Fort Chambers / Poor Farm Management Plan

The City of Boulder invites community members to provide input on what on-the-ground features (such as signage, art and seating) are desired for people to learn and reflect and to share information about the Fort Chambers – Poor Farm site – which has a direct connection to the Sand Creek Massacre.

This community engagement opportunity builds on community input gathered earlier this year where community members first shared potential ideas, stories, and perspectives for interpretation. Community members next provided input about the importance of representing the different ideas, stories, and perspectives along the trail.

Now, the city invites the public to share their input on what on-the-ground features are desired for representing information and supporting visitors in learning and reflecting along the trail. Please join us to share your input:

• Community Workshop: the workshop will be held from 2 to 4 pm, on Monday, Sep. 22, at the Open Space and Mountain Parks Hub, 2520 55th St. Boulder, CO 80301
• Online Questionnaire: Available Sept. 22, to Sunday, Oct. 5, 2025. A link will be posted here when available.

Previous Community Input

In June, 2025 the City of Boulder invited community members to help prioritize ideas, stories and perspectives that will shape an educational, reflective and healing trail on the city’s Fort Chambers/Poor Farm site, through a community workshop and an online questionnaire.

This recent engagement built on community input gathered earlier this year where community members were asked to share their ideas, stories, and perspectives for healing trial interpretative elements. Now understanding the breadth of potential stories, the city requested additional guidance to help determine which ideas, stories or themes were the most important to feature along the planned healing trail.  Thank you to everyone who participated and provided input!

The online questionnaire was available from June 10–30, 2025, through the city’s Be Heard Boulder platform, and was completed by 72 participants.

The first section of the questionnaire asked people to rate the importance of sharing each story along the Healing Trail. The ideas with the highest ratings were:

1. Aftermath of the Sand Creek Massacre for the Arapaho and Cheyenne Tribes
2. Contemporary, present-day Tribal culture
3. Victims of the Sand Creek Massacre and their personal stories
4. Indigenous/Native connection to land and ecology
5. Historical bias and continuing false narratives as depicted on stone marker

The next section of the questionnaire asked participants, “Which topics are most important to share along the Healing Trail?” with an option to choose their top 3 from a randomized list of all the topics. The ideas selected the most were:

1. Aftermath of the Sand Creek Massacre for the Arapaho and Cheyenne Tribes
2. Victims of the Sand Creek Massacre and their personal stories
3. Indigenous/Native connection to land and ecology
4. Firsthand accounts of the Sand Creek Massacre from Silas Soule, Morse Coffin, Joseph Cramer and/or others
5. Contemporary, present-day Tribal culture

The in-person workshop was facilitated by Ernest House, Jr. of the Keystone Policy Center on June 17, 2025. About 23 community members participated in a dot exercise, where participants were asked to place dots on the stories they wanted featured along the healing trail. Sticky notes were available to community members to provide additional insight into the topics they wanted to see represented in interpretive materials.

The ideas with the most dots were:

1. Aftermath of the Sand Creek Massacre for the Arapaho and Cheyenne Tribes
2. Indigenous/Native connection to land and ecology
3. Historical bias and continuing false narratives as depicted on stone marker
4. Valmont Butte's history as a culturally important site
5. Early settler perspectives and relationships with Tribes

Community input was also compiled and included in a memo prepared for the Open Space Board of Trustees PDF.

The trail is a key element of a collaborative stewardship plan developed with Arapaho and Cheyenne Tribal Representatives last year. The plan guides how the city will care for the Fort Chambers / Poor Farm site—land where more than 100 Boulder-area men trained before participating in the Sand Creek Massacre.

Next steps
The community input will be used to explore how community-prioritized stories will unfold along the healing trail. That could include interpretive signs, historical markers or monuments. An online questionnaire and community workshop are planned for Sept. 22, 2025 with Arapaho and Cheyenne Tribal Representatives joining in-person as part of our ongoing collaboration on this project. Input from the community and Tribal Representatives will then be used to further design the interpretive trail experience.

The city thanks Arapaho and Cheyenne Tribal Representatives for helping to guide stewardship of the Fort Chambers / Poor Farm Site, shaped by a shared city-Tribal vision of “Heal the Land; Heal the People.”  

In March 2025, the City of Boulder invited community members to share ideas for what stories should be told and interpreted at the Fort Chambers / Poor Farm site. Thank you to everyone who shared their ideas and perspectives online and at the community workshop! We received many ideas, which are broadly categorized below:

Indigenous Perspectives and Connection to Sand Creek Massacre

• Indigenous history
• Context surrounding injustices to Tribes
• Contemporary Indigenous perspectives
• Exploring Indigenous identities
  

The Land and Ecosystem at the Fort Chambers/Poor Farm Site

• Nature’s beauty and destruction
• Agriculture and native plants on the site
• History through agriculture on the site

Fort Chambers, Company D, and Connection to Sand Creek Massacre

• History and narrative about Fort Chambers, Company D and the Sand Creek Massacre
• Misinformation and false narratives
• Reinstalling the monument
  

Poor Farm and Early History of Boulder

• Early settlers
• History of the Queen Anne House/ Poor Farm
• Agriculture
  

Other Ideas

• Reflection on white privilege / continued benefits to Boulder residents
• Rotating stories/historic focuses at the site
• Native American dance and song/ programming
• Funding, oversight, and insurance
• “Healing” at a different site
  

A more detailed summary of the input PDF received, and a full compendium PDF, that includes all input are available.

Common threads from the input shared included:

• Historical Acknowledgment: Participants called for transparent storytelling about Company D, the Sand Creek Massacre, and historical misinformation.
• Reflection: Many stressed the need for the site to foster reflection and education around past injustices to Indigenous peoples.
• Indigenous Representation: Participants expressed a desire for the design to prioritize Tribal voices and accommodate Tribal needs.

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. Sign up for our “Field Notes” e-newsletter to receive the latest updates about this community and Tribal Nation engagement effort!

• Contact the project team

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. A presentation from Aug. 25, 2025 PDF provides information from OSMP's Cultural Survey Results.

A 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.

In July, 2024, 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.

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.

August 2025: OSMP staff provided the Open Space Board of Trustees with a memo summarizing the community input PDF about which stories and ideas to prioritize for inclusion along the Healing Trail and next steps for the design.

Previous Open Space Board of Trustees Updates:

• May 14, 2025 PDF
• July 10, 2024 PDF
• 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.