SerpApi.Org
Denver Mayor Mike Johnston told Denverites to look forward to meaningful change in his 2026 State of the City address on Tuesday night.
Johnston talked about the city as the home of the open frontier and the promise of opportunity. He acknowledged how difficult it can be to maintain hope in the face of despair –– and amid concerns of ever-increasing housing costs, the effect of artificial intelligence (AI) on the job market and how unaffordable basics like groceries, energy and childcare have become.
At one point he talked over a heckler, saying "dissent is part of governing."
Here are some of the big takeaways from the evening:
Changes to licensing requirements for childcare providers
Johnston painted a picture of the tough situation parents face when it comes to childcare in the city.
There's 31,000 kids under 4 years old, but less than 5,000 available licensed childcare slots, he said during the speech. Families pay an average of $25,000 per year for one child, $50,000 for two children and $75,000 for three, meaning some families spend well over half of their income on childcare and rent alone before groceries, education, birthday parties and family trips.
He also talked about the hurdles those who want to open a childcare business face just to operate, and how those barriers often force childcare providers to leave the work.
To make it easier to raise a family in Denver, Johnston said his administration would launch a listening tour across the city's neighborhoods to hear from families and providers about where they're struggling.
He also thanked the Denver City Council for passing an ordinance last week that ends duplicative licensing requirements for childcare providers, which he said removes redundant steps at the state level to save providers time during the licensing process.
Building affordable housing around public transit
Johnston identified high housing costs as one of the main challenges Denver faces. He talked about the plight of rising housing costs in the city and introduced a plan to build 20,000 housing units across 150 acres of city-owned land such as Mile High and National Western over the next year.
The idea is to invest into building more housing in parts of the city that are most connected to public transit, which he said would also better support the city's public transit system with adequate density around the spots where people get on and off the lines.
He called the plan Mile High Line, saying it would connect neighborhoods from Federal Boulevard to Sun Valley to Westwood.
Investing in parks and public open spaces
Johnston introduced a plan to make public parks and public open spaces more accessible, starting with the largest new park in 120 years of the city's history in the heart of its most historic Black neighborhood: Park Hill.
A privately run golf course sat in the middle of the neighborhood for decades, dividing the neighborhood with giant green fields where parents couldn't throw a football with their kids unless they could pay, he said during the speech.
The park is designed to be a world-class park surrounded by transit, grocery stores, restaurants and homes that working families are supposed to be able to afford, he said.
