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The Aspen-Pitkin County Housing Authority continued rejecting rental housing applicants because of their immigration status for more than two years after the state of Colorado made it illegal for landlords to do so.
Data provided through the city of Aspen shows that APCHA rejected at least 49 rental housing applicants based on their “temporary legal status in the country” in 2023. Some of the rejections involved units that APCHA owns directly.
Colorado’s “Immigrant Tenant Protection Act,” which went into effect at the beginning of 2021, prohibits landlords from “Refus(ing) to enter into a rental agreement … or to otherwise preclude a tenant from occupying a dwelling unit, based solely or in part on the immigration or citizenship status of the tenant.”
The legislation creating the act was Colorado Senate Bill 20-108. The act also prohibits landlords from asking prospective tenants about their citizenship or immigration status, which APCHA continued to do for at least two years after the act went into effect in 2021.
APCHA is the landlord for rental units in five housing developments, and its use of immigration status to approve tenants applied to those units.
Until December 2023, APCHA’s qualification criteria required that all housing applicants provide proof of legal residency in the United States. APCHA residents were required to submit that proof again every two years as part of a regular requalification process. Without meeting these requirements, applicants were not eligible for almost any of the affordable housing managed by APCHA, whether the housing authority owned it or not.
As of 2023, APCHA was the only public housing authority in the mid- to upper Roaring Fork Valley that had such a requirement. Staff members at Basalt Community Affordable Housing, the town of Snowmass Village Housing Department and Housing Eagle County confirmed that they do not inquire about housing applicants’ immigration status as part of their own requirements and have not done so in recent years (Housing Eagle County does ask for proof of residency in certain cases related to federal housing programs).
APCHA is not required under state law to check rental housing applicants’ immigration status. Colorado House Bill 21-1054, which Gov. Jared Polis signed into law in April 2021, exempts state and local government entities from verifying legal residency when providing housing benefits.
The housing authority deals with two federal housing programs: Low-Income Housing Tax Credits and Section 8 housing vouchers. LIHTC has no requirements regarding legal residency, and the Section 8 voucher program only requires legal residency for voucher recipients. APCHA staff confirmed that it did not have to end participation in any federal programs when it removed its legal residency requirement in 2023.
Despite addressing other aspects of state and federal law, housing authority staff did not mention the state law prohibiting landlords from asking about legal status during the board meetings that were held at the time they removed the legal residency requirement.
In contrast, Snowmass Village Housing Director Betsy Crum referenced the law unprompted when asked whether Snowmass has a citizenship or immigration status requirement in its housing program guidelines.
“We are prohibited from asking citizenship or immigration status by Colorado state law,” Crum said in an August 2024 email.
APCHA staff hold that they did change the regulations to comply with this law. In mid-September, APCHA Director Matthew Gillen and Tom Smith, the housing authority’s attorney, were asked this question via email:
“There is a state law (CRS § 38-12-1203), which went into effect at the beginning of 2021, that prohibits landlords from denying prospective tenants a lease agreement based on their legal status. Did APCHA’s use of legal status as an application criterion for rental housing qualification up through the end of 2023, and denial of rental housing applicants based on legal status during that time, not conflict with this statute?”
Gillen responded, “APCHA amended its regulations to comply with the state statute. We are not aware of any violations of the statute by APCHA before or after the official adoption of this policy.”
In a separate statement on Monday, Gillen added that the housing authority’s board removed the citizenship requirement from the guidelines because of their own policy discussions unrelated to any notions of wrongdoing by APCHA.
The legal environment around public housing authorities — often vital resources for workers in Colorado’s resort communities — and undocumented applicants is poorly defined and variable.
Spokespeople from the Colorado Attorney General’s office and the Colorado Department of Local Affairs, the agency that works with state and local housing programs, turned down the Aspen Daily News’s information requests. Both agencies said they did not have relevant information about state regulations over undocumented people’s access to public housing.
Drew Hamrick, general counsel and senior vice president of government affairs for the Apartment Association of Metro Denver, said the many layers of federal and state law regarding public housing and immigration status form a labyrinth for local government entities to navigate. With ideological battles playing out differently at state and federal levels, Hamrick said, local communities must deal with confusing webs of regulations to stay in compliance and meet their own needs.
“There are advocates on both sides that would like to see the state regulations be the same as the federal regulations,” Hamrick said. “Some people want regulations to be tighter on citizenship requirements. Some would like to see them looser. That's a political football, and unfortunately, housing providers get caught in the middle of that.”
When APCHA did ultimately remove its legal status requirement, staff members said it reduced demands on staff time and helped the housing authority fill its units for lower-income workers.
“Staff and the board didn't think it was necessary, and we were spending a surprising amount of time trying to figure out people's legal status, which isn’t always clear,” Gillen said. “It isn’t just as simple as permanent resident status or citizenship, right? What do you what do you do when people are here under something like a T visa, which is a protection for trafficked persons?”
APCHA officials believe that removing the authority’s legal status requirement has helped them fill some of their housing units for low-income workers, particularly those managed under requirements from LIHTC.
The housing authority has long struggled to fill its LIHTC units, constructed with federal assistance on the condition that they only serve low-income workers. The income requirements are so low that they make most Aspen workers ineligible. APCHA has made efforts to advertise its housing in English and Spanish. Applications are available in both languages.
APCHA staff say they removed the legal status requirements of their own accord. No APCHA board member resisted or rejected the idea in public meetings.
Though they were ineligible for APCHA housing, unauthorized workers make up a significant portion of Aspen’s workforce. Aspen’s restaurants, for example, frequently forego the background checks necessary to verify whether an applicant is permitted to work in the United States, according to one Aspen worker.
Without the threat of a background check, unauthorized workers can get restaurant jobs with fake green cards or social security cards.
“Most restaurants in town turn a blind eye to that,” said the worker, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he is not working legally in the country.
This article will refer to him as “Marco.” He works as a food runner at a downtown Aspen restaurant.
As with all workers in Aspen, Marco constantly struggles to find attainable housing in the area.
“I hate it. It’s always stressful,” Marco said.
Over his seven years working in Aspen, Marco said he cycles through short-term housing arrangements in the upper valley. Right now, he is living in a small apartment in Snowmass Village, which he shares with roommates.
Marco said he has lived in seasonal APCHA housing when he was working legally on a visa. He said he knows some unauthorized workers who have obtained APCHA housing even before the housing authority lifted its immigration status restrictions.
According to APCHA records, most of the 2023 rental applicants denied because of immigration status were applying for seasonal housing. But Marco said workers without legal authorization often stay long-term in the valley.
While many are seasonal workers who overstay their visas and may plan to return to their home countries, many others have entered the country illegally and stayed. For some, the money is more important, while others fall in love with the lifestyle, Marco said.
Marco, who plans to reinstate his work authorization soon, said he has mixed feelings about the role of unauthorized workers in Aspen. On one hand, as an immigrant who initially arrived legally, he doesn’t think it’s smart to support uncontrolled illegal migration to the United States. He said he worries about allowing people into the country without checking their backgrounds.
On the other hand, he said many of the workers who arrive in the country illegally are poor and don’t have the opportunity to use legal pathways, even though American employers actively rely on them.
“It’s hard to imagine an American choosing to chop onions for 10 hours straight every day,” Marco said.
Without clearer regulations or intervention in the system, Marco said, he thinks restaurants will keep hiring unauthorized workers and they will continue to be a large contingent in Aspen’s workforce.
“It’s all part of a cycle. Someone would have to break that cycle,” he said. “I’m not saying it’s good or bad. It just is what it is.”