Survival Program

Four Winds' Survival Program is part of a long-standing effort to provide a safety net for our community members in need. We revived the program in 2021 to focus on the needs of unhoused Native people living on Denver's streets. This work emerged out of an autonomous, grassroots direct action in response to the City of Denver’s attempt to violently displace a group of homeless Native people who had set up camp outside Four Winds. Our relatives moved their camp onto the Four Winds property,established a self-determined matriarchal community they called Denver Indigenous Refugee Camp (DIRC), and began organizing themselves to demand a city-sanctioned campsite dedicated to serving Native people. Having won a hard-fought battle for the city sanctioned site, our relatives at the DIRC then chose to move to the new site. Four Winds shifted focus to establish a street survival supply distribution center, and to begin providing limited case advocacy as liaisons between our relatives and their case managers or the justice system. We also support our relatives in transitional housing and those who have recently moved into permanent housing with grocery assistance and direct financial assistance. We know that a diverse set of our community members face food insecurity, lack of access to reliable transportation, and that many are in need of direct emergency financial assistance, so we hope to soon expand this work to serve our broader community.