The line between the City of Denver and its lobbying
community got much thinner after Roger Sherman, a managing partner at CRL
Associates, was appointed to the Citizen Oversight Board (COB) by a 9-3 vote by
City Council.
Lobbyist: Roger Sherman, Managing Partner of CRL Associates, was recently appointed to the Citizen Oversight Board.
Denverite first reported that Sherman, who worked behind the
scenes on the sale of the Park Hill Golf Club and the NO on 300 campaign, was
Council’s first choice for the appointment.
“We have 700,000 people who live in Denver, and another
300,000 people come to Denver every business day — totaling one million
people,” newly elected District 10 Councilman Chris Hinds told the Glendale
Cherry Creek Chronicle in an emailed statement. “It is difficult to believe
that the “one in a million” choice from City Council is the managing partner of
the largest lobbying firm for the city.”
Councilman Chris Hinds opposed the appointment
Members of COB are first nominated by the Mayor and then
confirmed by City Council. Sherman’s appointment came just two days after Mayor
Michael Hancock won re-election.
According to records from the Denver Elections Division, CRL
made generous campaign contributions during the 2019 municipal elections. In
total, CRL contributed nearly $4,000 to Mayor Michael Hancock’s re-election
campaign, while doling out contributions to City Council candidates as well.
Sherman personally donated $250 to District 2 representative
Kevin Flynn, and the firm’s Chief Strategy Officer Kim Kucera donated the same
amount to Albus Brooks’ campaign against Candi CdeBaca in District 9.
Councilwoman Robin Kniech received $2,000 from CRL’s founding partner Maria
Garcia Berry in December 2018 and received the same amount again in February
2019 from the firm itself.
During the City Council meeting, Kniech underscored Sherman’s
qualification, experience, and “strong voice” for police accountability as her
reasons for supporting his nomination.
“[Sherman] not only has experience working with COB, but
also has a track record of coming to City Council and advocating for stronger
oversight of the police department,” Kniech said. “So, for those who have said
they’re afraid this appointment might be too favorable to the Mayor’s Office,
there is simply no evidence of that.”
COB assesses the effectiveness of the Monitor’s Office and
has the authority to appoint people to the Office of the Independent Monitor,
which oversees the police department. Even so, COB neither advises the mayor’s
office nor oversees any functions of the police department. It is simply a
screening body, according to Kniech.
Three of the newly elected Council members voted against the
appointment, including Hinds, CdeBaca, and Amanda Sawyer (District 5).
CdeBaca attempted to have Sherman’s appointment delayed
until August 5 in order to allow time for a public hearing. Other members were
less concerned with hearing public comments, citing an adopted resolution from
earlier in 2019 introduced by Councilmembers Kniech, Paul Lopez, and Paul
Kashmann, which “strengthened the purview of COB”, according to Kashmann. The
resolution increased the number of board members from seven to nine.
Opposed: Newly elected Denver City Council members Candi CdeBaca, left, and Chris Hinds were critical of the appointment of Roger Sherman to the Citizen Oversight Board. CdeBaca attempted to delay the appointment to allow for a public hearing. The City Council rejected that idea and voted 9-3 to appoint Sherman.
“I don’t think this is an issue or question of
qualifications,” CdeBaca said. “I think this is an issue of consolidated power.
Sherman is a well-known member of CRL and has recently led the opposition to
[Initiative] 300, where there have been numerous police violations. Now, we’re
selecting someone to nominate people and oversee that entity.”
CdeBaca cited a recent Colorado Public Radio article that
details the close relationship between Denver’s Big 3 lobbying firms and the
city government. In total, the Big 3 have done over $1 billion in city work in
Hancock’s previous two terms as mayor and have acted as a revolving door
linking the Mayor’s office and the lobbying community.
“With the contacts that Mr. Sherman has, I am doubtful that
he would be nominating or screening the appropriate people for this role,”
CdeBaca said. “We should be nominating people with direct connections to the
community who demanded this role and this board.”
For the last eight-plus years the Denver City Council served
no earthly purpose whatsoever. Thirteen individual council members drew six
figure salaries, had gold plated health insurance and pension plans, along with
expensive office space and assistants, but did absolutely nothing in return
other than rubber stamp everything that a figure head Mayor and the high
density developers who controlled him, put before them.
