Odalys Avila’s job is finding answers—answers for families who are used to being told “no.”

"We do have a lot of clients who are undocumented, and so, when you're undocumented, unfortunately, you know, they don't qualify for anything," she said.

Avila works at Servicios de la Raza, a social services organization that serves Denver Colorado’s Latino community. She helps members of the community navigate different health systems and sign up for insurance, which gets complicated even if there are US citizens in the household.

"We do have some families who fear, 'if we apply for our kids or for my husband, how is that gonna, you know, affect me as an undocumented person?'" she said.

She sees firsthand how that uncertainty turns into real health complications.

"Not being able to cover medications or not being able to get preventative care and then coming at the last minute, looking for some sort of assistance because you know, now they have these like major health issues that they need to get taken care of," Avila said.

According to 2020 US Census Data, the Hispanic population is the least insured in the country: 18% of Hispanic people of all ages in America were uninsured, compared to 10% of Black Americans and 8% of white Americans.

By age groups: 25% of working-age Hispanics and 9.5% of Hispanics under 18 were uninsured.

"Families are in a really tough spot to decide: do I get healthcare for my child who needs a transplant or do I make sure that we can stay in the United States and not go back somewhere that we had to flee because of violence?" said Rayna Hetlage, senior policy manager at Colorado’s Center for Health Progress, an organization that helped get bills turned into law that allows health insurance access to undocumented immigrants and low-income people.

"When the Affordable Care Act was passed, concessions were made to get it to passed and some of those concessions were things like leaving out DACA recipients, leaving out undocumented immigrants from having any access to coverage," said Hetlage.

A new law will expand Medicaid and CHIP coverage to undocumented pregnant people and children in 2025, and beginning next year, state funds will be able to help qualifying residents who are a certain level below the federal poverty line purchase insurance.

Advocates, like Rudy Gonzalez of Servicios de la Raza, says these solutions are necessary to level the playing field for low-income members of his community.

"We're going to be able to get them insured. I mean, that's the biggest part of this new law," he said.

Several states like California, New Jersey, Texas, Michigan, and New York have worked to create similar solutions, like expanding Medicaid access to undocumented children and pregnant people, with more reaching out to Colorado.

"We've had conversations with other states who are really curious to hear what we're doing here," said Hetlage.

For Avila, she hopes the more access increases for low-income or undocumented folks across the board, the more people will see the need that exists.

"I hope that they support future laws that are possibly put in place. I hope they support this law and this program to be expanded," she said.

Lalo Alcaraz still gets excited when he sees people reacting to one of his political cartoons.

"That never gets old," he said.

A tiny office is where he creates a loud message by using barely any words. 

“I’m just trying to get people to think critically," Alcaraz said.

The thing about political cartoons, he said, is that within seconds people should understand the point.

“I think political cartoons are really accessible, quick format that delivers the truth with a punch,” Alcaraz said.

His work is sometimes controversial. Alcaraz admits he's received hate mail throughout his career. 

“Bluntness. That's what makes my cartoons different. I have a lot of different cartoons I like to be direct," Alcaraz said.

Alcaraz is a Pulitzer Prize-nominated cartoonist whose daily comic strip "La Cucaracha" is the first nationally syndicated Latino political cartoon.

His art has made him an icon in the Mexican-American community.

In the pandemic, his work has carried a new meaning.

“It makes me feel good if someone tells me like, 'that really helped me to talk to my uncle about his dislike of vaccines,'" Alcaraz said. "That’s always a win for me."

He created special cartoons to fight pandemic misinformation as part of the "COVID Latino" project with Arizona State University.

The Latino community’s high reliance on social media for news is a reason why groups like Nielsen say they are at a higher risk for misinformation.

Avaaz, a nonprofit organization, found posts with misinformation in Spanish on Facebook are far less likely to be flagged— compared to posts in English.

“I think we’re all responsible to our communities we can’t expect people to come in and fix things for us and also on the ground level at some point," Alcaraz says.

Facebook has promised to do more to fact-check Spanish posts on its platform.

As the midterm elections near, Alcaraz hopes his messages can be educational.

"You know the information is out there; you have to look at it," he said. "'Use the coco that God gave you.'" That’s an old thing my mom used to say.”

Day of the Dead is a holiday that originated in Mexico. In Spanish, it’s called "Día de los Muertos." Nohemi Valencia-Bustillos has grown up celebrating it.

