Denver’s plans to move an overflow homeless shelter to a permanent site advanced Tuesday with the City Council’s approval of the $4.5 million purchase of a building near I-70 and Colorado Boulevard.
City officials still are working out renovation plans for the industrial building, 4330 E. 48th Ave. They expect to open it in March or April as the first of two potential city-owned sites for emergency overflow shelter beds and storage.
That will result in a move of the city’s overflow shelter space from a building near Peoria Street and Interstate 70, which has accommodated about 315 men and 120 women on floor mats some nights. The city then plans to convert that far-northeast structure into .
The task of moving the overflow shelter last fall when another building the city had been pursuing in Sun Valley — in tandem with the northeast Denver site — began to fall through. Plans had called for opening up that first overflow shelter site in January.
City officials filed a lawsuit last month against 2601-2605 W. 7th Ave. LLC, charging that principal Bret Kaup improperly pulled out of the $4.1 million sale.
While it pursues a court judgment to secure that building, the city is buying the northeast Denver structure from Brue Capital Partners. The council next Monday is expected to approve a companion measure that would draw on a homeless services fund, general fund contingency money and the Denver Human Services account to pay for that purchase.
On Tuesday, the council in a block vote approved the purchase agreement as well as a one-year, $559,000 contract with the Denver Rescue Mission to continue operating the overflow shelter at the Peoria site and then the new building.
A separate city contractor buses men and women to and from the overflow shelter from central Denver facilities when extra capacity is needed, especially on cold nights.
