When Colorado politicians and advocacy groups talk about the need for affordable housing, there are three professions that come up again and again: teachers, nurses and firefighters.
It’s a potent line in a politically fraught debate, aimed at overcoming the stigma of low-income housing at the local level. After all, who doesn’t support having a place in their community for the people who teach their kids, treat their sick and keep their neighborhoods safe?
With the passage of Proposition 123, the 2022 low-income housing ballot measure, campaign leader Gary Community Ventures proclaimed that “our teachers, nurses and firefighters will have a chance to stay in the communities they serve.”
But a line that has long served as a talking point for low-income housing is now being deployed by those who favor expanding government affordable housing programs to the middle class, as we wrote about this week.
“We’re working on creating housing that’s affordable for all those people — nurses, teachers and firefighters,” said Sen. Jeff Bridges, a Democrat from Greenwood Village, who sponsored the legislation creating Colorado’s new middle income housing tax credit.
“Firefighters in Breckenridge don’t qualify under the limits that low-income housing advocates want. Teachers barely qualify under the limits.” In some jobs, he added, “nurses, teachers and firefighters make above 120% of AMI (area median income).” At that level, they don’t qualify for traditional affordable rental housing, but still make far too little to afford the median home in Summit County, which now sells for close to $1 million.
So if both sides of the affordable housing debate are using the same line, it raises the question: How much do teachers, nurses and firefighters actually make?
The answer depends on where they live — and how much experience they have. But the bottom line is that people working in all three professions hover somewhere around the cutoff line to qualify for traditional affordable housing programs. As a result, sometimes they can live in affordable units, and sometimes they can’t.
The median household income in Colorado in 2022 was just shy of $90,000. That puts the income cutoff for most affordable rental housing at somewhere around $50,000 to $70,000, but that limit fluctuates by county and household size.
In 2023, the median Colorado teacher made around $63,000, according to state labor data. The median registered nurse made $91,734; and the median firefighter earned $75,000.
Entry-level wages look a little different: $46,000 for teachers, $72,297 for nurses and $51,000 firefighters at the start of their career.
If you include health care practitioners other than nurses, wages can drop significantly. Entry-level social workers, for instance, make about $44,000, while entry-level health technicians make just $41,000 — well below the levels needed to qualify for affordable housing just about anywhere in Colorado.
Pay can fluctuate by tens of thousands of dollars depending on the county. The median teacher in Boulder County, for instance, makes over $80,000. That’s about $20,000 more than one in Pitkin County — even though both counties have similar median incomes overall. As a result, the average teacher in Pitkin County might qualify for low-income housing while one in Boulder might not.
Bottom line: When housing proponents say they want to house “teachers, nurses and firefighters,” it could mean a lot of different things.
STORY: Colorado is steering affordable housing money to the middle class — and away from the working poor
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WHO QUALIFIES FOR LOW-INCOME HOUSING?
A few job types stand out consistently in local housing need assessments.
Summit County’s 2023 housing study found that those who work in construction, hotels and restaurants and retail are the most likely to rent and make less than 40% of the area median income. A 2023 report from low-income housing developer Enterprise Community Partners found that janitors, child care workers and emergency medical technicians tend to make lower-income wages, too — both in Summit and urban job markets like Denver.
But in Summit, government workers, health care professionals and those who work in schools tend to make more than 80% of the area median income — a stat that helps underscore the pressure from mountain communities to expand who can benefit from state affordable housing dollars.
“What we see is that fewer and fewer families, particularly families with two income earners, actually qualify for that housing that is 60% of AMI or below,” said Tamara Pogue, a Summit County commissioner.
Nonetheless, many who work in those essential professions still make less, the study shows. In Summit, 1 in 4 people who work in education make less than $75,000, while 19% and 14% of health care and state and local government employees do, respectively.
“I think it’s really important to pull the whole conversation out of this idea of area median income, and into reality,” said Kinsey Hasstedt, the state and local policy director for Enterprise Community Partners. “There are still a lot of people in those very same professions that are getting named who are earning far less than 140% or 160%” of the area median — the income levels that the state now subsidizes.
