Unaffordable housing may be the single most pressing issue facing Denver and other parts of our state. It affects everyone—workers, families, communities of color, young people, seniors. I am committed to providing solutions to our housing crisis, creating a community where all people, regardless of income, can thrive. We need a comprehensive, creative approach to housing that addresses both immediate needs and long-term solutions for everyone who calls this city and state home. Our lack of affordable housing gives rise to grave consequences, including increased homelessness, displacement, and pollution, stymied economic growth, and entrenched instability and poverty. We need to ensure that our city and state retain their vibrancy and sense of community by attacking the housing crisis at every level, from the rental market to home ownership. 

• Develop a diverse range of housing. Large, luxury housing units are not a solution to affordability. We need to change zoning laws and use tax breaks and subsidies to encourage the building of “missing middle” housing units.

• Reimagining the urban core. While we suffer from too few residential options, we have the opposite problem with commercial office space. We need to incentivize the development of vacant or under-utilized commercial spaces in the downtown Denver core by rethinking residential requirements and providing appropriate financial incentives.  

• Abolish parking minimums statewide. Parking spots can be prohibitively expensive (up to $50,000 a parking space for structure parking) and take up valuable space. Other cities that have abolished parking minimums have seen widespread success in increasing housing stock. We need to prioritize our neighbors over cars and abolish parking minimums.

• Encourage alternative home ownership models and City- and State-owned housing development. Home ownership is out of reach for many of our state’s residents. We must reduce legal obstacles in the way of alternative ownership models such as community land trusts and real estate cooperatives. We should also support city and state efforts to develop housing on suitable city or state-owned lands and allocate resources for the purchase of underutilized or vacant land for additional housing development.

• Increase access to transitional living programs. Transitional living programs reduce homelessness. We should invest in acquiring more transitioning living options with wrap around services for the unhoused, including motels, hotels, and other appropriate non-congregate housing options.

• Prohibit exploitative algorithms in the rental market. The use of algorithms in setting rental rates is the modern era’s version of price-fixing. We need to prohibit the use of price-gouging and anti-competitive algorithms in our rental markets.  

• Slumlord accountability. Slumlords leave residents worse off while fleeing with their money. Municipalities should be made to help tenants set up escrow accounts for renters strikes in the event of serial health and building code violations by landlords. If those violations are not ameliorated or the building becomes condemned, tenants should have the right to reclaim their rent and find alternative housing with those funds.