feature published May 21 on the camp<\/a>.)<\/p>\nJust south of the Roaring Fork Transportation Authority bus stop at the Brush Creek stoplight, an orderly village of tents and small recreational vehicles has taken shape. The county has provided portable bathrooms, wash stations, water barrels, solar showers and bear-proof trash containers. Aspen Skiing Co. contributed fencing to separate and delineate the individual camps. A designated \u201ccamp host\u201d works with public officials, including local law enforcement, to ensure all health-related rules are observed and that all residents feel safe.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere are 15 or so people living out there successfully,\u201d said Nan Sundeen, the county\u2019s human services director. \u201cThe primary purpose is public and individual health. We needed for the people experiencing homelessness to have a home they could rely on and feel safe in.\u201d<\/p>\n
Braulio Jerez, the Aspen Police Department\u2019s human service officer, visits the encampment several times per week and feels the project has been a huge benefit to both the homeless population and the community.<\/p>\n
\u201cI would say there\u2019s been an 80 percent decrease in our department\u2019s contacts with our typical homeless population \u2014 for things like sleeping in public, open container violations, trespassing and so forth,\u201d Jerez said. \u201cI\u2019d say the camp has served its purpose, by having all these individuals centralized in one location. There\u2019s food, water and shelter being provided. And whatever needs may come up, it\u2019s easy to address when it\u2019s one location.\u201d<\/p>\n
Jerez says the residents have pitched in to build their own shower and a gazebo for shelter from the summer sun. \u201cThese are just normal people who have run into problems and are trying to get their lives together,\u201d he said. \u201cA lot of them were working before COVID came along. They all want to work.\u201d<\/p>\n
Vince Savage, executive director of the Aspen Homeless Shelter, has long advocated for some kind of year-round, permanent shelter, but hasn\u2019t found a building. He can\u2019t say yet whether the current encampment might have a future life, but he\u2019s glad to see it succeeding.<\/p>\n
\u201cJust by chance and necessity, we were forced to give something a try,\u201d Savage said. \u201cIt shows that this kind of thing can work, even on a shoestring budget and a shoestring operation out there.\u201d<\/p>\n
Nobody is declaring victory over homelessness in the valley, but the \u201cexperiment\u201d out at Brush Creek does offer lessons for local officials to consider when society is no longer in the grip of COVID-19. <\/p>\n
\u201cThe success of that encampment is something Pitkin County really needs to think about,\u201d Jerez said. \u201cThere\u2019s a social contract out there that everyone signs, and we really haven\u2019t had many issues or disagreements.\u201d<\/p>\n
Does the encampment have a future? Could it be winterized and house people longer-term? Or could it point the way toward a permanent, brick-and-mortar solution that enables the residents to live somewhat independently? Nobody has those answers yet, because nobody knows what the legal and public-health environment will look like even three months from today, let alone next year.<\/p>\n
For the time being, however, there is a cautious optimism about the project. And we could all use a little optimism nowadays.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere are so many ifs, it\u2019s just really hard to predict,\u201d Savage said. \u201cWe\u2019re not going to end homelessness, but we can do something.\u201d<\/p>\n
Tamara Tormohlen is executive director of Aspen Community Foundation.<\/p>\n
via:: The Aspen Times<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Editor\u2019s Note: The Giving Thought column, which was appearing twice-monthly on Tuesdays, will appear on a weekly basis on Thursdays as the community continues to recover from the pandemic and ACF\u2019s role is increased. What happens to Coloradans who\u2019ve been ordered to \u201cstay at home\u201d but don\u2019t have a home? Since the COVID-19 pandemic hit […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[49],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2459393","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","category-local-news"],"acf":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-08-17 01:04:14","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"distributor_meta":false,"distributor_terms":false,"distributor_media":false,"distributor_original_site_name":"KSPN The Valley's Quality Rock","distributor_original_site_url":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn","push-errors":false,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2459393","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2459393"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2459393\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2459393"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2459393"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2459393"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}