Tijuana’s Salesian Race Returns with a Mission: Supporting Refugees and Violence Victims
The Salesian Project in Tijuana is gearing up for their second annual charity race, hoping to double last year’s 200 runners when the 5K kicks off September 6 at 7 a.m. from María Auxiliadora parish in Colonia Herrera neighborhood.
“For us, it is the center of diffusion of the Salesian presence,” explained Father Juan Simón Zárate. The Salesians arrived in Tijuana in 1987, establishing their base in that community before expanding across the city’s most vulnerable neighborhoods.
The organization operates six locations throughout Tijuana, including Sánchez Taboada, Mariano Matamoros, Valle Verde, Colonia Herrera, downtown, and Colonia Castillo. Their services include educational programs through Don Bosco School, youth centers (oratorios), a breakfast program serving hundreds daily, shelters for vulnerable populations, and community centers offering medical and psychological support.
This year’s funds will support the Don Bosco Salesian shelter, which houses women and children fleeing violence and trafficking. The shelter faces budget cuts, a consequence of USAID cancellation by the Trump administration.
“We run for women and children victims of violence, we run for those young people who need to be heard and attended to, we run with refugees who flee from their places of origin,” said project director Claudia Portela.
Last year’s race funded a water purification system for the largest free soup kitchen in Tijuana, providing clean drinking water to shelter residents and community members.
Fernando Montes from UNHCR, which has worked with the Salesians for five years, sees the race as important community outreach: “This initiative is a very good space to create sensitivity toward the refugee population in the community that receives them.”
The participation fee is approximately $11 USD, with proceeds going directly to support the shelter’s operations.
This article was written with the assistance of AI tools based on a Spanish-language transcript from a press conference held by Salesian Project Tijuana and edited by the Tijuanapress.com team.