LOCAL

BY BELEN WARD BWARD@COLORADOCOMMUNITYMEDIA.COM

An effort to quickly pair homeless people with open rooms in Adams County during cold weather will get a boost from a trio of software developers and a national software effort.

Adams County relies on a Severe Weather Action Plan (SWAP) to help people that are homeless and living in severe weather conditions from getting hypothermia and freezing to death. That program relied on a manual and paper-based process.

Code for America Community Fellows Fiona Tang, Ben Poon, and Brandon Johnson began working on an app to streamline that process a year ago. Code of America is a technology company that helps governments streamline manual processes.

SWAP is funded and operated by Adams County. Several municipalities and agencies also participate in the program, including Brighton’s Almost Home.

The SWAP program provides vouchers to the homeless to get them into hotels during cold winter conditions. SWAP works with a network of hotels that provide rooms for the homeless and then sends that information to agencies like Almost Home, including room availability at different locations.

Adams County also works with street outreach teams that go out on foot to find and meet homeless people, conducting mobile shower and laundry events. They also post flyers with locations of shelters and soup kitchens, urging them to go to the Brighton and Thornton Anythink libraries to receive the hotel vouchers.

Community Fellow Fiona Tang said members of the team joined those outreach efforts to find out what homeless individuals needed and how those services could help them.

“It was a much more informed perspective on what it means to, for example, live on food stamps, or being homeless,” Tang said.

But the fellows saw how slow the manual process could be, she said.

“Almost Home, a communitybased organization was performing intake with people experiencing homelessness to get them into hotel rooms,” Tang said. “During one of our outreach visits, we observed clients fill out forms manually and we observed caseworkers painstakingly copy these intake responses into a spreadsheet, only to later manually enter them into the Homelessness Management Information System. We thought that this was a ripe opportunity to streamline a process that didn’t need to be so time-intensive and cumbersome.”

The result is the team’s SWAP app or SWAPP. Community Fellow Ben Poon said it also helps agencies prepare.

“Another addition that was in place before we came along, we added and created a no-reply text line where messages are broadcasted out to people who are subscribers,” Poon added. als experiencing homelessness. That amounted to roughly 8,300 nights of unsheltered homelessness, a fifteenfold increase from the previous year, Poon said.

“The Swap-app enables other human service agencies in the county to participate in distributing vouchers. We helped equip caseworkers and street outreach teams from multiple municipalities including Brighton, Thornton, and Westminster. The city of Bennett had also expressed interest in coming on to the platform” said Poon.

Streamlining the process with SWAPP

Before the new app, the process to locate hotels for people took an average of 11-12 minutes. After SWAPP, that process was reduced to two minutes.

“I’m especially proud of this because it represents a significant improvement on client and caseworkers’ experience when interacting with the SWAP program. Instead of transferring intake information from paper forms to a spreadsheet to the Homelessness Management Information System, our app helped to eliminate the data entry step to the spreadsheet, while also increasing data accuracy and reducing caseworker frustration,” said Poon.

Almost Home’s manual process of paperwork, invoicing and reimbursement was eliminated with the new app.

“For example, before SWAPP, hotels sometimes got away with charging Almost Home for nights un-stayed, but with the accurate data provided through the app, Almost Home could dispute invalid charges,” said Poon.

Data Accuracy

A side benefit for Almost Home upgrading to the app is the accuracy of the data, Poon said.

“SWAPP became the most reliable and comprehensive source of data for chronic homelessness in all of Adams County, especially given the cancellation of the 2021 point-in-time (PIT) count due to Covid-19,” he said.

It’s also been useful in other areas, Poon said.

“Our stakeholders had so much confidence in our app that they relied on it for non-SWAP-related service delivery,” he said. “The county & Almost Home used our SWAP data to identify ‘off the grid’ clients in otherwise unknown jurisdictions, identify veteran clients eligible for VA-housing benefits, and run an adhoc Covid-19 vaccination clinic

“It feels great to know when working on software, you are working on digital so there is no tangible thing to touch, but what is cool because it is a digital product that is getting people into a safe housing that need it. It’s extremely gratifying,” he said.

