Building America CDE Hosts Worker Lunch at Denver Job Site

September 18, 2013

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Building America CDE, in cooperation with the Colorado Building and Construction Trades Council (BCTC) and the Colorado Coalition for the Homeless (CCH), hosted a lunch to honor the union workers who are building the $35 million CCH Stout Street Health Center in downtown Denver, Colorado. The building will allow CCH to significantly expand its healthcare services for the city’s homeless and is part of a larger mixed-use CCH development that includes 78 units of mixed-income and supportive housing. 

Building America, a subsidiary of the AFL-CIO Housing Investment Trust, is providing $8.5 million in New Markets Tax Credits to help finance the 50,000-square-foot healthcare facility. The entire mixed-use development is being built all union under Building America’s labor policy, creating an estimated 210 union construction jobs. 

Representing the HIT and Building America at the event were Labor Relations Director Rod DuChemin and Western Regional Marketing Director Emily Johnstone. Featured speakers included Neal Hall, Business Manager of the Colorado BCTC, and Sheila Lieder, President of the Denver Central Labor Council, who congratulated the union workers on their progress on the major downtown development. CCH President John Parvensky acknowledged Building America’s key role in putting together financing for the project. “The investment from Building America has been critical...It really provides the equity that we need in order to leverage other grants in the community, in order to build this $35 million project," Parvensky told the gathering. 

Many of the workers on the project expressed appreciation for the chance to work on a project that will significantly improve the lives of some of Denver’s most needy residents. 

One of these workers was David Mauro of IBEW Local 68. "I went to school right around the corner at Ebert Elementary,” he said. “[This project] helps the community because there are a lot of people standing out on the corner when we leave every day, and they all need help."