In progressive metropolitan cities across the states, we’re seeing local governments attempt to combat an influx of homelessness. Thousands of migrants are coming off buses from Texas, flooding cities like Denver. Although Denver’s Mayor Mike Johnston has an ambitious plan to end homelessness for good, this plan has proven to be so much more difficult with the sudden rise of homelessness.
From a recent post, we learned that “Johnston campaigned on a promise to house more than 1,000 people experiencing homelessness before the end of 2023. Denver has also acquired multiple hotels to serve as temporary shelters for homeless folks and migrants alike and chipped in more than $17 million of funding to help build a new five-story shelter.”
While Denver has spent $35 Million on the migrant homeless crisis, hopeful results have yet to be seen. Just around the block from a city-operated motel, an encampment grows. Even more alarming, Denver is seeing homeless children sleeping outside in the cold for the first time.
City Council member Amanda Sandoval and her staff went tent-to-tent, trying to get a headcount of how many people were sleeping in the encampment near Zuni Street and Speer Boulevard. This is where she learned that many migrants were recently timed out of the motel around the corner or kicked out for rule violations, such as bringing food into the motel.
As Sandoval went around the encampment, she told reporters she had nowhere to send those children. This was just in preparation for a future emergency – like when temperatures are below zero.
Although the city of Denver is still in reactionary panic mode, a more organized, long-term plan is clearly needed—and quickly.
According to NPR, “Genesis Daniel Perez and her children were staying in a hotel before their allotted month was up. Now they’re living in a tent outside. Perez’s father had to make a trip to the hospital after they moved out of the hotel, she said, from exposure to a snowstorm. Many migrants have ended up in local emergency rooms in recent months.”
It’s important also to consider that many migrants have immigrated from much warmer climates and do not have the same kind of tolerance for the cold. We can already see how moving migrants out on the street into the cold is only going to make the homeless crisis that much worse.
At a glance, it’s also evident that Denver is borrowing tactics from other metropolitan cities facing the migrant crisis, such as New York City. Similar to NYC, Denver is cycling migrants through the system quicker and requiring families to leave their shelter after just a short amount of time. Both Denver and NYC are struggling with the lack of shelter space, as well as the lack of housing – especially affordable housing.
Where are these homeless families and individuals expected to go after they leave the shelter? There is nowhere for them to go. NYC has used public schools and waiting rooms when temperatures have dropped. Denver may take similar initiatives.
Will Denver residents demand better?
Clearly, they’re not going anywhere, and these families and children will soon become a part of their communities. It’s starting to look like it. Local moms are using Facebook to organize clothes and food for homeless migrant families.
On the streets, V Reeves, an advocate with Housekeys Action Network Denver, hands out food and clothing and says she’s not impressed with the city’s action plan. She criticizes a $2 million pickleball budget line while expressing the real threat of human traffickers that may descend upon those sleeping in the tent city.
“That’s a reality that’s totally impending,” Reeves said. “We have never been in a position, as advocates before, where we’re literally bringing baby items and clothes and concerned about actual babies being in the cold.”
Julia Vazquez, with her children and grandchildren, reside in the hotel across the street from the encampment. Julia worries about the day they will have to move out here. She talks about how her daughter has asthma.
City Council member Sandoval said she hopes for more money to help families like Vasquez’s before they end up in a tougher situation. Sandoval’s acknowledgment of this fact is a step in the right direction.
Even more important than funding is a solid plan. Hopefully, Denver can learn from the mistakes that cities like Los Angeles and New York City have made in addressing the homeless crisis.
State officials should also consider long-term strategies as they scramble for short-term solutions. The homeless crisis will inevitably continue to grow, and everyone will need to be able to access affordable housing. That is the only real long-term solution to ending homelessness, after all. Will Denver truly house their homeless? Only if we demand it.