“It feels like the tech exists and we just need folks to bridge the gap between technology that does exist and can help people and like these issues that are on the ground. It feels really good to bridge the gap,” said Tang.

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STAFF REPORT

Commerce City voters will vote on two tax questions on the Tuesday, Nov. 2, ballot.

Both concern the city’s Northern General Improvement District. One, Question 6A, asks for a $10 million increase in district taxes to construct and improve public safety, improve and widen streets, improve and expand water mains, water pipes and valves and to expand storm drain detention facilities.

If approved, the question would also repair, replace and expand parks and recreation facilities, open space and trails.

The second question, 6B, asks for an increase of $295 million in district taxes (with a repayment of up to $709 million at a cap of $27.6 million annually) to pay debt service on all outstanding debt, including voter-approved debt from Question 6A.

The Adams County booklet of analysis of these and other county questions said there were no comments on either ballot question by the constitutional deadline.

ADAMS 14

When she and her mom went to the school, the next day, Angela said administrators told them they were busy with lunch duties and asked them instead to call later. It took two days to reach an administrator who agreed to talk to Angela’s mom in person the following day.

On her daughter’s fourth day of missed school, Angela’s mom went back to campus to ask for help. But Angela said that the administrator brushed off her mom’s concerns, demanding proof, calling her mom a “bandit” and using her past criminal record against her. “How is that making anything better?” Angela asked. “At that point I was very disappointed. My hopes were gone.”

While trying to provide screenshots of her conversation with the girl who threatened her, Angela said she was passed around to three administrators before one suggested the two girls sign a contract agreeing not to fight. Still feeling unsafe, Angela asked if her schedule could be changed to avoid the other girl. When that request was denied, she ended up walking out of school in tears, again. In total, she’s missed eight days, and she said no one from the school reached out to her to ask why.

Angela can’t help but remember when she went to a school in the Cherry Creek district while she was being cared for by foster parents. There, she said teachers or counselors would reach out to her as soon as she missed just one class period.

Now she and her mom are seeking to change schools. Angela will be going to Lester Arnold, Adams 14’s alternative high school, but she won’t start until Oct. 18.

“I just feel hurt,” Angela said. “I know it could be better.”

Jason Malmberg, a teacher at the district’s high school and president of the teachers union, said that he believes problems in Adams 14 are more complicated than people — even education experts from other parts of the state — realize.

He points out the facility issues, air quality problems, immigration policies that keep parents away, overworked staff, and understaffed schools.

“We’ve polluted this corner of the metro area for generations. People come in and they just assume everybody has clean air to breathe and clean water to drink so, hey, it must be the teachers’ fault,” Malmberg said. “We didn’t, as a state or a county, surround this community in need with resources.”

Some district staff say they miss the support they were getting from MGT and its subcontractors. But it seems that it varies by school, department, and for teachers, by what they teach. Some teachers said they haven’t felt the absence of MGT and its partners.

Some administrators who anonymously sent a letter to the state board of education this week say they are concerned about the upheaval.

“Teaching is already a hard job, teaching in a turnaround district is even more challenging, and teaching in a turnaround district without consistent leadership is almost impossible,” the letter states. “The stress of this turmoil is most definitely impacting staff, which in turn, impacts students.”

Malmberg says that coaching may have been helpful for some but wonders if the millions spent on MGT’s contract could have made more of an impact instead by reducing class sizes, increasing pay for paras or addressing mold and facility issues in schools — problems which have at times forced school buildings to close.

“I don’t think we’re going to coach our way out of this,” he added.

Molina also thinks a lot about the environmental challenges for students in Commerce City. Many children, including her own she said, are sick often and miss school either because of their own health problems or because they are helping take care of their sick family members.

“I feel like we’re being punished,” she said.

Margarita Cardoza, a mom of two students, only one whoi is in Adams 14, said she believes the state board has failed to act and expects that this loss of accreditation won’t mean much either.

“It’s like they don’t care about us, I don’t know what they think,” Cardoza said. “A lot of students have lost out on a quality education. The state has had multiple chances, and they haven’t done anything.”

