As thousands of migrants pour into Denver, CBS News Colorado has learned the city is buying bus, train and even plane tickets to send many of them somewhere else.
Over the last year, Denver has spent nearly $4.5 million transporting more than 12,000 migrants out-of-state.
“We say, ‘where do you want to go?’ and then we buy them a ticket, usually by bus, and get them on their way,” says Jon Ewing, a spokesperson for Denver Human Services.
He provided a spreadsheet showing the city has transported migrants to virtually every major city in the country over the last year. It’s not only sent them to big cities but smaller ones like Wilson, North Carolina. Most of them have gone to Chicago, New York and Salt Lake City. It’s also sent several hundred migrants to Texas, which has bused 6,600 migrants to Colorado since May according to Republican Texas Gov. Greg Abbott.
“We feel that it’s the right thing to do to get them to where they actually want to be,” says Ewing. “If you looked at it in crude financial terms, meaning, if they stayed here for a few weeks and didn’t even want to be here, then we’d be paying to support and shelter them here and they didn’t even want to be here.”
He says Denver sending migrants to other cities is entirely different than Texas sending them here: “The difference is we’re actually asking them where they want to go.”
But he admits they also don’t give other cities a heads up: “There’s just no way for us to coordinate on that scale. It’s just unfeasible. And it’s only for one or two tickets, often, per day.”
The city began tracking travel by ticket type in June. While most of the migrants get bus tickets, the city has purchased 335 plane tickets over the last five months alone at a cost of about $115,000. Almost half of them were purchased in October.
“Could be because of a person’s medical condition, it could be because it would be too arduous to drive or travel by bus,” says Ewing.
He says the city has spent more than $31 million on migrants overall since last December and transportation represents about 14% of the total.
He says the city has spent just over $12 million on personnel, $7.5 million on shelter and $4.8 million on food: “We need support here. Denver cannot do this alone.”
President Joe Biden has asked Congress for about one-and-a-half billion dollars to help cities like Denver, but last week, several mayors — including Denver Mayor Mike Johnston – told the White House they need $5 billion.
