Fort Chambers / Poor Farm Management Plan

Through March, the City of Boulder invited community members to share ideas for what stories should be told and interpreted along a planned “healing trail” for the Fort Chambers / Poor Farm site. Thank you to everyone who shared their ideas and perspectives at community workshop on Friday, March 21, and through an online form. Read stories and ideas shared by the community.

All input will be compiled and presented in future conversations to help shape the creative vision for the Fort Chambers / Poor Farm property’s Healing Trail. Learn more about next steps in the "Planning Process" section below.

The idea for the healing trail was developed in collaboration with the Arapaho and Cheyenne Tribal Representatives during a previous planning process and identified in the site’s concept plan. The concept plan provides recommendations for how the city will care for land with a community connection to the Sand Creek Massacre. Community input will guide the design of an “interpretative experience” for the healing trail, a place for education, reflection, healing, gathering and native plantings. The healing trail and its interpretive experience is a key component of the concept plan that is guided by a shared city-Tribal Representative vision of “Heal the Land; Heal the People.”

This planning process is anticipated to take approximately 15-18 months with five engagement windows:

1. Listening and Learning. Goal: Hear all potential experiences and stories people desire for the site.
   
   
2. Identifying Themes & Priorities. Goal: Understand the most important stories to share out (prioritize) and the reasons why.
   
   
3. Identifying a Vision for the Interpretive Experience. Goal: Create a vision for the Healing Trail.  Explore and identify how the stories will unfold along the Healing Trail (i.e.  flow of the interpretive experience and order of themes/stories). Explore potential design features/elements.
   
   
4. Designing the Interpretive Experience. Goal: Understand level of support (or not) and why for a staff/consultant developed draft design(s) including interpretive elements/features to inform the development of a final design.
   
   
5. Finalizing the Interpretive Experience Design. Goal: Finalize and share out the Interpretive Experience design.

The process will involve the community throughout, with engagement windows that include both in person and online options.  Read a memo PDF or watch/listen to a recent Open Space Board of Trustees meeting to learn more. Sign up for our “Field Notes” e-newsletter to receive the latest updates about this community and Tribal Nation engagement effort!

The city acquired the Fort Chambers – Poor Farm property in 2018 to fulfill open space purposes in the city charter, and it is located near Boulder Creek east of 63rd Street and south of Jay Road. It is currently closed to the public while the concept plan recommendations are being implemented.

This unique property has important historical, ecological and agricultural features. This story map includes details on:

• The history of the area, including historic maps and aerial photographs, to see how the land uses changed over time.
• Information about Fort Chambers, Company D, and a historic marker that was located on the property.
• The Queen Anne Victorian home on the land. The house and the adjacent area are on the National Register of Historic Places. 
• A "poor farm" that Boulder County operated between 1902 and 1918. The county used the "poor farm" to help feed, house and care for older and sick community members, along with people experiencing physical and mental disabilities. 
• The property’s ecological values. Today, it provides habitat for more than 100 wildlife species and 90 plant species PDF. It also has 48 acres of wetlands and open water.
• The land's agricultural uses and agricultural structures, irrigation water and fertile soils that have supported agricultural operations on the land for decades.

In July 2022, Open Space and Mountain Parks staff began collaborating with Tribal Representatives from the Cheyenne and Arapaho Tribes, the Northern Arapaho Tribe and the Northern Cheyenne Tribe to understand their desired long-term relationship with this site. The concept plan provides a broad foundation for how the city – with continuing guidance from Tribal Representatives – will steward land where Fort Chambers likely stood.

The fort was built northeast of Boulder in the summer of 1864 amid exaggerated and false claims of coordinated Indigenous violence that helped fan anti-Indigenous hatred in Colorado during the summer and fall of 1864. In August 1864, more than 100 Boulder-area men mobilized into Company D of the Third Colorado Cavalry Regiment at Fort Chambers.

The men of Company D attacked a Cheyenne camp near present day Sterling (“Buffalo Springs”) on Oct. 10, 1864, killing 10 Cheyenne People. They later participated in the killing of 230 peaceful Arapaho and Cheyenne People at the Sand Creek Massacre on Nov. 29, 1864 – the deadliest day in Colorado history.