Some parents have also said they worry the work that has been happening for the past two years under MGT didn’t take into account the more than half of district students who are learning English as a second language.

“We have kids that speak two languages. They’re smart,” Molina said. “I see that as a wealth. But they take away our biliteracy programs, they bring different programs every year. They’re just taking our resources.

“These laws are not working for us,” Molina said, referring to the accountability laws that put Adams 14 on the state’s radar in the first place for low achievement. “These laws are not designed for people like us. They were not made with my children in mind.”

Rocky Mountain Arsenal Five-Year Review Report Final and Available to the Public

The U.S. Army recently completed its latest Five-Year Review (FYR) report for the Rocky Mountain Arsenal (RMA), which covers the period of 2015-2020. The FYR process includes a statutory and policy review of the RMA’s 1995 and 1996 On-Post and Off-Post Records of Decision (RODs). The RODs provide detailed descriptions of the environmental cleanup approach selected for the site.

The U.S. Army established the RMA in 1942 to produce chemical weapons as a deterrent in World War II. Shell Oil Co. later leased some of those facilities to manufacture agricultural products. Common disposal practices of the time resulted in contamination of the site's soils, structures and groundwater. Contaminants included solvents, metals, pesticides and miscellaneous industrial chemicals.

The purpose of the FYR is to determine whether the RMA's cleanup remains protective of human health and the environment. A critical part of the FYR is to update any changes to environmental standards and to determine if the remedy outlined in the RODs and subsequent Decision Documents remains protective in light of those new standards.

Based on a review of documentation, site inspections and interviews for this FYR cycle, the U.S. Army has determined that the cleanup remains protective of human health and the environment. The EPA concurs with the U.S. Army’s findings. Six issues and recommended actions have been identified to be addressed over the next five-year period to ensure the long-term protectiveness of the environmental cleanup.

FYRs at the RMA will be required for the foreseeable future, since the cleanup approach included landfills and consolidation areas which hold contaminated waste from the RMA's cleanup. The next FYR is scheduled to begin in 2025 and be finalized in 2026.

The 2020 FYR final report, along with the protectiveness determinations of the U.S. Army and EPA, is now posted on the RMA’s website at www.rma.army.mil. The document is also available for public review by appointment at: RMA Joint Administrative Records and Document Facility, Rocky Mountain Arsenal, 6550 Gateway Road, Commerce City, CO 80022.

For more information, please contact Ms. Patty Lee, RMA, at 303.289.0300, or Patty.l.lee6.civ@mail.mil.

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arrived at Prairie View. She said the on-fi eld accomplishments were one thing .. but not the only thing that mattered.

“His focus was on the successful young men he coached,” she said. “He joined Lincoln Hills Cares Foundation to provide opportunities for diversity and inclusion for environmental occupations.” Howard earned a master’s degree in plant ecology and botany from the University of Colorado-Boulder in 1996.

Latson also talked about his brother’s ability to form relationships.

“It wouldn’t be Dr. Howard unless he was talking to somebody about something, and he did it with love,” Latson said. “He created unique relationships with people, and he always expected their best. He never said ‘no’ to making people around him better.

“He brought his love of the outdoors to inner-city youth,” Latson added. “His legacy is one of education mentorship and love. Everything he did was with the intent of planting a seed that will continue to grow for generations to come.” Gonzales and Howard coached the ThunderHawks girls basketball team. But, Gonzales noted, Howard’s sense of humor ruled. If you wanted to join, Gonzales added, your humor had to be on Howard’s equal.

“His impact on me, his family, Prairie View High School will never be forgotten,” Gonzales said. “He wanted nothing more than for you to believe in yourself more than he believed in you.”

Nate Howard’s family and friends fi le into Prairie View High School for his Oct. 8

celebration of life service. PHOTOS BY STEVE SMITH

SCHOLARSHIP FUND

The Dr. Nathaniel Howard III Scholarship Fund, through Evaluation Athletic Performance Foundation Inc., a Colorado nonprofi t, is accepting donations through Citywide Banks, 12075 E. 45th Ave., Suite B, Denver 80239. The account niumber is 007513.