The city of Durango and La Plata County are considering additional sites for a managed camp for the unhoused community.

The two governments discussed new locations at a joint meeting Thursday and outlined their collaborative efforts to bring a managed camp to Durango after years of work.

“This is a shared problem and we can do shared solutions, which I think we’re agreeing to today,” said county Commissioner Marsha Porter-Norton.

The county held a public meeting on Dec. 13 to discuss initial plans to move forward with a land-use application for a site the county identified near the Durango Tech Center and the Crestview and Ella Vita neighborhoods.

A search led by county Manager Chuck Stevens identified the site as the only viable location for a managed camp on county-owned property.

Homeowners in west Durango pushed back during the meeting, arguing that the camp should be constructed elsewhere.

“There’s nothing that the city or the county can do to prevent our neighborhood from becoming the homeless highway again,” Rob Middleton, an Ella Vita Court resident, said during the meeting.

Some of the residents who attended later approached the city and the county with a list of additional sites for consideration, Stevens said during Thursday’s meeting.

“We think that some of those sites need a more thorough review and vetting. Some of those sites probably are not viable candidates for one reason or another,” he said. “At this time, I would say that staff is looking at the sites that we think have potential and we’re doing a little deeper dive (and) a little more analysis on those.”

The list includes 18 sites owned mostly by the city, but also by the county and private landowners.

The locations span parking lots, vacant lots, the Best Western along U.S. Highway 160, the former Durango 9-R Administration Building, River City Hall and the recently demolished Mason Center, among others.

Mayor Kim Baxter and City Councilor Melissa Youssef targeted the land behind the Best Western. The city is currently in the process of buying the Best Western and the 56-acre parcel behind it, and has been considering the site for a managed camp.

“Looking at all the options, this clearly is the best option in terms of access to services (and) impact on communities and neighborhoods,” Youssef said.

Porter-Norton applauded the city for its efforts to purchase the Best Western and said the property has potential, but the developers of the Best Western could be a roadblock, said Kevin Hall, director of Community Development for the city.

The city has been in contract talks with TWG Development, an Indianapolis-based real estate company, to redevelop the motel into affordable housing.

The firm was interested in the parcel behind the Best Western as open space, but not as a managed camp, citing concerns about investors and financing, Hall said.

“They weren’t supportive of the idea of a managed camp behind the project that they’re going to take on and develop,” he said.

Porter-Norton pushed back against an outside company influencing the plans of the county and city, recognizing that any deal between the city and third-party developers is complicated.

“What’s the value of the aesthetics and open space versus this incredibly pressing issue to get a more sustainable path for the unhoused in our community?” she asked. “Just like we are not going to allow a managed camp to hurt any neighbors, we wouldn’t want the managed camp to hurt the neighbors that are going to live at the Best Western.”

Meetings between elected officials, county and city staff members, and the Neighbors in Need Alliance, an unhoused advocacy coalition, have yielded a set of criteria that were used to conduct a managed camp site analysis released in March 2021.

Those criteria are:

In a follow-up interview, Stevens could not put a number on which of the 18 new locations might meet some or most of those criteria or which would be feasible for a managed camp.

County and city staff members are still performing an initial review of the sites and will communicate with one another, Stevens said.

To expedite and facilitate the development of a managed camp, Porter-Norton said the county commissioners could extend financial assistance to the city

“If we could identify any sites on this new list or the old list and look at them in a different way, we’re really willing to partner with funding. ... We’d like to continue to look at any site we possibly can,” Porter-Norton said.

Stevens admitted that though the city and the county have been trying to build a managed camp for years, the placement has always been a barrier.

“We really haven’t been successful in identifying a very good location or even an alternative location to Purple Cliffs,” he said.

Mayor Baxter and county Commissioner Matt Salka pointed out that managed camp discussions between the city and the county are productive, but often little comes of them.

They argued for more constructive work to finally bring the managed camp to fruition.

“One of the things that seems to happen in our meetings is we have these great discussions and then we don’t have a next step,” Baxter said.

“We can sit here and talk until we’re blue in the face and nothing ever gets done,” Salka said. “So let’s get this going and let’s start moving forward on a location.”

ahannon@durangoherald.com