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https://www.dailycamera.com/2022/03/31/editorial-by-whatever-means-necessary-the-russian-people-should-replace-putin/
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President Joe Biden learned the hard way Saturday about the dangers of going off script at the end of a speech heavily criticizing Russian leader Vladimir Putin for his unprovoked war against Ukraine. At the end of the speech, Biden blurted out, “For God’s sake, this man cannot stay in power.” The words themselves were spot on. The only problem was the person speaking them.
As the United States learned during four years under Biden’s predecessor, a president who doesn’t carefully measure his words, especially in times of crisis, can easily get himself and the country into deep trouble. President Donald Trump potentially incriminated himself on a few occasions and created headaches for his aides when his off-the-cuff remarks insulted foreign leaders, wrecked alliances and inspired people to experiment with dangerous, bogus coronavirus remedies.
For all of Biden’s careful pronouncements and wartime decisions designed specifically to avert a direct superpower confrontation that could provoke World War III, he managed with a nine-word sentence to confirm Putin’s warnings that the United States seeks to dominate Russia and install a U.S.-friendly regime.
Putin warned as recently as February that “there should be no doubt that any potential aggressor will face defeat and ominous consequences should it directly attack our country.” As if to raise the specter of nuclear retaliation, he added, “All necessary decisions have been taken in this regard.”
It’s a safe bet that any American move toward regime change in Russia would, in Putin’s mind, constitute a direct attack. Biden, who insisted Monday that his words were personal feelings and didn’t reflect a policy change, had the effect of bringing the world a step closer to the very danger he most feared: a provocation that leads to World War III.
In truth, Russia is long overdue for a new leader — a sane leader who doesn’t keep a 30-foot conference table between himself and his guests, and who doesn’t concoct bizarre scenarios of “denazification” to justify invading a neighboring country headed by a Jew.
Putin took control of a nascent, far-from-perfect post-Soviet democracy in 2000 and, in the course of a few years, converted it into a full-fledged dictatorship. He has deployed Russian agents to assassinate his critics. He has banned use of the word “war” to describe the slaughter in Ukraine. Press freedoms have been annihilated. On Sunday, Russian media were banned from carrying reports from four Russian journalists who interviewed Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy.
This madman deserves to be replaced — by his own people. The way to do it is to flood Russians with the truth about their president’s war crimes and atrocities via the internet, broadcast media, printed information and any other available means. Putin didn’t hesitate to meddle in 2016 to help put Trump in office. It’s only fair that the United States should return the favor against Putin.
— St. Louis Post-dispatch Editorial Board
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https://www.dailycamera.com/2022/03/31/letters-to-the-editor-redtail-ridge-vote-no-for-a-better-future/
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Grace Christian: Property tax hikes: Our seniors suffer, not landlords
Wednesday’s paper featured a guest opinion by a landlord who objects to increased property taxes to pay for the proposed library district: Karey Christ-Janer: Earth to Boulder: You need your landlords.
She “must” pass the increase onto tenants, who will suffer increased rents. Her proposed alternative is to increase sales taxes, thus taking the burden off her/landlords.
Now sales taxes are “fair” in the sense that all pay the same rates, rich and poor alike. Which, clearly, makes them deeply unfair. They are regressive, i.e. hit the poor much much harder than the rich. So my solution is: how about landlords just accept slightly lower profits?
The folks who are actually harmed by rising property values and the resulting seriously increased property taxes are seniors on fixed incomes like social security. They have seen their property taxes rise exponentially. Mine take up more than a full month’s income. No laughing matter. So let’s implore the county commissioners to take pity on retirees and increase the senior retiree exemption.
Grace Christian
Boulder
Cory Nickerson: Redtail Ridge: Yes to development, either way
It is my sincere wish to remind local voters that no matter how you vote on Redtail Ridge, it will be a yes to development. That is a fact. Louisville’s special election on April 19 is an opportunity for voters to decide if the Redtail Ridge development is a healthy extension of our community.
When you cast a “YES” vote, students, residents and businesses will be beneficiaries of a dizzying display of community improvements and amenities. These include, but are not limited to a long-overdue extension of Campus Drive from Monarch PK-12 to 96th as early as 2023 (while a vote “no” make this entirely uncertain and likely three years away). A vote “YES” will result in 93 acres of new, permanent open space, public parks and trails (but a vote “no” means we only get 38 acres). A vote “YES” brings in $25 million in property taxes (and a vote “no” drops that income down to $21 million). A vote “YES” creates 40 acres of permanent conservation easement for keystone species (and yep, you guessed it, a vote “no” means we only get 20 acres). There are more comparisons at www.yesforlouisville.com where you can also view the endorsements.
Those who claim a “YES” vote hurts those trying to rebuild from the Marshall Fires are misleading voters. Commercial development requires a different skill set and materials than those that are used to build residential homes. All votes – yes or no – will result in a development. Wouldn’t you want to vote for a development that helps Lousville? Voting “no” hurts Louisville. It won’t stop development nor will it require the developers to start over. Vote “Yes” in the special election April 19.
Cory Nickerson
Past PTSO Co-President Monarch High
Sherry Sommer: Redtail Ridge: Vote “No” for a better future
Last October, while I was collecting signatures for our Redtail Ridge referendum petition, a gentleman asked me: “What is your interest in pursuing a referendum?” His question was excellent, and I’ve thought of it often.
First, I must qualify — this resident’s question cannot be answered as worded. Personal interest did not propel me to pursue a referendum petition or to organize a special election campaign. My motivation is the wellbeing and health of our community. I believe Louisville can and must do better than the proposal before us, and that is why I’ve been working to inform residents about this important special election vote on April 19. Voting “No” on this ballot item means that Louisville will have the opportunity to do better.
What does it mean to say Louisville can do better?
A better proposal would protect the wellbeing and quality of life for all in Louisville, including wildlife. A better proposal would preserve land north of Disk Drive that has never before been developed. Of the dedicated public lands in the current proposal, only 59 acres would be recognizable as open space. The current configuration of Campus Drive would bisect this meager open space, and its intersection with 96th would cause backups from stoplight to stoplight. A better plan would preserve land north of Disk Drive as dedicated public open space, preserving critical habitat for wildlife. A better plan could result in a two, rather than four lane Campus Drive, routed away from the open space and conducive to improved traffic flow. A better plan would cluster reduced square footage of development into a smaller area.
A better proposal would reflect long term thinking: The current, car-dependent proposal would generate up to 20,000 additional car trips per day without providing alternative means of transportation, worsening already hazardous air quality. Traffic flow would slow to failing and substandard levels. A better proposal would be smaller and would generate less traffic, and would reduce car dependence for travel to the site. A “No” vote would allow City Planning staff to prioritize the needs of residents rebuilding after the fire. Residents who need to rebuild would not be in competition for City Planning staff time.
We have the community support and involvement needed to ensure that Louisville can do better: I’ve talked to hundreds of residents, first as candidate for City Council in 2019 and now, as cosponsor of the referendum petition. There is very little difference of opinion among residents — the vast majority love Louisville’s small town character. Their greatest fear is development that would change the town, making the air unbreathable, the roads impassable, and overwhelm City facilities. There is a groundswell of support for a better proposal for this site. We have the volunteer commitment and structure to ensure a better proposal emerges from this process.
If Louisville residents vote “NO” in this special election, we get the opportunity for a better outcome for this land and for our town. Any proposal submitted in this future, whether the previous 2010 plan or some entirely new proposal, is required to go through an extensive public review process with numerous opportunities for improvement and public input. Please vote “No” and Help Louisville Do Better. www.preservelouisville.org
Sherry Sommer
Citizens for a Vibrant, Sustainable Louisville
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https://www.dailycamera.com/2022/03/31/longmonts-newest-postmaster-is-10th-to-take-on-role-in-76-years/
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Sean Schtakleff got his start working for the post office shortly after he graduated from high school in Palmdale, Calif.
The temporary, Christmas-time job sorting packages in a processing center has led to a nearly 25-year career working for the U.S. Postal Service.
Schtakleff took on his latest role March 16 when he was inducted as the newest Longmont postmaster. He is only the 10th person to serve as Longmont postmaster since 1946.
Before the role in Longmont, Schtakleff was the station manager for the Capitol Hill post office in Denver from 2019 until he was hired in Longmont. He came to Denver after working from 2007 to 2019 for the Durango post office, where he served as a supervisor and postmaster.
The postmaster oversees the day-to-day operations of the post office. In Longmont, the role involves managing roughly 140 workers and 101 routes across Longmont, Frederick and Firestone.
On Thursday morning just before 8:30 a.m., Schtakleff moved through the back room of the post office building at 201 Coffman St. Employees bustled around their work spaces sorting mail, including several crates of peeping baby chicks, which Schtakleff noted are commonly seen at the post office this time of year.
Schtakleff said he was looking to work for a smaller post office, like Longmont, because there’s a chance to better get to know workers and the community they serve.
“I found that Longmont draws more of that rural community that I’m used to down in Durango,” Schtakleff said.
Besides maintaining universal six-day mail delivery, expanding seven-day package delivery and “spurring innovation to meet the needs of our modern customers,” Schtakleff hopes to close the Longmont post office’s hiring gap. The lack of employees is one of the biggest challenges facing the post office today, he said.
“It puts the burden on our current staff,” Schtakleff said. “It puts us delivering mail to the community at later times in the afternoon and later times into the evening. It doesn’t impact the service to the community, it’s more the time of day that we are out there.”
Schtakleff plans to tackle this problem by getting the word out through advertisements, hosting job fairs and visiting community events, such as the farmers market, to share information about hiring opportunities.
Schtakleff is hoping to hire 10 more full-time carriers and up to 40 part-time carriers. He hopes to fill a number of those roles by late summer so that he can have a core of well-trained staff that will be best prepared for the holiday rush, when the post office can see two to three-times its regular volume of mail.
Safety has always been a priority, Schtakleff said, when asked about this element of the job in wake of the fatal shooting of postal worker Jason Schaefer, who died delivering mail in southwest Longmont in October. The mother of Schaefer’s child, and a co-defendant, were arrested in connection to his death.
Schtakleff said from what he knows about the incident, the post office “did a great job handling that,” and that it was a “unique situation with those individuals.”
“Safety is always, always our concern to all of our employees every day,” Schtakleff said. “We have tons of safety programs that we have installed across the nation.”
James Boxrud, U.S. Postal Service spokesperson, said while he wasn’t involved in Schtakleff’s hiring, he worked with him in Denver.
“He is very professional, cares about his employees, community and customers which to me makes him a great fit for our town,” Boxrud wrote in an email.
Boxrud, who lives west of Longmont and has worked with every local postmaster since 1977, also added:
“The Postmaster … is a coveted position in most cities and postmasters often stay for years till they retire or move to larger cities.”
Before Schtakleff, Vicki Stephens served the Longmont post office as officer-in-charge and carried on the postmaster duties in the interim. Stephens began serving in the role after Stacey Bradley left in 2020. Stephens left her role in Longmont to take on the role as postmaster in Broomfield.
Schtakleff lives in north Denver with his wife and three children, ages 14,12 and 8. He said staying in the postmaster role for a number of years is an important part of making a positive impact.
“(The postmaster who’s here for the long run) is a stable figure in the community so that we continue to provide great service,” Schtakleff said. “When that changes, the solidity of the daily process gets hiccups.”
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https://www.dailycamera.com/2022/03/31/ncar-fire-containment-reaches-100-thursday-evening/
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Boulder-Fire Rescue reached 100% containment on the NCAR Fire, which burned 190 acres in Boulder.
According to a tweet sent about 5 p.m. Thursday, Boulder-Fire Rescue announced crews had reached full containment on the fire. However, they noted that it does not mean the fire is completely “out” because there may be smoldering areas or smoke from where it was extinguished.
Hey #Boulder! We are happy to announced that Containment of the #NCARfire is now at 100% and the acreage remains at 190. #boulder #boulderfirerescue #wildland #thanks pic.twitter.com/8oiui8Ok1u
— Boulder Fire-Rescue (@boulder_fire) March 31, 2022
On Tuesday, the fire reached 90% containment thanks to the rainy weather.
Boulder officials said the fire started about 2 p.m. Saturday in Bear Canyon.
At its largest, the evacuation area included an estimated 19,000 people and 8,000 homes before it was reduced Saturday night and then lifted on Sunday afternoon.
There have been no structures damaged and no reported injuries.
