What We Do

How We Help

How we help is as important as the assistance we provide.
Friendship - We build cooperative and supportive relationships by being in the colonias every week. Friendship is an honest and on-going human relationship. We strive to avoid paternalism. All parties are treated as equals.
There is no requirement to participate in a church service, a religion or a political party. We strive to help in ways where we are not a critical resource. We do not want the people to be dependent upon us or our good-will. We want to work together as friends.
 
Delivering help directly to the people is a key component of our success. Unannounced visits at shelters, schools and homes allow us to see that our help is being used wisely. In addition to examining receipts, we also gather information about the shelters and cafeterias from neighbors, teachers, and trusted friends.
 
Most important, we are in the neighborhoods and know what is happening from our observations. We continually add to our knowledge base through first-hand observations. (continue)

What we do

Paper Houses Across the Border serves impoverished, marginalized and vulnerable families in the colonias of Mexico. Our focus is on the children and the working poor. We enable them to improve their lives and to help the children to escape poverty. (notes from the kids!)
 
We make life-changing medical treatments possible. Children are saved from amputations because we make surgery and treatment possible. We enable parents to provide chemotherapy and other cancer treatments for their children, that otherwise would be unavailable.
 
We provide meals for thousands of school children and began feeding these children when teachers explained that many of their students came to school ‘too hungry to concentrate’. Some fainted during class because of the lack of nutrition. (more)
 
Many of the children that we help with severe medical problems are undernourished. Our response is to increase our home visits and deliver more vegetables, vitamins, and fruit to the homes of the working poor.
 
When natural disasters, such as the 2010 floods in the colonias, we replaced food, clothing and we supplied building materials to the people that saw their entire homes swept away.
 
We help to provide medical care and basic necessities to the thousands being from Arizona and shipped to Acuña. (Shelter stories)
 
We empower and enable the people to solve their own problems. In June of 2011, we began organizing families with members diagnosed with Down syndrome. By September, they were forming a charitable organization to advocate for the people in the colonias with Down syndrome and similar medical conditions. (story).
 

How to Help

  • Volunteer to edit or translate our web pages and documents.
  • Sponsor a table at our cafeteria - Cost is only $25 a month to feed 8 children!
  • Host a yard-sale for Paper Houses
  • Host a coffee-clutch for Paper Houses
  • Talk with your school, church or employer about inviting Bob to make a presentation.
  • Volunteer to serve on our advisory board.
  • E-mail your friends and relatives to visit this website.
  • Twitter to your friends about us.
  • Share us on Facebook
For information and other opportunities click here.

We are establishing relationships between American and Mexican schools. Begin with an e-mail.