Dana Merk will be the first to admit she wears a “lot of hats.”
The 43-year-old North Aurora woman is a nurse and professor at DePaul University; co-founder of Headwaters, a nature-based Montessori school, cancer survivor and adopted mother of two young boys who she and husband Dan, a Jefferson Middle School teacher, are determined to raise with empathy for others.
They also want to “keep our children safe.”
Her 12-year-old is not only tall for his age but from the Philippines “and could pass for Latino” — both of which make her “concerned” at a time when ICE agents are targeting the local Hispanic community, Merk told me.
All that’s going on today “is making me lean more into our community,” she said, noting that most recently she and her family took part in the No Kings Rally in Aurora last month; and she’s getting more involved with food distribution for We Can Lead Change – Fox Valley, a grassroots group that focuses on vulnerable residents living among us.
No question, Merk insisted, “I see more people” doing the same.
It’s a sentiment that seemed to reflect last week’s back-to-back Committee of the Whole and City Council meetings, where agenda items included an ordinance restricting ICE on Aurora city property; and a temporary warming center for the city’s homeless population.
This marathon event brought out a plethora of impassioned comments from residents, including one woman who told the council her husband, a legal immigrant who had a DUI years ago, has not left the house since the middle of September because of fear.
While there seems to be no question City Council is supportive of a warming center, you never would have known that from the fervent and at times aggressive public comments that addressed the need for such a center.
Fourth Ward Alderman Jonathan Nunez recognizes this current uptick in advocacy and empathy, giving “credit to the number of constituents who reached out sharing their support for both these two topics.”
Nunez is among community leaders I spoke with who link this more fervent involvement to national issues that are landing close to home.
In a Pew Research Center survey this year, 42% of Hispanic/Latino adults say they worry that they or someone close to them will be deported. Recent census numbers estimate close to 43% of Aurorans identify as Hispanic/Latino. So it doesn’t take a math whiz to figure out why the ICE threats have hit hard.
Fear, said Nunez, “has become more personal.”
As has housing and food insecurity.
With sky-high rents and interest rates, those issues are no longer impacting only the poor, said Rick Guzman, executive director of The Neighbor Project, which helps underserved families in the Aurora area attain home ownership. Lack of affordable housing is a significant problem. Even middle class people are feeling the pinch; including parents with adult kids moving back home or those priced out of the real estate market.
As Guzman pointed out, Suddenly there’s not all those “degrees of separation” between the haves and the have nots.
Arlisia Dockery, co-founder of ECHO Development Center, which provides food, shelter and resources for underprivileged families in Aurora communities, not only sees a growing need, she also sees “more people coming in to support” the efforts of nonprofits like hers.
More citizens are holding smaller food drives, she added. They are showing up for meetings and volunteering their time.
Likewise, Marie Wilkinson Food Pantry Executive Director Annette Johnson has “been impressed with the outpouring from the community,” noting that “people have been dropping off grocery bags upon grocery bags of food” since the last week of October when it was announced SNAP benefits were at risk.
“We’re getting lots of private individuals coming, as well as many companies wanting to do food drives,” Johnson said. “Even our furry friends are getting help” as “people are also doing pet food drives.”
To Dockery, who earlier this year was honored by the Kane County Board for her outreach work, the surge in empathy is about more awareness. “People are not just sitting behind desks but are in the trenches,” she said. “They see what is happening.”
Merk, who battled cancer as a senior in college, noted how fear can often lead to inaction, which in turn leads to feelings of helplessness. “But even taking one small action can take that helplessness away,” she insisted. And it also reminds us there are plenty of other people out there who care.
“When I was sick I bargained through the stages of grief, promising whoever is listening that if I don’t die I will earn my keep,” Merk said. “I feel it even deeper now because of the catastrophic impacts” affecting so many.
“Serving others is the cost of living,” she added. “I want this to be who our family is. It makes me feel proud our kids can see we are trying to make this a better place.”