by Mark Smiley | Feb 25, 2019 | Editorials
Almost every mayor of Denver who has two or more terms in office has some project or initiative that highlights what the individual wanted to accomplish in public office. For Mayor Robert Speer it was Speer Boulevard and the City Beautiful movement. For Mayor Stapleton it was the Mountain Park System and Civic Center Park. In the case of Mayor Wellington Webb, he was justifiably proud of what he was able to accomplish with Confluence Park and Mayor Federico Peña fought tirelessly for Denver International Airport.
But what about Mayor Michael Hancock? He has been able to destroy and/or monetize parks and open space throughout Denver. He has been able to take the 16th Street Mall, the pride and joy of Mayor McNichols, and turn it into a dangerous place at times that reeks of urine and feces emanating from the alley ways. He has been able to destroy or damage neighborhoods throughout the city with ugly high rises built right to the curb. He has driven out African-American families who have been in the city for generations with his gentrification efforts and making affordable housing in the city a thing of the past. He has turned the once beautiful Speer Boulevard into a concrete canyon. Driving about Denver has become a chore almost any time of the day and parking has become scarcer and scarcer. If he and Councilman Albus Brooks have their way they will have defacto legalized heroin/meth use and sales with so-called Safe Injection Sites.
What could represent and highlight these and many other similar achievements by his honor. We suggest Initiative 300 could do the trick. It would alter the municipal code of Denver to provide a right to rest in any public space in Denver and to live in any motor vehicle on any street without being asked to move. It allows for people to eat, share and serve food in public places. It would make it a crime to harass any person exercising these rights and would override any and all laws of Denver or the State of Colorado that are in contradiction of these provisions.
How perfect can you get to represent the ideals and aspirations of the Hancock Administration. This initative would help to destroy the enjoyment of most people in Denver of those parks and open spaces that Mayor Hancock hasn’t already closed or monetized. It would solve the affordable housing crisis since one could live almost anywhere within a tent and drive down home values so that houses would be “more affordable.” These wonderful legal provisions would also apply not only within the boundaries of the City and County of Denver, but also to the Denver Mountain Park system which would not only apply to Red Rocks concerts and Evergreen Golf Course but apparently to Winter Park.
Initiative 300 applies not only to parks and open space but any public space any land owned or leased by the City and County of Denver or any property upon which there is an easement for public use which would include the sidewalk in front of your house and any street median by your home. Asking too loudly for the person camped out in front of your house not to urinate or defecate on your lawn could be deemed a form of harassment subjecting you to arrest.
The only real obstacle to this initative is the fact that high density developers who control the mayor’s office and who want to destroy the city and its parks and open space for their own profit and fun, are opposed. How dare the homeless advocates make the city an undesirable place to live and work when the high-density developers are doing a bang-up job on their own. The flotsam and jetsam over at Colorado Concern, who runs the day-to-day operations of the city along with the mayor’s Chief of Staff Alan Salazar, will put money in to defeat the proposition. Mayor Hancock himself has been strangely silent on the matter afraid to alienate anyone on either side of the issue with his dubious re-election campaign in full swing. But his silence is in part understandable as he is spending a significant part of his time chasing and harassing women down in Atlanta away from prying eyes.
But we as citizens of Denver all owe it to our beloved mayor who we have elected twice (once without any opposition) and who will, in all likelihood, be re-elected for a third term given the enormous war chest he has built up from high-density developers. It is not easy to destroy a once beautiful and very livable city especially when you have money to burn, but Hancock is helping to achieve the same and Initiative 300 could, in fact, be the crown jewel ode to his time of public service.
This is a once in a lifetime opportunity to attract thousands of drug-addicted street people from across the country to the Mile-High Queen City of the Plains to share our new utopian vision provided by Mayor Hancock. Vote “Yes” on Initiative 300, and help the mayor destroy our once beautiful city.
— Editorial Board
by Mark Smiley | Jan 28, 2019 | Editorials
Diogenes, a Greek philosopher, was said to have wandered the streets of Athens with a lantern in broad daylight saying he was looking to find an honest man. If he were to come to Denver today and went to Denver City Hall, he would have an equally tough time. It has just become more difficult as Denver City Councilman Rafael Espinoza has decided not to run for a second term as the representative of the 1st District, which includes Denver Highlands.
