7 days ago
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Posted On: May 28th 2026, 06:14 pm
🚨 WSJ just dubbed Denver “America’s Emptiest Downtown” 😬
California developer Asher Luzzatto just scooped up two prime downtown towers (621 & 633 17th Street) for a fire-sale $3.2 million.
Now Denver’s DDA is handing him a $63 million low-interest, taxpayer-backed loan to turn them into ~700 apartments… including a “vertical village.”
At least 70 units will be income-restricted.
Will they be filled with problematic voucher tenants who bring crime, drugs and chaos?
Meanwhile Denver already has nearly 4,000 vacant affordable units…an 8.8% vacancy rate (a 10-year high!!)
Denver County is losing residents through net negative domestic migration.
Yet the cycle continues:
🔥 Let crime & chaos destroy downtown
💰 Out-of-state developers buy distressed towers for pennies
🏗️ Promise shiny “affordable” conversions
💸 Raid public coffers (DDA’s debt capacity is now in the hundreds of millions) to subsidize the deal
Why are we building more subsidized housing when thousands of units are already vacant?
Who exactly is this helping…besides developers and insiders?
#DoBetterDenver #ddawatch
California developer Asher Luzzatto just scooped up two prime downtown towers (621 & 633 17th Street) for a fire-sale $3.2 million.
Now Denver’s DDA is handing him a $63 million low-interest, taxpayer-backed loan to turn them into ~700 apartments… including a “vertical village.”
At least 70 units will be income-restricted.
Will they be filled with problematic voucher tenants who bring crime, drugs and chaos?
Meanwhile Denver already has nearly 4,000 vacant affordable units…an 8.8% vacancy rate (a 10-year high!!)
Denver County is losing residents through net negative domestic migration.
Yet the cycle continues:
🔥 Let crime & chaos destroy downtown
💰 Out-of-state developers buy distressed towers for pennies
🏗️ Promise shiny “affordable” conversions
💸 Raid public coffers (DDA’s debt capacity is now in the hundreds of millions) to subsidize the deal
Why are we building more subsidized housing when thousands of units are already vacant?
Who exactly is this helping…besides developers and insiders?
#DoBetterDenver #ddawatch
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