Denver Housing Authority outlines Sun Valley transformation, asks council for $20 million bond

The Denver Housing Authority on Wednesday walked the South Platte River Committee through more than a decade of planning and construction in the Sun Valley neighborhood and asked the city for an additional $20 million in bond funding to complete the project’s next phase.

"This property began with 333 aging homes, a concentration of 1,400 very low income residents," said Renee Martinez Stone, DHA chief strategy and planning officer, describing the site’s history and the agency’s Healthy Living Initiative, a resident-focused planning approach DHA said it first piloted during Mariposa redevelopment. Martinez Stone said DHA used planning grants in 2013 and HUD implementation funding in 2015 to align housing, health indicators and resident services.

Erin Clark, DHA’s chief real estate investment officer, summarized the physical changes: DHA has replaced the original Sun Valley Homes with 965 apartments across seven DHA buildings delivered in three phases, and DHA plans to sell additional land to market-rate developers to yield roughly another 1,000 market-rate units. Clark said a HUD Choice Neighborhood grant of $34,000,000, about $60,000,000 from city affordable-housing bond and other city sources, and tax-credit and private financing were combined to leverage more than $500,000,000 in total development.

The presentation emphasized design choices aimed at families and children. DHA said the Riverfront Park concept is roughly 11 acres split into a two-phase build: Phase 1 will be just over five acres and is budgeted at $8.5 million under an intergovernmental agreement between DHA and the City and County of Denver. Clark said the city’s contribution to Phase 1 is $3,000,000 (including $2,000,000 from the Elevate bond and $1,000,000 from the capital improvement program) and DHA’s contribution is about $5,500,000, funded largely through an urban renewal/TIF mechanism.

DHA’s executive presentation noted programmatic elements—people-center offices, gardens, a food incubator and a commissary kitchen—and said DHA has built supports to preserve community ties, including a first right of return for original Sun Valley residents. "We are delivering 965 apartments," DHA’s CEO said, framing the broader project as a mixed-income redevelopment intended to reduce concentrated poverty while creating local economic opportunities.

As part of that closeout pitch, DHA’s CEO requested $20,000,000 in bonds to finish Phase 2 and "completely deliver and fulfill our promise," saying the estimate is grounded in prior site work, Brownfields analysis and more than $7,000,000 already invested in environmental cleanup and design.

Councilmembers pressed DHA for additional detail. Councilmember Heinz asked how the $34 million in HUD funds translated into the larger development total; DHA offered to provide a detailed capital-stack breakdown. Councilmember Perez raised school-access concerns, noting that families’ willingness to return may be affected by the absence of a neighborhood school. DHA said it is coordinating with Denver Public Schools on reuse options for existing school buildings and on early-childhood access. On resident governance, DHA said it is building resident-council structures across its mixed-income developments so local councils and community engagement are in place.

DHA said it is projecting about 1,000 children (ages 0–18) living in DHA units by September when final leasing phases complete; that count excludes projected market-rate units. DHA officials offered to provide council a breakdown of the 965 units by bedroom count and AMI (area median income) restrictions.

The committee did not take a vote on the bond request during the meeting; DHA asked the committee to consider the funding request as part of next steps and committed to follow up with requested capital-stack details and unit-level data.

The committee moved on to the DOTTI bridge briefing after DHA’s presentation.