Councilmember Candi CdeBaca: New Sheriff In Town
Citizens by the scores appeared before the City Council to
beg them for relief from the depravations of the merciless business cartels
such as the CEO driven and Orwellian named “Colorado Concern” and the rapacious
“Downtown Denver Partnership” but to no avail. The City Council even decided,
with the Mayor’s support, to essentially legalize (subject to state approval)
heroin sales to all, including children, under the rubric of caring “safe
injection sites.”
On the night of the second City Council meeting since the
2019 Spring municipal election there was nothing on the agenda which would
cause the Mayor and his staff to expect anything but the normal supine behavior
from the City Council that they had so long enjoyed. But on that night,
however, newly-elected City Councilwoman Candi CdeBaca arose to object to
utterly mundane contracts to two outside contractors who run halfway houses for
approximately 500 convicts in the city. The money for the contracts was not
even from Denver, but rather the State. CdeBaca objected to the contracts on
the grounds that the contracts were with companies whose parent entities
provided detention facilities for ICE, and the fact that she did not like
for-profit companies making money off doing services which are normally
performed by government.
She stated she did not expect support from a single other
councilperson. To the shock of one and all, a majority of the Council supported
her, and the contracts were canceled. The cancellations shook the political
insider world of Denver. If a run-of-the-mill, non-controversial contract could
be cancelled at the whim of a single councilperson, how safe are the literally
hundreds of workie-workie contracts of the Mayor’s friends and city lobbyists?
Is anybody’s piece of the municipal corporate gravy train safe?
After that meeting came the equally shocking proposal by
Council President Jolon Clark of a $43 million carbon tax on businesses to
fund, inter alia, a city climate change office. Clark and his six Council
co-sponsors are a majority on the 13-person Council. The Mayor and his lackies
at the bought-off Denver Post, howled. How dare Clark act as if the City
Council was a democratically elected legislative body. Notwithstanding the
protestations, the Finance and Governance Committee approved passing on the
proposals to the full Council by a 4 to 3 margin with CdeBaca, Hines, Gilmore
and Clark voting in favor and holdovers, Ortega, Kniech and Black voting
against.
As a practical matter we don’t support either the
cancellations of the halfway house contracts or the carbon tax on businesses,
the latter of which has to be approved by the voters even if passed at the
Council level. But far more important to us than the actual merits of these
actions is the fact that a majority of the City Council are no longer willing
to act as a doormat for a corrupt Mayor and his backers. We are hoping that the
new majority will also oppose the rape of Park Hill Golf Course by Westside
Investments, LLC., and the destruction of the Elyria and Swansea neighborhoods
by the ill-conceived and unbelievably corrupt I-70 expansion, along with
hundreds of other projects designed to destroy what was once a truly beautiful
city and its neighborhoods.
Is it possible that representative democracy is returning to
the Mile-High City at long last? We certainly hope so.
The latest Cirque du Solei show to come to Denver is Corteo,
written and directed by Daniele Finzi Pasca. Corteo, which has been seen by
eight million people around the world, tells the story of a clown picturing his
own funeral, which takes place at a carnival and is witnessed by angels.
Corteo, which means “cortege” in Italian, is a joyous procession, a festive
parade imagined by a clown.
Bouncing Beds: Like a gaggle of young kids playing in their grandparents’ room, six artists jump on two 600-pound beds that move on rotating platforms.
The show first premiered in 2005 under the big top in
Montreal and has been since updated for arenas in March 2018, keeping the
original story intact. The show features 51 performers, including acrobats,
clowns, musicians and actors.
Cirque du Solei has been entertaining Colorado audiences
since 1997. “We always have a great responsive audience there and we love to
perform in a place where people react well and enjoy our shows and I think it
adds a lot to the show,” said Max Batista, Tour Publicist for Cirque Corteo.
The stage has a unique setup as it will be set up in the
center of the arena and audience members will be on either side with good sight
views. Set Designer Jean Rabasse has divided the Grand Chapiteau and its
rotating stage in two, with each half of the audience facing the other half, so
they see not only the performance, but also have a performer’s eye view of the
audience. There is one turntable built into the stage, which is about 41 feet
long, and the track is almost 120 feet long.
