DENVER (KDVR) — The Colorado General Assembly’s latest housing affordability bill makes an unstated claim: You need to be wealthy in order to live in Colorado without government assistance.

If passed, the bill would funnel $203 million worth of federal COVID relief funds into a state grant program. Local governments and nonprofits would apply for these grants with ideas on how to locally encourage “affordable housing” and “workforce housing.”

The grants won’t just target low-income households, though. Legislators say the middle class now needs government housing assistance in what is now one of the country’s most expensive states.

“This bill will improve support systems for middle income families whose modest resources squeeze them between skyrocketing housing costs and ineligibility for assistance,” wrote Sen. Rachel Zenzinger, D-Arvada, in a release.

Traditionally, state- or locally-funded housing assistance has been for lower-income brackets — households that make less than the area’s median income.

In Colorado, affordable housing now applies to households that make substantially more than the area median income.

“For a household residing in housing on a rental basis, annual income of the household is at or below one hundred forty percent of the area median income of households of that size in the county in which the housing is located,” the bill reads. “For a household residing in housing on a home ownership basis, annual income of the household at or below one hundred forty percent of the area median income of households of that size in the county in which the housing is located.”