WHAT TO WATCH
OPPOSITION TO PROPERTY TAX MEASURES FORMS
Coloradans for Local Communities will be the issue committee battling Initiative 108 and its companion measure, Initiative 50, which would limit property tax growth to 4% a year and is already on the ballot.
The group is being led by Scott Wasserman, the former head of the Bell Policy Center, a liberal policy nonprofit. He recently stepped down from the Bell to start a consulting firm.
The group has raised about $40,000 so far, including $15,000 from the Bell Action Network, the political nonprofit associated with the Bell Policy Center; $10,000 each from the Colorado Fund for Children and Public Education and the Colorado Children’s Campaign Fund; and $3,000 from the Special District Association of Colorado.
THE NARRATIVE
A bleaker Colorado Senate picture for Republicans
A closer look at the Colorado Senate map paints a bleak picture for Republicans trying to defend against a Democratic supermajority in the chamber this year.
Democrats hold a 23-12 majority in the Senate, one seat shy of a supermajority, and the party will be defending two competitive seats in November and trying to pick up three others.
The districts with state Senate races this year will be up for grabs for the first time since their boundaries were redrawn in the 2021 redistricting process, so it’s hard to gauge how competitive they will be.
But an analysis of precinct- and county-level 2022 election results in the districts provided to The Unaffiliated paints a dire picture for Republicans.
Take Senate District 5 in western and northwestern Colorado, where state Rep. Marc Catlin, R-Montrose, is running against Democrat Cole Buerger, a small business owner who lives in Glenwood Springs.
The district, currently represented by outgoing Sen. Perry Will, a New Castle Republican, was estimated through a nonpartisan analysis of election results between 2016 and 2020 completed during the state’s redistricting process to lean 3 percentage points in the GOP’s favor. But in 2022, Gov. Jared Polis won the district by 10 percentage points, while U.S. Sen. Michael Bennet won it by 6 percentage points and Attorney General Phil Weiser won by 3 percentage points.
Democrat Kathy Plomer, who was running for an at-large seat on the state Board of Education, lost the district by less than 1 point. She was the only Democrat running statewide in 2022 who lost in the district.
Will was appointed to the Senate district seat by a vacancy committee and is running for Garfield County commissioner instead of seeking another term.
Some other highlights from the analysis:
Carnes and the Colorado GOP used The Sun’s reporting about the redistricting analysis of prior election results in Senate District 16 in fundraising emails sent out last week.
CAMPAIGN FINANCE
Ike McCorkle asks donors to send money to combat effect of Trump assassination attempt as part of new “partnership” with PAC
Democrat Ike McCorkle, hot off his primary loss in Colorado’s 4th Congressional District, is now raising money for a liberal super PAC.
His first fundraising solicitation: the day after the attempted assassination of Donald Trump, and asking people to “rush a donation of $5, $50, $500, or even $5,000” to combat how the former president will be showered with “attention, sympathy, coverage and funding.”
“The heinous violence … is a symptom of the politics created by one man — Donald Trump. This is another link in the chain of events he set in motion on Jan. 6,” a text from McCorkle said. “This is the road that Donald Trump set us on. And it’s up to us to change course.”
McCorkle, a Marine veteran, added: “These events will make defeating Trump electorally exponentially harder.”
A text and Facebook post from McCorkle say he planned to roll out his new “partnership” with Turn Left PAC, which was created in May 2023, later on, but that the assassination attempt moved up his timeline.
The political action committee’s address is listed as West Virginia. The group says it is working to flip red seats blue.
Three of the people the PAC has paid — Alexandra Kefalas, John Debona and Steven Hall — also received money this year from, or were associated with, McCorkle’s campaign. Another connection between the PAC and McCorkle’s campaign is C2G Strategies, a political consulting firm based in Texas that has been paid by both by McCorkle’s campaign and the PAC.
We interviewed McCorkle and asked him if it was appropriate to invoke the assassination attempt in a fundraising solicitation so soon after the shooting happened. He didn’t answer directly, but said it’s absolutely appropriate to fundraise to defend American democracy.
