Local refugees from Burma would be lost without Drucie Bathin

P.C. is one of several people Bathin has met through her natural gift for networking. She's relentless, never missing an opportunity to make a connection and not shy about asking for help. The Rangers is an official nonprofit, and while one of the Americans she's recruited to serve on the board works on preparing applications for two sub-grants — one for youth activities such as dance and soccer, and another for leadership training for the tribal heads — Bathin works on making miracles with no money.

Three days before Christmas, she and Hae stopped by a Denver police station to pick up two trash bags full of toys. The donation was coordinated by a community resource officer in the gang unit. He and Bathin connected after she attended a forum hosted by Mayor Hancock, at which she spoke on behalf of a group of refugees about their worries that the youth may turn to violence.

Anthony Camera

Drucie Bathin helps refugees from Burma feel at home.

Anthony Camera

Kit Taintor is the director of the Colorado African Organization.

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• Drucie Bathin
• Christian Karen
• Jack Johnson
• Paul Stein
• Denver Police Department

The week before found her sitting around a kitchen table in upscale Highlands Ranch, discussing the possibility of opening an Asian health clinic with a retired banker, a pastor, the CEO of the Asian Pacific Development Center and a nephrologist. All have Asian roots, and they called on Bathin to learn more about the health problems faced by the recent refugees from Burma. "The big issue I see is we have refugee go to the clinic and then they refer to a specialist, but they don't go because they scared," she told them.

A week before that, she got word that three refugee families had run out of food. Their eight months' worth of food stamps had expired, and they either didn't understand that they had to reapply or didn't have the English skills to do the paperwork. So Bathin took that on, sorting through the refugees' ID cards, pay stubs and utility bills for the required information, and meticulously filling in each bubble and line. In the meantime, she called Jack Johnson, a retired schoolteacher from Elizabeth and the head of the Colorado Burma Roundtable Network, a Christian organization that works with refugees here and overseas.

"Hiiiiiii, Jack," Bathin said into the phone, smiling. "It's Drucie."

She explained that the families were hungry. "Do you have any Santa Claus that want to give away the food?" she asked. A member of one of the families, a single mother of three who'd recently returned from a seasonal job picking apples in Delta to find that her food stamps had expired, was sitting in her office. "She is not naughty," Bathin added.

Johnson's organization had a spare $300, and he drove to Denver pledging to donate up to $100 to each family. A few hours later, Johnson, Bathin, Hae and members of all three families were at King Soopers. As the two mothers and one father piled oranges, potatoes, jumbo crates of eggs and huge sides of pork into their carts, Johnson added the prices on his cell phone's calculator. Bathin translated the amounts, doing the math so the families would know how much more they could spend. It was a big to-do for a simple shopping trip, but something Johnson would be unable to do on his own.

In the checkout line, an overwhelmed cashier held up a plastic produce bag. "These are organic cucumbers," he said to Johnson. "Is that okay?"

"It's okay for now," Johnson said. "Next time," he told Bathin, "get regular cucumbers."

"They don't know the difference," she said. "I will have to teach them."

For now, at least, it's what she does best.