Breckenridge, Colorado, along with many other beautiful mountain towns are seeing trends of increasing workforce demand with inadequate infrastructure to support the housing demand that simultaneously grows.

The lack of investment from the town of Breckenridge towards its low-income residents has already been criticized and well known, but many of the same issues continue to persist. There is a major lack of equity and equality being invested for the lower socioeconomic residents that live in Breckenridge who are largely responsible for the financial success of all businesses in town. The town council members of Breckenridge in addition to the council members of the Summit County government have reports that announce their awareness to the fact that “there are around 700 to 1,000 total units that are needed to currently fill low-income residential needs,” according to the Summit County Housing Assessment, 2019. Contrary to common problem solving, the town council of Breckenridge continues to approve large scale commercial projects (i.e. Breckenridge Grand Vacation project in Breckenridge Gondola lot) which exacerbates housing market prices thus exacerbating low-income housing availability.

The lack of affordable housing increases the vulnerability of this community to climate related issues and disasters and increases cost-burdened houses, displacement and migration of long-term residents. Changes must be made within our current town council and county to encourage investment towards supporting a community whose livelihood and personal well-being are put into jeopardy because of political disregard.