Samantha Menendez stands outside One Shot Back, the bar she owns at 2134 Curtis St. (Matt Geiger/BusinessDen)
As the owner of a golf-themed bar in Arapahoe Square, Samantha Menendez has had to defend her business financially — and physically — from nearby homeless encampments.
She’s had a point-of-sale system thrown at her. She’s removed feces and tents outside her door. One evening, she fended off a violent homeless man from entering while her city councilman, Darrell Watson, was patronizing the establishment.
So, when the city announced late last year that it would be distributing about $1 million in grants to businesses impacted by homeless encampments, Menendez quickly applied.
Denver announced the grant recipients last month. An Ameriprise financial planner whose office is next to One Shot Back was awarded funds, as was Wide Right, another bar mere feet away.
But Menendez was shocked to learn her business was not selected.
“We just got slapped in the face with nothing,” she said.
In total, 69 businesses received grants — most for $15,000, with a handful getting $7,500 due to smaller annual revenue. Over 300 businesses had applied; 178 were found to be eligible for the program, which used federal funds. Some listed addresses outside of Denver. Others hadn’t been open in 2022, as the program required.
One Shot Back appears to have been eligible. Menendez said she didn’t know why she lost out.
The answer appears to revolve around a software program — and in slight variations in how businesses operating in close proximity described the same encampments.
Pictured is the Curtis Street storefront for Ameriprise, a financial services planner. Next door is One Shot Back, whose green sign you can see in the top right corner. (Matt Geiger/BusinessDen)
Deborah Cameron, chief business development officer for Denver Economic Development and Opportunity (DEDO), told BusinessDen that the city department uses a software program called Zengine to review all applications for programs it administers. The platform assigned a score to each application for the encampment grants, based on information the business provided.
The city pays $22,307 every year to use Zengine, per a DEDO spokeswoman.
“Looking at applications trying to decide who’s worthy and who is not — that would take us forever,” Cameron said.
Through a public records request, BusinessDen obtained several applications from businesses in Arapahoe Square, which has a high concentration of homeless services providers and has struggled for years with large encampments.
Grants were intended for businesses affected by an encampment within two blocks. The application asked businesses how long the encampment was present, the size of the encampment and how far it was from the business. There were a handful of drop-down choices.
In its application, One Shot Back said it was affected by an encampment that was there for six to eight months and was less than a half block from the bar. Ameriprise, located next door, cited an encampment present for more than 12 months and located within a block.
“It’s obviously frustrating when you do have businesses adjacent to each other … When one gets it and one doesn’t, we totally understand that frustration, but it was based on the information that they provided,” Cameron said.
Cameron noted that there were more eligible businesses than there were available funds.
The Ameriprise financial advisor didn’t respond to a request for comment.
One Arapahoe Square grant recipient was Mercury Cafe, where owner Danny Newman said the $15,000 would help offset the $7,000 a week the business paid for private security while an encampment was present nearby, as well as the reduced business it caused.
“It’s huge for us, even if it’s minimal for a lot of other businesses,” Newman said of the grant last month.
A block away at the bar Pairadice, co-owner David Davenport said he’d hoped to use the $7,500 grant — which the business ultimately didn’t receive — to revamp the bar’s patio
“We got to get it ready for summer,” Davenport said. “As a matter of fact it’s probably going to cost about seven grand. That (grant) would have been a perfect amount.”
Pairadice co-owners David Davenport, left, and Michael Miller stand inside their bar that faces Welton Street. (Matt Geiger/BusinessDen)
Pairadice is open every day from 3 p.m. to 2 a.m. Around the corner is TeaLee’s Tea House & Bookstore, which operates with more limited hours four days a week.
In its application, Pairadice cited an encampment present for nine to 11 months. TeaLee’s cited one present for more than a year.
“One click of a button has disqualified us from the grant,” Davenport said of the situation.
Davenport said he answered the questions as truthfully as possible, but said the application didn’t allow for nuance. He said an encampment had been within a block of Pairadice for nine to 11 months, but there had been other encampment activity within two blocks impacting the bar for more than one year.
“On a given week, you would lose easily like $1,000 (in revenue due to encampments) … ” Davenport said. “… Another possible metric is the amount of people that you’re missing entirely, that used to come downtown Denver eight years ago, that won’t come to downtown Denver for the last three years because of encampments, as an ongoing crisis.”
Watson, the District 9 councilman who represents Arapahoe Square and surrounding neighborhoods, said he played a role in making the grant program focus on businesses and encampments, and noted that he held town halls to publicize it. While some in his district lost out, he noted that $547,000 ultimately went to District 9 businesses.
“My commitment to One Shot Back, to Pairadice and to anyone else within District 9 that didn’t receive grants is that we’re going to continue fighting and looking for funds and making sure that they all find support within the very tight city budget,” Watson said.
