Thanks to our generous donors, the Santa Cruz Welcoming Network raised $52,871 through Santa Cruz Gives. That's the 2nd highest amount raised among the 63 participating non-profits in the 6-week campaign. Special thanks to the Volunteer Center, Good Times, and Community Foundation of Santa Cruz County for making Santa Cruz Gives possible and to the Santa Cruz Hub for Sustainable Living, our fiscal sponsor. Also thanks to our volunteer fundraisers, especially Ellen Fitzgerald Murtha, Amy Harrington, George Newell, and Meg Sandow. Welcoming Network team members have scheduled a strategy meeting to plan the best use of funds to accompany our new neighbors.
We are a community network dedicated to welcoming and supporting asylum seekers and other refugees.
Many people are anguished by the breakdown of the U.S. immigration system and the terrible stories emanating from our southern border with Mexico: asylum- seekers being turned away with no chance to present their cases; immigrants camped out at the border who become the prey of extremely violent and ruthless gangs; thousands of immigrants locked up in privately-run detention facilities in deplorable conditions; and others, including minors, who die while attempting to cross the desert.
In Santa Cruz in 2019, that anguish led to the formation of the Santa Cruz Welcoming Network. The Network's belief is that if local folks were offered the opportunity to do something to help in response to this crisis, they would step forward and do so. And that is in fact what has happened.
The Santa Cruz Welcoming Network sees the same dignity and humanity in every person and helps ensure decent, safe circumstances for asylum-seekers and refugees, because all persons have the right to seek freedom from violence, fear and repression.
For one family, the move from emergency housing in a motel to a home of their own can be the difference between a life overshadowed by the mortal threats they fled and the beginning of a new life with hope on the horizon.
