“Buscar asilo se ha vuelto casi tan difícil como llegar aquí en primer lugar”.

Este artículo apareció originalmente en inglés el 28 de agosto. Traducido por Daniel Parra.
Read the English version here.

Hace cinco meses llegué a Nueva York procedente de Venezuela. Venir aquí ha sido la decisión más difícil que he tenido que tomar en mi vida. Amo a mi país, pero, para mí, quedarme allí habría significado enfrentarme a la posibilidad real de que me mataran.

En Venezuela, tenía un negocio de comida rápida y estudiaba gestión medioambiental. Quería luchar por un futuro mejor y decidí alzar mi voz contra el gobierno actual en señal de protesta. A causa de ello, mi vida dio un vuelco. Me amenazaron con castigos severos y con la muerte, lo que me obligó a tomar la decisión de abandonar mi hogar. Dejé atrás todo lo que conozco y amo: mis parientes, mi tierra, mi cultura y mis pertenencias.

Para llegar a Estados Unidos, tuve que caminar durante días por el Tapón del Darién, una enorme selva tropical en la que no hay carreteras visibles. Todos los días eran aterradores, ya que nos veíamos obligados a caminar por zonas rocosas llenas de barro, nos enfrentábamos a la posibilidad de encontrar animales salvajes y a muchas otras situaciones mortales. También me aterrorizaba la idea de ser secuestrada, maltratada e incluso asesinada en esta región sin ley y plagada de actividades delictivas. Tras atravesar esta zona, cruzamos Centroamérica y México.

Tras cruzar la frontera, tardé casi dos semanas en llegar a Nueva York. Al entrar, los agentes nos recibieron y nos llevaron a un puesto de trámites donde nos indicaron que buscáramos rápidamente un abogado y nos entregaron un papel con números de teléfono. A continuación, nos indicaron que nos subieramos a un autobús que nos llevaría a una iglesia de San Antonio que ofrecía refugio. Dando un salto de fe, subimos al autobús, ya que no teníamos otra opción. En cuanto llegamos al refugio, la gente que trabajaba allí nos ayudó a conseguir un tiquete de avión a New York.

En Nueva York vivo en un refugio donde nos proporcionan artículos de primera necesidad, incluida comida, y pude matricular a mis hijos en la escuela. Aunque estoy muy agradecida por la ayuda recibida, cada día me preocupa más nuestro futuro. En particular, no sé cómo seguir adelante con el proceso de solicitar asilo por mi cuenta. He tomado cartas en el asunto. Después de buscar durante varios días, encontré Make the Road New York/Hace Camino Nueva York, que me dio un teléfono móvil y otros recursos para ayudarme a moverme por la ciudad.

Durante los últimos meses, he tenido la misma rutina casi todos los días. Dejo a mis hijos en el colegio y empiezo a buscar organizaciones que puedan ayudarme con mi situación. Sin embargo, a pesar de llamar a innumerables puertas, siempre obtengo el mismo resultado. Me han dicho más veces de las que puedo contar que necesito solicitar asilo, pero que no pueden ayudarme en este momento porque están saturados de casos y no tienen los recursos para ayudarme.

En el lugar donde me encuentro, ninguno de los trabajadores parece tener información clara sobre qué hacer, más allá de compartir sitios web y números de teléfono que podrían ser útiles. Buscar asilo se ha vuelto casi tan difícil como llegar aquí en primer lugar. Mi única alternativa sería pagar un abogado particular, lo cual, sencillamente, no me resulta viable en este momento. Los abogados me han pedido entre 12.000 y 15.000 dólares por representación y ayuda con los trámites.

No es realista esperar que la gente disponga de estas grandes sumas de dinero a su llegada. Sin embargo, no puedo obtener autorización para trabajar hasta después de presentar la solicitud de asilo, lo que significa que no puedo ahorrar para el abogado que necesito. Una vez más, me siento como si estuviera atravesando una selva sin caminos a la vista.

El primer paso crucial para los solicitantes de asilo como yo es solicitarlo realmente, lo que también desbloqueará la autorización de trabajo mientras se revisa nuestra solicitud. Por no hablar del hecho de que las solicitudes deben presentarse a tiempo, ya que si no se hace en el plazo de un año desde la llegada, no se puede solicitar asilo. Pero es más fácil decirlo que hacerlo cuando nos han abandonado a nuestra suerte.

Se Hace Camino Nueva York, el contralor municipal Brad Lander y otros han pedido que la ciudad destine más dinero a servicios jurídicos para ayudar a personas como yo a presentar nuestras solicitudes de asilo. Esa idea tiene sentido para mí, y no entiendo por qué el alcalde Eric Adams o la gobernadora Kathy Hochul no la han incluido en los presupuestos municipales o estatales de este año. Además, es importante tener en cuenta que, todos aquellos que no puedan presentar su solicitud en el plazo previsto, pasarán a ser indocumentados. El resultado sería un aumento de las personas que viven en el limbo, con miedo a denunciar las injusticias o la discriminación, por nombrar sólo algunas consecuencias

Además, he oído que el alcalde está distribuyendo folletos en los que se pide a personas como yo que consideren otras ciudades a la hora de venir a EE.UU. ¿No sería mejor centrar las actividades de divulgación en ayudar a las personas a acceder a los servicios que necesitan para sobrevivir y presentar sus solicitudes de asilo?

