9News: Denver reports historic drop in unsheltered homelessness

Janelle Finch, 9News

DENVER — Denver is reporting a historic decline in street homelessness, citing a nearly 50% reduction since 2023. The city’s annual Point in Time count found the number of unsheltered individuals dropped from 1,423 in 2023 to 785 in 2025. 

"I think what’s exciting is, we set the ambitious, some people thought crazy, goal to say in one term, could we try to end the experience of street homelessness,” Denver Mayor Mike Johnston said. “As of right now, Denver has now delivered the largest multi-year decrease in street homelessness than any city in American history.”

Johnston said over the past two years, approximately 7,000 people have been brought indoors through city programs, including family shelters and the All In Mile High initiative. Of those, Johnston said about 5,000 have transitioned to permanent housing.

"We knew when you move people off the street, the first step often is to go into shelter or transitional housing," Johnston said. "That’s a part of the process, that’s not necessarily a surprise to us, that’s where we wanted people to go. And that means expanding the stock of affordable housing citywide, which is again going to be important for every working Denverite, not just those who were previously homeless."

During the Biden Administration, Denver was selected among several cities to be a part of the U.S. Interagency Council on Homelessness's 'All Inside' initiative. The partnership granted the city a federal assistance resource.

"I think what's extraordinary about Denver is, even though the problem has been really large over the last few years, the focus that Mayor Johnston and his team have brought to it, the collaborations with the Colorado Coalition for the Homeless and others, have really started to work," former Executive Director Jeff Olivet said. "I think it was a great decision for us to partner with Denver on that initiative."

Olivet said he admired Denver's leadership for taking a compassionate approach to finding a solution.

"When Mayor Johnston came into office, he treated this like an emergency," Olivet said. "He put very good people into key positions, and they have taken a very smart, very thoughtful and also very compassionate approach to this. "

Johnston said federal American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) funds helped establish a foundation of infrastructure, including tiny homes and hotel purchases. Moving forward, he said the city will have to be more self-reliant.

"All our dollars, now going forward, are just general fund dollars where we have a special dedicated tax in Denver that supports this, and that’s where our revenue comes from now," Johnston said.

Maintaining momentum won’t come easily. The city faces a $250 million budget shortfall and is in the midst of balancing finances across 27 departments.

“All of our departments will have to tighten the belt,” Johnston said. “But we’re not going to undo the key programs we’ve invested in that have been so successful in homelessness.”

Olivet said more cities may be put into a similar situation as Denver after President Trump signed an executive order to close the council office.

"There's a profound lack of vision and lack of compassion coming out of Washington, D.C., right now, around homelessness," Olivet said. "There are proposals to slash budgets for housing and health care for children and drug and alcohol treatment programs. Things that we know work. And so what that leaves is states and local governments, nonprofits, the faith community, the business community, trying to find their own way."

Olivet said housing prices need to be addressed around the country.

"We need to pair the good work that's happening around unsheltered work with upstream prevention to make sure homelessness doesn't happen in the first place," Olivet said.

Mayor Johnston stressed the importance of keeping housing affordable, pointing to Denver’s need for 3,000 to 5,000 new units per year to meet demand.

“There’s a bottleneck,” he said, referring to the transition from shelters to permanent housing. “We’ll need to make more investments.”

To address this, the city plans to continue building and permitting affordable units, acquiring existing properties, and offering rental subsidies to bridge affordability gaps.

Johnston also warned of potential challenges tied to broader federal policy, including cuts to Medicaid that could impact low-income residents' access to health care.

 “If you make massive cuts to health care safety nets, you will either have increased costs for everybody or people who can’t get access to health care, both of which would be catastrophic,” he said.

Johnston said he is having conversations with Denver Health and Gov. Jared Polis to get ahead of a potential crisis.

"This cruel bill is bad for Colorado, Americans, and the country’s economy," Gov. Polis shared in a statement with 9NEWS. "I’m disappointed to see Republican members of Colorado’s delegation vote to take health care away from Colorado kids, families, and vulnerable people, increasing health care costs on everyone. If this bill is so ‘big and beautiful,’ as Republicans boast, then Americans should be asking why it wasn’t voted on in the light of day? The reality is, Americans are being left behind and left in the dark by Republicans in Washington. In Colorado, we will continue fighting to lower costs and make health care more accessible and affordable for all."

Despite budget pressures, Johnston said homelessness and public safety remain the top priorities for his administration.

“We’re always looking for ways to do this effectively and efficiently,” Johnston said. “And we’ll just keep working harder and smarter to do that.”

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