Three months after Denver Mayor Mike Johnston’s office floated a list of 11 “promising” sites to shelter homeless people, plans have progressed on four of them — while three have been dropped from the list as the administration looks for replacements.
As the new mayor’s goal of getting 1,000 people off the street by Dec. 31 approaches, work is underway on three micro-community sites that will shelter people in temporary tiny homes or pop-up Pallet shelters, so named because they are shipped on wooden pallets. A former hotel has begun housing people, while renovations are underway on another hotel that shares a site with one of the future micro-communities.
Johnston’s advisers also have made one major addition to the site list, one that is poised to make a big impact quickly.
The Denver City Council on Nov. 6 approved a lease and potential $43 million purchase agreement for a former DoubleTree Hotel at 4040 N. Quebec St. That building features 289 rooms with more than 435 beds, said Derek Woodbury, a spokesman for the city housing department.
That capacity will be critical, since the administration remained more than 700 people short of the House 1,000 goal as of Wednesday morning.
But Johnston also has suffered setbacks. Three properties, all privately owned, have been pulled from consideration in recent weeks after facing an onslaught of public opposition from nearby residents — as well as unique site difficulties that complicated plans for temporary homeless sites, city officials said.
The dropped sites are at 1380 S. Birch St. and 5500 E. Yale Ave. in southeast Denver and at 1191 N. Bannock St. in Golden Triangle. Woodbury cited unspecified “logistical and operational challenges” on the Birch Street property, concerns about how many tiny homes or pop-up shelters the Yale Avenue site could accommodate, and the presence of a sinkhole on the Bannock Street site.
Johnston and his top homelessness adviser, Cole Chandler, have expressed confidence that the administration will acquire and establish enough housing and shelter units to hit the end-of-the-year goal that the mayor set on his second day in office in July. As the effort continues into next year, with new goals, it’s possible discussions occurring in neighborhoods with dropped sites will add new properties to the map.
Still, this fall’s plan faces plenty of challenges.
The council’s safety committee on Wednesday advanced several contracts connected to operating upcoming sites — all but one.
Chandler hit a speed bump on one site during the committee meeting as he laid out the plans for the opening of the three micro-community properties in December.
The plan starts with 54 Pallet shelters opening at 12033 E. 38th Ave., in the parking lot of another city-owned hotel currently that’s being renovated to serve as a shelter.
Two other sites are on track to open shortly thereafter: 44 tiny homes at 1375 N. Elati St. in a community tailored to support women and nonbinary individuals and — for now — a 60-unit community on a piece of Colorado Department of Transportation-owned land at 2301 S. Sante Fe Drive.
For the final property, the committee unanimously postponed for two weeks a proposed contract with the nonprofit Colorado Village Collaborative to operate the site. The delay allows more time for talks about the city’s plans.
The property was eyed for 120 units, but the administration has agreed, under pressure from the surrounding Overland neighborhood, to start with 60 units, with two options to expand later. Councilwoman Flor Alvidrez, who represents Overland, sent a letter to the mayor last week asking for the city to go even slower by capping the site at 60 units, phased in 30 at a time.
At Wednesday’s hearing, Alvidrez called the current plan a “slap in the face to residents of Overland,” adding: “I also think it’s extremely inequitable. The reason there is a site this big available for free is because this is an underserved area. You’re not going to find this large of a piece of land in a high-income area.”
Chandler said afterward that the contract delay wouldn’t affect preparations to open the site.
Among the contracts moved to the full council is one with the Salvation Army. The organization is being considered to manage the former DoubleTree hotel, as it does with a nearby former Best Western hotel that’s now called the New Directions shelter. That property, with 194 rooms, was sheltering 178 people as of earlier this week, Woodbury said.
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