In a community where Hispanic roots are evident from place names – Durango, La Plata County, Florida Road, Ignacio – and the surnames of many families, Cinco de Mayo takes on added importance.

For at least two decades, Ballet Folklórico de Durango has been an integral part of festivities for the Mexican holiday, which, despite popular culture to the contrary, marks victory in a battle against French troops in Puebla, Mexico, not Mexican Independence Day.

“We are a diverse community,” said DeeDee de Haro Brown, a former director of the Durango Latino Education Coalition, which originally founded Ballet Folklórico de Durango. “It’s important to show the Latino culture, and there are different events around town where they call on the Folklórico to represent that Hispanic culture.”

But the Ballet Folklórico is facing dissolution if supporters can’t raise enough money to keep it going.

“It’s 20 years old and hovering on the brink,” said Shirena Trujillo Long, who, as director of the Centro de Muchos Colores at Fort Lewis College, oversees Ballet Folklórico. “We’re hoping we can sustain this group, because it has benefits most people don’t even realize.”

Community members, ranging in age from 4 to adult, pay $60 for a year’s tuition, which includes weekly classes during the school year, special rehearsals before performances and 12 to 15 performances annually. Ballet Folklórico owns most of the costumes. FLC students dance for free, as it’s considered part of their student-activity fees.

The group needs at least $2,000 to pay the dance instructor, but if it can raise $5,000, which would cover all the expenses for a semester, it would be in the running for a matching grant. The instructor the group is planning to hire, Melisa Smith, grew up in the program, and organizers hope to pay the FLC student in the form of a scholarship.

Helping kids in many ways

Ballet Folklórico has had several homes during its history, and that’s part of the funding challenge. Originally founded by the Durango Latino Education Coalition, which became Del Alma, it was one of several initiatives to keep students in school and involved in positive activities that reinforced their rich cultural background.

After Del Alma merged with the Durango Education Center, the center found itself running a dance troupe, which was not quite part of its core mission, education center Executive Director Teresa Malone said. That led to an agreement with El Centro de Muchos Colores to take it over, and El Centro merged it with its own Baile Folklórico, which was an FLC club.

“We first started it as an activity for Latino kids, an activity related to their culture, and that’s still important,” Brown said. “But we also saw things like kids staying in school longer and becoming more confident.”

Those results, she said, allowed them to get grants from the National Endowment for the Arts and the Colorado Council on the Arts, now Colorado Creative Industries.

“They wouldn’t just give funding for a dance troupe, we had to show them how it impacted kids,” Brown said. “We would see the students come in, keeping their heads down, shuffling their feet, then they would become performers, heads held high and become proud of their culture.”

Hundreds of young people have passed through Ballet Folklórico since its inception, not all of Hispanic heritage.

“Sometimes, it’s someone studying Spanish,” Brown said, “and through the years, we would have kids who would see them perform and would think it looked like fun, so they would join.”

Dances uphold traditions

There’s more to the cultural aspect than just learning dances, said Jennifer Cossey, 36, who’s stepping down as dance instructor after 11 years. She’s been dancing since she was 4 and teaches the history and stories behind each of the three to five dances in the curriculum each term.

“These are really traditional dances that have been passed down for generations, for centuries, really” she said. “The history, the story speaks to us, and the movements and steps all have significance.”

In addition to serving as a visible representation of the diverse culture of the area, Ballet Folklórico serves an even more important purpose for the dancers’ futures, the members of the Save Our Ballet Folklórico Committee said.

“With dancers from kindergarten through 12th grade, the FLC connection is key, because it makes the college feel like home,” Long said. “This is a real pipeline to get students to continue their education, and it works.”

Ballet Folklórico has two fundraisers coming up, one at Gazpacho’s on Saturday and another during the performance of the Ballet Folklórico Quetzalli de Veracruz at the Community Concert Hall at FLC for Cinco de Mayo.

How much money it raises over this critical weekend will determine the group’s future.

abutler@durangoherald.com

If you go

Ballet Folklórico de Durango will be holding fundraisers to continue its mission of teaching Hispanic students about their culture while providing multicultural entertainment at events throughout the Four Corners.

The group will dance at 1 p.m. Saturday at Gazpacho New Mexican Restaurant, 431 East Second Ave., as part of the restaurant’s Cinco de Mayo Fiesta. Gazpacho’s also will make a donation of a percentage of sales from its El Centro Margarita Special on Saturday and Sunday to Ballet Folklórico and a book scholarship fund for El Centro de Muchos Colores at Fort Lewis College.

At 2 p.m. Saturday, also at Gazpacho’s, a Zumbathon fundraiser will be led by Darlene Brace-Torres.

The group will be the opening act for Ballet Folklórico Quetzalli de Veracruz at 7:30 p.m. May 5 at the Community Concert Hall at Fort Lewis College. Donations will be collected before and after the performance and during intermission. Tickets to the performance are available at www.durangoconcerts.com, by calling 247-7657 or by visiting the Durango Welcome Center at the corner of Main Avenue and Eighth Street. Tickets range in price from $21.60 to $34 depending on age and seat section selected.

Tax-deductible donations may be sent to the FLC Foundation, with Ballet Folklórico de Durango in the memo line, 1000 Rim Drive, Durango, CO 81301.