Four years ago, he became the first person to defeat an incumbent councilperson since the mid-1980s. Moreover, he won in a landslide, garnering 70% of the vote. He came into office hoping to accomplish great things and, in particular, helping to arrest the destruction of Denver neighborhoods by high-density developers. He declared at the time: “I will not be beholden to developers, special interests, the mayor’s office, or even fellow council members.”
He has been true to his word. He even tried to join a lawsuit against the mayor to stop the flood control project at City Park Golf Course. Unfortunately, a majority of his fellow councilpersons were and are, in fact, beholden to the same including developer hacks and Hancock toadies Mary Beth Susman and Kendra Black. Espinoza, during his short tenure, was able to accomplish some important goals including eliminating bump stocks in Denver and imposing new requirements on keeping neighborhoods informed about proposed real estate developments.
But he was unable to stop the onslaught of solely-profit driven, poorly conceived real estate developments. Nor was he able to rein in the absolute control over Denver City Council by the office of Mayor Hancock. Of course, Hancock himself is too busy working out and chasing women in not only Denver but also in Atlanta and Washington, D.C. to control anything.
But that does not mean that his chief of staff, Alan Salazar, in connivance with the Brownstein law firm and the boys and girls at Colorado Concern, doesn’t have time to destroy the city for fun and profit.
There was nothing more shameful in the last four years than the City Council’s craven capitulation to the harassment of Denver Police Officer Leslie Branch-Wise and subsequent payoff for her silence with taxpayer funds. Espinoza tried to hold the mayor accountable as outlined in a letter that went public, but he was one of the few voices on city council willing to take a stand and the heinous conduct of the mayor went unheeded.
Espinoza points to the three-part series in The Denver Post by Bruce Finley titled “The Densification of Denver” which has become one of the cities with the least open space and parks per resident almost anywhere in the country. This for a town that was planned in the early 20th century as a “city within a park.”
But as a councilman he found himself powerless to do anything about it. He believes he can accomplish more as a private citizen outside of government. He has endorsed his top aide Amanda Sandoval to replace him. He indicates the 1st District is really getting two for one. His aide will be working inside of City Hall while he, as a private citizen, can work on key items such as preparing neighborhood design standards that he, as an architect, is particularly well qualified to undertake.
We have not always agreed with Councilman Espinoza. For example, we are incredulous that he voted for Albus Brooks’ Mexican drug cartel backed legislation to essentially legalize and subsidize heroin use in the City and County of Denver under the rubric of “safe injection sites.”
But overall there has been no more principled, hard working and industrious city councilperson. The fact that being a city councilperson in Denver is so worthless and unimportant that it is not even worth being one, is deeply disturbing. What does that say about the majority of the City Council who are there to pick up a six-figure salary and perks and do not care about what they are doing to the city and the citizens of Denver? God help us.
— Editorial Board
by Mark Smiley | Dec 17, 2018 | Editorials
It is said that politicians are attracted to money like
flies to a dung heap. In Denver no one loves the smell of money more than City
Council President Albus Brooks, a close ally of ethically challenged Mayor
Michael Hancock. He is expected to succeed Hancock in four years assuming
Hancock prevails in his quest for a third term this spring.
Brooks has the full confidence and support of the
high-density developers that own and control Mayor Hancock. Brooks’
subservience to developers has gotten him in trouble at times with some of his
constituents in District 9. Developers have begun to gentrify his district with
high-density developments driving some African American families out of Denver
where they have lived for generations. His tone deafness over the Ink! Coffee
shop controversy highlighted how out of touch he was with the many issues
important to the residents of his District. Brooks has only exasperated his
problems by his remarks on Colorado Public Radio where he appeared not to grasp
the concept that “involuntary displacement” was very much of a concern to
homeowners in Five Points, Elyria-Swansea and other neighborhoods in his
District.
Brooks infamously declared on the radio: “Displacement is
not in the home ownership category. It’s in the rental category and someone
cannot afford what their landowner is jacking up the price with, right? And so,
that is something that we are working very hard on.”
