Affordable housing up for debate in the Colorado legislature
DENVER (KDVR) — The high cost of living remains one of the top issues for Coloradans, and a couple of new measures hope to address the housing aspect.
Gov. Jared Polis told “Colorado Point of View” in December that affordable housing remains one of his top priorities for 2024. Two bills moving forward at the Colorado Capitol look to address the issue.
Colorado tackles housing affordability
The first aims to prevent unnecessary evictions by requiring landlords to prove their reasoning for kicking tenants out. The second would do away with caps in some cities that limit how many unrelated people can live together under one roof.
On this week’s “Colorado Point of View,” analysts discuss why affordable housing efforts may not always make headway.
That was seen this week, when Steamboat Springs voters rejected a project to create 2,200 affordable housing units, as reported by The Colorado Sun. Some opponents worried about their property values decreasing because of the development.
Democratic analyst Andy Boian said that’s where local control can hit roadblocks.
“I think the legislature should mandate some of this stuff and they’re on a good path to do so, but there’s gotta be work done at the state level in order to say let’s bring down the cost of housing statewide first,” Boian said.
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He said local governments can use the state’s findings as guidance on how much and where affordable housing should be built.
“But at least pass an initiative statewide to say we have an issue we have to resolve, this is the way to do it — at least in general,” Boian said.
Republican analyst Michael Fields agreed on the importance of local control but added: “On the other hand, we have a statewide, regional problem with not enough units, and I think the key is that we’re 225,000 units under where we need to be. It drives the whole market up. It drives costs up for everybody.”
Watch the full conversation on “Colorado Point of View” on Saturday at 7:30 p.m. and Sunday at 7:30 a.m. on Colorado’s Very Own Channel 2.
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