From adding affordable housing and preventing evictions to making community investments and providing financial support directly to community members, the city's Housing and Human Services Department supports our community in many ways.

The city’s Housing and Human Services Department (HHS) is committed to providing resources and community connection so everyone can experience Boulder as a just, inclusive and equitable community.

It can be challenging for community members to see the successful outcomes of HHS’ work when so much of it happens behind the scenes. In 2022, HHS supported our community in many ways.

2022 Highlights

Provided intervention for community members experiencing mental and behavioral health crisis. ​​​​​​

  • The Crisis Intervention Response Team (CIRT) of mental health professionals made 1451 responses, with police officers, to community calls for help with police officers. This represents more than 700 unduplicated individuals who received support through CIRT in 2022.

Secured 127 affordable housing units for city residents and, in collaboration with county partners, enabled 270 community members experiencing homelessness to transition to permanent housing situations.

  • Affordable housing units were secured through acquisition, renovation and new construction activities.

  • This includes 77 unhoused community members were assisted with reunification with family or other social support networks, and two people were connected to other long-term programming such as treatment for substance use disorders.

Maintained and scaled-up services for low-income older adults and families in need, and youth leaders in Boulder. ​​​

  • Older Adult Services (OAS) provided over $100,000 in financial support to over 130 older adults living with lower incomes for basic needs like medical, housing supports, transportation, dental, food insecurity, and other essentials. 

  • OAS partially reopened the East Age Well Center giving older adults in the community access health and wellness, lifelong learning, fitness and other programs and services at two locations. Beginning Jan. 1, 2023, the East Age Well Center was fully open.

  • Family Services provided more than $381,000 in financial assistance and support services for essential needs including child care subsidies, housing supports, physical, mental and dental health, transportation, and food to 113 families living with lower incomes.

  • In Spring 2022 the Youth Opportunities Advisory Board (YOAB) fully re-launched.

Helped keep Boulder community members housed, through services to avoid evictions.

Maintained investments and launched new projects with local and federal funding to help increase affordability and quality of life in Boulder.

  • Provided roughly $7M in annual grants to supported community-based projects to provide healthy food, economic support, health services, childcare, academic support, substance use prevention, and other needs.

  • Allocated federal COVID-19 relief funds to provide direct cash assistance to low-income community members and to begin designing a Guaranteed Income Pilot Project.

Responded to our community’s emergency needs.

  • The city provided direct assistance to low-income mobile home park residents whose homes experienced damage from extreme winds during the Marshall Fire, collaborated to expand assistance to more than 100 additional impacted households, and collaborated with city and county departments to plan a wind damage repair grant program.

  • As the year came to a close, the HHS team, along with our city and county colleagues, once again stepped up to support our community by opening and staffing an emergency warming center during a historic cold snap. Over the three days that the warming center was open, 107 individuals found refuge from the cold and twenty city employees worked a combined 300 hours to staff the center and do in-person outreach to community members in need.

What’s coming up in 2023

In 2023, Housing and Humans Services will focus on the establishing a Homelessness Day Services Center, revising the city’s Inclusionary Housing codes to focus on increasing the number of middle-income units, exploring a Middle Income Down Payment Pilot, launching Project Recovery in partnership with Boulder County and more.

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