Arvada council reviews five-goal homelessness plan; mayor seeks housing-cost tally

Arvada City Council discussed a proposed five-goal homelessness plan at an Oct. 27 workshop, where the mayor asked staff to calculate the cost of housing the 65 people included in the city’s 2026 goal. The workshop was not an adoption vote, and no date was set for the plan’s return, according to the workshop recording.

The plan’s goals are to prevent homelessness; respond to short-term homelessness, defined as a year or less; respond to chronic homelessness, defined as a year or longer; mitigate effects on the community; and build public trust through transparency.

Council members asked about the city’s work with Jefferson County and overlapping county services, program costs and outcomes, follow-up after people are housed, and accountability when people commit crimes. Staff said the city did not then have the capacity and data for a formal aftercare program, and that tracking returns to homelessness was not a current focus. At the close of the workshop, the mayor said the plan itself did not need to change before returning for adoption. The discussion did not result in a formal direction to revise the plan.

Staff estimated about $3 million in annual general-fund spending on homelessness-related services, excluding support-service staff time. The approximate amounts included $1.8 million for the core program, $875,000 for police response, $175,000 for Municipal Court’s One Small Step program and about $100,000 for cleanups. The cleanup amount fluctuates.

The 2027–28 budget includes 15 transitional-housing rooms at Suburban Studios, part of the core-program amount. Staff said the rooms are intended for people stabilizing on a path to housing and that demand exceeds availability. The city had also requested $2 million in congressional-directed spending and $1.3 million through a U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development Continuum of Care competition. Both requests were pending at the workshop and were not included in the budget; staff said they could support additional rooms or services if awarded.

Staff reported that 79 people had moved from homelessness into permanent housing by the presentation date, exceeding the city’s 2026 goal of 65. Staff also reported that 52 people had been referred to Lakewood’s Liquid Navigation Center. The workshop presented these figures as outcomes related to the proposed plan; it did not independently evaluate them.