September 8th, 2022
Dear Colorado Coalition for the Homeless,
Residents of Quality Inn hotel and the broader community ask that you act on your mission to “help end homelessness” and your belief that “safe, adequate housing is a human right” and extend the lease at Quality Inn until the end of the year (December 31st 2022). Federal funding will continue to pay back expenses of running protective action hotels until the end of the year, and this time is necessary to line up housing for all residents of Quality Inn so they are not getting kicked to the shelters and streets.
It was stated that Quality Inn was being closed early so as to stagger the closing of hotels, so as to not close it in winter, and due to a lack of staffing in CCH.
- Closing this hotel early so as to stagger the closings does nothing to help residents if there is no housing lined up. Only 13 people are moving into the other protective action hotels from Quality Inn so it is not as though the other hotels are absorbing everyone who does not have housing.
- As for not closing in winter, this would only be a problem if people are getting kicked to the shelters and streets, which at this point they have been regardless – and no one, especially not the most vulnerable, at-risk, disabled and elderly, should be getting kicked to the shelters and streets if we commit to ensuring housing for them.
- Considering Salvation Army does the on-site staffing, this should not be an issue – in fact, these workers will be losing their jobs when the hotel closes and would prefer it to stay open. If the staffing shortage referred to is case managers, we’d agree that there needs to be more case managers! We would encourage CCH to activate contracts with other agencies doing case management to help with the workload.
If there are other unstated reasons for why keeping Quality Inn open until the end of the year is a challenge, we are quite sure that together with support from the City and the boarder community we could overcome these challenges and extend the stay until the end of year to use that time to secure housing for all residents.
Putting people first in this situation means seeing these 133 people without housing lined up not just as “houseless people” who will inevitably have to be houseless, but as “Patrick” and “Dawn” and “John” ect… – people with a wide range of medical needs and complex lives, who deserve safety, security, peace, and housing.
Let’s work together as a City and community to secure housing for every Quality Inn resident by the end of the year and keep the hotel open for this time to secure this essential housing.
No one is disposable. Hear this plea from residents directly:
“My problem is I have a heart problem. I got a heart murmur. I got a torn valve. I’m illiterate, I can’t read or
write very well, but they’re kicking me to some place away from my wife when we’re married. My wife is my
pacifier because without her, I wouldn’t know what to do…”
“They said, as soon as you get your vouchers, you’re gonna come and move in. But I don’t know, that can be
two, three months down the line… But we’ve been trying and trying and trying”
“I just don’t wanna be in the streets no more. I’ve been in those shelters so many times, people give fights in
women’s shelter and I can’t handle the anxiety, and my husband has heart problems and I worry about him and
I worry about me.”
“I’ve had my voucher since April. And if my case manager was any kind of a case manager, she would have
helped me get a place by now. I should have been one of the first people. I should have had a place since May
or June at the latest…”
“We can’t go to a shelter. I cannot be separated away from my angel head. The reason why is because I have
epilepsy and disability and she’s my caregiver. So that’s the main reason that I do not wanna be in the shelter…
[in reference to pets not being allowed] nothing’s gonna happen with the dog, I will not let anything happen to
that dog.”
“The hospital got me in here cuz my leg. And the hospital helped me get in here, but now I’m gonna be kicked
out on the street again.”
Sincerely,
Quality Inn Residents, Housekeys Action Network Denver, the community at large
Atlantis Communities
Colorado Cross Disability Coalition
Denver Catholic Worker
Denver Democratic Socialists of America
Empowerment Program
Harm Reduction Action Center
Mutual Aid Monday
Warm Cookies of the Revolution