Laws to Make Housing More Affordable and Ensure Quality Drinking Water Go Into Effect

DENVER, CO – Laws to boost workforce housing development, improve water quality standards in mobile home parks, and reduce homelessness go into effect August 12, 2026. 

SB26-001, sponsored by Senators Dylan Roberts, D-Frisco, and Jeff Bridges, D-Arapahoe County, and Speaker Pro Tempore Andy Boesenecker, D-Fort Collins, allows counties to use existing resources to support workforce and affordable housing, removing outdated restrictions that limit their ability to respond to local housing needs. 

“I’m proud of this law to unlock local governments’ ability to meet their own housing needs,” said Roberts. “This law will cut red tape and give counties, municipalities, and housing authorities more tools to help them build and maintain housing for more working families and individuals. This means more opportunities for Coloradans to stay in their communities and stable housing for the workers who keep our rural and mountain towns running.”

“Coloradans deserve to be able to live where they work, and with this law going into effect, we can leverage existing resources to better meet the needs of our communities,” said Boesenecker. “This law removes barriers that prevent local governments from being able to create housing that their communities can actually afford. Colorado Democrats remain committed to delivering housing opportunities, and legislation like this can drive down housing costs so Coloradans can build a successful future.”

“Local governments know their housing needs, and the state shouldn't artificially limit the tools they can use to ensure their residents have a place they can afford to live,” said Bridges. “This law removes barriers for counties and municipalities to invest in affordable and workforce housing and accelerates development. It’s a commonsense approach that lets local communities address their housing shortages.”

Also sponsored by Representative Chris Richardson, R-Elbert County, the bipartisan law allows local governments to sell, lease, or acquire property for the purpose of creating workforce or affordable housing and exempts construction materials used by local governments for building affordable housing from sales taxes.

HB26-1145, sponsored by Assistant Majority Leader Lisa Cutter, D-Jefferson County, Senator Kyle Mullica, D-Thornton, and Representatives Elizabeth Velasco, D-Glenwood Springs, and Jacque Philips, D-Thornton, strengthens water quality protections for Coloradans who live in mobile home parks. 

“We’ve made significant progress over the past few years to ensure that Coloradans living in mobile home parks have access to safe drinking water. However, by clarifying some definitions in previous legislation, we are making it crystal clear that mobile home park residents deserve clean, safe water," said Cutter. “This law strengthens CDPHE's ability to implement the program to prevent water issues that can impact health and welfare. It's important to address issues before residents become sick, and this bill will do that."

“Every Coloradan deserves access to clean water,” said Velasco. “In 2023, I proudly passed a law that strengthened protections for mobile home park residents to improve water quality. This law will expand on that law to help homeowners address water quality that is still contaminated enough to impact their welfare. The law also cracks down on non-compliance and notification requirements to better address water quality issues in mobile home parks.”

“Growing up in a mobile home park in my district, I saw firsthand how much more difficult it can be to get access to the safe, clean water that every Coloradan deserves,” said Mullica. “This new law is another crucial step forward in ensuring that access by ensuring CDPHE can prevent water issues and advance the health and safety of all Colorado communities.”

“Mobile homes are a great source of affordable housing, and it is important that people who typically do not have access to legal resources have a clear path to fix water quality issues,” said Phillips. “No one should be expected to cook with, drink or bathe in water that is brown and has an odor, yet that is the unfortunate reality that some mobile home residents live with. Our law, which is now going into effect, helps ensure that water quality issues that risk resident welfare are also addressed to guarantee that mobile home park residents also have access to safe water.”

The new law expands the definition of “remediation” to include risks to welfare, defined as water quality that is not suitable for drinking, cooking, bathing, washing clothes, use with home appliances and other household uses. Negative impacts on the finances of the household are also considered a risk to welfare. Previous law only required mobile home park owners to remediate poor water quality when it posed a direct risk to residents’ health and safety, such as if dangerous bacteria were found in the water.

Beginning August 12, 2026, the law authorizes the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment (CDPHE) to enforce the requirement for mobile home park owners to notify residents of water quality test results without a complaint being filed first.

In 2023, Cutter, Velasco, and Boesenecker passed the Mobile Home Park Water Quality Act to address water quality concerns in mobile home parks by establishing a water quality testing program and creating a path to remediation for mobile park owners to fix water quality issues discovered through the testing program. According to CDPHE, as of March 1, 2026, over 600 community partners in over 200 mobile home parks had their water quality tested as a result of that law.

HB26-1202, sponsored by Senators Judy Amabile, D-Boulder, and Janice Marchman, D-Loveland, and Representatives Emily Sirota, D-Denver, and Manny Rutinel, D-Commerce City, also goes into effect August 12. This law streamlines state and regional approaches to homelessness, allowing local governments to create multijurisdictional homelessness response authorities to coordinate strategies and share resources. The law also directs the Department of Local Affairs to create a statewide strategy to prevent and reduce homelessness.