofit organization and are planning to help Native communities through the pandemic and beyond. “With every delivery – once we are unloading – we take a moment on the side to share a few tears together,” Lewis said. “Because of the work, the organization, the volunteers, and everything it took to get there, it is a huge relief of mission accomplished when we get there. There is so much more to do.” ■ July 2020 DENVER VOICE 9
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