“Día de los Muertos is a celebration that we honor the ones that have passed away,” Valencia-Bustillos said.

She says the intent isn’t to mourn those we have lost, but rather to spend time with them. That’s why it’s common to lay out a photo of the person and a few of their favorite things. This year, Nohemi’s altar – called "ofrenda" in Spanish – is an ofrenda inclusive of many more beyond her family and friends.

“My ofrenda, I decided to dedicate it on the lives lost due to COVID, but I specifically focused on people of color and our older generation.”

She says she wanted to focus on people of color because they’ve been disproportionately impacted by COVID-19.

“On my ofrenda, there are 11 candles," Valencia-Bustillos said. "Those are the people that I know that passed away due to COVID.”

APM Research Lab, a nonpartisan research and analysis division, assembled a database that tracked the impacts of COVID-19 across different racial and ethnic groups during the first year of the pandemic. Craig Helmstetter is the lab’s managing partner.

“What we found over time is that the rate of death was pretty similar between white Americans and Asian Americans, but it was pretty different for other groups," Helmstetter said. "For example, for the Black population, death rates were twice that of the white and Asian population. For the Latino and Pacific Islander populations, death rates were about two and a half times the Asian and white populations. And for the Indigenous population, the death rate was over three times that of the white and Asian populations.”

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the factors that affect health equity include discrimination, health care access, educational gaps, and occupation.

“For example, populations of color are more likely to work in the service industry, more likely to work in part-time jobs without benefits,” Helmstetter said.

Helmstetter says there’s no evidence this is due to any biological or genetic differences between the groups.

“So, that leaves us with structural or systematic explanations as to why the death rates for COVID-19 are higher among certain populations of color.”

Valencia-Bustillos says it’s been really hard for her community to cope with so many lives lost.

“The older generation, it was a little harder because most of them were in a nursing home, so I had a great aunt who was in a nursing home and died in a nursing home and us as a Latin community, we gather around on their deathbed until they pass," Valencia-Bustillos said. "So this year, when we weren't allowed to, it was a very difficult time for us.”

However, she says she’s grateful for a holiday like Day of the Dead because she gets to sit with her loved ones in spirit. She's also happy to see people from different cultures joining in on the Mexican tradition.

“I love it," Valencia-Bustillos said. "I love seeing all of us come together and celebrating our past. I feel like it makes us united. We all have someone in our lives who we've lost and making an offering is just something we can all share.”

 

ATLANTA, Ga. — Just about every morning, Monicha Taylor hits the gym. She says it helps with productivity before logging on to work at her kitchen table.

“My favorite thing about it is the flexibility that you get,” Taylor said.

Her current public relations job makes it possible for her to work from home, but just like 25 million other Americans, she was unemployed the first few months of the pandemic.

“It was super frustrating, honestly, and scary," Taylor said. "I live alone and I have to take care of myself, so I just wasn't sure how I was going to come out of this or how I was going to stay afloat.”

Since graduating college in 2017, Taylor has been able to stay afloat thanks, in part, to freelance opportunities through Black Girl Group.

Founded by Stephanie Alston, Black Girl Group is a creative staffing platform that connects men and women of color to companies seeking more diverse creative talent.

“Let’s say they're looking for a graphic designer," Alston said. "They'll come to us and we will vet out the top three candidates for them and then we'll send those candidates over for them. They'll interview those candidates and if they decide to hire, then a relationship with them is made and then that person is able to move forward in that role.”

Alston says the idea came to her in a dream. Her goal is to diversify companies all over the U.S. by bringing people of color to the table.

“Being in PR in the past and being the only Black woman in the room on several occasions, what I realize is that oftentimes either there was not enough representation at the table or there was representation where people were afraid to speak up because they were fearful that they would be retaliated against if they did speak up,” Alston said.

Bringing women of color into the workforce is critical right now. Demographics professor Rogelio Saenz at the University of Texas-San Antonio says Black and Latina women have been the most heavily impacted by job loss during the pandemic.

“Childcare disproportionately falls to women and then with women, they also had elder care as well,” Saenz said.

Saenz’ report shows the highest peak of unemployment happened in April. Latinos had the highest unemployment rate at nearly 19%, followed by Blacks at 16.4% and whites had the lowest at around 13%.

“With respect to who was able to work from home and there that was also a significant difference, that it tended to be much more likely to be people with higher levels of education and also more likely to be whites compared to African Americans and Latinos,” Saenz said.