Discussion and collaboration with Tribal Representatives led to a concept plan that is based on a shared vision to “Heal the Land; Heal the People” and focuses on these key elements:

• Healing Trail: Create a trail with areas for education, reflection and gathering to foster healing and help the Boulder community acknowledge and communicate its role in the Sand Creek Massacre.
• Ecological Restoration: Heal the land from past ecological disturbances to help sustain the area’s rich natural diversity.
  
• Visitor Access: Enhance visitor access with a new entrance, parking and bus drop-off.
  
• Agricultural and Farmstead Enhancements: Sustain ongoing agricultural operations and conduct restoration of the home and farm structures on the land.

In March and April of 2024, the city and Tribal Representatives  welcomed community feedback on the draft concept plan through an online questionnaire, with 86% of respondents supporting the concept plan and its recommendations.

Last July, the city’s Open Space Board of Trustees recommended the city move forward with the concept plan and include Tribal Representatives and community histories in the development of content for the healing trail and other interpretative elements on the property. Learn more about this unique land and the concept plan.

Read more about OSMP work to fulfill these key elements in a January 2025 memo PDF shared with the Open Space Board of Trustees.

• Contact the project team

The City of Boulder honors Tribal sovereignty and conducts government-to-government consultations with Representatives appointed by elected leaders of Tribal Governments that have historic and enduring connections to the Boulder Valley and share agreements with the city. The city recognizes that Tribal Nations are sovereign governmental entities whose special relationship with the United States is recognized under the Constitution of the United States, treaties, Supreme Court decisions, federal laws and presidential Executive Orders.

Given the land's connection to the Sand Creek Massacre, City of Boulder Open Space and Mountain Parks (OSMP) staff prioritized receiving guidance from Tribal Representatives – including Sand Creek descendants – designated by elected leaders representing the Cheyenne and Arapaho Tribes, the Northern Arapaho Tribe and the Northern Cheyenne Tribe to help develop concept plan. Throughout this project, the city has collaborated with Arapaho and Cheyenne Tribal Representatives to:

• Learn the Cheyenne and Arapaho Tribes, the Northern Arapaho Tribe and the Northern Cheyenne Tribe's desired long-term relationship with the land.
• Understand how best to interpret the land's history and its connection to the Sand Creek Massacre and accurately describe Boulder residents’ role in the massacre. 
• Identify opportunities to incorporate the intergenerational trauma that the Arapaho and Cheyenne Nations have endured from both the colonization of Indigenous lands in the Boulder Valley and the Sand Creek Massacre into Boulder history.

January 2025: OSMP staff provided the Open Space Board of Trustees with a memo outlining the planned engagement process PDF for designing the interpretative experience along the healing trail included in the Concept Plan. Watch and listen to a OSMP staff presentation at the January 2025 Open Space Board of Trustees meeting.

July 2024: The Open Space Board of Trustees recommended that the city move forward with a concept plan for the city’s Fort Chambers – Poor Farm property, which is guided by a shared city-Tribal vision of “Heal the Land; Heal the People.” Their recommendation came after a long-term planning process that included consultation with Arapaho and Cheyenne Tribal Representatives and community engagement that showed strong support for the collaborative planning and concept plan recommendations.

OSBT members also recommend including Tribal Representatives and community histories in the development of content for the healing trail and other interpretative elements on the property. Read the OSMP memo for this meeting PDF. Watch and listen to the OSBT meeting on July 10, 2024 PDF.

Previous Open Space Board of Trustees Updates:

• March 13, 2024 PDF
• Dec. 6, 2023 PDF
• Sept. 13, 2023 PDF
• March 9, 2022 PDF

Read a broad compilation of timeline information that city staff have developed to provide community members context on colonization of Indigenous lands in the Boulder Valley, Fort Chambers, Company D and the Sand Creek Massacre. We ask community members to go beyond our broad overview and take time to learn more about the Sand Creek Massacre by:

• Visiting the Sand Creek Massacre National Historic Site in Eads, Colorado. Take time to reflect on the site, how Boulder community members participated in the massacre and the intergenerational harm it caused for generations of Arapaho and Cheyenne Peoples.
• Going to History Colorado's exhibit, “The Sand Creek Massacre: The Betrayal that Changed Cheyenne and Arapaho People Forever.” History Colorado developed the exhibit with guidance from the Cheyenne and Arapaho Tribes, the Northern Arapaho Tribe and the Northern Cheyenne Tribe.