The cause of the fire remains under investigation, and the Boulder County Sheriff’s Office is asking anyone who was on or near the trails south of NCAR around the time the fire started and may have seen anything to call 720-564-2679 or email BCSOTips@bouldercounty.org.
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https://www.dailycamera.com/2022/03/31/photos-erie-high-school-vs-centaurus-baseball-3-31-22/
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Erie High School’s Colin Carlson (No. 1) bunts in the game against Centaurus High School in Lafayette on Thursday, March 31, 2022. (Matthew Jonas/Staff Photographer)
Erie High School’s Trenton Rowan (No. 8) catches a bouncing ground ball in the game against Centaurus High School in Lafayette on Thursday, March 31, 2022. (Matthew Jonas/Staff Photographer)
Erie High School’s baseball team celebrates a home run with Holden Pantier (No. 7) in the game against Centaurus High School in Lafayette on Thursday, March 31, 2022. (Matthew Jonas/Staff Photographer)
Erie High School’s Dillon Alcouffe (No. 11) pitches during the game against Centaurus High School in Lafayette on Thursday, March 31, 2022. (Matthew Jonas/Staff Photographer)
Erie High School’s Sam Stem (No. 18) gets a hit in the game against Centaurus High School in Lafayette on Thursday, March 31, 2022. (Matthew Jonas/Staff Photographer)
Erie High School’s Taylor McMaster (No. 2) snags a ground ball in the game against Centaurus High School in Lafayette on Thursday, March 31, 2022. (Matthew Jonas/Staff Photographer)
Centaurus High School’s Jacob Amador (No. 2) tries to grab a ground ball hit by Erie High School in Lafayette on Thursday, March 31, 2022. (Matthew Jonas/Staff Photographer)
Centaurus High School’s Zach Schultz (No. 18) throws to first in the game against Erie High School in Lafayette on Thursday, March 31, 2022. (Matthew Jonas/Staff Photographer)
Centaurus High School’s Zack Young (No. 10) pitches during the game against Erie High School in Lafayette on Thursday, March 31, 2022. (Matthew Jonas/Staff Photographer)
Centaurus High School’s Nathan Hirsh (No. 19) throws the ball in the game against Erie High School in Lafayette on Thursday, March 31, 2022. (Matthew Jonas/Staff Photographer)
Centaurus High School’s Brandon Korn (No. 11) throws to first in the game against Erie High School in Lafayette on Thursday, March 31, 2022. (Matthew Jonas/Staff Photographer)
Centaurus High School’s Nathan Hirsh (No. 19) gets a hit against Erie High School in Lafayette on Thursday, March 31, 2022. (Matthew Jonas/Staff Photographer)
Centaurus High School’s Isaiah Hirsh (No. 3) avoids the pick off attempt by Erie High School in Lafayette on Thursday, March 31, 2022. (Matthew Jonas/Staff Photographer)
Erie High School’s Gabe Mendoza (No. 20) gets a hit against Centaurus High School in Lafayette on Thursday, March 31, 2022. (Matthew Jonas/Staff Photographer)
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https://www.dailycamera.com/2022/03/31/pro-redtail-ridge-lobby-vastly-outraises-opponent-draws-big-support-from-developer/
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The special election committee formed in support of the proposed Redtail Ridge development outraised its opposition nearly 40-fold, according to campaign finance reports made public Wednesday by Louisville.
Yes for Louisville, the pro-development faction, raised a total of $55,617.23 in monetary and in-kind contributions.
Of that total, about $48,000 in in-kind donations came from Redtail Ridge’s developer Brue Baukol Capital Partners LLC, including $30,000 in marketing services from consultancy The Strategy Division.
The Denver-based developer plans to build as many as 3 million square feet of office, industrial and flexible-use buildings at the long-vacant, former Phillips 66 (NYSE: PSX) site off U.S. 36.
In all, Yes has spent $5,382.74, the lion’s share going toward print and digital advertising from Prairie Mountain Media, publisher of local newspapers such as the Boulder Daily Camera and Colorado Hometown Weekly. (Disclosure: BizWest has a content licensing agreement with Prairie Mountain Media)
The campaign’s largest single donors, each of whom gave $500, were former Louisville Mayor Chuck Sisk, who is married to Yes organizer Terre Rushton, and Centura Health’s Avista Adventist Hospital CEO Isaac Sendros, whose involvement is notable because Avista is seeking to relocate to Redtail Ridge. The hospital’s official position is that it is “neutral on the referendum.”
“We are thrilled that our citizen-led initiative has inspired so many Louisville residents to generously support the Yes For Louisville campaign and council’s 2021 approval of the Redtail Ridge redevelopment plan,” Yes treasurer Richard Morgan said this week in a statement. “From the beginning, we have said that we would be transparent and fact-based, and that’s why we’ve properly recorded and disclosed all contributions and expenditures.”
For its part, Citizens for a Vibrant, Sustainable Louisville raised $1,425.85, with the three highest individual donors forking over $103.48.
The group reported spending $2,107.49, apparently operating at a deficit.
The biggest expenditures for the group were yard signs, $1,010.60, and fliers, $614.99.
The special election campaign has been fierce with Yes filing a rules complaint, which was dismissed by Louisville’s City Clerk’s office (although Yes organizers claim the dismissal was in error), and Citizen’s accusing its opponents of operating as pawns of Brue Baukol.
“The developer has spent tens of thousands of dollars spreading professionally-crafted misinformation in the belief that residents can be persuaded to vote against their collective best interest. It just shows their contempt for the people of Louisville,” Citizens supporter Justin Solomon said in a statement. “Maybe this cynical strategy has worked for them in the past, but Louisville voters are a savvy bunch. They won’t be manipulated.”
The April 19 special election, which the Louisville City Council initiated after a successful petition led by Citizens organizers and other opponents of the Redtail Ridge plan, asks voters to decide: Shall Louisville Ordinance No. 1811, Series 2021, An Ordinance Approving the First Amendment to ConocoPhillips Campus General Development Plan (Redtail Ridge Master Plan), be approved?
A “Yes” vote allows Redtail Ridge developer Brue Baukol Capital Partners LLC to move forward with its plans for the property.
A “No” vote would result in the site reverting to its previous land-use designation, which is more restrictive than the plan approved by the Louisville City Council in 2021 after more than a year of debate and public hearings.
This article was first published by BizWest, an independent news organization, and is published under a license agreement. © 2022 BizWest Media LLC.
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https://www.dailycamera.com/2022/03/31/steve-pomerance-the-east-boulder-subcommunity-plan-dont-look-up/
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I can’t resist making a reference to one of the best movies I’ve seen in a long time — “Don’t Look Up.”
For those of you who haven’t seen it, its title refers to politicians telling people to avoid looking up, because if they did, they would see the huge meteor coming to destroy our planet, with obvious parallels to our climate emergency and the unwillingness of many politicians to face it. To me, the East Boulder Subcommunity Plan has the same feeling of unreality, though not as dramatic. It might be a decent start in another context, but for Boulder it simply doesn’t work, because it makes some problems worse, and avoids putting in place the regulations and finances necessary to deal with others.
Jobs/Housing Balance – Over the last 50 years, Boulder has gone from a city with a relatively reasonable balance between jobs and resident workers to one with over 60,000 in-commuters. This has resulted in massive traffic increases (and carbon emissions) and huge pressure on housing prices. The EBSCP makes this worse because all the proposed scenarios add thousands of more jobs than housing for these workers.
Transportation Planning – The EBSCP foresees a giant transit center and other facilities to attempt to address its self-created in-commuting nightmare. But the numbers are huge. Busses will take hours to deal with the full demand, and that assumes that RTD can and will pay for them, which is highly uncertain. The plan’s “last mile” solutions are unproven and unfunded. Efficient self-funding alternatives, like charging for parking and then paying people to carpool, have apparently been ignored.
Affordable Housing – The EBSCP could have proposed that the area be rezoned with much more housing and many fewer jobs to the point where the housing would be more than adequate for the workers, but this never happened. And for the housing that is to be allowed, the regulations could be redone to require, say, 50% of the units to be permanently affordable; that would roughly preserve our population’s current economic distribution. But that didn’t happen either.
Affordable Business Space – It’s not clear to me how much effort was put into achieving this important outcome, but as best as I can tell, any actual regulations are left for the indefinite future. Unfortunately, there is way too much of this vagueness in almost all the implementation of the plan’s goals.
Building Energy Consumption – The EBSCP would have been a good place to implement a requirement that all new buildings be net-zero in energy consumption. Net-zero buildings have already been constructed in Boulder and could easily be done in this planning area. It would mean requiring better insulation, rooftop solar, efficient lighting, etc., plus perhaps some solar gardens with more space for PV panels. Adding in battery storage and micro-grids could create an area that would self-sustain during power failures, making it more attractive for certain businesses. But the only references to anything like this were vague and indefinite.
Expectations – When I raised these issues, one response I’ve heard is that the property owners in East Boulder had reasonable expectations about what they would be able to build, and so making drastic changes would not be fair. So, apparently, the concerns about affordable housing expressed by the city power structure do not extend to correcting the plan’s jobs-housing imbalance and insisting on a high percentage of permanently affordable housing in what gets built there. Interestingly, this level of deference to property owners’ expectations has not been granted to single family homeowners, given the constant threat of up-zoning their neighborhoods to allow multi-unit apartments. Apparently, what’s good for the goose is not good for the gander. Just saying…
Water – I should not have to keep bringing this up, but the numbers I’ve seen indicate that if the Colorado River’s Lower Basin states and Mexico get their allotted shares, the Upper Basin states, which legally are entitled to only the leftovers, will have to cut their consumption. How hard this will hit the Colorado Big Thompson Project is unclear, but it will happen, because the CBT has relatively junior rights. And we in Boulder gets a third of our water from the CBT. We really need a serious risk analysis BEFORE we push all this mass of new development. Taking the attitude of “don’t look up” and failing to do the work first is, frankly, just plain dumb.
The EBSCP clearly needs a lot of fixes for all these issues and problems. It’s time for that hard work to begin.
Steve Pomerance is a former Boulder city council member. stevepomerance@yahoo.com
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https://www.dailycamera.com/2022/03/31/student-voter-registration-week-kicks-off-monday/
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Student Voter Registration Awareness week kicks off on Monday.
High school students who will be turning 18 in 2022 can register to vote in the June primary or November general elections depending on when they turn 18. If you turn 18 before June 28, you can plan to vote in both elections, and before Nov. 8 for general elections.
If you have a Colorado driver’s license or state ID you can register by visiting GoVoteColorado.gov, or find out if your school has a voter registration liaison to help you get registered. If you are not yet 18, you can still pre-register by following these instructions.
In combination with Student Voter Registration Awareness week, the City and County of Broomfield is hosting an “I Voted” sticker design contest for K-12 students.
To enter you must be a K-12 student who lives or attends school in Broomfield County, and you have to use the design template available on Broomfield’s website. All entries are subject to approval and must be non-partisan.
You can submit your artwork and application in-person or by email to electionsdivision@broomfield.org.
For a full list of rules and instructions visit votebroomfield.org. Submissions are due by 5 p.m. on Friday, April 29.
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https://www.dailycamera.com/2022/03/31/study-boulder-second-most-popular-for-zoomer-renters/
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A RentCafe study found that Boulder is the second best city in the country for Generation Z renters.
The analysis determined the popularity of cities across the country by examining the share of total apartment applications submitted by members of each generation.
In Boulder, Generation Z accounts for 66% of applicants, followed by Millennials at 18%.
Boulder was the only Colorado city to crack the top 20 most popular cities with Zoomer renters.
“At state level, Colorado Springs boasts the second-largest share of Gen Z renters — 36%. However, when it comes to Colorado’s trending Gen Z hotspot, Denver is the new up-and-coming favorite,” the report found. “In just one year, apartment applications coming from this age cohort increased by 29%, pushing the city’s share of Gen Z renters to 28% by 2021.”
This article was first published by BizWest, an independent news organization, and is published under a license agreement. © 2022 BizWest Media LLC.
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https://www.dailycamera.com/2022/03/31/u-s-census-boulder-county-lost-residents-from-july-2020-to-july-2021-weld-county-sees-big-gain/
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Weld County added more new residents than any other county in the state since the April 2020 census, according to new data released by the U.S. Census Bureau.
The county added an estimated 11,055 residents, taking it from a population of 328,981 to 340,036, as of July 1, 2021, a growth rate of 3.4%.
The Census Bureau estimates population in counties annually, building on the latest census, earlier estimates and demographic analysis.
