Aurora's Jurinsky wants non-profit probe to determine how migrants ended up there

Photo byBarbara ZandovalonUnsplash

AURORA, Colo. -- Aurora City Council member Danielle Jurinsky wants to know who is helping migrants in Aurora and how.

Jurinsky sponsored a resolution that appears on Monday’s agenda. The resolution, if approved by council, would direct City Manager Jason Batchelor to investigate which non-profits received money from the state of Colorado or the City and County of Denver. The resolution authorizes him to use Colorado Open Records Act requests to obtain the information.

“The state of Colorado and adjacent jurisdictions to the city, such as the City and County of Denver, have intentionally placed immigrants within the city without notifying the city of this placement and consequently placing great strain in our community,” the resolution states. It notes that the state has created the “Office of New Americans” to serve as a clearinghouse for public and private organizations looking to help migrants settle in Colorado.

Several apartment buildings in Aurora have experienced gang activity, police have said, but city officials maintain the larger problem is a lack of maintenance by the landlord, CBZ Properties.

Fewer resources than Denver

“Aurora is not a county and does not have the same responsibilities and funding that a county has, and as such the city’s financial resources or other local resources are limited and offering sanctuary or support is impossible and creates risks to the health, safety, and welfare of both migrants and the residents of Aurora," the resolution states. "Nonetheless, the city has used funds from multiple sources including the city’s own funds through the years to assist non-profits that help the immigrant community seeking to improve the overall provision of services to them.”

According to the resolution, the city does not have the resources to support the migrants. “The council is concerned that placing immigrants within the city without the adequate resources to assist them is detrimental to the city, to the immigrants, and the community at large.”

Who moved in the migrants?

In an email, Jurinsky made her objectives for the resolution clear. "We would have no authority to tell the non profits what they can/can't do. The intent is to expose how this happened. Where did the money come from? Who were the non profits involved? What was the City of Denver and the state's role in this? How were complexes selected? What complexes did these folks go into?"

Jurinsky also wanted to know whether the units were inspected before migrants moved in. According to Jessica Prosser, the city's homeless services director, two non-profits were placing migrants in Aurora. In an email to Jurinsky, Prosser said she learned of the placements through conversations with the state Office of New Americans, the Department of Local Affairs, and the City and County of Denver’s Office of Newcomer and Migrant Support. "No housing quality inspections were completed to check for even basic life safety concerns prior to placing individuals in apartments in Aurora," Prosser wrote. "From my understanding deposit assistance was offered as well as three months of rent in some cases. This was done starting in the spring of 2023 and continued to the spring of 2024."

Denver official: We didn't place migrants in CBZ buildings

"As of the beginning of August 2024 I was told that no additional placements were being made and there was no additional funding for this purpose," Prosser continued in the email. "Many migrants were placed in the properties that CBZ owned, according to Papagayo and (ViVe) Wellness, two of the non-profits receiving state and Denver funding as pass through agencies."

Prosser said in her email that according to tenants at the CBZ properties, the management company offered lower rent, less consistency with leases and more leniency regarding the number of people allowed in each unit.

Jon Ewing, a spokesman for the City and County of Denver, said migrants were not "placed" in the troubled CBZ buildings, but admitted some migrants who came into the country through Denver now live in other Front Range cities. He said city money only was used for housing for migrants enrolled in the Denver Asylum Seekers Program, and none of those migrants live in those buildings. "We did not place anyone in those apartments," Ewing said in an emailed statement. "As we’ve said from then beginning, nonprofits used their own resources to help people cover first month’s rent, deposit and security fees. Even then, this was only done after the newcomers themselves chose their own apartments. The nonprofits, to my understanding, did not select which units people stayed in. The only noteworthy times city dollars have been used to cover rent or deposits is with the DASP program or when we resolved a large encampment on Zuni in January, and I was told that no one from that encampment was placed in those apartment complexes."