Hey friends, I have an old friend, Annika, who is now a grad student, working on a degree in cybersecurity. She's a sex work survivor, currently on HRT, and is homebound most days due to the trauma of multiple car accidents over the years. Therefore she's been relying largely on student loans to get through school.
And she's almost done, one or maybe two more semesters after this to go on her degree in Cybersecurity!
But she's at a crisis point, with no employment or other resources left to stay housed for the rest of the summer semester.
Annika contact me originally to find out about shelters in Phoenix where she might be able to stay and work toward finishing her degree, thinking that might be possible. The reality of the status of sheltering in the valley for single adults in is pretty grim, though, and Annika would be high risk for violence due to being trans.
There is also a long wait list for shelter space, even for families in crisis, and most folks waiting have no other option than the CASS Overflow Shelter (a massive outdoor shaded misted concrete pad to throw down a mat on or lean on your walker while packed in with several hundred other desperately hot, ill, and dying people).
I have no idea how people survive that ordeal out there, much less how Annika would finish college coursework while trying to survive the streets.
Given that, I insisted we need to help Annika stay housed where she is, instead, which is an affordable weekly in Phoenix, a padsplit.com spot for $232/week - and we need the next rent by noon Thursday, July 16. So we need to raise about $2000 to get her through the summer with rent and a little left over for groceries and prescriptions (she is on HRT, and her AHCCCS was cancelled as she navigates the new Medicaid requirements the Trump administration set up to deny as many people service as possible).
Whatever you can afford to share, now or later this month, would be deeply appreciated by us both. In the world of Mutual Aid, Annika has much to give back, once she is through this difficult period, and I know she is worth this investment.
With gratitude and love: Sharing is caring, so please share whether or not you can donate. Every little bit will help!
