The question arrived on a blank index card, without a name attached: “What do I do if the person who hurt me actually loves me?”

It had been collected after an Esperanza Dance Project performance, where Tucson students watched young dancers use movement, music and narrative to address a heavy subject: sexual trauma. No teenager had to raise a hand or identify themselves when asked for their reactions to the performance. The card could speak for them.

At a recent gathering organized by Owl & Panther, a nonprofit that supports refugees and others displaced from their home countries, roughly 20 women and six children painted pots, planted cilantro and parsley and listened to music. For participants adjusting to an unfamiliar language and the loss of community, the activity offered connection without words: They could share smiles, enjoy the music or simply work with their hands.

Meanwhile, at a Southern Arizona Adaptive Sports open gym, someone newly disabled by an accident begins their adjustment by watching, from courtside, athletes zipping around in chairs built for agility, recasting the wheelchair from a symbol of limitation into just another piece of athletic equipment — and an invitation to move again.

And at a Pima County mobile home, a resident confined to a wheelchair following a workplace accident is finally able to safely leave the house, after volunteers from Community Home Repair Projects of Arizona build a ramp, restoring an ordinary freedom most people take for granted.

On paper, the four nonprofits have little in common. One uses dance, another expressive arts, another adaptive sports and another wrenches, lumber and evaporative-cooler parts. But each begins with much the same question: What is preventing someone from living safely and fully — and what would it take to remove that barrier?

Different as those answers are — a way to speak, a community, adaptive gear or a ramp — each restores voice, belonging and agency.

Esperanza Dance Project: Finding a Voice

For Beth Braun, the path to that index card began in 2011, after she learned that her daughter had been sexually abused. The longtime dance teacher began noticing students hiding in hoodies, covering cuts or unable to meet her eyes.

“That was when I realized, OK, I need to use what I do to help these kids,” she said. “And dance was the answer.”

Esperanza combines movement, music and narrative with classroom preparation and a Q&A. Its high school program addresses sexual trauma; a middle school version focuses on bullying, mental health and relationships. Young dancers wear street clothes and perform to familiar music.

“Students are lectured at all day long,” Braun said. “Sometimes the words just don’t do it. Those words don’t always get through that wall that they’ve built around themselves.”

The cards provide evidence of an outcome difficult to quantify: a young person feeling seen or deciding it is safe to ask for help.

Esperanza charges schools nothing, leaving it dependent on grants and donors. Braun said reduced funding, rent and a largely volunteer company limit its reach. Last spring, eight dancers completed 12 performances, but she still had to turn down schools.

“I did not want to create any barriers,” Braun said. “I didn’t want them to come back and say, ‘We’re so sorry, we don’t have the money for this.’”

Owl & Panther: 

Finding Belonging

For Owl & Panther interim executive director Patty Barcelo, that fear of speaking up is personal.

She arrived from Guatemala in the mid-1980s and entered a Tucson school speaking little English. One day, while she was enjoying an ice cream cone, another student asked her a question. Barcelo thought she answered correctly.

“I apparently didn’t,” she said. “I got slapped right in my face while my ice cream cone melted. I will never forget that.”

The incident left her afraid to speak, or even participate in school activities. Owl & Panther — then an informal gathering of refugee children (the name comes from a Cherokee creation story to honor their own watchfulness through the dark) — gave her a place to make art and spend time with others who understood displacement.

“What Owl & Panther did for me is it allowed me to feel a sense of belonging,” she said. “It allowed me to feel that there are others like me.”

More than 30 years later, Barcelo leads the organization. Participants still decide when — or whether — they are ready to share. “There’s no pressure,” she said. “You just come and you participate. There’s no timeline to heal.”

Creating that space requires more than paintbrushes and potting soil. Participants may need rides or child care, while written resources require translation into Dari, Pashto, Arabic and Swahili.

Barcelo estimated that Owl & Panther serves about 200 participants but has turned away families at capacity. It’s now scheduled to lose its Arizona Department of Economic Security funding Sept. 30, increasing reliance on donors and volunteers.

“My dream world would be nobody gets turned away,” Barcelo said.

Southern Arizona Adaptive Sports: Finding Movement

Mia Hansen’s brother broke his neck in a 1978 diving accident, causing paralysis from the chest down and complete quadriplegia paralysis. Wheelchair tennis and rugby helped him return to an active life, later inspiring Hansen to found SAAS in 2017.

“We started this to break down barriers to participation,” she said. “One of the biggest ones is expense.”

SAAS offers low-cost or free programs and maintains about 70 adaptive bicycles, sports wheelchairs and other costly equipment. Its athletes range from beginners to Paralympians.

Hansen identified three obstacles: cost, equipment and, crucially, the motivation to try. “If we’ve given you free equipment and free programming, now what’s your excuse?” she said.

Its school initiative has introduced adaptive sports to about 15,000 students at 40 schools — most without disabilities, who, Hansen says, have fun using the sports wheelchairs together. Students with physical disabilities — some previously sitting out physical education — get to become the athletes everyone else is trying to catch.

After years of storing equipment in Hansen’s garage and her brother’s backyard, SAAS leased its first commercial space. Unrestricted donations help cover rent, utilities and staff.

“That’s not the sexy part or the fun part, but you’ve got to have it so that you can continue to keep the programming going,” Hansen said.

Community Home Repair Projects: Finding Safety

For Community Home Repair Projects of Arizona, or CHRPA, removing a barrier can mean keeping a house inhabitable. In June, it replaced an evaporative cooler for a medically vulnerable 80-year-old who had lived without cooling for more than three years.

Executive director Carrie Nelson said CHRPA provides free critical repairs in about 1,000 low-income households annually. Cooling accounts for about 40% of its work; last year, it replaced more than 50 evaporative coolers.

Demand and costs are rising. CHRPA received over 1,000 more voicemails this year than last, Nelson said, while some material prices increased 15% to 50%.

“If the cooler can’t run or water is off to the house, the stability and sustainability of a home is at stake,” she said. “For folks living on a fixed income or on low wages, there is no room in the budget for a home repair crisis of any size.”

Grants keep CHRPA operating but carry restrictions. Individual gifts provide flexibility: $50 can replace a cooler motor, $100 can install a grab bar and $2,000 can replace an evaporative cooler.

“Individual donations help us say ‘yes,’” Nelson said. “This is CHRPA at our best — listening to our neighbors, meeting them where they are and finding ways to make homes safer, healthier and more functional.”

Whether the obstacle is silence, isolation, a missing piece of equipment or a staircase, the common work is meeting a person where the barrier stands — then helping clear a path through it.

“We’re just looking to give everyone a chance to live more fully,” Barcelo said. “I think that’s the right of every human being.”