The Denver Meadows Mobile Home and Recreational Vehicle Park is seen Sept. 7. Renters are protesting a decision by the park’s owner to raise lot fees and to sell the property in July 2018 for redevelopment. Photo by Gabriel Christus/Aurora Sentinel 
A number of feral cats are seen roaming Sept. 7 around the Denver Meadows mobile home park. Photo by Gabriel Christus/Aurora Sentinel 
A raccoon takes a plate of food under a mobile home Sept. 7 at the Denver Meadows mobile home park. Photo by Gabriel Christus/Aurora Sentinel 
The Denver Meadows Mobile Home and Recreational Vehicle Park is seen Sept. 7. Photo by Gabriel Christus/Aurora Sentinel 
The Denver Meadows Mobile Home and Recreational Vehicle Park is seen July 7 from East 17th Place. Plans to rezone the mobile home park were tabled Sept. 12 by Aurora City Council. Photo by Gabriel Christus/Aurora Sentinel 
The Denver Meadows are seen from the East 17th Place on Thursday July 07, 2016. Plans to rezone the mobile home park were tabled at city council on Monday. Photo by Gabriel Christus/Aurora Sentinel 
Signs are displayed at the home of one of the residents of the Denver Meadows in 2016. Plans to rezone the mobile home park were tabled at city council on Monday night. Photo by Gabriel Christus/Aurora Sentinel 
A sign is displayed at the home of one of the residents of the Denver Meadows on Thursday July 07, 2016. Plans to rezone the mobile home park were tabled at city council on Monday night. Photo by Gabriel Christus/Aurora Sentinel
AURORA | Citing scarce affordable housing in the Aurora area, city council agreed Monday night to postpone any applications for redeveloping mobile home parks while the city conducts a study.
The council voted unanimously to impose a 10-month moratorium on processing redevelopment applications in order to review the impact of future redevelopment of the city’s 12 mobile remaining mobile home parks as they relate to affordable housing in an already tight market.
The resolution comes as residents of Denver Meadows have been meeting with city staff, council members and the mayor for over a year about a pending closure of their park located near East Colfax Ave.
Residents of that particular park are suing the park’s owner regarding alleged retaliation from the owner as part of the closure. Many of which are low-income and speak little English attended the council meeting to express their support for the moratorium because of their own experience in the park that sits near the University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus.
But council members say the passed measure is addressing a much bigger issue than Denver Meadows: What happens when a mobile home park owner wants to sell their land and some of the city’s most affordable housing is lost to developers.
“The fact is we don’t have a plan,” councilwoman Crystal Murillo said at a council retreat earlier in the month.
The mandate would require a task force is formed to look at mobile home parks and how they contribute to affordable housing in Aurora. More specific details have yet to be worked out on what the task force would need to investigate.
“We’re not picking on any particular mobile park owner,” Murillo, who represents Ward I where Denver Meadows and other parks on East Colfax are located, said Monday. She went on to say that she believes council members have a direct interest in making sure community members aren’t displaced across the city, not just in Denver Meadows.
During the hearing co-owner of Denver Meadows Shawn Lustigman argued to council that he’s already given residents more than enough time to move and has tried to work with them to find new parks or locations for their homes. He asked why council didn’t consider a moratorium years ago. But residents of the park who attended the meeting told a different story, highlighting instances of rent hikes, water shutoffs and other actions they consider retaliation for trying to save the land they lease.
Nonprofit 9to5 has been working with Denver Meadows residents to save the property for close to two years. They say residents have raised more than $20.5 million to buy the property from the owner, but their offer was turned down.
Andrea Chiriboga-Flor, a lead housing organizer for 9to5, told the Sentinel the moratorium would certainly give the residents more time to relocate, but the moratorium coupled with a task force to study the issue becomes important because mobile home parks are the largest source of unsubsidized housing in the state.
She said many of the residents in Denver Meadows say they’d have trouble moving their mobile homes because they are older models and don’t meet the standards of other parks in the city.
Others said they have additional reasons for fighting for the moratorium.
“The reason we haven’t left our home is because there is no place to go,” one woman said through a translator to council. “If I, one family, cannot find another place, what’s going to happen to 70 families that are displaced?”
Another woman said she’s looked at buying land, but either couldn’t get the land rezoned for her mobile home or it would cost too much to get power and water to it.
A moratorium relates to land use, city attorney Mike Hyman told council Monday night — which is why the moratorium would be placed on all mobile home parks, and not just Denver Meadows. Under the moratorium, only zoning changes would be held up. The owner could still sell or close the property — which convinced some members of council there were no property rights issues impeding with the moratorium.
Council members repeatedly explained to the crowd of about 40 that the moratorium was not a solution for the Denver Meadows residents. The owner can still sell during the moratorium. But councilman Charlie Richardson, who asked staff for a timeline, said the residents have about another year to figure out their next move.
“I really hope the task force can come with a miracle solution,” he told the crowd, which cheered at the final vote.