Blocked from sleeping in vehicles within municipal boundaries, workers in profit-minded Colorado mountain towns now must seek “safe outdoor space” – in Walmart lots, surrounding woods or new design…
SALIDA — Blocked from sleeping in vehicles parked within municipal boundaries, workers in profit-minded Colorado mountain towns now must seek “safe outdoor space” — in Walmart lots, forests or newly designated areas with Wi-Fi and access to bathrooms.
Colorado’s widening kibosh on sleeping in vehicles adds to festering pain beneath the state’s recreation-oriented tourism and house-buying economic fervor. Towns are transformed and celebrated as mountain amusement havens where river rafts and mountain bikes glide. But an intensifying housing squeeze hits workers hardest and now threatens service.
Local business manager Scott Link, 45, recalled: “the things that come with this — the depression, the paranoia” — after a three-year stint “trying to keep a really low profile” while living out of a white camper truck with his two pit bulls. Next bumper sticker in the works: “Salida: where the locals live in motels and tourists stay in houses.”
In Breckenridge, activist Raychel Kelly, a fashion industry pattern maker and sample sewer who runs a cleaning service, launched the Good Bridge project using a church parking lot that gives safe space for 14 local workers living out of their vehicles. “It is a band-aid for sure. It is no way to live,” said Ryan Matthews, 49, a local brewing industry leader who owns a house half a block from the new parking area.
The designated overnight zone in Centennial Park by Salida’s public pool won’t be a magnet because only workers sponsored by employers can receive window-sticker permits, Nelson said. “This is designed for the workforce, not just whomever is rolling into town.” Similarly, the campers are available only for workers.
The cost of parking in the designated lot may be an obstacle. Only a handful of workers have used it since it opened at the end of June. Rafting industry workers who currently camp on company property are expected to take advantage after Aug. 15, when artificial releases of water from a federal reservoir to ensure sufficient flows in the Arkansas River end.
“You have to give your employees benefits,” McGovern said, estimating costs of training a worker at $5,000. He suggested state intervention with Gov. Jared Polis declaring an affordable housing emergency so that federal emergency funding could become available for creating housing for workers living out of vehicles.RJ Sangosti, The Denver Post
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