Samantha Menendez stands outside One Shot Back, the bar she owns at 2134 Curtis St. (Matt Geiger/BusinessDen)
As the owner of a golf-themed bar in Arapahoe Square, Samantha Menendez has had to defend her business financially — and physically — from nearby homeless encampments.
She’s had a point-of-sale system thrown at her. She’s removed feces and tents outside her door. One evening, she fended off a violent homeless man from entering while her city councilman, Darrell Watson, was patronizing the establishment.
So, when the city announced late last year that it would be distributing about $1 million in grants to businesses impacted by homeless encampments, Menendez quickly applied.
Denver announced the grant recipients last month. An Ameriprise financial planner whose office is next to One Shot Back was awarded funds, as was Wide Right, another bar mere feet away.
But Menendez was shocked to learn her business was not selected.
“We just got slapped in the face with nothing,” she said.
In total, 69 businesses received grants — most for $15,000, with a handful getting $7,500 due to smaller annual revenue. Over 300 businesses had applied; 178 were found to be eligible for the program, which used federal funds. Some listed addresses outside of Denver. Others hadn’t been open in 2022, as the program required.
One Shot Back appears to have been eligible. Menendez said she didn’t know why she lost out.
The answer appears to revolve around a software program — and in slight variations in how businesses operating in close proximity described the same encampments.
Pictured is the Curtis Street storefront for Ameriprise, a financial services planner. Next door is One Shot Back, whose green sign you can see in the top right corner. (Matt Geiger/BusinessDen)
Deborah Cameron, chief business development officer for Denver Economic Development and Opportunity (DEDO), told BusinessDen that the city department uses a software program called Zengine to review all applications for programs it administers. The platform assigned a score to each application for the encampment grants, based on information the business provided.
The city pays $22,307 every year to use Zengine, per a DEDO spokeswoman.
“Looking at applications trying to decide who’s worthy and who is not — that would take us forever,” Cameron said.
Through a public records request, BusinessDen obtained several applications from businesses in Arapahoe Square, which has a high concentration of homeless services providers and has struggled for years with large encampments.
Grants were intended for businesses affected by an encampment within two blocks. The application asked businesses how long the encampment was present, the size of the encampment and how far it was from the business. There were a handful of drop-down choices.
In its application, One Shot Back said it was affected by an encampment that was there for six to eight months and was less than a half block from the bar. Ameriprise, located next door, cited an encampment present for more than 12 months and located within a block.
“It’s obviously frustrating when you do have businesses adjacent to each other … When one gets it and one doesn’t, we totally understand that frustration, but it was based on the information that they provided,” Cameron said.
Cameron noted that there were more eligible businesses than there were available funds.
The Ameriprise financial advisor didn’t respond to a request for comment.
One Arapahoe Square grant recipient was Mercury Cafe, where owner Danny Newman said the $15,000 would help offset the $7,000 a week the business paid for private security while an encampment was present nearby, as well as the reduced business it caused.
“It’s huge for us, even if it’s minimal for a lot of other businesses,” Newman said of the grant last month.
A block away at the bar Pairadice, co-owner David Davenport said he’d hoped to use the $7,500 grant — which the business ultimately didn’t receive — to revamp the bar’s patio
“We got to get it ready for summer,” Davenport said. “As a matter of fact it’s probably going to cost about seven grand. That (grant) would have been a perfect amount.”
Pairadice co-owners David Davenport, left, and Michael Miller stand inside their bar that faces Welton Street. (Matt Geiger/BusinessDen)
Pairadice is open every day from 3 p.m. to 2 a.m. Around the corner is TeaLee’s Tea House & Bookstore, which operates with more limited hours four days a week.
In its application, Pairadice cited an encampment present for nine to 11 months. TeaLee’s cited one present for more than a year.
“One click of a button has disqualified us from the grant,” Davenport said of the situation.
Davenport said he answered the questions as truthfully as possible, but said the application didn’t allow for nuance. He said an encampment had been within a block of Pairadice for nine to 11 months, but there had been other encampment activity within two blocks impacting the bar for more than one year.
“On a given week, you would lose easily like $1,000 (in revenue due to encampments) … ” Davenport said. “… Another possible metric is the amount of people that you’re missing entirely, that used to come downtown Denver eight years ago, that won’t come to downtown Denver for the last three years because of encampments, as an ongoing crisis.”
Watson, the District 9 councilman who represents Arapahoe Square and surrounding neighborhoods, said he played a role in making the grant program focus on businesses and encampments, and noted that he held town halls to publicize it. While some in his district lost out, he noted that $547,000 ultimately went to District 9 businesses.
“My commitment to One Shot Back, to Pairadice and to anyone else within District 9 that didn’t receive grants is that we’re going to continue fighting and looking for funds and making sure that they all find support within the very tight city budget,” Watson said.
