Denver Human Services planned to cover more than $76,000 in costs rung up as city workers cleared downtown sidewalks of homeless camps this year by tapping a fund that receives some donations for the homeless.

The city agency has reversed course, a spokeswoman confirmed to The Denver Post. Aware of the bad optics of the original decision, officials have decided instead to tap into the city’s public works budget to cover the homeless sweep’s costs.

DHS’s Julie Smith said about 97 percent of annual revenue for the DHS fund — called the Homeless Donation Fund — actually comes from federal reimbursements, rather than the coins that people deposit in fake parking meters at the airport and downtown.

But a local news outlet recently asked questions about its use to cover costs for the sweeps of encampments, and Smith said that prompted the decision to change course. The first inquiry came from KCNC-4’s Brian Maass, who on Twitter has promoted a story about “diverted homeless donations” that’s set to air Thursday.

“When the invoices for the movement and storage of items related to the former encampment on Lawrence Street near Park Avenue West were received, the initial decision was made to charge them to the Homeless Donation Fund because the work related to homelessness,” Smith wrote in an e-mail to The Denver Post.

She added: “While this is perfectly within the bounds of the purpose of the fund, upon further consideration, it made more sense for Public Works to assume responsibility for cleanup and storage costs while DHS continues to fund efforts to help people get the services they need and/or into shelter.”

The homeless sweeps began in early March. The city posted notices on sidewalks near the Samaritan House shelter, essentially serving as eviction notices. Then public works crews began sweeping belongings from sidewalks into receptacles that were placed in storage for two months.

The action by public works crews, with backing from police, marked a tougher stance that led to more sweeps — and drew criticism from homeless advocates who saw the move as dehumanizing and aggressive. Mayor Michael Hancock and other city officials maintained that the escalation was necessary because a softer approach, which for months focused on connecting homeless campers with social service organizations, had proven fruitless.

Ultimately, Smith says, just one person claimed confiscated items from the secure storage. There rest of the items placed in receptacles went unclaimed, despite outreach efforts, and were discarded after 60 days. That period had been extended from the original 30 days.

The city so far has paid $10,740 out of the Homeless Donation Fund for the storage facility at 1221 Glenarm Place, which was handled by Custom Environmental Services, and for staffing costs, Smith said. Another $65,549 in invoices connected with the sweeps remains to be paid, she said.

Public works will reimburse the fund and pay those remaining bills, Smith said.

The city uses the Homeless Donation Fund to pay for some homeless services programs, including a contract to bus people to overflow shelters during colder months and money to aid operation of the Salvation Army’s Crossroads Shelter and Christ Body Ministries’ respite care shelter for homeless people who are injured. The city also is tapping $2 million from the fund this year to help open the $5.5 million homeless “solutions” center in Athmar Park.

Figures cited by Smith indicate that the bulk of the money that flowed into the Homeless Donation Fund last year — about $2.5 million — came from reimbursements from the federal government. The city receives those payments to partially offset services provided to DHS by other city agencies, including the city attorney’s office. Officials direct those offsets into the donation fund, for use on homelessness programs.

A little more than 3 percent of the fund’s money comes from about $92,000 a year dropped into the donation meters downtown and at Denver International Airport, Smith said.

Most of those donations are set aside to pay the salary for a city employee who is developing a metrowide coordinated entry system for housing for the homeless, Smith said.

Meanwhile, the city uses $1.2 million from the fund each year to pay for the busing and shelter programs, she said, exhausting the donations that come in many times over.

But Smith acknowledged that many people who drop money in the meters as donations would take exception to the city tapping into the fund that money goes into to pay for the sweeps’ costs.

The city receives donations for homeless services in other ways, with that money directed into other funds for the Denver’s Road Home homelessness office. An example is money donated through the new “text-to-give” program, which allows people to donate $5 via their cellphone bill by texting HOMELESSHELP to 41444.

“The bulk of donations to Denver’s Road Home ($100,000 to $200,000 annually) goes into a separate account in partnership with the Mile High United Way,” Smith wrote in an e-mail.