This show also features six musicians and two singers who
are on stage with the performers. Typically, musicians and singers are hidden
from the audience but in Corteo, they are part of the show. “People can see us
all during the show,” said Eve Willems who plays the accordion, guitar, and
mandolin in Corteo.
Corteo: In this Cirque du Soleil a clown imagines his own funeral as a carnival of sorts, blending the ridiculous with the tragic. The show will be performed nine times from August 15 to August 22 at Pepsi Center.
The music accompanies the show and features different styles
of music including Spanish and Irish. Willems, who submitted her video
application to become a part of the show via Facebook, enjoys being part of
Cirque. “At first for me it was to discover all the different talents and I was
amazed to see all these people doing their tricks,” said Willems. “Now that we
have started, I like traveling with all these people and make people dream and
it’s really nice to be part of it.”
The show lasts two hours and 30 minutes (with a 20-minute intermission) and is packed
with death defying feats fans have come to expect from Cirque shows.
Czar Of Cherry Creek’s Conversion Into A NY Village Plans To
Create $30 Million 18-Hour-A-Day Nightlife Hub
Cherry Creek Czar: BMC Investments CEO Matt Joblon is spending $30 million to remake and reposition the Inn at Cherry Creek.
When Peter Weber built the Inn At Cherry Creek 15 years ago,
it was the district’s boutique hotel. It opened on Clayton St. at about the
same time the JW Marriott Denver at Cherry Creek opened a block south at 150
Clayton Lane. That was when Cherry Creek North was still home to mostly
independently-owned boutique outdoor retail stores and dining destinations.
Then in 2014 the Denver City Council passed new zoning rules
for the district that reduced parking requirements, lifted restrictions on
building heights and allowed hotels in for the first time. Now most of the
independent retailers and dining destinations are gone, replaced by expensive
high-rise apartments and high-end New York retailers and restaurateurs. Three
new hotels — the Halcyon, Moxy and Jacquard — have been added. Matt Joblon —
CEO of BMC Investments and czar of the continuing massive Cherry Creek makeover
— built the Halcyon and Moxy and has a 99-year ground lease on the Inn at
Cherry Creek. The Halcyon and Moxy are both within half a mile of the Inn at
Cherry Creek. BMC has developed or is in the process of developing more than
$500 million in projects, all in Cherry Creek North.
The Inn at Cherry Creek continued to operate for a year, but
Joblon has now begun a year-long renovation or more accurately a makeover and
repositioning of the boutique site at 233 Clayton St. The existing building — a
four-story property with 37 hotel rooms, three residences and three commercial
spaces — is being gutted and 15,000-20,000-sq.-ft. of space added at an
estimated cost of $30 million. The MBC project is a collaboration with
hospitality and development industry veterans Aparium Hotel Group and
CHMWarnick.
Culture Makeover: A year-long renovation of the four-story Inn at Cherry Creek is underway on Clayton St. The hotel and three commercial spaces are being gutted and 15,000-20,000-sq.-ft. of space added at an estimated cost of $30 million.
Adding Fifth Floor
The renovation is expected to include a partial fifth floor
to the four-story hotel. The new space will be rebranded but fewer than a
half-dozen rooms are expected to be added.
The Inn’s original restaurant — The Weber Grill — was
shuttered by Joblon almost immediately after signing the 99-year lease. In its
place Joblon has promised “a great new space” that will be much larger, serving
three meals a day.
Joblon also plans to expand the hotel’s retail space. To do
that he is bringing in a third party to do an “experimental type of retail that
does not currently exist in Cherry Creek.” He has often referred to this
pro-posed space as an “upscale bazaar” similar to the Denver Central Market. Or
maybe something like the Greenwich Village Abingdon Square Greenmarket.
Boutique Beauty: For 15 years relatives of Valley families along with tourists to Denver stayed in the boutique Inn at Cherry Creek that featured 37 rooms.
Getting Party Going
You may think that Cherry Creek nightlife is dead but don’t
be fooled, Joblon plans to get the party going again at the renovated space. In
fact he wants to transform the hotel and the street from an “eight-hour-a-day
to an 18-hour-a-day community.”
