While the Colorado Fiscal Institute publicly lambasted a report on homelessness, the senior economist prominently cited in its criticism said he privately has no problems with the methodology in a text exchange with one of the study’s authors.  

“I dug deep into your research methodology and had no problems with it especially giving the range,” Colorado Fiscal Institute senior economist Chris Stiffler told Common Sense Institute staffer Chris Brown in a text exchange.

Brown had reached out to Stiffler after CFI criticized CSI’s study, which concluded that within three years – from 2021 to 2023 – metro Denver is on track to spend nearly $2 billion on homelessness. The study said spending would increase from $465 million in 2021 to an estimated $660 million in 2023, a 42% spike. The money includes allocations for shelters, services and health care services for homeless people. The study also said the number of “unsheltered” people — meaning individuals who sleep in tents, parks or abandoned buildings — jumped by 33% between 2020 and 2022, a level unseen since 2008.

“We took a lot of time to listen to provider feedback, and while we understand there is no consensus, I think our work actually helps the case that specific provider program models cost way less than overall levels of spending we capture,” Brown, who initiated the brief exchange, told Stiffler.

Brown also said if Stiffler and others “ever have some questions about this report, or other work, just let me know.”   

“Between you and me,” Stiffler wrote back to Brown, “I gave them a lot of pushback about using my name to criticize your work.”

Elliot Goldbaum, who speaks for CFI, did not dispute that the exchange occurred.

When asked why CFI and Bell Policy Center quoted Stiffler in their criticism despite what he said he expressed privately — and whether it is dishonest to say one thing in public, particularly a criticism, but hold the opposite position in private — Goldbaum cited Stiffler as saying he stands by his criticism.  

“I stand by my critique of CSI’s analysis and lack of meaningful context in the report, and remain firm in my assessment that the report was designed to do little else but quantify an eye-popping dollar amount of costs related to people experiencing homelessness,” Stiffler said in statement Goldbaum shared with The Denver Gazette. “My only regret is sending what I thought was a private text message being kind to someone who seemed like they had their feelings hurt.”

In a news release, CFI and Bell had questioned the study’s methodology and accused CSI of “artificially” inflating the costs and coming to “extreme conclusions.”  

The news release quoted Stiffler as saying the study’s “biggest flaw” is not offering “any meaningful context to their expenditure figures.”

“Just giving a dollar amount without any context is like a doctor telling you a test result without telling you whether the number is a good or bad one,” Stiffler said in the news release.

In a statement on Saturday, CSI President and CEO Kristin Strohm said researchers engaged in a months-long conversation with dozens of providers and city leaders and “worked in good faith to provide a solid accounting for the dollars being spent.”

“The senior leadership of some of the organizations don’t seem to like transparency and accountability, and that is a shame,” she told The Denver Gazette. “The public has a right to know. I’m disappointed, but not surprised that Bell and CFI would do the political dirty work for those fighting transparency and accountability. People can draw their own conclusions about what should be done. What can’t be argued is: we are spending a lot more — $1.7 billion over three years — while the number of homeless continues to grow.”

Strohm said researchers excluded hundreds of millions of dollars from the study’s baseline.

CSI said the total would have been $2.9 billion — not $1.7 billion — if the study counted the excluded amounts.  

“We ensured conservative and accurate numbers were presented,” Strohm said.

Goldbaum and Andrea Kuwik, a senior policy analyst at Bell, told The Denver Gazette Friday that the CSI study does not provide “any frame of reference to understand the numbers.”

The two groups also complained that citing expenditures from Denver Health “significantly, and unnecessarily, inflates total costs,” and that not all of the cost is attributable to health care due to homelessness.

“What they could have done is taken the health care spending from those experiencing homelessness, and compare it to those of a similar demographic group, but who are housed,” Goldbaum and Kuwik told The Denver Gazette in an email. “In examining the difference, that would have allowed for a better comparison of health care costs due to homelessness. Also, indigent care does not equate with care for people experiencing homelessness.”

CSI maintained that the study only looked at dollars specifically used for spending on homelessness — and not coupled with other services — and that researchers took steps to avoid double counting and verified its numbers with organizations cited in the report.

Brown, CSI’s vice president of policy and research, also said the study is transparent, and it “includes complete sourcing and notes on the data.” He reiterated that the report does not say $1.7 billion already has been spent, but that it estimates Denver metro area would reach that figure by the end of 2023. He also pushed back on Stiffler’s comments that the report needed more “context” to assess homelessness programs.

“The funding analysis in the report is of the system overall. It is not an analysis of any specific homelessness program,” Brown said.

“The report very clearly articulates that the dollars are being spent towards supporting those experiencing homelessness AND those in permanent supportive housing,” Brown said, adding the study describes the process researchers used and that roughly 43% of nonprofit’s total spending is captured in the report.