Denver City Council is considering more than $33 million in contracts with homelessness services provider Urban Alchemy, a San Francisco-based nonprofit whose founding CEO Lena Miller has flown first class and made $369,923, plus $5,446 in other earnings, according to its most recent tax filings.
Miller makes $10,000 more than the leader of the much larger Colorado Coalition for the Homeless — making her among the very highest-paid CEOs for Denver’s homelessness providers.
One of the contracts Urban Alchemy may take over is from The Salvation Army, which pays its regional leader only about $30,000, though other staffers at the charity make more.
“It’s akin to taking a poverty vow,” said Salvation Army spokesperson Jennifer Forker.
Nine executives at Urban Alchemy were making more than $150,000 a year, according to the 2024 filing, while the nonprofit’s Denver practitioners will be starting at $21 an hour, according to job postings.
Urban Alchemy is one of many national nonprofits that grew fast as cities spent big on addressing homelessness after the pandemic, when encampments spread across the country.
It has also paid for luxury travel expenses.
“The organization has paid for the CEO to travel first class when necessary for logistics and its business purposes,“Urban Alchemy explained in tax forms, though it did not say how often it happened.
Meanwhile, the organization “employed drivers for car-based travel to Los Angeles and Portland to allow the executive team to work while on the road,” the company wrote.
None of a sample of other local nonprofits disclosed first-class flights or hiring drivers.
Urban Alchemy expanded fast.
Jeff Kositsky, who now serves as Denver’s deputy director of housing opportunity for the Department of Housing Stability, was making more than $198,000 a year for Urban Alchemy as its chief growth officer.
He apparently succeeded at the job, as the company’s revenue boomed by tens of millions as Urban Alchemy snagged contracts nationwide.
The nonprofit’s 2019 tax filing showed only about $36,000 in revenue. In the 2023-’24 fiscal year, the nonprofit brought in nearly $85 million in revenue and spent $82 million, according to filings.
About 2 percent of the organization’s budget went to compensating executives. It has spent an average of about 91 percent of its budget on program expenses, with the rest going to administration and fundraising. That is within the widely accepted standards for nonprofits.
Urban Alchemy employs over 1,200 people and provides workforce programs related to “civic engagement, urban street cleaning and reentry services,” the tax document stated.
Most staff do not fly first class. Ninety-six percent are “former long-term offenders” dubbed “Urban Alchemy practitioners” who “provide clean and safe public facilities” in cities like San Francisco, Los Angeles, Austin and Portland.
Online, the company boasts offering the “highest paid felon jobs.”
The nonprofit’s goal is to employ formerly incarcerated people to “reduce recidivism and simultaneously transform the energy of the most chaotic places in urban environments” – places where homelessness, mental illness and addiction intersect. These employees may clean streets, monitor public bathrooms or ensure elevators are working.
Denverite has previously reported on allegations of overspending, mismanagement, sexual harassment and lobbying rule violations Urban Alchemy has faced in other cities.
A company spokesperson maintained those allegations were baseless.
What’s next in Denver?
Denver City Council will be voting Monday night on a $3 million contract with the organization to provide “community ambassador services” like offering referrals to unhoused residents and giving directions to Coors Field to Rockies Fans.
Council on Monday also will weigh a separate $30 million contract for Urban Alchemy to run The Aspen hotel shelter.
The shift toward this San Francisco provider comes after the long-term city partner The Salvation Army lost some shelter contracts with the city. Several council members have asked for smaller, local groups to have a chance to win government contracts with the city.
