At the March 7 Arvada City Council meeting, council unanimously approved a resolution to purchase a property located at 6630 W 51st Avenue and 5045 Marshall Street in Arvada for $2.75 million plus closing costs with the intention of using the site as a Jefferson County housing navigation center.

Jefferson County is seeking to build two housing navigation centers for people experiencing homelessness.  The centers will be shelter beds as well as permanent housing, according to Kelli Barker, JeffCo’s regional homelessness response coordinator.

Arvada City Manager Mark Deven said that the current plan is to locate one navigation center in the northern part of JeffCo and one in the southern/central part of the county.

“The City of Arvada has been in collaboration with JeffCo local governments in addressing and coordinating local homeless services. We have informally agreed on a regional approach on this matter with the desired outcome to make homelessness in JeffCo rare, brief and non-recurring,” Deven said.

One of the approaches to establishing this is to establish regional navigation centers that offer services to homeless individuals and families in addition to permanent supportive housing that would also include shelter beds,” Deven continued.

Deven said that discussions about Arvada’s role in the county plan began on June 3, 2021 and have continued throughout a process which has identified an affordable housing developer, which Deven did not name.

The purchase of the property was necessitated by the need to gain site control in order to facilitate the application for low income housing tax credits, Deven said. After that, an Intergovernmental Agreement will need to be reached between the City of Arvada and Jefferson County and a developer working on low income housing tax credits will need to be hired.

Deven said that if any of those contingencies fall through, the city will maintain control of the land and evaluate options.

“If any of these situations fail to materialize, we would hold the land and we could look at the possibility of selling it back in order to return our investment if for some reason the project isn’t feasible,” Deven said.

Deven added that the eventual goal for the project would be to have the facility operational by Dec. 2024 and possibly providing some temporary services on the site onec the city gains site control.

Councilmember Randy Moorman endorsed the project and thanked the city team for their due diligence.

“I just want to applaud the work of the team to get us to this place to be purchasing this property for planning well in advance. I really appreciate that and our need for this navigation center,” Moorman said.

District 2 Councilmember Lauren Simpson also endorsed the project and addressed potential issues that nearby residents might have with the project, citing her knowledge of the area as its representative.

“I realize to the public something like this can send up red flags. You say a ‘navigation center,’ you say, ‘homeless services.’ For many that will conjure up wonderful images, for others that might conjure something scary. And I want to assure the public at this point in time that this is my district and I’ve already driven around it; I’ve already looked at this,” Simpson said.

“This is a good site that would be able to provide opportunities to people. It’s not buried inside an existing historical neighborhood. It is walkable to job opportunities that could train people. We are not looking at the kind of situation where we could be seeing tent cities in Arvada. So, this right now is a move to get land to judge the feasibility of the project,” Simpson continued.

Simpson concluded her statement by stressing the importance of planning for this project.

“If we’re going to do this, Arvada, we’re going to do it right. we’re going to help people, but we’re going to help them the right way and we’re not going to bring danger to Arvada,” Simpson said.  

Council also voted to approve a resolution authorizing the funding for the Severe Weather Shelter Network, which provides shelter for those experiencing homelessness during cold weather nights. Arvada joins Lakewood and JeffCo in partnering to provide financial support for the Severe Weather Shelter Network through 2022.

Deven mentioned that the Severe Weather Shelter Network moved to a model utilizing motels during the COVID-19 pandemic.

“Historically, this shelter used to take place in a congregate setting in churches. However, due to COVID, the Severe Weather Shelter Network adjusted to a model that would house people experiencing homelessness during severe weather nights in motels, so they went away from the congregate model to help contain the spread of the virus,” Deven said.

That resolution also passed unanimously with a 6-0 vote. Mayor Marc Williams did not attend the meeting for an undisclosed reason.