On the 27th of December of last year, Denver County Judge Johnny Barajas, using the 8th Amendment that stops cruel and unusual punishment, ruled that the urban camping ban enacted in Denver, Colorado, was unconstitutional. That, ladies and gentlemen and children of all ages, ushers in balls-to-the-wall, full blast boogie adventures in homelessness.
Like all good things it has a beginning, and the beginning of our problem of the unhoused is none other than the lizard king himself, John Hickenlooper. John Hickenlooper, when he was the Mayor of Denver, launched a program that he titled “The Ten Year Plan” to eliminate homelessness. If I recall correctly he was doing it to honor his mother, whom he took to an outstanding movie starring Linda Lovelace (winkie, winkie) as a young man. That plan not only didn’t end homelessness it put everything on turbos.
The 10 year plan has turned into the 20 year plan that has launched Hickenlooper’s stupidity, along with Michael Hancock, Denver City Council, and collective Denver media, into turning Denver into a mini San Francisco.
Hickenklooper’s legacy — Denver’s Road Home. Daily in Denver’s media, wearing rose colored glasses, we see the results of Hickenlooper’s utopian plan to do something that the late Bob Coté described as shoveling a certain substance against the tide. It just can’t be done. And now, of course, he wants to become Senator. Or does he? Depending on the moment, the day, the time, John Hickenlooper may or may not want to be Senator but he is leading in the polls.
Homelessness, Hickenlooper once said, is a sign of prosperity, and not a sign to be celebrated, but a sign, nonetheless.
Look what we have around you now. Infestations of rats, needles, on sidewalk defecation, 14th Avenue near the Colorado Capitol, Lincoln Park, Civic Center Park. And the appalling fallout when the Denver Police, trying to do their job, are met with a Denver Public School Board member and others trying to stop the police from cleaning up a rat’s nest. Denver City Councilwoman Candi CdeBaca called the camping ban an iteration of the black code vagrancy laws that were once used against the black population.
The agreed upon figure collected by Hickenlooper and Hancock in the plan to end homelessness is around $64-$65 million. Denver City Auditor Dennis Gallagher said, after auditing the program, they could not determine if that $64 to $65 million had any impact at all on reducing homelessness. The only thing we know for sure is all that money was spent.
Hickenlooper kicked it off in 2005, telling you and I he would end homelessness in 10 years. That was 2005. Now another $46 plus million has been allotted by the City of Denver and all you have to do is drive around and see the results of those millions of dollars.
We have talked about this before. You can’t feed the bears in Yellowstone. If you put a bird feeder in the backyard you’re going to get squirrels. The late Bob Coté knew the truth. Bob, in that war on homelessness, was George Patton. He knew. The 10 year program with all the collection boxes set up all over the city, all these millions of dollars, take a walk down the 16th Street Mall. Enough is enough.
The man who did everything he could to turn Denver into what it is today, now wants to be the next U.S. Senator. I’m not telling you Cory Gardner is any day at the beach, but I think we said it before. In the words of Barry McGuire in that telling song, Eve of Destruction: “Look around you, boy, it’s bound to scare you, boy.” And you tell me we’re not on the eve of destruction?
Vote early, vote often. Have a nice day.
- Peter Boyles