Douglas County ranked second statewide in terms of residents added, with 11,012 new residents taking the population from 357,978 to 368,990, an increase of 3.1%.
When looking at estimates for the one-year span from July 1, 2020, to July 1, 2021, Weld and Douglas reversed positions, with Douglas County adding 8,888 residents during that 12-month period and Weld County adding 8,678.
El Paso County ranked No. 3 statewide in terms of population added since the census, with 7,472 new residents taking the population from 730,395 to 737,867, up 1%.
Larimer County ranked No. 4 statewide, adding 3,467 residents, taking the population from 359,066 to 362,533, an increase of 1%.
Boulder County actually lost population according to the estimate, dropping by 1,215 residents, from 330,758 to 329,543, down 0.4%.
Broomfield County added 1,213 residents, taking the population from 74,112 to 75,325, up 1.6%.
Rich Werner, president and CEO of Upstate Colorado, a regional economic-development organization based in Greeley, said the latest population gains reflect a trend that has existed over the past decade.
Weld County communities offer more-affordable housing options than many parts of the Denver area, Werner noted, with growth of industry adding to the appeal.
“When you have an area of Northern Colorado that is tied to the metro Denver region and are seeing robust growth in industry, along with additional affordable (housing) options and a variety of communities to live in, you’re seeing (such factors) support that growth,” he said. “It’s always been an issue of housing stock and affordability that lends itself, along with the commuting patterns of the workforce.”
The Census Bureau identified net migration as the main factor in Larimer County’s one-year population growth, while Weld County showed a robust natural change of 1,993 and net migration of 6,730.
But negative net migration was cited as the key component of Boulder County’s population loss since July 1, 2020, with 1,413 residents moving out of the county, only slightly offset by natural change, or births compared with deaths.
That could be a reflection of the high housing costs in Boulder County. The median single-family sales price for the city of Boulder, for example, approached $1.6 million in February, with Longmont at $600,000. February’s median sales price in the Greeley-Evans market was only $434,850.
“We saw this happen to Longmont years ago, where Longmont’s growth was really predicated on the affordability issue of folks who worked in Boulder but could not afford to live there and so moved to Longmont,” Werner said. “And now we’re seeing the same thing as our population growth increases, as our industries continue to grow, we’re seeing more interest in living close to the workplace.”
Nationally, five of the Top 10 largest-gaining counties in 2021, were in Texas, with Collin, Fort Bend, Williamson, Denton and Montgomery counties gaining a combined 145,663 residents.
Also:
- Los Angeles County, Calif., experienced the largest population loss of any county, losing 159,621 residents in 2021. Seventy-one percent of counties (2,218) experienced positive net international migration.
- Four counties crossed the threshold of 100,000 residents in 2021: Cleveland County, N.C. (100,359); Lancaster County, S.C. (100,336); Bastrop County, Texas (102,058); and Grant County, Wash. (100,297).
- Los Angeles County, Calif. (9,829,544), and Cook County, Ill. (5,173,146), had more than 5 million residents in 2021, making them the two most populous counties in the nation.
This article was first published by BizWest, an independent news organization, and is published under a license agreement. © 2022 BizWest Media LLC.
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https://www.dailycamera.com/2022/03/31/boulder-county-center-for-judaism-to-take-orders-for-shmura-matzo/
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The Boulder County Center for Judaism is offering “Shmura” matzo for the Jewish community in their celebrations of Passover.
“Shmura matzo is the closest thing to what our ancestors ate while fleeing Egypt 3,000 years ago,” said Rabbi Pesach Scheiner of the Boulder County Center for Judaism in a news release sent by Chany Scheiner, co-director of Boulder Center for Judaism.
The Center has been importing this “Rolls Royce of Matzo,” which is machine-made and pre-packaged matzo, for more than 30 years.
Scheiner said the word “Shmura” means to watch or guard. The imported matzo are watched closely during preparation so they do not come in proximity with the smallest speck of leavening, which is forbidden on Passover.
This year, over 100 pounds of matzo will be ordered. The Boulder Center for Judaism encourages families to order in advance. Each box contains one pound of product and is available in regular or whole wheat.
Pick up will be between noon and 2 p.m. April 10 by appointment. Purchasers will be notified when their order is ready to be picked up at the Boulder County Center for Judaism, 4900 Sioux Dr., or make arrangements for it to be delivered.
Contact Boulderjudaism@gmail.com or call 720-422-6776 or visit boulderjudaism.com/BuyMatzah to place an order.
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https://www.dailycamera.com/2022/03/31/boulder-police-seek-publics-help-to-locate-stolen-bikes-worth-70000/
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Detectives with the Boulder Police Department are asking for the public’s help to locate bikes worth $70,000 that were stolen late Wednesday night or early Thursday morning.
Startup company Driven Technologies Inc., located in the 2800 block of Wilderness Place, reported the burglary Thursday morning. Police think the burglary occurred between 10 p.m. Wednesday and 8:15 a.m. Thursday, according to a news release from the Boulder Police Department.
Thursday night, Jason Smith, CEO of Driven Technologies Inc., said one of the bikes — his personal bike — was recovered by the Boulder Police Department. His bike, a blue specialized Turbo Levo mountain bike with white lettering, is valued at $12,000.
Officers were still working to locate the other two bikes stolen Thursday night.
Smith said he arrived at work about 8 a.m. When he walked to the front of the store, he noticed that a football-sized rock was thrown through the company’s glass front door. When the glass did not shatter into pieces, Smith suspects the person kicked it out until it fell out of the frame.
“The rock went through the safety glass, and we think they wanted to gain entry,” he said. “It was framed in, so they kept kicking the bottom and the frame of the window popped inward.”
At first it didn’t seem like anything was stolen, but when Smith walked to the back where the show bikes were, he realized three bikes were gone.
Besides his bike, the other two bikes that were stolen were prototypes. They are worth a combined total of $70,000.
He said he is not sure whether the person who stole the bikes knew what they were taking, adding that they were the most expensive looking bikes in the room but are not usable.
“They have their hands on these beautiful and expensive show bikes, and my fear is they can’t do anything with them and they are going to throw them in a dumpster,” Smith said.
Bike theft has been on the rise in recent years in Boulder County, according to officials.
In November, eight men were indicted by a state grand jury and accused of using stolen vehicles and large rocks to break into and burglarize bike shops across the Front Range, including several in Boulder County.
Mitch Trujillo, community service officer in Boulder, said during a police townhall last year that bike theft is a nationwide problem because bike owners are still not properly locking their bikes or are leaving their garage doors open.
Smith said his company did not have any surveillance cameras at the store but will be investing in them soon.
“I read about it all the time and now it happened to me,” he said. “We read about the bike shops, and now it is really hitting home.”
Boulder police are asking anyone with any information related to this investigation to call Detective Cody Hartkopp at 303-441-1951 and reference case 22-2976. Those who have information but wish to remain anonymous can contact the Northern Colorado Crime Stoppers at 1-800-222-TIPS (8477). Tips may also be submitted through the Crime Stoppers website at nococrimestoppers.com/.
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https://www.dailycamera.com/2022/03/31/boulder-youth-led-healing-event-scheduled-for-saturday/
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Lila Nuttle, a sophomore at Fairview High School, volunteered to help plan an upcoming event around healing after the King Soopers shooting because she’s interested in healing through art.
Her ideas for the event included a community art project, as well as an opportunity for participants to exchange notes with “happy” messages. Between the shooting and recent wildfires, she added, her community has experienced a lot of trauma.
“We just want to put some joy out there and give people a chance to have some fun and feel safe to acknowledge any emotions,” she said. “We want everyone to get something out of this event, whether it’s being with people, finding resources and ways to cope, or just kind of escaping into a stress-free environment.”
Growing Up Boulder is hosting Saturday’s the youth-led Healing Day of Remembrance to mark the one year anniversary of the mass shooting at the Table Mesa King Soopers, where 10 people were killed on March 22.
The free, all-ages event is from 10 a.m. to noon at the Boulder Museum of Contemporary Art, 1750 13th St. Planned by Boulder’s Youth Leadership Healing Committee, the event includes opportunities to heal through art, writing and community connection.
The high school students on the planning committee were supported by Growing Up Boulder, Mayamotion Healing and the University of Colorado Boulder’s Renee Crown Wellness Institute. The event is funded by the Community Foundation Boulder County’s Boulder County Crisis Fund.
Executive Director Mara Minzter said Growing Up Boulder received a grant from the crisis fund to determine what young people need in the wake of the shooting and help provide that support. Twenty six high school students applied to be on the planning committee, while about 18 routinely participated in the sessions.
“They’re so aware and so deeply impacted,” Minzter said. “It’s so easy for us as adults to forget about their needs because they maybe don’t express themselves the same way as adults.”
She added young people are experiencing record high levels of anxiety and depression.
“This healing event is a way for them to help themselves and help others,” she said.
Maya Sol Dansie, who founded Mayamotion Healing, said one theme for the event is fostering resilience.
“The healing of trauma is not linear, and a traumatic event can activate grief or traumas from previous experiences,” she said. “I want to help young people accept that there are heavy experiences we will likely confront again and again.”
Saturday’s event includes art for young children, a community art project, a community altar, a sensory station and a writing station, as well as support from Boulder Mental Health Partners and Natural Highs.
Minzter said the organizing team also will collect information from children and teens at the event about how they wish to heal, then use that information to help design the second part of the project.
“We see this as informing the next steps,” she said.
Josh Cochran-Holmes, a freshman at Fairview High, said he wanted a part in remembering the King Soopers tragedy.
“I didn’t feel like just sitting on the side and watching,” he said.
He said one of his ideas for the events was creating ofrendas, or offerings, on a altar at the event, then allowing participants to add to the display. The overall goal is a “peaceful place (for people) to heal from this event, express their emotions and pay their respects,” he said.
He said he appreciated the opportunity to plan an event, noting young people may think differently than adults.
“We have grown up in a different generation, and we have different ideas,” he said. “That doesn’t mean that anyone is wrong, but some fresh thoughts and healing practices would provide a welcome change.”
Fairview junior Greyson DeMarco worked on the communal art project for the event, with participants invited to paint or draw on a puzzle piece. Once completed, the puzzle pieces will spell the word “healing.”
He said the event is designed for anyone who wants to connect and express themselves, not just those affected by the King Soopers shooting.
“I feel like everybody has gone through something in their life,” he said. “I see this as a resource for people to get help if they want to. You can express yourself however you want to, no matter what you’re going through.”
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https://www.dailycamera.com/2022/03/31/cu-boulder-dedicates-tree-to-victims-killed-in-king-soopers-mass-shooting/
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One by one, each person picked up a shovel. When it was their turn, they bent over, scooped up dirt and gently buried 10 packages of seeds beneath the earth.
Written on each package — of what will soon be budding wildflowers — were the names of every victim killed last year during the mass shooting at King Soopers in south Boulder.
The seeds were buried by the family members and friends of the victims on Thursday at Farrand Field. Soon, they will root and grow adjacent to a tree recently planted to memorialize Boulder Officer Eric Talley, Denny Stong, 20; Neven Stanisic, 23; Rikki Olds, 25; Tralona Bartkowiak, 49;Teri Leiker, 51;Suzanne Fountain, 59; Kevin Mahoney, 61;Lynn Murray, 62; and Jody Waters, 65, who were killed in the shooting.
“Planting this tree cannot bind the wounds that were inflicted on our community almost a year ago, but it can serve as a memorial — a reminder of what we lost,” said Juniper Loomis, a student at the University of Colorado Boulder and former King Soopers employee. “It should also serve to remind us of the response from our community, of the love that we have shown that we hold for one another.”
Loomis said she met Stong and Olds when she started working at the Table Mesa King Soopers in November 2020.
SarahDawn Haynes, outreach and engagement coordinator with the University of Colorado Boulder, said the university has had a tree committee for 11 years. She said the campus has hosted memorial trees for alumni and faculty for years, but after the shooting, the committee discussed planting a tree in honor of all of the victims to show their support for the families and students.
“We may not fully understand how it impacted our community, but it’s very significant,” Haynes said. “It will be a way for whoever comes to school here to know it’s a part of our history. It’s touched so many of our lives.”
The tree planted is a catalpa. In the winter it loses its leaves, but soon large heart-shaped leaves will spring from it, said Stephanie Mayer, senior instructor of ecology and evolutionary biology at CU Boulder. In May or June, the tree will produce flowers, which is later than many other trees on campus, who will have lost their blossoms by then.
