DENVER — Denver has a $40 million challenge it can’t solve itself.
This week, city council will vote on whether to approve a $40 million contract to outsource nearly all of Denver’s response to migrants arriving here from the southern border -- everything from medical care, to shelters, to food will be handled by a third-party company.
On Wednesday, the Denver City Council's Safety, Housing, Education and Homelessness Committee will vote on whether to award the contract to GardaWorld and its subsidiary Aegis Defense Services. GardaWorld is most well-known for armored cars and security guards. Aegis advertises on its website it has an “unrivalled reputation in protecting oil fields” in Iraq.
But GardaWorld does have experience working with migrants. The city said GardaWorld has contracted with places like El Paso, San Antonio and Chicago to help them with migrants.
They’ve also contracted with the state of Florida.
Contracts show GardaWorld was chosen by Florida to run a program led by Gov. Ron DeSantis (R), flying migrants out to other states led by Democrats. Critics call it a political stunt.
The proposal city council is seeing says GardaWorld was chosen through a “competitive” process with staff from throughout he city involved. While GardaWorld specializes in logistics and security, we don’t know what that would look like here in Denver.
9NEWS reached out to GardaWorld to see if they have the staff like doctors to help migrants or if they would outsource that as well, but did not hear back.
Since December, Denver has served nearly 12,000 migrants. It’s used rec centers, churches and even parking garages as shelters and intake centers. Nearly the entire response has been led by community partners and city employees. Now, that could change completely.
Back in April, Denver City Council heard specifics on how much migrants arriving in Colorado are costing the city. The price tag the city’s chief financial officer gave councilmembers was between $800 to $1,000 per week per migrant. From December to June, the estimated cost was between $17 and $20 million. Now Denver’s potential new contract will cost the city $40 million through next March.
WATCH: Federal money given to Denver for migrants has strings attached
"For the facilities, the staffing, the services, the food, the supplies. Everything is included in that scope of services," Margaret Danuser, Chief Financial Officer for the Denver Department of Finance, told City Council in April.
City Council will also vote this week to create a new fund to pay for all of this. It would reallocate nearly $20 million from other funds to support what they’re calling the Border Crisis Response Special Revenue Fund. In addition, the city would use FEMA money close to $10 million it was just awarded to help foot the bill.
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