City of Cortez Housing Action Plan & Code Update

Cortez builds 22 homes a year. In the 1970s, it built 73. That production gap — and what fills it — shaped the city’s housing action plan. Nearly half the homes in Cortez are more than 50 years old. The community needs 35 to 85 additional units a year just to keep pace.

The engagement started by establishing common ground. Residents disagreed about rent caps, tax incentives, and density — but they agreed on the production gap and the condition of aging housing stock. Starting from shared facts made the conversation productive, even when the solutions remained contested.

Western Spaces prepared the housing action plan and land use code assessment, going beyond recommendations to deliver draft code language for each fix — restrictive zoning, parking minimums, complex approval steps, ADU prohibitions — ready for adoption. A housing plan that ends with “consider allowing ADUs” gathers dust. One that hands the city council a finished ordinance gets on the agenda.