Colorado Springs Mayor Yemi Mobolade said the city has added roughly 9,100 housing units since he took office, but he acknowledged the "missing middle" population he pledged to help on the campaign trail has seen little progress.
In a one-on-one interview with News5 Mobolade discussed how hes addressed housing promises made during his 2023 campaign for office, when he spoke about a population struggling with housing costs and how he would work to fix that. Housing remains a major issue across Colorado and within the city, and affordability is consistently one of the top concerns for Coloradans.
The "missing middle" refers to people who make too much to qualify for rental assistance but are still trying to get into homeownership. It's a group that doesn't always know where to turn.
Mallorie High is part of that group, she has been trying to find a home for her family of five in the $300,000 price range.
"I mean you see for sale signs everywhere, but never, not in the price range you're thinking," High said.
When asked whether homeownership feels within reach, she said it does not, especially when factoring in costs like homeowners associations.
"Thats another hugely expensive thing," High said, referring to HOAs.
She said renting can feel less stressful, but she wants the stability that comes with owning.
"I want to be able to do what I want with my house. I want pets for my children, and I would rather have it in my house where I know I don't have to worry about moving in a year, you know, put those lines on the wall for my kids when he's growing up because they, you know, want that- everybody wants that," High said.
High said the condition of homes in her price range has also been a major obstacle.
"The condition of properties that are in the price range is just crazy to me. A lot of them are sadly repos, and they are like, well, we don't wanna do nothing to them, so if you wanna get this house, you have to fix it up yourself and put the money in, and hopefully, you can qualify for that house if you do all this," High said.
She said she has looked at other nearby cities, like Pueblo and Woodland Park, but both she and her husband work in Colorado Springs and don't feel the commute is realistic. Despite the challenges, she is remaining optimistic.
"Something will come that's just right for us. You just have to, you know, believe that we'll be led to it when it's meant to be led to us," High said.
Mobolade raised this same issue during his 2023 mayoral campaign.
"Developers literally cannot build housing for that missing middle income earners right now- there's virtually no incentive available," Mobolade said.
One of his proposals was to create a "missing middle housing fund."
In his State of the City address this month, Mobolade detailed what he considers his accomplishments, including progress on housing.
"Since I took office, roughly 9100 housing units have been developed, built, or leased across Colorado Springs, including more than 3,000 affordable homes supported by Colorado Springs utilities and sales and use tax rebate," Mobolade said.
But when asked how many of those units address the missing middle, Mobolade acknowledged that remains an area where the city has struggled.
"Actually that goes into your previous question, what are things that you've not been able to accomplish? That's probably one of them. I do believe that we see more federal incentives that address affordable housing proper. So the area median incomes that are 30 percent, 60 percent, we're seeing more where those funding addresses. Have we solved it? Absolutely not. I want to be clear. We still have a ways to go. But where we're not seeing a whole lot of progress is with the missing income earners," Mobolade said.
News5 also asked directly whether the missing middle housing fund he campaigned on ever materialized.
"No. That did not happen. Yeah. Funding Funding is the, as most things are, funding is the challenge and then, and, you know, we've done a lot with very little," Mobolade said.
Colorado Springs has received money from "Proposition 123," a fund voters approved in 2022 to build affordable housing projects.
When asked what metrics voters should use to determine whether he fulfilled that campaign promise, Mobolade pointed to the city's overall housing supply.
"We've increased the supply of housing. So you want to address the critical areas in terms of housing but you also want to address just that you want to increase the supply of housing because it's a supply and demand issue. So I'm proud that we are adding to the housing inventory. I'm proud that you're seeing rents rent rents go down since the historic peaks in 2022. I think those are things that voters can measure me on in terms of are we moving the needle? Are we headed in the right direction? The answer is yes," Mobolade said.
There have also been discussions to address this issue at the state Capitol, particularly when it comes to building starter homes. Mobolade is running for re-election.
This story was reported on-air by a journalist and has been converted to this platform with the assistance of AI. Our editorial team verifies all reporting on all platforms for fairness and accuracy.
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