Pueblo officials apologized Monday afternoon after a vaccine clinic for those over 69 years old was overwhelmed with patients and exceeded its quota an hour before the clinic was supposed to open.

“This morning, we opened up (vaccinations) for 70-plus year old individuals from Pueblo County, and quite frankly, I didn’t do a very good job,” Pueblo County Sheriff Kirk Taylor said at a press conference. “We had quite a debacle out here this morning. We felt like it was based partly on our messaging that we had a big rush out here, and then we got all tied up, and we tied up the interstate.”

In the run up to the clinic, the county health department said it would be open from 9 a.m. until 5 p.m. But by 8 a.m., the agency and the Pueblo Police Department both posted on social media to announce that the clinic was closed for the day and that the daily allotment of vaccine had been completely exhausted.

Colorado as a whole is beginning to move into its first phase of distribution to members of the general public, as opposed to targeted efforts in hospitals and long-term care facilities. Those who are older than 69 years old are now at the top of the priority list – though clinics are still being run in nursing homes – and counties are beginning to dole out inoculations to older Coloradans. But the “magnitude” of Pueblo’s Monday clinic is unlike any other in the state thus far, officials at the press conference said.

In response to the Pueblo Department of Public Health and Environment’s Facebook post about the closure, residents wrote that they or their loved ones had showed up hours before the clinic was supposed to open and were turned away because the entire supply had already been accounted for. Images from the morning show cars snaking through a parking lot, and the health department warned residents to avoid the area because of heavy traffic.

At the press conference, city and county officials said that 700 vaccines had been distributed Monday morning to the area’s older residents. In a shift to avoid such “debacles” in the future, the officials urged residents who are over 69 years old to register online; more than 1,500 have already done so, Taylor said. Those who registered will be placed on a list that health officials will slowly work through.

Asked why the website hadn’t been launched previously, Taylor said the county wasn’t anticipating a crowd so large. But he also said that Pueblo County has 23,000 residents who are over 69 years of age and thus qualify for this current vaccine priority.

Taylor said the county often wasn’t getting word of its daily allotment until 8 p.m. the night before, which would leave officials scrambling to stand up clinics. It was an “an extremely fluid” situation that would come with growing pains. But he pledged that the process would improve going forward. The county’s goal is to vaccine 1,000 people per day.

“We turned a lot of people away today,” he said. “It was terrible. My guys hated to do it, the city hated to do it as well. I hope they accept my apology, and we’re going to fix it.”

“This is a colossal effort,” said Randt Evetts, the county’s public health director.

He and Mayor Nick Gradisar, while acknowledging Monday’s difficulties, still tried to look at the situation as a positive: Pueblo’s most vulnerable residents are now starting to get vaccinated, and the county has already improved how many inoculations it can dole out daily.

“It’s heartening to see the interest,” Gradisar said. “Unfortunately, the vaccines available to us have been pretty inconsistent.” 

He linked the poor distribution to the United States’ overall response to the pandemic, which he said is among the “worst” in the world. The frustration about the inconsistent arrival of vaccines to Colorado is not limited to Pueblo. Gov. Jared Polis last week acknowledged the shifting target, which is largely because of Pfizer’s ever-changing shipment sizes. Still, he said, the state is receiving 70,000 doses a week, a number that will grow as other COVID vaccines are approved by the federal government.

If you’re a Pueblo resident who’s 70 or older, you can add your name to the county’s vaccination list by going to pueblovaxnow.com.