Nightlife Epicenter: Renovated hotel will feature cocktail bars, music and entertainment similar to Café Wha? in New York City.
That means the hotel will feature music, food and other
amenities. “We want to do a project that is focused around the cultural part of
Cherry Creek to really grow and expand that part of it … for both locals and
people coming out and visiting,” Joblon says.
The renovated hotel’s nightlife — cocktail bars, music,
entertainment and art — will be inside so the neighborhood won’t complain.
Joblon originally planned for live music on the rooftop terrace at the Halcyon
Hotel but the neighborhood association squashed the notion because of the
hotel’s proximity to condos.
Culture Epicenter
He wants the new Inn at Cherry Creek to become its own
thriving, diverse community. Meeting rooms and community areas are being
designed into the hotel’s expansion. “The core of our vision is to create a
place that becomes the cultural epicenter for this neighborhood.”
Upscale Bazaar: Rebranded hotel is introducing a new type of retail to Cherry Creek similar to the Denver Central Market.
Think New York’s Greenwich Village or as New Yorkers call it,
“The Village.” He wants the hotel and Clayton Street to become Cherry Creek’s
bohemian capital, a spot with places like Greenwich Village’s Fat Cat and Café
Wha? He dreams of the Clayton block becoming an updated and stylish version of
Greenwich’s MacDougal St., where throngs flock to enjoy drinks, live music and
meet up with friends.
He believes the hotel has incredible potential to be a
destination in and of itself and thus help the neighborhood to thrive. He aims
for the hotel to draw all types of people with all kinds of stories. “That’s
what I think is going to make this place really special. Not to mention very,
very different.”
Marriage Of Money
The 30-something Joblon grew up in the Boston area — his
family owns Brittany Global Technologies — and moved to LA to work for an
individual real estate investor. That’s where he met his future wife Alissa
Alpert, daughter of Lee Alpert who has developed more than 44,000 acres of
Denver real estate. Joblon moved here in 2010, married Alissa and met Darren Everett
who at the time was VP of Operations for the Alpert Companies. Everett is a
founding partner of BMC Investments and President of BMC’s property management
affiliate, BLDG Management.
Party Cat: New space will be an 18-hour-a-day party animal designed to be similar to Greenwich Village’s Fat Cat.
Soon after moving here — Joblon lives in Cherry Hills
Village but has offices in a Cherry Creek building he built at 2nd Ave. and
Detroit — he began building a relationship with the Inn at Cherry Creek owner
Peter Weber. He says he wanted to make sure that another party didn’t beat BMC
to the deal and create a brand that would compete with his nearby hotels.
Earlier this year, of course, BMC sold the Halcyon Hotel to Ohio-based
Rockbridge Capital for $93 million.
The rebranded Inn at Cherry Creek will still face the same
problems as the other two hotels: attracting hospitality and retail workers!
Why? Cherry Creek North’s expensive parking and relative lack of public
transportation.
Funeral services were held for Joan Packard Birkland who
passed away on June 15, 2019. She was described as one of the greatest (if not
the greatest) female athletes in the history of the State of Colorado. She was
inducted into the Colorado Sports Hall of Fame, Colorado Women’s Sports Hall of
Fame and the Colorado Golf Hall of Fame. The Joan Birkland Pavilion at the
Gates Tennis Center in Denver, headquarters of USTA Colorado, is named in her
honor.
Athlete Extraordinaire: Joan Birkland was for many years a top amateur golfer in all of Colorado, one of many sports where she excelled.
She was born on August 17, 1928, in Denver to well-known
surgeon Dr. George Packard and his wife. She was one of three sisters. With no
organized sports for girls she played baseball, football, basketball and tennis
with other children (mostly boys) at City Park near her home. After graduating
from East High School she went on to the University of Colorado in Boulder
where she met Ormand Birkland Jr., whom she married in 1948. The marriage
lasted over 50 years until his death in 1999.