“The Band-Aid that was often put on the struggles that women of color face in the workplace, it was ripped off,” Alston said.

Saenz says the lack of opportunity for higher education and well-paying jobs among women of color is an issue of sexism and systemic racism. Because of that, he says the types of jobs many women of color have are in the service or tourism industries, those heavily affected while we were in lockdown.

The need for diversity became essential and noticed after George Floyd was killed in late May of 2020. Alston says that's when companies started making commitments toward diversity.

“It is unfortunate that the death of George Floyd, you know, was one of those things that propelled us into that," Alston said. "But at the same time, we are now able to give more people opportunities to sit at the table who may have otherwise never had the opportunity before.”

Taylor says her long-term goal is to become an entrepreneur like Alston, propelling women of color into high-paying and meaningful jobs.

“We started five years ago selling out of our house and now its expanded into this,” Anahi Mendivil said.

She works at Oasis Fresh Fruit & More, along with her mother, Haydee Caraveo.

“When the whole COVID thing started, it was just me, my mom, and my sister who were running and working, No one else was working with us and that's how we were able to maintain a bit of a budget with this less of a profit," Mendivil said.

Mendivil and her family members know the pains of running a business -- especially now during the pandemic. She helped translate for her mom.

“Now that people have been able to come back inside, it's been a little better but we’re just trying to adjust to all the new norms,” Mendivil said. “But sales have not been normal as they used to be.”

Their experience reflects what many Latinos are facing. A new study from Pew Research shows Hispanic businesses were hit especially hard by COVID-19. In May 2020, nearly six in 10 said they live in households that experienced job losses or pay cuts, compared to 43 percent of the overall U.S. population.

“Hispanic businesses however went from a 3.9 to nearly 20 percent unemployment, so it jumped a lot more than it did for whites and African Americans,” Jack Strauss, an economist and professor at the University of Denver, said.

“Less than a year ago,” he explained, “Hispanic businesses in general and Hispanic unemployment nearly matched that of the overall U.S.”

He said one of the reasons this group was hit hard, is because so many Hispanic-owned businesses make up some of the hardest-hit industries.

“Hispanics tend to concentrate in leisure and hospitality, which we all know has been hit very hard by COVID. Their second industry is retail, and then construction as well. All three industries were hit severely hard,” Strauss said.

“We work in the service industry, we are in restaurants, we are in cleaning services, we work in the meat industry, and Latino workers, they don't have the privilege to work from home,” Berenice G Tellez, Secretary of the Latino Chamber of Commerce in Denver, Colorado, said in a group Zoom meeting to discuss the topic. They all spoke about how language barriers played a role in the immediacy and availability of new information to Latino businesses owners.

“Some of them are running on fumes, so to speak,” Pete Salas, chair of the chamber said.

And many Hispanic-owned businesses are family run -- like Oasis.

“We've always tried to keep someone in our family working at all times,” Mendivil said.

Another aspect unique to these businesses, is they provide cultural space for the community.

“Something that really changed also is that people used to come in here on weekends. And a lot of people would be in here and eat and stay a long time and due to this, we have to manage how much people can be in here and how much time,” she said.

“I want to share the Americado experience, which is part of my Mexican culture, with everybody,” Francis Nieve Blanca, owner of Volcan Azul Catering and Food Truck, said. “The impact has been really on the amount of clients that we have, it has totally lowered our clients.”

“I have two jobs and the income for both actually has gone down, and that has impacted my family,” she said.

In a recent Pew Research survey, 70 percent of Latinos said the worst of the problems due to COVID-19 are still to come.

“This impact is going to last probably up to several years,” Strauss said.

However, these businesses aren’t ready to give up.

“We’ve been trying to incorporate new technology which is not very common for us,” Mendivil said. “So we can maybe go into doing deliveries.”

“It’s like my mom said, when money is not enough, you just tighten your belt. It's a saying in Spanish. Apretarse el cinturón, meaning that you just spend less,” Nieve Blanca said.