Estoy agradecida por haber llegado a una ciudad que acoge a inmigrantes desde hace mucho tiempo, un lugar donde se supone que la gente como yo debe sentirse segura. Soy consciente de que, cuando llega mucha gente a la vez, puede ser un reto para el gobierno local. Pero también sé que hemos llegado aquí dispuestos a trabajar, abrir negocios y formar parte de esta increíble ciudad, como tantos neoyorquinos inmigrantes antes que nosotros.

Pido humildemente a todos los niveles del gobierno que se dé el apoyo necesario para que los solicitantes de asilo podamos presentar nuestras solicitudes y obtener la ayuda que necesitamos a corto plazo, para que podamos salir de los refugios y volver a ponernos en pie lo antes posible.

Raiza Guevara es miembro de Make the Road New York/Se Hace Camino Nueva York.

Asphalt contributes to the urban heat island effect and makes places more prone to flooding. Planners are rethinking its place in cities. This article originally appeared in Nexus Media News.

This article originally appeared in Nexus Media News.

It all started because a man named Arif Khan wanted a garden.

In 2007, he had recently moved into a house in Portland, Ore., whose backyard was covered in asphalt. Some friends helped him tear up the impervious surface, and soon after, they won a small grant to carry out a similar project in front of a local cafe.

“It was a one-off,” said Ted Labbe, co-founder of Depave, an urban greening movement. “But it was so successful that the next year we got solicited to do three projects, and then five the year after that. It just kept escalating.” In the 15 years since breaking ground on Khan’s backyard, Depave has completed 75 projects in schoolyards, churches and other community spaces across Portland.

The Depave movement has spread across the United States and Canada in recent years as climate-related extreme heat and flooding have made some cities rethink the wisdom of all that heat-absorbing, impervious surface area.

Depave’s newest chapter is in Chicago, where about half of the population lives in areas where temperatures are at least eight degrees higher than the city’s base temperature, a disparity that can prove deadly in heatwaves. More than 60 percent of the city is covered in impervious surfaces, and when record rains fell in early July, more than 12,000 residents reported flooding in their basements.

“Environmental justice communities are suffering from a lot of pavement-related issues,” said Mary Pat McGuire, a professor of architecture at the University of Illinois, and the founder of Depave Chicago. “We’re trying to bring attention to it so that the city will start treating this as a critical part of climate adaptation and social justice.”

Since launching in 2022, McGuire and a group of volunteers have been holding listening sessions across the city to identify local needs. She and her cohort recently finished drawing up plans for their pilot project: greening a public schoolyard in West Englewood, a low-income neighborhood in southwest Chicago.

“They teach the Montessori method which is very hands-on,” McGuire said. Depave consulted with sixth, seventh and eighth graders, along with teachers, parents and school board members to draw up a blueprint for the new schoolyard. It includes pollinator gardens, an outdoor classroom, log structures, bioswales and shady trees. “Green infrastructure isn’t clean, neat and tidy,” McGuire said. “We’re going to get messy.”

Paved roads and parking lots take up about 30 percent of urban areas in the United States. (In some cities, like New York, that figure is closer to 61 percent.) Parking lots alone cover more than 5 percent of developed land in the lower 48 states, according to the U.S. Geological Survey.

“We’ve had a love affair with paving things for several generations,” said Brendan Shane, climate director at the nonprofit Trust for Public Land (TPL). “We have too many unnatural paved surfaces and not enough natural surfaces, and that’s creating these urban heat islands [and] rapidly flooding neighborhoods.”

Extreme heat and flooding are particularly acute in low-income communities of color, which typically have less green space than wealthy, white neighborhoods, a legacy of redlining practices.

Replacing asphalt with greenery has benefits beyond lowering temperatures and reducing flood risk. It’s also associated with lower stress levels, a reduction in noise, fewer traffic-related injuries and even restoration of local biodiversity. It can also improve air quality: asphalt releases hazardous air pollutants into communities, especially in extreme heat and direct sunlight.

“We want to bring it to the city’s attention that this is a critical part of climate adaptation and solving social inequity,” McGuire said.

Amid climate-fueled heatwaves and floods, cities around the country are rethinking the streetscape. In Phoenix, Arizona, where asphalt can get so hot during heatwaves it can give third-degree burns, officials are painting surfaces with reflective grey paint. Nashville, which experienced deadly floods back in 2010, has transformed alleyways into blooming bee-filled rain gardens.

More than a decade ago, Chicago invested $14 million in building what it dubbed the “greenest street in America.” The two-mile stretch of Blue Island Avenue and Cermak Road in the Pilsen neighborhood sports rain gardens, permeable pavements and solar-powered street lights.

