Ithaka plans to build new transitional housing at 301 S. Union Blvd., a nine-acre tract for which City Council approved rezoning from public facility to office complex on May 11. Ithaka s buildings will occupy only a portion of the property, with retail, office and townhomes planned for the site.
Pam Zubeck
Not just a firefighter, but horse trainer, Guardsman, handyman and cook. Heidi Beedle
The firefighters who just showed up at your house for a medical emergency or to douse a neighborâs house fire might have already worked 40 hours or more that week at a side hustle unrelated to their fire service duties.
They may have cooked at a local steak house, pulled extra shifts with an area fire department or a private ambulance service, written mortgage loans, taught at a local college, installed hardwood flooring or worked on remodeling a house they are hoping to flip for a six-figure profit.
Apartments like these could spring up to curtail the local affordable housing shortage. KonstantinL.Shutterstock.com
Given the extreme shortage of affordable housing in Colorado Springs, the news that the Pikes Peak Real Estate Foundation has launched the area s first Workforce Housing Fund comes at an opportune time.
The fund has already accumulated more than $200,000 and serves as a collaboration among the city, regional foundations and local developers, the foundation said in a release.
Estimates of affordable housing shortfalls vary from 14,000 to 20,000 units in a city where incomes fall below that found statewide.
Census Bureau data from 2019 shows median household income in Colorado Springs at $64,712, compared to statewide, at $72,331.
Ithaka Land Trust has borrowed nearly $750,000 from the city of Colorado Springs to acquire properties over the years, and it still owes most of that money.
The house at 411 W. Bijou St. that also includes a columbarium. Pam Zubeck
Members of the Bijou Community, a tight-knit peace and justice group that provided housing to the poor for decades, is seeking an answer to its question about regaining control of one of its houses as posed several weeks ago.
It also asks Ithaka Land, formerly Ithaka Land Trust, to change its name again to more accurately reflect a change in mission from housing the poor to providing transitional housing to help low-income people become independent.
Anjuli Kapoor Pam Zubeck
The issues arose after the
Indypublished its Jan. 27 coverstory revealing the land trust sold half its properties to one developer without accepting bids or obtaining appraisals, sold some below market value as reported by the El Paso County Assessor s Office, and then floated loans to that developer, a Denver area firefighter.