“This tree flowers when there aren’t other flowering trees out there,” Mayer said.
In honor of Leiker, who had a love and passion for the Golden Buffaloes Marching Band, the tree sits in view of where the band practices, Haynes said.
“(The memorial) just makes us whole and makes us recognize our wounds instead of just trying to move on with life,” she said.
Vince Aquino, CU Boulder forestry supervisor, said the university is working to add a plaque in front of the tree which will list the victims’ names.
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https://www.dailycamera.com/2022/03/31/erie-high-senior-wins-40000-college-board-scholarship/
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Erie High School senior Ethan Cramer recently learned he was one of 25 students nationwide to win a $40,000 College Board scholarship.
College Board awarded more than $1 million in scholarships through BigFuture, its online college planning tool. Students earn entries in the scholarship competition by completing steps in the online guide.
Cramer and other scholarship winners were surprised with the news that they had won the scholarships on Good Morning America.
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https://www.dailycamera.com/2022/03/31/macys-sales-price-revealed-32m/
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The former Macy’s building in the Twenty Ninth Street shopping center sold last week for $32 million, Boulder County property records show.
Boulder 29 LLC, a joint venture between Denver-based developer Corum Real Estate Group and New York City-based Fair Street Partners, acquired the vacant building from Macy’s Real Estate Holdings LLC.
The Boulder City Council approved plans to redevelop the department store into a three-story, 154,000-square-foot office building with 9,000 square feet of retail space on the ground floor. Construction is set to start in May, with delivery expected by the fourth quarter of 2023.
“The adaptive reuse of this building will be an excellent example of how recycling and repurposing outdated structures can energize irreplaceable real estate,” said Eric Komppa, president of Corum Real Estate Group, in a statement. “In addition to reutilizing the building’s shell, the project will capitalize on the structure’s high ceilings, large floorplates, and Flatiron vistas to create an environmentally efficient and distinctive office environment that is ideally suited for the wide variety of tenants in and drawn to the Boulder market.”
Since 2016, Macy’s has announced the closure of hundreds of stores, but the company’s other Colorado locations have thus far been spared. Locally, Macy’s operates in Broomfield, Fort Collins and Loveland.
Last year, the Fort Collins location at Foothills Mall was purchased by a private equity company with ties to the development firm that’s been tapped to lead redevelopment at the mall.
There have been plans in place to redevelop the Boulder Macy’s for several years.
In early 2021, the Boulder City Council decided in an 8-1 vote to approve a site plan that proposes to transform the shuttered department store into a mixed-use office and retail space.
Despite the approval, the Macy’s project remained controversial due to nagging concerns that the addition of office space will exacerbate Boulder’s jobs-housing imbalance.
That imbalance is a reference to Boulder’s ongoing challenge of providing affordable housing options for the city’s workforce while continuing to add high-wage professional jobs that push up the cost of housing.
Boulder’s concern over the jobs-housing imbalance is so acute that the council in early 2019 adopted a development moratorium across a swath of the city that includes the Macy’s site. That moratorium, inspired by Macy’s proposal, was meant, in part, to assure existing residential and retail spaces wouldn’t be gobbled up by developers and turned into office buildings. Macy’s plans were initiated prior to the moratorium, which was rolled back in October 2019.
In an effort to address these concerns, Macy’s has pledged to contribute $3 million to Boulder’s affordable housing program.
This article was first published by BizWest, an independent news organization, and is published under a license agreement. © 2022 BizWest Media LLC.
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https://www.dailycamera.com/2022/04/01/boulder-traveler-pens-cookbook-for-the-modern-nomad-with-the-buslife-kitchen/
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When it comes to road tripping, adventurers are going beyond trail mix and jerky to fuel up.
Life on America’s highways and backroads offers satisfying views and equally fulfilling homemade meals, if you know your way around an abbreviated version of a home kitchen.
Boulder couple A.J. Forget and Ayana Otteman embarked on a journey in April 2020 and have since been posting up at national parks, campgrounds and the occasional Cracker Barrel parking lot.
Forgoing fast food and freeze-dried fare, Forget took advantage of the three burners in the duo’s refurbished, short school bus — named Sweet Bea — that they outfitted themselves.
Under pastel desert skies and by salty coasts, he crafts everything from refreshing watermelon gazpacho to stovetop nachos in less than 100 square feet of living space.
Forget fused his love of the open road and flavorful eats with a cookbook entitled, “The Buslife Kitchen.” Funded by an extremely successful Kickstarter campaign, the project gained speed rather quickly with the goal of $10,000 being surpassed.
While recipes are designed to be crafted while on wheels, they truly can be enjoyed on the grid as well. Offering a mix of super-easy dishes to throw together post-hike and more elaborate ones to dive into when energy and time allow, the book offers the perfect mix of mouthwatering fare.
The e-book ($17) is currently available at TheBuslifeKitchen.com. Folks can also pre-order a paperback copy ($22), which is expected to be released in July. Also on the site is an array of “Buslife Kitchen” swag from tanks and T-shirts to enamel camping mugs.
Forget previously worked as a wildland firefighter for the National Park Service, based mostly out of Rocky Mountain National Park. During that time, he put away money that has acted as a bit of a nest egg — allowing him to devote time to this book venture.
Otteman, a jeweler, currently works as a nanny for the Venardos Circus — a troupe of acrobats and magic-makers that are set to roll into Longmont in late April. After Otteman got the unique job offer from a magician friend, she and Forget decided to follow the big top to various locales and have been doing so for the past seven months.
We caught up with the roving couple to find out more about what inspired Forget’s love of cooking, how traveling has brought about a slew of untapped ingredients and the underrated significance of sharing a meal with strangers and friends in the great outdoors.
Kalene McCort: Love the diversity of recipes this cookbook offers. What would you say sparked your interest in the culinary arts?
A.J. Forget: I have enjoyed cooking for about as long as I was able to reach the stovetop. My father and my older brothers were all great cooks, so I grew up in a household where good food was something that was really valued. Back when I could barely see the stovetop, and the only thing I knew how to cook was bacon and eggs, I was always eager to cook up a meal for whatever friends were over. For me, there is little in life as wonderful as sitting down to a really excellent meal with people I love, and it is doubly wonderful if I prepared it. But another part of why I learned to cook is that being broke is a lot more enjoyable if you have some skill in the kitchen. We love to eat, and to eat really good food, but restaurants are expensive.
Back in college, when I was really broke, I realized that it doesn’t take a lot of money to eat really well if you are willing to do the work yourself. A lot of the best dishes out there are made with simple, cheap ingredients, and all you need to make them is a willingness to play around and learn a few things. I am thankfully not as broke as I was back then, but the kitchen skills I picked up over the years still serve me well.
Living in the bus, whenever possible, we like to be way out there camping somewhere beautiful. In those settings — be it the heart of the desert or high up in the mountains — there aren’t a lot of good food options aside from what we make ourselves. Fortunately, with a bit of planning ahead of time and the recipes that I’ve put together in this book, just about anything we want to eat we can make in our tiny kitchen.
KM: Do you guys find yourselves hitting up local farmers markets and buying organic produce, meat and other goods from local purveyors and, does what’s in season play a role in what is plated up?
Ayana Otteman: As much as I love the romantic notion of hitting up a local farmers market and ogling over fresh produce…I actually hate grocery shopping. I am certainly a little embarrassed to admit this, but I find the whole process dull and overwhelming. Most times I accompany Andy to a local market or to the grocery store, I end up perusing the hot sauces, the pickles and the booze, while he does the heavy lifting.
AF: We love to shop seasonally and regionally as much as we can. Or, I guess I’m the only one enjoying the shopping part. But we both do enjoy eating regionally and seasonally, at least. Finding new ingredients to work with is my absolute favorite thing, and it is certainly one of the joys of living on the road.
While it can seem at times like the food of our country is pretty homogenous, there is still a lot of variety in regional ingredients and cuisines. No matter where you are in this country, there is something unique and wonderful to the local food scene, whether we’re talking about a known favorite like Maine lobster or more of a hidden gem like the datil peppers of St. Augustine (Florida). There is always something wonderful to discover if you know where to look.
KM: I understand you recently surpassed your Kickstarter goal that will cover the cost of printing. Congrats. Were you surprised with the level of support that poured in from folks all over?
AF: This Kickstarter campaign has truly been a life-changing experience for me. I have been working on this project for several years, and during that time I received a lot of good feedback, but there was definitely still a part of me that was afraid this crowdfunding campaign would be a complete flop. Instead, we reached our first funding goal in under a week.
By the end of the campaign, we had exceeded that initial goal by 54%. Around 300 copies of the book have already sold to people in at least 15 different countries. But, most importantly, the personal messages that I’ve received have been just so kind and enthusiastic. I really could not have anticipated this level of support and excitement, and I am completely overwhelmed with gratitude.
KM: I imagine it’s hard to narrow down, but are there a few favorite dishes in “The Buslife Kitchen” that you’d consider stand-outs?
AO: Although I don’t enjoy the shopping process, I definitely enjoy the taste-testing process. Over the last two years I have had the pleasure of tasting all the recipes in “The Buslife Kitchen” — some of them many times over. It is certainly hard to narrow down, but here are a few faves you won’t want to miss. Baking is something that I love, and figuring out how to do it in the bus was a challenge.
When Andy mastered the recipe for this stovetop focaccia, I was so excited. It’s a perfect appetizer or side dish for any meal. Rajas con crema are delightful vegetarian tacos featuring beautifully blistered poblano peppers that pack the perfect punch. I’m such a sucker for a good poke bowl, and the cubed beets in the vegan poke bowl are a perfect stand-in for raw fish. After I ate this for the first time, I said I could eat it for every meal…and although Andy wouldn’t quite sign on to that, it has certainly become a go-to in the bus.
I didn’t know much about Hawaiian cuisine before Andy started testing these recipes out, but that section — and the Huli Huli chicken — quickly became one of my faves. Something about grilled pineapple, sweet-glazed chicken and mac salad creates the perfect dinner plate. We shared this meal while on the road with some buslife friends and everyone was raving about it.
There’s also the pumpkin crème brulée –– how can you not want to blow torch a dessert? Pumpkin pie has been my favorite for a long time, but having the spiced pumpkin flavor in a custard with a caramelized sugar top is next level.
KM: What are you hoping your book brings to the lives of buyers and, can we expect any in-person book signings or cooking demos this year?
AF: One of the greatest joys of travel is sharing a drink or a meal with new friends. Living in the bus and traveling full-time, we have met some really amazing people and have had the joy of inviting them over for dinner or a rooftop happy hour and getting to know them.
My hope is that this book will create an invitation for many more such meals and friendships. There is an ancient altruism to the sharing of food, and it is one of the greatest tools we have for bridging gaps between people.
Whether we’re talking about learning about a new cuisine and culture from visiting an unfamiliar restaurant — or cooking one of their recipes — or just inviting over the new neighbors for a barbecue, the sharing of food is a universally important tradition and one that we could all probably do with a bit more of.
As far as in-person events, all that I have planned right now are a couple of vanlife/buslife gatherings. We will be at Descend on Bend in Oregon in August and Skooliepalooza in Arizona in January 2023. But the door is certainly open. I would love to do an event at the Boulder Book Store, but nothing is planned yet. And if you happen to find us in the woods somewhere, I’ll be happy to sign a book, give you a cooking demonstration and invite you over for supper. Following us on social media is definitely the best way to keep up with events that we’re planning.
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https://www.dailycamera.com/2022/04/01/broomfield-state-officials-break-ground-on-crosswinds-at-arista/
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Broomfield and state officials celebrated the groundbreaking of the area’s newest affordable housing community, Crosswinds at Arista, on Tuesday.
Representatives from the Broomfield City Council, Broomfield Housing Authority, the developer, Gorman & Company, and the State of Colorado Division of Housing joined together to break ground on the 159-unit development.
The 6.2 acre site, located at 8710 Uptown Ave., received unanimous approval from Broomfield City Council last November after the council identified the need for more affordable housing in Broomfield.
The development will include a mix of one- to three-bedroom units, meant to serve families and individuals earning up to 60% of the area median income.
“We are incredibly thankful to have had the opportunity to create Crosswinds at Arista in partnership with the City and County of Broomfield, the Broomfield Housing Authority and the State of Colorado Division of Housing. This new community responds to the goals laid out by the Housing Advisory Committee of Broomfield and will expand the spectrum of housing options available in the Arista neighborhood,” Colorado Market President of Gorman & Company Kimball Crangle said in a release. “This project could not have come to fruition without alignment with the seller of the property, the Colorado State Land Board. Our mutual goals helped put this project on the map.”