“There are a lot of great strategies and plans out there,” says Vincent Lee, a principal at Arup, an engineering and architecture firm. Last year, Arup released a study examining the  “sponginess” —or ability to absorb rainfall—of several cities and making the case for cities to invest in nature-based solutions to prevent flooding. “But implementation is a major challenge due to lack of funding, outdated policies and codes and minimal cross-sector collaboration.”

Many advocates say schoolyards are ideal sites for greening projects because they represent an opportunity to educate students about climate resilience. Space to Grow, another Chicago organization, has overhauled 34 schoolyards over the last decade, replacing asphalt with permeable sports fields, rain gardens and other porous surfaces.

“Our schools are the center of the community, and we want to make sure kids are excited to be in those spaces,” said Meg Kelly, Space to Grow’s director.

According to the organization’s data, replacing asphalt with permeable sport fields, rain gardens and other porous surfaces has reduced ground temperatures by up to 54 degrees Fahrenheit and captured more than 3.5 million gallons of stormwater, alleviating neighborhood flooding.

McGuire said she wants Depave Chicago to help neighbors avoid the next flood or find respite from the next heat wave, but she also wants to help Chicagoans envision a different future for their city.

“It’s about changing attitudes towards concrete,” she said. “We’ve been missing an opportunity to embrace nature in the city, and I’m just trying to get people to look at the world around them and dream of something different.”

“Aug. 31 is International Overdose Awareness Day. Here in New York City, the overdose crisis has reached historic levels: 2,668 people died of drug overdoses in 2021, a 78 percent increase since 2019. As someone who recently survived an overdose, this crisis hits incredibly close to home.”

Aug. 31 is International Overdose Awareness Day. Here in New York City, the overdose crisis has reached historic levels: 2,668 people died of drug overdoses in 2021, a 78 percent increase since 2019. As someone who recently survived an overdose, this crisis hits incredibly close to home.

My personal experience—as well as my professional role as an outreach coordinator at Alliance for Positive Change’s LES Harm Reduction Center—has taught me that increasing harm reduction awareness, access, and resources are crucial to turning the tide on our current crisis.

The unexpected presence of fentanyl and xylazine in the unregulated drug supply is a factor that is driving the growing number of deaths. Both can be found in everything from cocaine to counterfeit pills, and for those without a tolerance, it can be extremely dangerous.

As an outreach worker, I share information and resources with the community that can save lives. Fentanyl and xylazine test strips are key harm reduction tools that I distribute in the field. People can use the strips to test their drugs and make a more informed decision about how they use their substances.

Syringe Service Programs are another crucial component of harm reduction. These initiatives not only help prevent the spread of infections, but also establish points of contact where individuals can begin to build trust with a community provider and access resources, counseling, and referral services. By meeting people where they are, syringe exchange programs break down barriers to seeking support, no matter what that looks like for the individual.

My own overdose came while grocery shopping. I had taken a pill that I didn’t know contained fentanyl. I didn’t have fentanyl test strips to use. When I fell over, an emergency responder gave me Narcan, and it saved my life. We need more New Yorkers to have access to and knowledge of how to administer this overdose reversal drug. Community-based harm reduction organizations like Alliance for Positive Change are critical to distributing resources like Narcan in communities most impacted by the overdose crisis.

My journey from overdose survivor to harm reduction advocate has taught me that compassion and understanding are infinitely more powerful than judgment and isolation. As an outreach coordinator, I know that the harm reduction tools themselves—like testing strips, Syringe Service Programs, and Narcan—are extremely valuable. But the community, connection, and compassion our team offers are often even more important. Amid an unprecedented crisis, New York must invest in harm reduction measures as a means of saving lives.

This Overdose Awareness Day, my own experience serves as a stark reminder that behind every statistic is a person who deserves a fighting chance. I am proud to no longer use drugs, but everyone’s journey is different—there is no one-size-fits-all solution. Together, let us champion a future where harm reduction takes precedence, and every individual has the opportunity to continue to write their own story. Only then will we start to turn the tide on the overdose crisis.

Ashley Lynch is an outreach coordinator at Alliance for Positive Change.

To reach the editor behind this story or to submit your own opinion piece, email Jeanmarie@citylimits.org.

A Prince William County Police Department officer is recovering from minor injuries after a collision Sunday with another driver, who is suspected of driving under the influence.

According to a Facebook post from the department, the officer was driving a marked police SUV down the Prince William Parkway at the time of the crash, just before 1:30 a.m. At the intersection with Wellington Road, the officer continued through a green light when another driver in a pickup truck ran a red light and entered the intersection.

The other driver crossed in front of the cruiser, and the officer — who police said was driving at speed for the Parkway — crashed the front of the cruiser into the back of the pickup truck.

The impact and post-crash maneuvering caused the police SUV to overturn.

Only minor injuries were reported.

The pickup truck driver was arrested for DUI following the collision.

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