Colorado Homeless Families, Inc.
PO Box 740130
Arvada, CO 80006 - United States
303 420-6634

In 1987, after the oil bust in Colorado, many other companies in Colorado closed, resulting in the loss of many jobs. Resolution Trust Corp (RTC) Savings and Loan closed because of over-extenting on loans that could not longer be paid back. This created 14,000 HUD home properties in the Denver Area. This was the first time that Connie Zimmerman saw homeless families with children living on the streets or in their cars. These families were the ANew Poor@, who for the first time found themselves to be homeless. They had education, training and skills, but no jobs were available to match with their experience. Many were able to get low paying jobs but could not keep up with raising cost of living, including housing.

During the first three years, CHF was organized and directed entirely by the volunteer Board of Directors and the Zimmerman family in the family home. CHF began by renting six properties from the US Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) for homeless families. Since that time, CHF has expanded from these six properties to 47 properties that we own and maintain for homeless families in a transitional housing program. Nineteen of these homes were previously owned by HUD, but later were purchased by CHF. Ten townhomes, known as Ralston Gold, were purchased from RTC and used as transitional homes for homeless families with children with one unit serving as the CHF office. Twelve more townhomes were built at the Ralston Gold Complex. Construction began in May 1995 and was completed in September 1996.