This funding will be used to develop permanent rental housing for the hardest-to-serve homeless individuals who may also be living with a disability, mental illness or an addiction.
"I am tremendously grateful for this funding for Denver," says Mayor John Hickenlooper. "It rewards the efforts of our community-based Commission on Homelessness, which has been working aggressively since November to develop short-term and long-term solutions to the many challenges faced by our homeless residents. We will use this funding to create housing for some of our chronically homeless residents, as a first step in helping them stabilize their lives."
The other portion of the funding, up to $800,000 over three years, will go to the Colorado Coalition for the Homeless from the US Department of Veterans Affairs. The VA grant will enable the coalition to expand the transitional housing and supportive services they provide for homeless veterans.
"Agencies in Denver have been very successful over the years in getting more than our fair share of federal grants addressing homelessness," according to John Parvensky, president of the Colorado Coalition for the Homeless. "With the Denver Homeless Commission in place, we are now in a better position to leverage local funds from the city and the business community."
The Interagency Council on Homelessness, which directs collaboration at the federal level for preventing and ending homelessness, coordinated the grant awards. Combined, the grants are part of $30 million in federal funding awarded to cities across the country to help end homelessness.
Denver received the third largest amount, behind only New York City and Los Angeles.
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