The Douglas County nonprofit Wellspring Community is in the process of moving tenants into its recently completed conversion of the former La Quinta Inn in Castle Rock to affordable apartments.
The apartment building, called Unity on Park, provides affordable housing for adults with intellectual or developmental disabilities (IDD), with half of the units reserved for tenants with disabilities. There are 22 studios and 20 one-bedroom units, and 66 parking spaces.
All of the housing units will be restricted to people making 30-80% of the area median income.
Nicole DeVries, the executive director of Wellspring, which provides services to people with IDD, said the project addresses an unmet demand for independent living options in Douglas County.
DeVries said more than 20,000 adults with IDD in Colorado live with a caregiver who is over the age of 60.
“This is the first community of its kind in Douglas County,” DeVries said. “This is the first step, but it just scratches the surface of meeting the needs, not just in Douglas County, but statewide.”
Unity on Park provides an independent living option while still offering 24/7 on-site staff to assist residents with daily tasks. DeVries said staff mostly helps with building life skills.
“They help with learning to cook and to clean, getting groceries, getting to doctor appointments, getting to and from work, doing laundry, managing a budget, managing their schedule,” DeVries said. “It’s all the stuff any one of us had to learn how to do when we first lived on our own or lived outside of our parents’ house, but they just get extra assistance and support.”
The project received support from the state, the Douglas County commissioners and the Castle Rock Town Council. The state contributed a $4 million grant, while the county purchased the property for Wellspring and Castle Rock waived development fees.
Wellspring also partnered with the Douglas County Housing Partnership to manage the property.
“It didn’t cost Wellspring anything,” DeVries said. “It’s called Unity because it brought so many different people together and unified around one project, which couldn’t happen for just any project, but it happened for this, which is pretty incredible.”
DeVries said Wellspring is already in the process of developing a second housing project in Castle Rock. The next project aims to build for-sale condos for adults with IDD and others.
“We’re doing the same concept in terms of taking a hotel and turning it into housing, but we’re selling them as condos instead of renting them,” she said. “Then that provides the individual with IDD a long-term asset that follows them as they age.”
DeVries said she’s proud that Wellspring has been able to fulfill one of its founding missions and plans to continue chipping away at the need for housing and residential services.
“It feels like the real work for us is just getting started,” she said. “Our founder’s original vision 15 years ago, when she started the organization, was to create a place where people could live out their lives together and to see that we took a step to do that feels really, really amazing.”
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