The marriage, by all accounts, was a happy one,
notwithstanding (or perhaps because of) the fact Ormand was every bit as
mediocre in sports as she was outstanding. She took up golf as it was the one
sport he played and she was soon regularly beating him. She joined an AAU
basketball team (the Denver Viners) while at the University of Colorado where
she played with tennis great Phyllis Lockwood. They became an almost unbeatable
women’s tennis doubles team in Colorado. She competed on the Denver Vipers team
for eight years, becoming honorable mention All-American in the sport of
basketball.
The Birklands joined the Denver Country Club (DCC) in 1953
and she began to concentrate her athletic endeavors on golf and tennis. She
described her activities at the time as: “A typical day for me would be to hit
and shag balls, take a lesson from a DCC golf pro, play nine or eighteen holes
with Dorothy Major at Willis Case or meet Phyllis Lockwood and play tennis with
her in Boulder, and then we would shoot a few hoops at CU.”
Later in her career she generously gave her time and talents
to children with handicaps, including teaching golf at an amputee program at
Children’s Hospital, bowling with children with cerebral palsy and coaching
basketball for asthmatic kids.
She was also active with many women’s and sporting organizations including the United States Golf Association. Birkland co-founded Sportswomen of Colorado and served as that organization’s executive director for 40 years.
In 1957 she took on the number one female player in the
world Althea Gibson at the Colorado Open which, at the time, attracted many of
the world’s greatest tennis players. To the shock of the press and the gallery
Birkland began beating the world’s number one player. A reporter for The Denver
Post called in to his paper to hold the afternoon press as he might be
reporting “one of the greatest sporting upsets in the history of Colorado.” In
the end, however Gibson prevailed 8-6, 6-4.
By the 1960s she excelled at the highest levels at both golf
and tennis simultaneously, an athletic feat that is almost unheard of in the
annals of Colorado sports. She won the Denver amateur tennis title in 1960,
1962 and 1966 and the Colorado state tennis title in 1960, 1962 and 1966. She
garnered six singles and 15 doubles titles in Colorado and Intermountain tennis
tournaments.
On a friend’s dare Birkland in 1962 competed in and won both
the state tennis and golf championships in the same summer and repeated this
feat again in 1966. She was awarded the Robert Russell Prize for Colorado
Amateur Athlete of the Year in 1962.
Upset In The Making? Joan Birkland is shown here serving against the number one female tennis player in the world at the time, Althea Gibson, in an attempt to win a historic match.
She took the state women’s golf title seven times. At the
Denver Country Club she won 30 straight Ladies Country Club Championships from
1955 to 1984. Many of the victories were anything but easy sometimes winning at
the 18th hole or in sudden death in the match play format. She attempted to
retire from the competition several times but her competitors, some of whom
were themselves state golf champions, would hear nothing of it. As one of her
competitors said: “As far as I was concerned, no Joanie — no tournament.”
Even in her 90s Birkland could regularly be found on the
golf range at the Denver Country Club working on her swing while interacting
with golfers around her and trying to pick up tips to improve her game. Fellow
inductee to the Colorado Golf Hall of Fame, Gary Potter, stated: “She was
amazing. She cheerfully accepted the fact that the ravages of time severely
restricted her playing abilities, but she simply wanted to be the best she
could be with whatever limitations God had provided that day. She happily
picked up whatever tips or advice you may provide and incorporated them into
her play if they made sense to her. She was an extraordinary and truly
wonderful human being.”
Joan Birkland
While she never had any children herself Birkland is
survived by an extended family including her sister Evelyn McLagan, her
brother-in-law Neil McLagan, nephew Hugh Birkland and nieces and nephews, Tracy
Tempest, George Tempest, Scott McLagan, Tom McLagan and Ken McLagan and their
families.
There he defiantly stood on the veranda of the public Park
Hill Golf Course, the three-time former mayor of Denver, Wellington Webb, who
is still very much a political powerhouse in the city. He had called an
emergency press conference to give out a clarion call to all citizens to save
155-acre Park Hill Golf Course as open space against the ravages of one more
rapacious high-density developer, this time Westside Investment Partners, Inc.
and its unctuous CEO and snake oil salesman Andrew Klein.