These comments helped Candi CdeBaca decide to run against
him this spring in the city election. She has stated: “He didn’t understand the
nuances of involuntary displacement. That is directly connected to his power
and his purview. He should know all of the ins and outs of it.”
What Brooks does understand is money or more specifically
how as a politician he gets his hands on as much of it as possible. While high
density developers strongly support him as he does their bidding, he is not
particularly liked by them on a personal basis. His cryptic nickname among some
developers and lobbyists is “The Buddha.” It is not that he has any interest in
that Eastern religion but rather the fact that many statues of the Buddha have
him sitting with his left palm pointing upward. According to his critics Brooks
shakes your hand with his right hand while his left palm points upward to be
greased.
This leads to his latest money-making scheme — heroin
injection sites. There is big money to be had by politicians in drugs these
days. On the Republican side Colorado Senator Cory Gardner and former Speaker
of the U.S. House John Boehner have become ardent advocates for the
legalization of marijuana across the country notwithstanding spending most of
their political careers adamantly opposed the same. What changed? Once pot was
legalized in states like Colorado and California there arrived a river of money
for politicians and lobbyists who would help overcome federal constraints on
the drug.
Brooks’ nose for money has led him to an even more lucrative
drug field — heroin. Mexican drug cartels are facing a crisis. With
legalization of marijuana in various states no one needs the cartels to grow
marijuana in Mexico and ship it across the border. Moreover, cocaine is no
longer the drug of the young and the hip and usage is dramatically down. What
is up is opioid addiction and in particular heroin addiction. What is holding
back this growth market is the terrible stigma attached to heroin use.
That is where politicians like Brooks can help. He has
gotten the Denver City Council to approve so called “safe injection sites.”
Heroin users are provided free needles, syringes, septic pads and a private
place to shoot up. Medical attendants will be there to administer Naloxone in
case of an overdose. Of course, once you have one site you will need many more
as addicts driving to and from a single injection site to get their multiple
daily fixes is generally not to be encouraged.
If you want more of something you subsidize it, but that is
not the key service Brooks is providing to the cartels. What the cartels need
to grow their heroin businesses is for the stigma of heroin use to disappear.
What better way than state and municipal sanctioned and supported “safe”
injection sites to say to today’s youth that the hellish existence of a heroin
addict is just one of many different but acceptable lifestyle choices. In
places like Vancouver, Canada where there are safe injection sites, the use of
heroin has skyrocketed and while there are no reported deaths at the sites
there plenty nearby.
The Buddha, of course, is just trying to be “compassionate”
to heroin users and the cartels who support and nurture them. Brooks will get
rich in the process. If there is any justice in this world, kids and their
families who become addicted to heroin because of the actions of Councilman
Albus Brooks will someday go visit him in what grand mansion he will be
ensconced in to personally thank him for the destruction and damage he has wrought to them.
Albus Brooks
by Mark Smiley | Nov 19, 2018 | Editorials
Jamie Giellis
The 2018 statewide elections in Colorado are over. While a blue wave may not have occurred nationwide it certainly did happen in the Centennial State. Republicans not only didn’t win the governorship it lost all statewide offices it held including Attorney General, Secretary of State and Treasurer by wide margins. In Denver all the sales tax hikes were approved as prognosticated in our August 2018 editorial. Statewide the voters shot down new taxes for education and roads although Denver voters likely would have approved both.
We Denverites love our taxes, perhaps reflecting the fact that Denver is home to a very significant number of federal, state and local employees. But we also demand value for our money which many feel we are not getting from our governing city government. Neighborhoods are being destroyed with inappropriate and endless high-density projects, parking downtown has become an arduous chore at times and our roads are increasingly jammed with no relief in sight.
It would appear that many citizens of Denver have had it with Michael Hancock who is viewed as a clueless puppet of high-density developers. The publicity of the mayor’s sexual harassment of police officer Leslie Branch Wise, and his use sub silencio of taxpayer money to pay her off, has been the last straw for many in the city.
Four years ago, not a single person qualified for the ballot to oppose Hancock’s re-election. The situation has dramatically changed today with at least three highly qualified candidates willing to take on his Honor. Last month we identified two of those individuals — Penfield Tate and Lisa Calderon. Since then another highly qualified candidate has entered the ring — Jamie Giellis.