Amenities for this community include bike storage, playgrounds, laundry facilities, a picnic area and a dog park. According to the release, Crosswinds at Arista will be close to RTD Broomfield Station, with several bus routes and Bus Rapid Transit options between Denver and Boulder.
Construction on the development is expected to be finished in fall of 2023.
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https://www.dailycamera.com/2022/04/01/climate-change-may-push-the-us-toward-the-goldilocks-zone-for-west-nile-virus/
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Michael Keasling of Lakewood was an electrician who loved big trucks, fast cars, and Harley-Davidsons. He’d struggled with diabetes since he was a teenager, needing a kidney transplant from his sister to stay alive. He was already quite sick in August when he contracted West Nile virus after being bitten by an infected mosquito.
Keasling spent three months in hospitals and rehab, then died on Nov. 11 at age 57 from complications of West Nile virus and diabetes, according to his mother, Karen Freeman. She said she misses him terribly.
“I don’t think I can bear this,” Freeman said shortly after he died.
Spring rain, summer drought, and heat created ideal conditions for mosquitoes to spread the West Nile virus through Colorado last year, experts said. West Nile killed 11 people and caused 101 cases of neuroinvasive infections — those linked to serious illness such as meningitis or encephalitis — in Colorado in 2021, the highest numbers in 18 years.
The rise in cases may be a sign of what’s to come: As climate change brings more drought and pushes temperatures toward what is termed the “Goldilocks zone” for mosquitoes — not too hot, not too cold — scientists expect West Nile transmission to increase across the country.
“West Nile virus is a really important case study” of the connection between climate and health, said Dr. Gaurab Basu, a primary care physician and health equity fellow at the Center for Climate, Health, and the Global Environment at Harvard’s public health school.
Although most West Nile infections are mild, the virus is neuroinvasive in about 1 in 150 cases, causing serious illness that can lead to swelling in the brain or spinal cord, paralysis, or death, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. People older than 50 and transplant patients like Keasling are at higher risk.
Over the past decade, the U.S. has seen an average of about 1,300 neuroinvasive West Nile cases each year. Basu saw his first one in Massachusetts several years ago, a 71-year-old patient who had swelling in his brain and severe cognitive impairment.
“That really brought home for me the human toll of mosquito-borne illnesses and made me reflect a lot upon the ways in which a warming planet will redistribute infectious diseases,” Basu said.
A rise in emerging infectious diseases “is one of our greatest challenges” globally, the result of increased human interaction with wildlife and “climatic changes creating new disease transmission patterns,” said a major United Nations climate report released Feb. 28. Changes in climate have already been identified as drivers of West Nile infections in southeastern Europe, the report noted.
The relationship between lack of rainfall and West Nile virus is counterintuitive, said Sara Paull, a disease ecologist at the National Ecological Observatory Network in Boulder who studied connections between climate factors and West Nile in the U.S. as a postdoctoral researcher at the University of California-Santa Cruz.
“The thing that was most important across the nation was drought,” she said. As drought intensifies, the percentage of infected mosquitoes goes up, she found in a 2017 study.
Why does drought matter? It has to do with birds, Paull said, since mosquitoes pick up the virus from infected birds before spreading it to humans. When the water supply is limited, birds congregate in greater numbers around water sources, making them easier targets for mosquitoes. Drought also may reduce bird reproduction, increasing the ratio of mosquitoes to birds and making each bird more vulnerable to bites and infection, Paull said. And research shows that when their stress hormones are elevated, birds are more likely to get infectious viral loads of West Nile.
A single year’s rise in cases can’t be attributed to climate change, since cases naturally fluctuate by year, in part due to cycles of immunity in humans and birds, Paull said. But we can expect cases to rise with climate change, she found.
Increased drought could nearly double the number of annual neuroinvasive West Nile cases across the country by the mid-21st century, and triple it in areas of low human immunity, Paull’s research projected, compared with averages from 1999 to 2013.
Drought has become a major problem in the West. The Southwest endured an “unyielding, unprecedented, and costly drought” from January 2020 through August 2021, with the lowest precipitation on record since 1895 and the third-hottest daily average temperatures in that time period, a National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration report found.
“Exceptionally warm temperatures from human-caused warming” have made the Southwest more arid, and warm temperatures and drought will continue and increase without serious reduction of greenhouse gas emissions, the report said.
Ecologist Marta Shocket has studied how climate change may affect another important factor: the Goldilocks temperature. That’s the sweet spot at which it’s easiest for mosquitoes to spread a virus. For the three species of Culex mosquitoes that spread West Nile in North America, the Goldilocks temperature is 75 degrees Fahrenheit, Shocket found in her postdoctoral research at Stanford University and UCLA. It’s measured by the average temperature over the course of one day.
“Temperature has a really big impact on the way that mosquito-transmitted diseases are spread because mosquitoes are cold-blooded,” Shocket said. The outdoor temperature affects their metabolic rate, which “changes how fast they grow, how long they live, how frequently they bite people to get a meal. And all of those things impact the rate at which the disease is transmitted,” she said.
In a 2020 paper, Shocket found that 70% of people in the U.S. live in places where average summer temperatures are below the Goldilocks temperature, based on averages from 2001 to 2016. Climate change is expected to change that.
“We would expect West Nile transmission to increase in those areas as temperatures rise,” she said. “Overall, the effect of climate change on temperature should increase West Nile transmission across the U.S. even though it’s decreasing it in some places and increasing it and others.”
Janet McAllister, a research entomologist with the CDC’s Division of Vector-Borne Diseases in Fort Collins, Colorado, said climate change-influenced factors like drought could put people at greater risk for West Nile, but she cautioned against making firm predictions, since many factors are at play, including bird immunity.
Birds, mosquitoes, humans, and the virus itself may adapt over time, she said. For instance, hotter temperatures may drive humans to spend more time indoors with air conditioning and less time outside getting bitten by insects, she said.
Climate factors like rainfall are complex, McAllister added: While mosquitoes do need water to breed, heavy rain can flush out breeding sites. And because the Culex mosquitoes that spread the virus live close to humans, they can usually get enough water from humans’ sprinklers and birdbaths to breed, even during a dry spring.
West Nile is preventable, she noted: The CDC suggests limiting outdoor activity during dusk and dawn, wearing long sleeves and bug repellent, repairing window screens, and draining standing water from places like birdbaths and discarded tires. Some local authorities also spray larvicide and insecticide.
“People have a role to play in protecting themselves from West Nile virus,” McAllister said.
In the Denver suburbs, Freeman, 75, said she doesn’t know where her son got infected.
“The only thing I can think of, he has a house, they have a little baby swimming pool for the dogs to drink out of,” she said. “So maybe the mosquitoes were around that, I don’t know.”
KHN (Kaiser Health News) is a national newsroom that produces in-depth journalism about health issues. Together with Policy Analysis and Polling, KHN is one of the three major operating programs at KFF (Kaiser Family Foundation). KFF is an endowed nonprofit organization providing information on health issues to the nation.
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1776 Musical about the birth of America, through April 3, Performance Now Theatre Company, Lakewood Cultural Center, 470 S. Allison Parkway, Lakewood; $20; performancenow.org.
Animal Farm Stage version of George Orwell’s biting satire, through May 21, Arvada Center for the Arts, 6900 Wadsworth Blvd., Arvada; $45; arvadacenter.org.
The Liar Adaptation of a French farce, through May 22, Arvada Center for the Arts, 6900 Wadsworth Blvd., Arvada; $45; arvadacenter.org.
Murder on the Orient Express Agatha Christie’s whodunit set aboard a train, through April 16, Candlelight Dinner Playhouse, 4747 Marketplace Drive, Johnstown; $35-$72.50; coloradocandlelight.com.
The Noteworthy Life of Howard Barnes An average man wakes up and discovers his life has become a musical, through April 23, BDT Stage, 5501 Arapahoe Road, Boulder; $65-$70; bdtstage.org.
The Other Josh Cohen Rock ‘n’ roll romantic musical comedy, through May 1, DCPA Theatre, Garner Galleria Theatre, 14th and Curtis streets, Denver; $45; denvercenter.org.
Stick Fly Play that explores the interconnectedness of race and class, April 2-May 19, Arvada Center, 6900 Wadsworth Blvd., Arvada; $45; arvadacenter.org.
Tootsie National tour of the musical based on the popular movie, through April 10, DCPA Broadway, Buell Theatre, 14th and Curtis streets, Denver; $35-$115; denvercenter.org.
Coming soon
Ann A no-holds barred portrait of Texas Governor Ann Richards, April 22-May 5, Cherry Creek Theatre Company, Mizel Center, 350 S. Dahlia St., Denver; $26-$42; cherrycreektheatre.org.
Blue Ridge A progressive high-school teacher spends six months in a church-sponsored halfway house, April 15-June 5, Miners Alley Playhouse, 1224 Washington Ave., Golden; $17-$45; minersalley.com.
Choir Boy Gospel musical about a gay student in conflict, April 22-May 29, Denver Center Theatre Company, 14th and Curtis streets, Denver; $30-$71; denvercenter.org.
Dixie’s Never Wear a Tube Top While Riding a Mechanical Bull Dixie Longate shares lessons learned in this one-person comedy, June 22-July 17, DCPA, Garner Galleria Theatre, 14th and Curtis streets, Denver; $46-$80; denvercenter.org.
Flyin’ West Drama about Black women who forged new lives following the Civil War, April 9-May7, Firehouse Theater Company, John Hand Theater, 7653 E. 1st St., Denver; $25; firehousetheatercompany.com.
Heart Richard World-premiere comedy about Shakespeare’s complicated villain Richard III and all his fans, April 8-30, Buntport Theater, 717 Lipan St., Denver; $(name your price); buntport.com.
Jersey Boys Musical that reveals the story of Frankie Valli and the Four Seasons, April 15-17, DCPA Broadway, 14th and Curtis streets, Denver; $35-$115; denvercenter.org.
Man Up: A Musical Original piece about a boy’s struggle to overcome expectations of masculinity, and the deep redemptive power of love, April 8-10, Empathy Theatre Project, Nomad Playhouse, 1410 Quince Ave., Boulder; $24.60; empathytheatreproject.org.
Quixote Nuevo Tejano musical about becoming the hero of your own story, May 13-June 12, Denver Center Theatre Company, 14th and Curtis streets, Denver; $30-$69; denvercenter.org.
Theater of the Mind David Byrne and Mala Gaonkar-created immersive theater piece world premiere, Aug. 31-Dec. 18, DCPA, York Street Yards, 3887 Steele St., Denver; theateroftheminddenver.com.
They Promised Her the Moon Story of Jerrie Cobb and a group of female would-be astronauts, April 15-24, CU Department of Theatre, Loft Theatre, University Theatre Building; $18; cupresents.org.
Twilight Zone, A Parody Episodes of the famed 1950s/60s TV show are lovingly recreated, April 22-May 14, Theater Company of Lafayette, Mary Miller Theater, 300 E. Simpson St., Lafayette; $18-$23; tclstage.org.
You Will Get Sick Play about learning to live in your own body, April 22-May 14, Benchmark Theatre Company, 1560 Teller St., Lakewood, benchmarktheatre.com.
To submit a new play or production, email the entry plus a high-resolution photo to features@prairiemountainmedia.com, with “theater listings” in the subject line.
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Boulder should see highs in the 50s and 60s over the weekend, according to the National Weather Service.
Today’s forecast calls for mostly cloudy skies with a high of 57 and an overnight low of 34.
Saturday’s forecast calls for mostly sunny skies with a high of 66 and an overnight low of 39.
Sunday’s forecast calls for mostly cloudy skies with a high of 58 and an overnight low of 36, with a 20% chance of rain and snow.
