Pueblo vax site gets federal help to address accessibility

PUEBLO, Colo. (KRDO) -- To increase vaccine accessibility, federal agencies are moving in to help run the mass vaccination site at the Colorado State Fairgrounds in Pueblo.

FEMA and the Department of Defense are helping staff the site and providing 3,000 doses of the Pfizer vaccine per day from the federal vaccine supply. They are working in partnership with the State of Colorado and Centura Health, who already run the site, to provide additional resources.

In a Pueblo County Commissioner's meeting this week, Pueblo Mayor Nick Gradisar mentioned that Pueblo has enough vaccines, just not enough people who are getting them.

This federal help is designed to break down barriers for those who want to get the vaccine. There is a free shuttle that runs from Pueblo's downtown transit center to the site at the Colorado State Fairgrounds. In fact, if you utilize the free bus, you won't even have to get off the bus to get your shot.

"This is an area with high social vulnerability," FEMA's Acting Region 8 Administrator Nancy Dragani said. "Social vulnerability can be a bunch of different things, right? It can be race and ethnicity. It can be language, it can be lack of transportation, it can be a rural environment, where people just have to travel distances."

For Tuesday's "soft opening" of federal help, only 800 people sought vaccine doses at the Colorado State Fairgrounds. If the turnout remains below 3,000 doses administered a day, the federal agencies will work to provide those leftover doses to other high-need areas of the state.

Officials said that getting a vaccine at this site could take as little as 30 minutes total. They don't anticipate long wait times to ever be an issue at this site because of the number of resources available with federal help.

The site works to address accessibility by increasing staffing to reduce wait times, providing resources for those who don't speak English, providing free transportation, and allowing people to get the vaccine at that site if they have not made an appointment.

"Whether they're people experiencing homelessness or people that lack transportation, or people that have disabilities, or people that don't have internet service. All of those are barriers to getting vaccinated, and that's what this site is intended to address," Dragani said.

You don't need an appointment to receive a vaccine at the Colorado State Fairgrounds in Pueblo, but officials recommend making one to allow them to better coordinate.

To make an appointment, click here.