From the streets of Chicago to Puerto Rico, a school dropout to a college graduate, the president and CEO of the Latino Community Development Agency in Oklahoma is using his life experience to help thousands of Latinos."Well, I was a Puerto Rican kid born and raised in Chicago – southside Chicago, where all the mess is still going on today. A mom that didn't know how to raise a kid, so I was raised by the streets," said Raul Font, president of the Latino Community Development Agency. "At some point in time, my mom, Puerto Rican, decided, 'I need some help. I need to be raising these kids in Puerto Rico.' So, We go to Puerto Rico, and I quit school. I quit school at 11 years old. I decided that school was not for me, and I was mad at the whole world because everyone had parents, nice houses and stuff, and I didn't.""You said you were raised by the streets at the age of 11, moved to Puerto Rico. It's a culture shock, culture change. What was that like for you?" sister station KOCO 5 asked."We had a problem of fitting in. We didn't know where to fit in, and I personally not having a home and not having a country, it was pretty hard," Font said. "We got in a lot of trouble, but we were really not into gangs."What kind of trouble did Font get into as a child?"I could still open your home in about 18 seconds, most likely," Font said. "I knew how to push the envelope. But then, at that age, that preteen age where you really get in trouble, here comes the basketball. This guy comes up and says, 'Just bounce the ball every time you ...' I started going to the basketball court, and I started seeing them play, and I started kind of imitating them. And then I realized that maybe there is something else that I can do."Font said basketball gave him the structure he needed to get to where he is today. "The structure and the support, because behind every basketball team there is someone there that is always watching you and making sure that you are at practice and that you're doing the right thing," Font said. "Nobody around in our neighborhood went to college. So, everybody kept on saying, 'You can take this to college.' I don't know what that was, but if they were going to pay me to go to college, why not? Why not try it?"Font also explained how he got involved in the Latino Community Development Agency."In the early 80s, I worked for the State Department of Education. Then, I was maybe the highest-ranked Latino in any state or federal program around, which is sad," he said. "But I thought that sitting at the table was important. Finally, we got the attention of several leaders in the community that said, 'Hey, there's not an agency that serves Latinos. How about if we start petitioning the United Way for some funding and start one?' A group of three of us, plus me, we decided to go to the United Way. And the United Way, in their wisdom, decided to give us $42,000. And that's how we got started.People who do this kind of work don't do it for recognition. Font was recently named one of the 100 most powerful people in Oklahoma."If it's a personal recognition and it doesn't yield anything for the community, then it's, what am I going to do – take a plaque and put it in my office or go away two years from now and it doesn't do anything? It has to produce something for the community," Font said. "What happens at LCDA is not because of me. It's because of the people that we hire and their passion."Watch the video above for the full story.

DENVER, Co. — Sisters Mathilde and Antonia Garcia are going through packs and packs of jewelry they made themselves.

To you and me, these bracelets and necklaces are beautiful pieces of wearable art. To these women, they mean housing security.

"It's very hard to see the families (that) have to move outside to start again in another place and for me. That's the saddest thing that's happened here," said Mathilde.

Mathilde is talking about Westwood, Denver's historically Latino neighborhood. What’s happening in Westwood is something that’s happening in neighborhoods like it all over the country and that's displacement and gentrification.

"We have been pushing for renters to have control over landlords because rent is being raised indiscriminately," said Irma Diaz.

Diaz, along with the Garcias, have been watching their neighbors, who have worked to make Westwood a better place, get priced out and have to move away from their cultural center.

"The cultures of the Mayans, Aztecs, Mexicas are in those murals, you feel a familiarity when you see your ancestors embodied in that art," Diaz said, talking about the colorful murals all around the neighborhood that highlight her culture.

The three women, originally from Mexico, wanted a way to prevent displacement from happening, so the Mujeres Emprendadoras Co-operative was born. Started in 2017, each member chipped in $100 to the cooperative and they work jobs that align with their already existing skills: jewelry making, catering, and salsa making.

The money they make goes into their goal: every member eventually owning their own home.

However, more important than the money they make is the financial knowledge and business skills they share with one another, because that, to them, it’s not only security but freedom.

"We used to hear like a lot of time, 'Oh, it's impossible. You cannot get a license to get to sell food,'" said Mathilde, "It's not true. Actually, it's very easy to get a license to sell food. You have to make to be sure that you are doing correctly."

The women have spoken about their cooperative in front of banks and universities and soon, their salsa line will even be selling in stores. To the women, the most rewarding thing is seeing their determination being passed down.

"I really appreciate the admiration our children have for us," said Antonia, "When you hear your children talk about what you do, it cheers you up. That’s why we keep going."

"I think in our community, the big thing that we have is we don't believe that we could, Mujeres is a way to say we could and we will do it," said Mathilde.

They hope they inspire others to find the inner power to prove to themselves that nothing, not freedom or security, is impossible.