Five-day forecast
Check out what weather is in store for the Boulder County area here
National Weather Service
See what the National Weather service is predicting here
24-Hour satellite
Watch NOAA’s 24-hour satellite image here
Real-time conditions
See what Boulder’s weather is like now at the National Center for Atmospheric Research here
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Boulder area
15th Street Gallery Featuring work by Boston artist Nancy Simonds and Denver artist Tony Ortega; open by appointment only; 1708 15th St., Boulder; 303-447-2841; 15thstreetgalleryboulder.com
Ana’s Art Gallery Art from local, African and Caribbean artists; noon-5 p.m. Friday-Sunday; 958 Cherryvale Road, Boulder; 303-261-5936; anasartgallery.com
Art and Soul Gallery Works by Denver artist Mark Bueno on display; 10 a.m-5 p.m. Monday-Saturday, 10 a.m.-4 p.m. Sunday; 1615 Pearl St., Boulder; 303-544-5803; artandsoulboulder.com
Art Parts “Spring Yarn Explosion,” while supplies last, get free yarn during Boulder Arts Week (March 25-April 2), make yarn creations and bring them back to the shop to yarn bomb reclaimed trees; 10 a.m.-6 p.m. Monday-Saturday and noon-5 p.m. Sunday; 3080 Valmont St., Boulder; artpartsboulder.org
Art Source International Gallery features antique maps, prints and vintage posters; 10 a.m.-6 p.m. Monday-Saturday, 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Sunday; 1237 Pearl St., Boulder; artsourceinternational.com.
Boulder Creative Collective “Pertenecer” by Grace Gutierrez celebrates Chicanx identity, through April 2; “While I Wait” by Julia Vandenoever explores the human relationship to nature, April 8-May 1; visit website for hours; 2208 Pearl St., Boulder; bouldercreativecollective.com
Boulder Museum of Contemporary Art “Once They Were Red,” fiber installations by local artist Erica Green; “³/ works,” drawing installations by Kansas City-based artist Kevin Townsend; “Inner Lining,” Natani Notah explores her Native American identity with sculpture, all three exhibits up through June 12; “El movimiento sigue” Los Seis de Boulder sculpture by Jasmine Baetz, through Oct. 23; 11 a.m.-5 p.m. Tuesday-Sunday; 1750 13th St., Boulder; 303-443-2122; bmoca.org
BMoCA at Macky “Imaginearia,” abstract drawings, paintings and watercolors by Natasha Mistry, through May 1; 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Monday-Friday; 1595 Pleasant St., CU Boulder campus; bmoca.org.
Canyon Theater and Gallery “The Continuous Line,” a drawing collaboration, through April 28; Boulder Valley School District’s annual K–8 art exhibition, April 6-May 12; 9 a.m.-7 p.m. Monday-Thursday, noon-5 p.m. Friday-Sunday; Main Library, 1001 Arapahoe Ave., Boulder, 303-441-3100, boulderlibrary.org/exhibits.
The Collective Community Arts Center “Ometeotl: We Are All One,” pieces from Chicano Humanities & Arts Council artists, through April 3; 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Tuesday-Thursday and Saturday, 10 a.m.-7 p.m. Friday, noon-5 p.m. Sunday; 201 N. Public Road, Lafayette; lafayetteco.gov.
Dairy Arts Center “Presentiment,” artists tap into the inner self, through April 9; “Project Worthmore,” outdoor mural by Erica Pacha creates awareness for Colorado refugees; 10 a.m.-6 p.m. Monday-Friday, noon-7:30 p.m. Saturday, noon-5:30 p.m. Sunday; 2590 Walnut St., Boulder; 303-440-7826; thedairy.org.
East Window and East Window South “Two Spirit Lakota,” photography from Pine Ridge Indian Reservation by Magdalena Wosinska, April 5-July 28; “Disgust: Unhealthy Practices,” group show in East Window South explores actions that can turn harmful and damaging, opening reception 6:30 p.m. April 7, April 7-June 28; East Window open daily 10 a.m.-10 p.m.; East Window South open by appointment; 4949 Broadway, Unit 102-B and 102-C, Boulder; eastwindow.org.
Eldorado Springs Art Center Art gallery and sculpture garden in the foothills; call for gallery hours; 8 Chesebro Way, Eldorado Springs; 303-378-0454; eldoradospringsartcenter.com.
The Gallery at Bus Stop “The Continuous Line,” Renate Mairie’s print project features continuous drawings from various artists; 6-9 p.m. first Fridays, noon-4 p.m. Saturdays or by appointment; 4895 N. Broadway, Boulder; noboartdistrict.org.
HiFi Jones Studio & Gallery Jonathan Hanst’s pop-culture art mashups are made from reclaimed vinyl and books; 4-8 p.m. Thursday, 11 a.m.-2 p.m. Sunday or by appointment; 209 E. Simpson St., Lafayette; hifijones.com.
Louisville Center for the Arts Spring Member Show, April 14-17; 801 Grant Ave., Louisville; louisvilleart.org.
Mary Williams Fine Arts Gallery features fine art, antique maps and framing services; call for hours; 5311 Western Ave., #112, Boulder, 303-938-1588; marywilliamsfinearts.com
Museum of Boulder “Boulder Strong: Still Strong,” commemorates one year after the mass shooting at King Soopers, through April 10; “Voces Vivas: Stories from the Latino Community,” explores county’s Latino heritage, through Feb. 26, 2023; 9 a.m.-5 p.m. Thursday-Monday, 9 a.m.-8 p.m. Wednesday; 2205 Broadway, Boulder; 303-449-3464; museumofboulder.org
Naropa University Art Galleries Nalanda Campus, 6287 Arapahoe Ave.: Cube Gallery has local and international artists; Nalanda Gallery hosts guest artists and student exhibitions, Lounge Gallery operated by students. Arapahoe Campus, 2130 Arapahoe Ave.: Lincoln Gallery features local and regional artists. Paramita Campus, 3285 30th St.: Paramita Gallery has works in all media by regional artists; all open 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Monday-Friday; bit.ly/naropaart
NoBo Art Center “Mo’Print,” Month of Printmaking group exhibit, through April 16; 4929 Broadway, #E, Boulder; noboartdistrict.org/nobo-art-center.
Particulars Art Gallery “The Nature Of Colorado,” exhibit and sale celebrates the beauty of the state; through April; noon-4 p.m. Monday-Thursday, 10 a.m.-6 p.m. Friday-Sunday; 401 S. Public Road, Lafayette; particularsart.com
Phil Lewis Art From T-shirts to custom snowboards and prints to laser engraving, Phil Lewis’ art is on display and for sale; noon-5 p.m. Friday-Sunday; 2034 Pearl St., Unit 102, Boulder; phillewisart.com
POP! Gallery Open Studios’ pop-up art and gift gallery; 11 a.m.-7 p.m. daily; 1421 Pearl St.; openstudios.org/pop-gallery
R Gallery “Let it Pop!” features art inspired by pop-art movement, opening reception 6 p.m. April 1, runs through April 24; “Flatirons Beauty,” featured collection; 11 a.m.-9 p.m. Tuesday-Saturday, 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Sunday-Monday; 2027 Broadway, Boulder; 303-447-2841; rgallery.art
Rembrandt Yard Aboriginal, local and national art; 11 a.m.-5 p.m. Monday-Saturday, call for hours; 1301 Spruce St., Boulder; 303-301-2972; rembrandtyard.com
Shark’s Ink Renowned printmaking publishing studio and gallery with more than 160 national artist collaborations since 1976; 550 Blue Mountain Road, Lyons; 303-823-9190; sharksink.com
SmithKlein Gallery New watercolor landscape works by Boulder-based artist Jim Pittman, through April; noon-5 p.m. daily; 1116 Pearl St., Boulder; 303-444-7200; smithklein.com
Thistle Community Gallery Work from NoBo artists Linda Bice, Steve O’Bryan, Adderly Grant-Lord and Dan Baumbach, through April; 4871 N. Broadway, Boulder; noboartdistrict.org.
CU Art Museum “Spring 2022 Master of Fine Arts Thesis Exhibitions,” April 1-23; “Hostile Terrain 94” aims to memorialize migrants who have died crossing the U.S.-Mexico border, through April 25; “The Art That Made Medicine,” anatomical illustrations, through April 29; “To Hear the Earth Before the End of the World,” light and sound installation, through July 16; 10 a.m.-4 p.m. Tuesday-Friday, 11 a.m.-4 p.m. Saturday; 1085 18th St., Boulder; cuartmuseum.colorado.edu
University of Colorado Museum of Natural History “Sincerely, Bud Johnson,” features objects from Bougainville Island collected by the CU student after World War II; “Antarctica: More than Meets the Eye,” explores the ancient Dry Valleys where CU conducts research; “Horses in the North American West,” Anthropology Hall; University of Colorado Henderson Building, 15th and Broadway, Boulder; colorado.edu
Longmont area
Firehouse Art Center “Mixed Grit,” inaugural showing of Gregory Santos’ exchange project during Month of Printmaking, through April 24; Capstone exhibit in the South gallery features art from Skyline High School students, through April 3; “Exquisite Connections,” a collaboration between local artists and writers in the South gallery, opening reception April 8, on display April 8-May 8; noon-5 p.m. Wednesday-Friday by appointment, noon-5 p.m. Saturday-Sunday; 667 Fourth Ave., Longmont; firehouseart.org.
The Great Frame Up “Longmont Artists’ Guild Member’s Show,” through April 2; “East Boulder County Artists Spring Studio Tour Preview Show,” opening reception 5 p.m. April 8, on display April 8-May 7; 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Monday-Saturday, 430 Main St., Longmont; longmont.thegreatframeup.com.
Longmont Museum “Washi Transformed: New Expressions in Japanese Paper,” by contemporary Japanese artists, through May 15; 9 a.m.-3 p.m. Tuesday-Saturday; 400 Quail Road, Longmont; longmontmuseum.org.
Osmosis Gallery Hosts more than 45 artists in a variety of mediums; 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Monday-Friday, 11 a.m.-5 p.m. Saturday; 290 Second Ave., Niwot; osmosisartgallery.com.
Walnut Gallery Features work from more than 50 artists in a wide range of media; 10 a.m.-4 p.m. Wednesday-Sunday, and open by appointment; 364 Main St., Longmont; thewalnutgallery.com.
Northern Colorado
Art Center of Estes Park “A Symphony Of Color,” oil paintings by Sally Richmond and photography by her son Sasha Richmond, through April 25; 11 a.m.-5 p.m. daily; 517 Big Thompson Ave., Estes Park; artcenterofestes.com
Artworks Gallery is celebrating its 10th anniversary with a reception 6-9 p.m. April 8, RSVP required; “The Lives and Traumas of Stuffed Animals,” dark humor graphite pencil drawings by Elaine Erne, April 8-June 25; “Power,” local group show that looks at the many forms power can manifest, April 8-June 25; 1-4 p.m. Tuesday-Friday, noon-4 p.m. Saturday; 310 N. Railroad Ave., Loveland; artworksloveland.org
Columbine Gallery More than 800 National Sculpture Guild pieces adorn a sculpture garden with local paintings on display inside; 11 a.m.-4 p.m. Wednesday-Saturday; 2683 N. Taft Ave., Loveland; columbinegallery.com
Independence Gallery Features various mixed-media works from Northern Colorado artists; 11 a.m.-6:30 p.m. Monday-Thursday, 11 a.m.-8 p.m. Friday, 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Saturday, 11 a.m.-3 p.m. Saturday; 233 E. 4th St., Loveland; independencegallery.com
Lincoln Gallery “Regional Photo Show,” black-and-white and monochrome photography, April 8-29; noon-6 p.m. Tuesday-Saturday; 429 Lincoln Ave., Loveland; 970-663-2407; lincolngallery.com
Loveland Museum “In the Garden, In the Distance,” mixed media by Jennie Kiessling, through April 10; “History As Art: Cherry on Top,” Becky Hawley and Dion Weichers explore Loveland’s cherry industry, through July 10; “Ditches & Running Water,” wet plate collodion photographs by Laura Cofrin, through April 24; 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Tuesday-Friday, 10 a.m.-4 p.m. Saturday; 503 N. Lincoln Ave., Loveland; lovelandmuseumgallery.org
Are we missing your exhibit? Please email cfantz@prairiemountainmedia.com with “art exhibit” in the subject line.
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Winter Walkabout Music Showcase — Longmont’s full day of song, where tunes by a variety of local artists can be heard billowing out of barrooms, cafes and other locales — may have recently pivoted to a “spring” rebranding, but still promises a bounty of unforgettable live sets from local entertainers.
“I’m most looking forward to the atmosphere, energy and vibe that the Walkabout brings to downtown and the Longmont Creative District,” said Colin Argys, marketing specialist and event coordinator for Longmont Downtown Development Authority. “Both 2019 and 2020 were such fun days and nights throughout the district, with tons of people out and about, laughing, smiling and enjoying all the wonderful live, local music throughout the various venues.”