Giellis, age 41, is the president of the River North Art District. She has b
Large scale apartment project on Speer Boulevard.
een identified by The Denver Post as an important force in the development of RiNo, South Pearl Street and the Golden Triangle in her role as founder of Centro which specializes in urban planning.
Urban planning is exactly what has been sadly lacking for the last eight years as can be seen by the virtual destruction of what was one of Denver’s most scenic roadways — Speer Boulevard. Massive condo and apartment buildings crowd the roadway with no setback and totally devoid of any open areas and trees.
As Giellis correctly noted: “A broad vision for Denver is missing and the current mayor has been responding to, and not necessarily planning for, all the issues that come along with quickly growing urban areas.”
As far as we are concerned the more qualified candidates for mayor the better. Under Denver’s Charter if no person reaches the 50% level in the first round of voting there is a runoff between the top two candidates.
It is not that Hancock will be easy to defeat. Those that control the mayor have been raising large sums of money for his re-election, from the high-density developers and other lowlifes that have been raping Denver for fun and profit for years. But the voters of Denver may, at long last, have become disenchanted with Harasser-in-Chief and all the money in the world will hopefully not save him.
by Mark Smiley | Oct 24, 2018 | Editorials
Penfield Tate
In spring of 2011, the citizens of Denver in their infinite wisdom decided to elect the unintelligent but gregarious Michael Hancock who as The Denver Post stated, had a “feel good story” rising from poverty to become the plaything of Green Valley Ranch developer Pat Hamill who owns Hancock lock, stock, and barrel along with his fellow crony capitalists at Colorado Concern. Of course The Denver Post never revealed who was actually running Hancock as it had become, as the only major paper in the city, as corrupt as the city government itself.
Hancock barely made the 2011 runoff beating out James Mejia by only 1,491 votes for the last spot behind first round leader Chris Roemer. Just think only 1,491 votes and the race would have been between two highly qualified and experienced candidates either of whom would have run Denver a multitude of times better than Hancock. For the last eight years high density developers and the Brownstein law firm have run and raped the city for fun and profit while Hancock has spent his time working out in gyms and chasing skirts.
Four years ago everyone realized what an awful mayor Hancock was but no credible candidate arose to run against him due in large part to the massive fundraising advantage Hancock had over anyone who would run against him. For a while it looked like 2015 would repeat itself with Hancock running essentially unopposed.
But over the last 30 days two highly credible candidates, Penfield Tate and Lisa Calderon, have thrown their hats into the ring for office of mayor of the City and County of Denver which will give Denver real choices.
Penfield Tate III is 62-years-old and an attorney with the national law
Lisa Calderon
firm of Kutak Rock. He was a state representative from 1997 to 2001 and state senator from 2002 to 2003. He represented northeast Denver which is the base of power for Mayor Hancock. He knows what he is up against having run for mayor in 2002, getting beaten out by John Hickenlooper.
He correctly points out how the rapid growth of Denver has been grossly mismanaged by the Hancock administration. The last eight years with all the wealth pouring into the city should have been Denver’s Golden Age, instead it’s been an unmitigated disaster for everyone but developers.
Tate has declared: “Development is out of sync with neighborhoods, disrupting the quality of neighborhoods. It’s imperiling open space and having an impact on parks. It’s driving gentrification. It’s impacting small businesses that are . . . getting driven out of neighborhoods. It is impacting affordable housing.” We could not have articulated some of the major problems of the Hancock administration better.
Lisa Calderon is a longtime community activist from north Denver and presently the co-chair of the Colorado Latino Forum — Denver chapter. Her parents were an African-American and a Latino. She has a law degree from the University of Colorado, Boulder, as well as a doctorate in education from CU Denver.
She has been a advocate against the treatment of prisoners at the Denver jail. She has held rallies against Michael Hancock’s harassment of and lying about his relationship with Denver Police Detective Leslie Branch Wise. She recently sued the City and County of Denver for canceling a contract to run a re-entry program for former inmates based on, she alleges, her criticism of the mayor and his harassment of Leslie Branch Wise.
She believes that the city is at a critical juncture: “So, I kept waiting for the candidate to emerge that I would support, who represented my values and my concerns about affordable housing and women’s issues, and concerns about the cultural preservation in our city. And I realized, I was waiting for me.”
