"He still believes in Santa," Anderson says. "He sees our front room is filled with a bunch of Amazon packages, and he thinks that Dad has some sort of contact with Santa in the North Pole."
In a sense, Anderson is Santa. Every winter, he dresses up, listens to kids' Christmas wishes and gives away toys for the Black Santa Project, an initiative based in Denver's Five Points neighborhood that organizes toy drives and free community Christmas events.
"It brings me so much joy to see the faces of the children who thought they weren't going to get anything," he says. "They just light up every year."
Anderson, an advocate for police reform and former vice president of the Denver Public Schools Board of Education, plans to don the red coat and white beard for the project's fourth annual toy giveaway on December 21, but the project is nearing code-red levels this year, he says. The Black Santa Project had a goal of giving away 10,000 toys to children this year but is about 5,000 short. Last year, volunteers had to turn kids away after running out of free toys, and Anderson wants to avoid repeating that.
"It breaks my heart again that we may be in a position to turn people away," Anderson says. "I'm not sure if we will be able to fill the 5,000 toys that we are still short of."
Anderson says that Toys for Tots was expected to deliver 2,200 toys to the Black Santa Project, but donated only 800 toys instead. In a December 7 statement, Anderson blames the shortcoming on a sudden change in Toys for Tots policies "that reduced promised toy allocations and denied logistical accommodations granted to other organizations."
He also accuses Marines working with the organizations of using a racial epithet during an in-person meeting while he was trying to negotiate for more toys. Toys for Tots has not responded to a request for comment.
Most of the 5,000 toys the project has collected so far are for children ages eleven and younger, including stuffed animals and board games. For teens older than eleven, Anderson would like to hand out gift cards or even video game consoles. The project helps about 3,000 families each year with toy donations and free pictures with Black Santa, he adds.
Anderson helped start the Black Santa Project in late 2021, when Jeff Fard, a community organizer known as Brother Jeff who's active in northeast Denver, called him to ask if there were any Black Santas in the area who could volunteer to talk to kids at a Montbello Walks event.
"All I got is a red jumpsuit and some Air Force Ones. I was the untraditional Santa Claus," Anderson recalls. "Folks were like, 'That's Santa from the hood.'"
The Black Santa Project will do Christmas a bit differently this year, as it has "adopted" two Aurora families with loved ones killed by gun violence. By adopting the families, the project will give gifts to the children and provide the families with a little extra company over the holidays.
The adopted families include the seventeen-year-old and three-year-old sons of Kilyn Lewis, who was shot and killed unarmed by Aurora Police while serving a warrant, as well as the family of Kamiaya Keyera Cleveland, the fourteen-year-old shot and killed by another teenager at a July 6 party in an Aurora park.
The group is also working with the family of Stephan Long, who was put in jail and on house arrest for murder charges that were later dropped by the Denver district attorney.
"They've had a very, incredibly difficult year," Anderson says of Long's family. "While Stephan's mom has not lost her child, she almost lost her child, but she did lose her job."
Anderson notes that the Denver Police Department is a partner in this toy giveaway, however, showing that the project is more focused on charity than politics this time of year.
"It says a lot if Auon'tai Anderson and the Denver Police can come together for the kids, especially with our longstanding differences on political opinions. That should tell the community that folks are coming together regardless of politics, regardless of their personal views," he says. "It's about the children."
The mall will host a Black Santa again this year, on Tuesday, December 10, and Wednesday, December 11; reservations for photos can be made online. Aurora's Stanley Marketplace will have a Black Santa on December 21, after already hosting a traditional Santa and a Spanish-speaking Santa. The Denmon Group, a luxury real estate company, is also hosting a Black Santa event with free photos on December 21 from noon to 4 p.m.
For anyone interested in making donations to the Black Santa Project, there is a Linktree with a volunteer sign-up form, a map of drop-off donation boxes and an Amazon wish list.
The Black Santa Project's fourth annual toy giveaway will take place at Manual High School, 1700 East 28th Avenue, on December 21. Parents can pre-register to come at 11 a.m. to pick up toys and take pictures with Black Santa. They can also stop by without pre-registering, but will have to wait until 1 p.m. to enter.