Kicking off at 2 p.m. April 9, the showcase — headlined by Foxfeather and iZCALLi — will feature over 100 musicians taking stages at close to a dozen venues throughout town, including record shop Absolute Vinyl.
“We’ve got a small but mighty team of folks helping us put this together,” Argys said. “Karyna Balch is a musician who relocated to Longmont within the past year, and she has stepped in to handle the booking and putting together the lineup. She’s spent a lot of time on it and has done a great job of curating a talented, diverse lineup. We’re excited to showcase all these talented local musicians again this year.”
From Walkabout veterans to newbies, the inclusive event is a place for a myriad of genres to shine.
Many Mountains — the Louisville couple who delivers cosmic Americana — played Winter Walkabout in 2020 and will return for the long-awaited spring edition.
“Up and down — east and west — the sidewalks of Main Street were bustling with humanity,” said Dustin Moran, who founded Many Mountains with partner KR Nelson. “I saw couples strolling hip to hip, spilling over the illustrated diagram of the event like it was a newly acquired treasure map to auditory bliss — which it was.”
While some organized music fans popped in from venue to venue with a purpose, for others, the sounds of folk, blues, bluegrass and more were a welcome surprise in previous years.
“There were folks just out for an evening stroll who serendipitously stumbled upon the event, not previously aware,” Moran said. “Interested — but lacking wristbands — some would stretch their necks to get a glimpse, others ducked their curious heads in to hear. One person attempted to slip the doorman a $20 bill hoping they’d grant them below-board admission.”
Many Mountains will perform at Abbott & Wallace Distilling at 2:45 p.m. April 9.
“For our set, Many Mountains will focus on performing material from our 2021 release, ‘Endless Time’ while folding in some tried-and-true tunes from our past catalogue,” Moran said.
Walkabouts not only provide artists a chance to share their tracks with crowds, but offer cherished opportunities for musicians to revel in sets by their peers.
Moran is just as enthused to catch performances by skilled troubadours as he is to play.
The sounds of Pamela Machala, of Boulder, has tinges of Ben Folds and Sara Bareilles as she consistently delivers excellence behind the keyboard. She will perform at The Times Collaborative at 4:30 p.m. April 9.
“Pamela Machala’s last album ‘Something Simple’ is awesome,” Moran said. “Catchy, smart songwriting, tasteful, succinct piano parts. It gives me feel-good vibes when I listen.”
From solo artists to full-fledged rock bands, the amount of variety is sure to deliver something for everyone.
“I’ve been paying attention to Native Station for years,” Moran said. “It’s fun to watch the evolution of a band. Their frontman and main songwriter, Greg Benton, strikes me as a true individual — one with conviction and a steadfast vision for his art. Native Station’s live shows are overflowing with energy and I plan to be there for it. It’ll do me some good.”
At 5:15 p.m. April 9, Native Station will play Elks Ballroom.
Danny Shafer, Taylor Shae, John McKay and Megan Burtt are just a few of the familiar local names in the upcoming lineup.
Dechen Hawk, of Lyons, will perform at The Times Collaborative at 6 p.m. April 9.
“Dechen Hawk is an ambassador of the Boulder County music community, an integral figure to the scene,” Moran said. “He has a loving heart and a voice that’ll make you weep. I plan to be there for his performance, to enjoy his soulful presence and show my appreciation for all he has done for the past 10-plus years.”
Multiple venues will make way for a fun and packed day of show-hopping.
“This year I’m excited to be hosting a stage at Longmont Public Media,” said Tim Gulsrud, president of Soundpost Sessions. “Many people may be aware of this historic building at 4th and Kimbark in downtown Longmont, but I think a lot of people have not actually ventured inside to see what goes on there. The Walkabout is a great opportunity to do that.”
Gulsrud has created a listening room that hosts a roster of eclectic acts throughout the year.
“We have been producing live music events at LPM since last summer and have done a lot of work to adapt it for use as a performance space and a recording studio,” Gulsrud said. “I’m excited to share that with others in our community.”
Among the acts performing at Longmont Public Media during the Walkabout will be Boulder-based singer-songwriter Wellington Bullings who will perform at 6:15 p.m. April 9.
“Attendees can expect to hear a lot of new material — stripped down with just keys and vocals — as well as songs from my debut album ‘Because I want to.’ I will be performing with an amazing pianist, John Stenger,” Bullings said.
The sultry-voiced songstress, who has been compared to Sade, is also excited to catch sets from fellow artists.
“I’m hoping to check out as many acts as I can,” Bullings said. “The lineup is so wonderful.”
Even after musicians pack up their gear and slip well-worn acoustics back into cases, the festivities will continue.
DJ Drake will be spinning at an after-party at The Times Collaborative. Attendees can enjoy food from Rising Tiger and a cash bar. The party starts around 9 p.m. and will go until around 11 p.m. Walkabout ticketholders get free entry. A cover payable at the door will be available for those who don’t have a wristband.
“Ticket sales have been steady and pre-sales thus far seem to have outpaced the 2019 and 2020 leadup,” Argys said.
At midnight, Walkabout tickets will make the leap from $25 to $30. The morning of the event they will increase to $35.
Walkabout also has a few volunteer slots open. By signing up, folks will get a ticket to check out the shows outside of their scheduled shifts, along with other merch.
“I am eager to hear some new music from other bands and artists,” said Longmont-based singer songwriter Antonio Lopez, who will perform with his band at Firehouse Art Center at 6:30 p.m. April 9 “This year, I am on the planning committee for the festival. We made a conscious effort to present more genres of music than what has been done in the past. In addition, we are striving to have more representation and have the festival reflect Longmont’s cultural diversity.”
Dryland Distillers has crafted a special “Musicians Menu” of unique cocktails available for purchase during the event at the tasting room. Walkabout attendees can also visit Dryland — in the 500 West Breezeway — between 1-9 p.m., to purchase merch directly from Walkabout musicians.
“My wife Georgia and I moved to Longmont 10 years ago now,” Lopez said. “The most rewarding part of being part of this artist community is witnessing our collective artistic growth. When I was a young man, I moved here with little more than a dream in my heart and a guitar in my hand. I feel very fortunate to now be a middle-aged man with the flame of that same dream still burning.”
The return of the Walkabout is a taste of things to come. This summer, the beloved outdoor concert series will return to 4th and Kimbark Street, every Friday in June, from 6-9 p.m.
“The lineup is nearly set, and we expect to announce the schedule and more information after the Walkabout,” Argys said.
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When Centaurus High School chemistry teacher and prep track coach Eddie Taylor first began researching the statistics for his upcoming Everest expedition, he didn’t find many pictures of climbers who looked like him.
In fact, very few Black mountaineers out of about 6,000 individuals have completed the trek up the world’s tallest mountain since the first summit of the Himalayan peak in 1953.
“We knew one or two people have done it, but we knew that it was just not a common thing for Black people to climb Mount Everest,” Taylor said. “When you see 10,000 (total summit attempts), most pictures you see are a picture of a white person or a Sherpa. We just knew it was very uncommon and then when I started looking it up, I found four (Black) people pretty quickly and then couldn’t really find any more. By word of mouth and then just talking to people, that number is now 10, maybe 11.”
Starting next week, Taylor will join the Full Circle Everest Expedition, a team of 11 people of African descent, with the hopes of beginning to change that statistic and to inspire other people of color to embrace the outdoors and mountaineering. They will be the first all-Black team to make the trip up the 29,032-foot beast.
Eight of them, including the 31-year-old Taylor, plan to summit the mountain during the second week of May, as long as everything goes according to plan.
“A group of Black people going to Everest — how can we not talk about representation and talk about inequalities and talk about how important something like this is?” Taylor said. “Because little did I know, this is important to a lot of people outside of me and outside of the people in the group. People are excited about it. Kids are excited about it. Adults are excited about it.”
Taylor, originally from Minnesota, couldn’t say no when team leader Phil Henderson — who first attempted to summit Everest in 2012 — approached him about the project after meeting him in Ouray in early 2021. The teacher and coach in him couldn’t pass up the opportunity to not only make history but to show kids and adults everywhere that they can achieve anything if they have the passion and the drive to do so.
In the months leading up to the expedition, Taylor and his team have worked exhaustively to win over sponsors and create as much visibility for the project as possible. The North Face clothing company will be funding nearly half of the team’s costs, and Italian climbing shoe company Scarpa, as well as Microsoft, will cover much of the rest.
Even though Taylor won’t be in the classroom for the next two months, he’ll still be teaching students near and far on a topic much more exciting than equations and reactions. Langston League LLC, a consulting firm that designs culturally relevant teaching material, is helping Full Circle develop a curriculum that circulates around the project for any teachers who may want to incorporate a lesson on Nepalese people, traveling to Asia, mountaineering, the history of Everest expeditions, goal-setting and relevant vocabulary.
“A lot of schools are interested everywhere: Memphis, Tennessee, Florida, New York, Centaurus,” Taylor said. “It’s kind of everywhere. It’s kind of crazy.”
Microsoft has even helped the team set up a communication channel through Flipgrid to allow teachers and their students to submit questions via email or video to the members of the team. Full Circle plans to hold a 30-minute live event on April 21 meant to interact with the kids in real-time.
Taylor’s wife Anna, who teaches first grade at Meadowlark School in Erie, has loved seeing her young students get inspired before Taylor has even boarded his flight to Kathmandu. Taylor even stopped by to speak in front of a packed house of students and staff at Meadowlark on Thursday morning.
“What I think is going to be really cool is I’ve been working with schools in the area to develop some interactive ways that students in our district and St. Vrain and Adams 12 can follow along in the journey too,” Anna said. “Between the work I’m doing and the work that Microsoft is doing with Flipgrid, it’s going to be awesome to see our students across a couple of districts follow along and get inspired by this trip.”
The full scope of that inspiration has far exceeded the bounds of the Boulder Valley School District, and Taylor hopes it will continue to grow as the team begins their journey from Kathmandu to South Base Camp and beyond. The team will be providing updates from their expedition through @fullcircleeverest on Instagram and under the “follow” tab of their website.
Preparing for the journey
Taylor first began mountain climbing in 2013. He found the new adventure that he craved after completing his stint as a decathlete with the University of Colorado’s track and field team. It combined his passion for athletics and the outdoors and eventually led him to trips up Aconcagua and Denali, two of the Seven Summits — the tallest mountains on each of the seven continents — located in Argentina and Alaska, respectively.
But even after conquering those two, with elevations of 22,841 feet and 20,310 feet, he never had the individual aspiration to take on the biggest behemoth of them all — not, at least, until Henderson first approached him about the endeavor last spring.
The historical and social aspects of the expedition appealed to Taylor more than the climb itself, but he nonetheless bought all the way in to ensure its success and visibility.
He began to train his body for what he could expect in the most Colorado way possible, as he tried to hike as many 14ers as his busy schedule would allow. He became acquainted with his team of 11 through twice-weekly Zoom meetings, as well as through team trips to Bozeman, Montana and Mount Rainier in Washington.
Taylor will take the first step of his 29,000-foot journey when he leaves for Nepal on Saturday and lands in Kathmandu on Monday. From there, Full Circle will begin the 10-day trek up to South Base Camp, which sits at 17,598 feet, and will spend the next two months repeatedly ascending and descending the mountain to properly acclimatize their bodies as the elevations grow steeper and as the air continues to thin out.
If everything goes according to plan, and if the notoriously fickle weather at the summit cooperates, the team plans to reach the top of the world during the second week of May. If unforeseen challenges prevent them from meeting that deadline, they’ll have until the end of that month to attempt the summit.
Taylor’s nerves and excitement haven’t quite settled in yet, even as the expedition fast approaches. After months of preparation and media attention, all while continuing to teach and coach at Centaurus, he’s relieved that the day has finally come and that all of the work he and his team have put into making the dream a reality is about to come to fruition.
He’s hoping that through Flipgrid, Instagram and the film crew that will be following Full Circle’s journey, he’ll help instill a dream or two in the kids and the adults who hope to one day achieve a similar, momentous feat.
He already is.
“What’s been really amazing to see is as awareness of this expedition grows and its purpose, it’s been amazing to see the outpouring of support from the community near and far and the messages that the team is receiving,” Anna said. “People are saying like, ‘Wow, I feel like I’m ready to go on a hike now because I’m seeing that you’re doing this.’ Just that representation has been incredible to see, its impact on the community before they even go.”
