Denver won’t be handing out debit cards with instant cash to asylum-chasing migrants in the next outlay of $6 million approved by the city council to subsidize food, housing, laundry, and other services.
Councilwoman Shontel Lewis was the lone vote this week against the funding, complaining about the lack of faith in migrants to spend for themselves the estimated $7,000 per participant in the city’s so-called “work program.”
We question why it’s called a work program or why debit cards were even considered, as organizers claim half of the 865 people enrolled in the Denver’s Asylum Seekers Program (DASP) are children.
But we digress.
The Denver Gazette reports:
Lewis insisted that the city can trust people getting taxpayer money to prop themselves up.
“Basic income does work and we’ve found that when you give unconditional dollars to folks to make decisions over their lives, that’s an effective use,” she said.
Lewis’s alleged proof that giving unchecked welfare works is questionable.
Denver handed out $2 million to homeless participants in a trial earlier this year, but only half participated in the survey to determine whether it was used to help them get housing.
Interestingly, the reasons cited for declining to pass out debit cards to non-citizens with unproven asylum claims who are not permitted to work in the U.S. is that it’s probably illegal.
Sarah Plastino, Newcomer Program Director told the council during a previous meeting:
“In terms of our legal concerns about direct cash assistance for migrants, we know the people in DASP are not authorized to work legally,” she said. “We shifted from debit cards to physical distribution because no debit card platform software we looked at can control the category of goods eligible for purchase on the front end.”
Instead, the city awarded a $6 million contract to Haven of Hope to provide those services to participating migrants through July 2025.
According to Haven of Hope’s public discloser of tax forms from 2022, they spent more money than they raised, and an enormous chunk of nearly $707,000 went towards salaries.
That year the organization raised more than $1.6 million but spent $1.9 million.
It does not inspire confidence.