Her platform centers around affordable housing, “resident-led” development, decentralizing the mayor’s office, and women and workers.
When asked how affordable housing and “resident-led” development mesh she stated:”We need to look at what does each community need in their neighborhood,” she said. “I can tell you right now I don’t need a big behemoth building shadowing over all of the other units, but there is a way to build for density that still takes into account community.”
She went on to note: “There are ways to do density that really centers a community in it, rather than a developer’s idea about cramming so many people in there.”
Eighteenth century diplomat and philosopher Joseph de Maitre declared that “in a democracy people get the leaders they deserve.” It is hard to fathom that anybody deserves a sexual predator and corrupt mayor like Michael Hancock, but we will find out next spring. Hancock has raised $700,000 from the worst of the worst in Denver, but no amount of money can scrub clean the permanent stains he has made across the city. We will have a choice next year in Denver and it can only be hoped that we choose wisely.
by Mark Smiley | Oct 2, 2018 | Editorials
The inaugural Grandoozy music festival had a reported attendance of 55,000 over the extended weekend.
The inaugural Grandoozy Music Festival was held over the extended weekend of September 14-16, 2018, at the Overland Golf Course off of Santa Fe Drive in southwest Denver. Why at Overland Park Golf Course? At first it would seem a strange choice. With virtually no on-site parking the golf course site is stuck between the extremely busy Santa Fe Drive on one side and a raft of homes on the other. The lack of on-site parking necessitated free shuttles from far away parking lots with the vain hope people would hike in from the nearest, not so convenient light rail station.
As part of the June 2017 presentation for City Council approval of the event on public land a bullet point was the that the organizer, Superfly Productions, negotiate with RTD to include public transportation as part of the $270 event ticket. But Superfly Productions apparently was uninterested in paying anyone for anything. RTD offered additional cars for the extended weekend and requested from Superfly $72,000 to cover the additional service, security and personal costs and when Superfly said no RTD dropped it down to $33,000. But the production company was still uninterested, and no additional service was added for the event for public convenience.
Stevie Wonder performed during the final night of the 2018 Grandoozy music festival.
The RTD kerfuffle was emblematic of why Superfly was at Overland Park Golf Course in the first place and not at the many different existing concert venues in the area such as Fiddler’s Green, Mile High Stadium or Red Rocks. Superfly had come to Denver to take every last penny it could beg, borrow or steal from the community. The existing venues cost real money while Overland Park Golf Course is on public land and could be obtained for a fraction of the cost. The City and County of Denver under Michael Hancock is trying to get rid of, or alternatively monetize, every possible inch of open space under its control.
Superfly could get everything it wanted for a relative song from the mayor’s office and the always compliant Denver City Council. In turn, the production company brought in a hodgepodge lineup which was far skimpier than almost any other marque event it holds. Headliners being Stevie Wonder, Kendrick Lamar and Florence + the Machine, all of which have performed in Denver before. The gaps were filled with numerous local acts Superfly could get to perform at the Festival on the cheap.
The Denver golf community and the Overland Park neighborhood vociferously opposed the event which has partially destroyed the oldest golf course west of the Mississippi. But as one insider noted: “Those groups are composed of old white people who the city is hoping to drive out as fast as possible. No one is going to pay any attention to them.” She was right. The City Council blew right past them with hardly an acknowledgment at the June 17 meeting.
So how was the three-day festival? Depends on who you ask. For the neighbors and the golfers it was a disaster, but that was expected from them. For many festival concertgoers the event was okay, but lacked the big names they had expected. They are hoping in future years Superfly will spend the money it takes to bring them better lineups. Don’t count on it.
But for Superfly Productions, Stevie Wonder’s greatest hit “Isn’t She Lovely,” best summed up the event. They made a killing. Good crowds at top dollar prices and very low overhead. Nineteenth century con man Soapy Smith found that Denver was a perfect place to pull off his many scams with a rube seeming to be waiting on every street corner. In Michael Hancock’s Denver not much has changed. If you are unscrupulous enough and have access to the powers that be in Denver government, there are fortunes to be made in the Queen City on the Plains.