“I think that the democratic republic is on the line,” he said. “So appropriate or not, the situation is what it is.”
McCorkle said he got involved with Turn Left PAC through his campaign manager, David Graham, and that the group plans to put up billboards and send out digital and text messages to voters across the country in districts where he thinks Democrats can — and need help to — win. He said some of the money would be spent in Colorado, including in the 4th District.
McCorkle was running this year for a third straight cycle in the 4th District. He lost to Republican U.S. Rep. Ken Buck by 23 percentage points in 2020 and 2022. This year, he lost in the Democratic primary in the 4th District to Trisha Calvarese by 4 percentage points.
McCorkle ended June with $255,000 still in his congressional campaign account, money he raised after Republican U.S. Rep. Lauren Boebert jumped into the 4th District race.
He said the money will “fund future campaigns and current federal campaigns that have a chance of flipping the House.” McCorkle said he “100% will be running again” in the 4th District in 2026 —and he can hang onto that $255,000 until the next election cycle.
By comparison, Democrat John Padora, who came in a distant third place in the Democratic primary in the 4th District, had only $23,000 left in his campaign account at the end of last month.
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THE POLITICAL TICKER
CAMPAIGN FINANCE
Most of the money behind a committee that spent nearly $656,000 unsuccessfully trying to help Aurora attorney Idris Keith beat state Rep. Mike Weissman in the Democratic primary in Senate District 28 came from Good Leadership Action Inc., a corporation registered in Delaware, where the state doesn’t make the names of business owners public. The corporation was formed May 10, three days before the federal super PAC, Democracy Wins, it donated $600,000 to was formed. The super PAC gave that money to the Colorado group Brighter Futures Colorado 527, which then donated most of that cash to Representation Matters, the committee that worked to help Keith beat Weissman. Because of the financial web, it’s unlikely the true source of the Representation Matters’ funding will ever be revealed.
CONGRESS
U.S. Rep. Greg Lopez has been appointed to the House Budget and Science, Space and Technology committees. He will serve on the Budget Committee’s health care task force. Lopez is serving out the term of former U.S. Rep. Ken Buck, which ends in early January.
5TH CONGRESSIONAL DISTRICT
Jeff Crank, the Republican nominee in Colorado’s 5th Congressional District, formed a leadership PAC, America’s Mountain PAC, and became part of a joint fundraising committee, the Crank Victory Fund, this week. Checks written to the joint fundraising committee will be divided among Crank’s campaign, his leadership PAC and the National Republican Congressional Committee.
3RD CONGRESSIONAL DISTRICT
Democrat Adam Frisch will begin airing TV ads Tuesday for his campaign against Republican Jeff Hurd, a Grand Junction attorney, in Colorado’s 3rd Congressional District. Contracts filed with the Federal Communications Commission indicate the ads will air through at least early August. The former Aspen city councilman has also reserved $2.4 million worth of TV ad time for the fall.
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YOU HEARD IT HERE
Crow made that comment a day after he joined about 100 other congressional Democrats on a call with Biden that by all accounts went poorly.
Biden was particularly unhappy with a question from Crow, who, according to a person familiar with the congressman’s remarks, said: “National security is a major issue in this campaign. Americans want a commander in chief who can project strength, vigor and inspire confidence at home and abroad. They need to feel that you have the helm when they go to bed each night.”
The person requested anonymity because they weren’t authorized to share what was said on the call.
Politico reported that those words set Biden off.
“I don’t want to hear that crap,” Biden said, according to Politico, which reported that the president raised “his voice in a forceful defense of his foreign policy record, including the rebuilding of NATO.”
Crow also pressed Biden on his strategy to beat Donald Trump in November, days before the former president accepted the nomination from a unified Republican party at its convention in Milwaukee.
“The status quo won’t work. Focusing just on Trump won’t work. Focusing on our accomplishments won’t work. What major change to your campaign do you propose?” Crow asked, according to the person familiar with the congressman’s question.
THE BIGGER PICTURE
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