For Immediate Release: December 8, 2010
Justin Park Community Engagement & Communications Coordinator Colorado Center for Community Development University of Colorado Denver | College of Architecture & Planning Mailing Address: CAP, Campus Box 126, PO Box 173364, Denver, Colorado 80217-3364 Physical Address: 1512 Larimer Street, Suite 750 Phone: 303-315-5866 | Fax: 303-315-5872 justin.park@ucdenver.edu
Five Points H istorical D istrict has New Plans to Enhance the Community
Denver Colorado December 8, 2010
In Denver Colorado’s Five Points Neighborhood, new initiatives designed to strengthen the community are rolling out this month. According to Alexander Person, Colorado Center for Community Development’s (CCCD) Architecture and Planning Coordinator, “In May of 2008, the Five Points Cultural Historic District was selected by the City of Denver’s Office of Economic Development to be a pilot district for Denver’s Neighborhood Marketplace initiative,” a new program designed to bolster businesses in Five Points as well as the neighborhood that surrounds them. The initiative is expected to face the growing number of problems in Five Points by halting the rise of gentrification, eliminating crime, filling the blighted empty buildings along the business strip, and generally improving the citizen’s quality of life. Earlier this April, CCCD stepped up as the organization to take on this initiative. Of all Denver neighborhoods, Five Points tops the list of the most crime ridden. According to Neighborhood Scout, a website focused on neighborhood ratings, the average median of people encountering violent crime is 4.7 per 1000th person. In Colorado that number is lower at 4.3 per 1000th person, in Denver it rises to 8.10, and for residents living on the crossroads of 23rd Ave and Humboldt St (within Five Points) that number sky rockets to the
chances of becoming a victim at 55 per 1000th person. That’s an 18% chance of being murdered, raped, robbed, or assaulted. For residents and business residing in Five Points, these numbers are a cause for concern, and are part of the reason why the restoration of the community as needed. The hope of the initiative created by CCD is that by renovating the business market of Five Points the rest of the neighborhood will in turn feel the effects. Person, who is part of a team chosen to carry out the initiative, stated that, “The goal of the initiative is strived to create a collaborative synergy between a multitude of state and local agencies to help Colorado communities work towards sustainable downtowns which are considered instrumental in maintaining a growing small community such as Five Points.� A grant funding to assist in the efforts to make this initiative happen is hoped to be released in 2011. For further information regarding this initiatives and others geared by CCCD, go to CCD website, http:/ /www.ucdenver.edu/academics/colleges/ArchitecturePlanning/discover/centers/CCCD /RuralTechnicalAssistanceProgram/About /Pages/index.aspx
The Colorado Center for Community Development (CCCD) is a community service center for the College of Architecture and Planning at the University of Colorado Denver. The Center seeks to improve the quality of community life by addressing a broad range of contemporary community problems using community development approaches. The Colorado Center works in communities large and small, rural and urban, in towns that never thought they needed outside assistance, and in neighborhoods historically underserved.
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