{"id":49977,"date":"2020-12-08T22:46:08","date_gmt":"2020-12-09T05:46:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/residents-get-some-space-to-stretch-at-purple-cliffs\/"},"modified":"2026-03-31T03:49:24","modified_gmt":"2026-03-31T09:49:24","slug":"residents-get-some-space-to-stretch-at-purple-cliffs","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/residents-get-some-space-to-stretch-at-purple-cliffs\/","title":{"rendered":"Residents get some space to stretch at Purple Cliffs"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\"Aquila
Aquila Cota will be moving into a 12-foot by 12-foot tent at the Purple Cliffs homeless camp. Cota, who helps clean the camp, has been living in a dome tent.<\/span>Patrick Armijo\/Durango Herald<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

Aquila Cota moved into upgraded digs Sunday, moving from a dome tent to a 12-foot by 12-foot canvas tent at the Purple Cliffs homeless camp.<\/p>\n

Rob McLaughlin helped organize an effort at his workplace, McAlvany Financial Group, that raised money for three tents from Ellis Canvas Tents<\/a>. Dave Ellis, owner of the Durango tent company, donated an additional tent.<\/p>\n

The tents were delivered Sunday and volunteers began setting them up.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s amazing what happens when word gets out. In the time we\u2019ve been here, another three tents were donated,\u201d McLaughlin said Sunday at the camp.<\/p>\n

Richard Dilworth, homeless outreach coordinator with the Business Improvement District, said Cota is well-known for cleaning up camp in the morning, and he often helps sort clothing donations so campers can more easily sift through items to more quickly find what they need, a convenience many appreciate in the December chill.<\/p>\n

Besides the four Ellis Canvas Tents, donations from McAlvany included supplies \u2013 food, water, clothing, radios, lights and other gifts for campers.<\/p>\n

\"Dave
Dave Ellis, right, and Richard Dilworth, left, help volunteers set up one of four donated tents at the Purple Cliffs homeless camp Sunday.<\/span>Patrick Armijo\/Durango Herald<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

\u201cI stopped by here a couple of weeks ago and met some folks. I started asking what they needed,\u201d McLaughlin said.<\/p>\n

Jim Micikas, a volunteer with the Neighbors in Need Alliance, said the group is looking for a storage structure to place blankets, spare tents and other equipment that people can reach easily in an emergency.<\/p>\n

\u201cPeople sometimes come in at 5 a.m., and we want to be prepared for them,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Ellis, who was helping set up the tent for Cota on Sunday, said he was going to talk to McLaughlin about designing a frame tent that would work well in the camp, which has constrained flat spaces that make it difficult to erect large tents.<\/p>\n

Cota said he enjoys his morning camp cleaning rounds.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt gives me something to do, and if anyone needs help, I\u2019m happy to do it,\u201d he said. \u201cAt some point or other, everyone needs help. That\u2019s the way I see it.\u201d<\/p>\n

parmijo@durangoherald.com<\/a> <\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Workplace donation drive brings new tents to homeless camp<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":49978,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[408,28,611,29,4259],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-49977","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-charity","tag-headlines","tag-homelessness","tag-newsletter","tag-newsletter-sign-up"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/49977","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=49977"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/49977\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":87671,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/49977\/revisions\/87671"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/49978"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=49977"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=49977"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=49977"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=49977"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}