Former Mayor Wellington Webb
Webb was eloquent and passionate about a subject near and
dear to his heart. After all, as he pointed out, as mayor he had done more than
any other recent mayor for parks and open space in the City and County of
Denver. Moreover, his critique of what is happening in Denver as a result of
the Hancock administration was absolutely spot on. He accurately noted the
destruction the Hancock administration had brought and was continuing to bring
to the Queen City of the Plains. He declared:
“As our city has transformed drastically in the last few
years, we cannot allow precious open space to become another casualty of
development.
“Once developers chip away at this open space, there will be
no excuses to go after more, including our parks.
“I think open space and park space is one of our most
important commodities. If we allow this park space to be sold and redeveloped
into a concrete jungle, I believe no park in Denver is safe.
“Because what do we get in its place? Housing like that
across the street, where you walk out the door and you’re on the sidewalk with
no greenspace.”
Park Hill Golf Course
“Once this is gone, it’s gone for good. It’s gone forever —
gone for our children, our children’s children. Gone for what?
“That’s not the Denver I remember. But when I came here from
Chicago, I didn’t want Denver to be Chicago. I wanted Denver to be Denver.”
We could not have said it better ourselves. Westside’s
Founder and Managing Principal Klein tried to con Webb and the public by
asserting that he would build “affordable housing” and maybe if the neighbors
begged pathetically enough, a grocery store with a nice large parking lot. Webb
correctly understood that such claims by Klein were little more than “a trick
to garner support.” Klein will brutally rape Park Hill for every penny he can
get out of it, while buying off whatever neighborhood quislings he can to mimic
lines that he feeds them.
But there is one big problem with what Webb did, and it
shows that he doesn’t really care about what is happening to Park Hill Golf
Course or Denver as a whole. Michael Hancock and his merry band of destructive
high-density developers would not be in power today if it were not for
Wellington Webb. If Webb had given the same Park Hill speech and call to action
just a few weeks before the June mayoral runoff between Michael Hancock and
Jamie Giellis, then Jamie Giellis would be mayor and Park Hill Golf Course
would have been saved.
What is, in fact, important to Webb is that all of his
friends and acquaintances got their concessions at DIA renewed resulting in
millions in profits for them. His daughter Stephanie O’Malley was appointed
early on by Hancock to be Manager of Safety, an all-powerful position that
oversees the police, fire and sheriff departments. This post was one that she
was totally unqualified for. When her ineptitude became too embarrassing, he
gave her the odd title of simply “Mayoral Appointee” with no responsibilities
or job requirements for which she brings down a six-figure salary. She has the
ultimate no work job all thanks to his Honor and his administration.
Webb lives in Park Hill and his neighbors have been begging
him to speak out and oppose the sale for months. He has come out now when it
simply doesn’t matter anymore. The sale to Westside took place a little over a
week later for $24 million. Westside’s only problem is that in 1994 under the
Webb administration, the Clayton Trust took $2 million in return for a
conservation easement keeping the open space for perpetuity. Westside and Klein
must get the easement cancelled and the property rezoned by the City Council.
Predatory Developer Andrew Klein
Webb has urged citizens to petition, protest and pressure
the mayor and the City Council not to lift the easement and/or grant the
rezoning. He notes that incumbent council members including two of the mayor’s
strongest allies lost re-election bids largely in reaction to the excessive
development scheme in their districts.
But Webb knows the three new council members will make no
difference whatsoever in a 13-member City Council filled with corrupt lackeys
of the mayor. Going to City Council meetings in Denver is a joke. The elected
officials couldn’t care less what the public thinks. Klein and Westside would
not have paid $24 million for the property if the fix was not already in with
the mayor’s office and the City Council and Webb knows it.
Webb’s entire charade concerning Park Hill Golf Course was
done so he can tell his neighbors and friends that he did “all he could do” to
prevent the destruction of the neighborhood when, in fact, he did nothing when
it really mattered. If you live in Park Hill and see the old mayor wandering
around you may want to note to him the saying attributed to Abraham Lincoln,
that: “You can fool all the people some of the time, and some of the people all
the time, but you cannot fool all the people all the time.” He has been caught
this time in his sham defense of Park Hill Golf Course and at least some of his
neighbors now know it.
Even Wellington Webb should be ashamed of himself.