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https://www.dailycamera.com/2022/03/31/boulder-county-coroner-autopsy-determines-saza-lee-died-by-suicide/
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The Boulder County Coroner’s Office says that Saza Lee, the Longmont man whose body was found near Sandstone Ranch months after he was reported missing, died by suicide.
Lee, 55, was found in a remote grassy area near a body of water with a handgun nearby, an autopsy report says. He had been missing since Sept. 10, when he failed to return from an evening bike ride along the St. Vrain Greenway. At the time that he went missing, Lee had been expressing suicidal ideation, according to the report.
A gunshot wound was located on the back of Lee’s head, the report said. At the time that he was discovered, his body had moderately decomposed.
Michelle Montonera, investigations supervisor with the coroner’s office, said the office does not track statistics on trajectory of gunshot wound deaths, so it could not say if it was irregular that the gunshot wound traveled from the back to the front of Lee’s head. She added that the coroner’s office determines time of death when someone is pronounced dead.
About 5:15 p.m. Feb. 13, a man flagged a Longmont officer down and told the officer he thought he found a body south of Sandstone Ranch and took the officer to the location.
Longmont public safety spokesperson Robin Ericson said the officer was in Longmont city limits when they were flagged down but that she didn’t know the exact location of the body.
That same day, Bobbie Lee wrote in Facebook post that the body was the remains of her husband, Saza Lee.
About 20 Longmont community members had attended candlelight vigil for Lee in November to pray for his safe return home. Attendees of the vigil were also asked to share stories about Lee, who was an executive director at the Life Care Center of Longmont. At the vigil, co-workers described Lee as having a “great sense of humor” and being “so sweet and generous.”
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https://www.dailycamera.com/2022/03/31/broomfield-pinwheels-for-prevention-going-sustainable/
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This year, a well-known symbol for Child Abuse Awareness Prevention Month is going sustainable.
The Broomfield Early Childhood Council announced it is purchasing large metal blue pinwheels to plant in partner locations, as opposed to the normal smaller plastic ones as part of its Pinwheels for Prevention initiative. Some smaller plastic pinwheels will be reserved for children to take home.
There will be a public pinwheel planting at the Broomfield Public Library on Tuesday at 10:15 a.m.
Since April is Child Abuse Awareness Prevention month, BECC hopes to “celebrate the whimsical, innocent nature of children and to promote accessible resources to our Broomfield families in supporting healthy, thriving children.”
Partners for this include the Broomfield Public Library, City and County of Broomfield, Court Appointed Special Advocates and the Ralston House.
“When seeing these large pinwheels in our county, we hope it evokes the foundation of our community, every child deserves to be valued, healthy and thrive,” a release from BECC states. “Child abuse is preventable and our county and county partners are here to support our families.”
According to the release, resources promoted during this month help to reach families with concrete support in times of need, help to understand parenting skills and the development of young children, create social connections with other families, build parental resilience and know the social and emotional competence of children.
You can access these resources and find more information at broomfieldecc.org/pinwheelsforprevention.
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https://www.dailycamera.com/2022/03/31/colorado-towing-legislation/
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Doris Morales walked to her car one day last summer to take her daughter to a critical doctor’s appointment.
But when she got to her parking spot at her Commerce City apartment building, she realized the vehicle had been towed.
Morales had expired plates. Her hours as a housekeeper had been cut during the pandemic, leaving her to decide between rent and renewing her tags, she said.
Her daughter has Down syndrome and the doctor’s appointment that day was to check whether the food she ate was going down correctly. Without a car, they missed the appointment. It took five months to reschedule.
“It was very anxious those five months to see what would happen in terms of her health and well-being,” Morales said through a translator.
It’s stories like Morales’s that prompted Colorado lawmakers to introduce a bill last week that they say would even the playing field between towing operators and the general public.
The proposed legislation amounts to what sponsors call a new towing bill of rights: It would ban the practice of towing cars for expired plates, and tow companies would no longer be able to keep someone’s car if they can’t afford to pay to get it back.
Costs for nonconsensual tows on private property — like in Morales’s apartment parking lot — would be brought down to be more in line with what a driver might pay if they got stranded on the side of the highway. Towers would have to give 24 hours’ written notice before removing a vehicle from an apartment complex or mobile home park.
The bill would also require more notice and better documentation from tow companies, and include stronger protections within the Public Utilities Commission and the Colorado Attorney General’s Office.
“It’s just about creating parity between nonconsensual operators and car owners,” said Rep. Edie Hooton, a Boulder Democrat who sponsored this bill. “Because right now there is none. There is no accountability for the tow operators.”
The towing industry opposes the bill in unusually strong language, saying lawmakers don’t understand their industry and that these changes don’t ultimately address their root concerns.
“They took the towing industry and said, ‘Those are the bad guys; we’ll throw them on the ground and drive over them with a bus,’ ” said John Connolly, president of the Towing and Recovery Professionals of Colorado. “This bill is, ‘(Expletive) the towers, they’re the bad guys.’ “
What’s in the bill?
One of the biggest pieces of HB 22-1314 — which is co-sponsored by Rep. Naquetta Ricks, an Aurora Democrat, and Sen. Julie Gonzales, a Denver Democrat — would take away the ability of tow companies to seize possession of people’s cars if they can’t pay the several hundred dollars it can cost to retrieve the vehicles after a nonconsensual tow from private property.
Under current law, that “possessory lien” can happen after 30 days, and it gives the tow yard the ability to auction the car. This situation puts many low-income people in an excruciating bind: Borrow hundreds of dollars from friends or family? Take out a payday loan with crippling interest? Or just lose the car altogether.
“It’s the loss of a job, the inability to take your kids to school or get food at the grocery store,” said Zach Neumann, co-founder and executive director of the COVID-19 Eviction Defense Project. “All of life’s most important tasks are taken away from you.”
Expired plates have been a common reason for tows, and the issue has only been exacerbated during the pandemic, when the Department of Motor Vehicles fell behind on its paperwork. In October, Denver’s DMV branches closed for two days so officials could chip away at a 52-day backlog in registrations and titles. The city had already stopped issuing tickets for expired tags due to the backlog.
Clara Rodriguez found herself with a $293 bill after her car was towed for expired tags earlier this month from her Aurora apartment building
“It was very difficult,” the 34-year-old said through a translator. “As a single mother, that $293 is coming from other areas that I can be using to support my daughter.”
She had to borrow the money from her sister and friend.
“This is a huge injustice,” Rodriguez said.
Lawmakers in this bill also wanted to address the cost question. Right now, the price difference between consensual and nonconsensual tows can be hundreds of dollars. The bill would mandate that carriers bring the nonconsensual tow fees in line with what they charge for consensual tows.
For someone like Morales, the $380 it cost to get her car back from the lot could have been two weeks of food for her family. Others have seen bills soar even higher.
“Paying $600 is truly life-changing,” Neumann said, citing studies that show the average American doesn’t have the savings to cover a $400 emergency.
Bringing down prices for nonconsensual tows ignores the high overhead and significant insurance costs it takes to operate these tow yards, Connolly argued, including workers’ compensation and expensive liability insurance. Consensual tows cost less because they have fewer expenses.
“All those things add up,” Connolly said. “People just don’t see that. They don’t understand how much it really costs to run a tow company.”
Greater oversight
The bill would also give both the state attorney general and the Public Utilities Commission greater oversight over towing companies that violate the law.
The proposed legislation would create an office of tow hearings to adjudicate disputes between tow carriers and vehicle owners towed from private property without their consent. Hearing officers or administrative law judges would hold hearings to determine whether a carrier violated the law or caused damages.
The attorney general would be empowered to prosecute violators under the deceptive trade practice statute.
Under current law, anyone with a claim against a tow company can file a complaint with the PUC. But a lack of staffing has caused cases to stack up, and investigators have previously told complainants that they have limited resources in adjudicating their complaints.
Former towing investigators and industry experts told The Denver Post that companies often chalk up PUC fines as a cost of doing business.
“We need to give people more channels to express concerns or to enforce their rights when vehicles are taken,” Neumann said. “We have a system right now that if you’re towed, you’re basically guilty until proven innocent.”
The towing industry didn’t immediately push back on this bill. In January, Connolly told Colorado Public Radio that his group looked forward to working with lawmakers to “close loopholes in current private property laws to help protect consumers and the integrity of the towing industry.”
But Connolly now says the legislators didn’t work with stakeholders to hash out the bill’s language and, as a result, the bill doesn’t address what they say it will address. The sponsors, he said, “are too young in the legislature and don’t know what they’re doing.”
“They said that this a consumer bill of rights,” Connolly said. “This isn’t a bill of rights. This isn’t Thomas (expletive) Jefferson here. It’s flashbangs, big headlines.”
Connolly said lawmakers are lumping all of Colorado’s 700 tow companies in with the small number of bad actors that give towing companies a bad name. Most of them, he said, are doing things the right way.
“They have some really dumb stuff in here,” Connolly said of the bill.
Bill sponsors and advocates, however, say it’s more than time for consumers to have protections in this industry. They cited a 2021 report from the U.S. Public Interest Research Group’s Education Fund that found holes in Colorado’s towing protections. This bill is an attempt to fill in those gaps, they said.
“Tow companies have become the judge, jury and bail bondsmen,” Ricks said. “It’s weighted too heavily in their court.”
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https://www.dailycamera.com/2022/03/31/dead-company-returning-to-play-folsom-field-in-boulder/
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Dead & Company will return to play two shows this summer at the University of Colorado Boulder’s Folsom Field, the first time the band has been in Boulder since the onset of the COVID pandemic.
According to the band’s website, Dead & Company will play two shows on June 17 and 18 as part of their 2022 summer tour.
“We can’t wait to see you out on the road for Dead and Company Summer Tour ’22,” the band tweeted Thursday.
The band canceled its 2020 tour due the pandemic and then played at Fiddler’s Green Amphitheater in Greenwood Village in 2021 when CU Boulder had yet to lift its COVID restrictions on campus.
Dead & Company, featuring former Grateful Dead members with singer-guitarist John Mayer, had played Folsom for four straight summers prior to 2020 and remain the only act to play there since the return of music to the venue in 2016.
“We are excited that we’re able to continue bringing the community back together for events on the CU Boulder campus,” the university said in a statement Thursday. “Among the many things missed during the pandemic has been the opportunity to host events at which the community can gather. We look to forward to CU Boulder again becoming a centerpiece for a variety of shared community experiences.”
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https://www.dailycamera.com/2022/03/31/marshall-fire-investigation-likely-to-take-several-more-months/
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The Boulder County Sheriff’s Office said the investigation into December’s Marshall Fire in east Boulder County could take “several more months.”
The sheriff’s office sent out a release Thursday with the updated timeline.
“The sheriff’s office recognizes the importance of this investigation and the community’s desire to understand what happened, however, we believe a thorough investigation is always warranted,” the statement read. “Investigators have been working with experts from around the country to analyze the evidence and to identify the possible cause and origin of the fire. That work is ongoing and will take time.
“Unfortunately, the sheriff’s office cannot share specific information regarding an open investigation.”
The sheriff’s office did say it had reviewed nearly 200 tips, hundreds of videos and photos, 911 calls, executed multiple search warrants and interviewed hundreds of witnesses.
According to the release, following the investigation a report will be given to the Boulder County District Attorney’s Office to determine if charges are warranted.
“Once this is complete, we anticipate conducting a media briefing to discuss the investigation outcome, release pertinent photos and videos, and answer questions related to the investigation,” the sheriff’s office stated.
The sheriff’s office in late January said the investigative portion of its quest to find the cause of the Marshall Fire was “nearing completion” and that the evidence had been turned over to experts and labs for analysis.
Officials have been looking into powerlines, human activity and even a long-smoldering coal mine as possible causes.
The Marshall Fire started as a grass fire near Marshall Road and Colo. 93 on Dec. 30 before burning 6,000 acres and destroying more than 1,000 homes. One person has been confirmed dead, and another is missing and presumed dead.
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https://www.dailycamera.com/2022/03/31/photos-ceremonial-tree-planting-at-cu-for-king-soopers-victims/
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Tom Whittington, father of shooting victim Terry Leiker, adds dirt to the memorial tree. The University of Colorado Boulder dedicated a tree to the people killed in the Boulder King Soopers shooting. It was planted to be within sight of where the Golden Buffaloes Marching Band practices. Leiker was a fan of the marching band. (Cliff Grassmick/Staff Photographer)
Juniper Loomis, left, a former employee of King Soopers and friend to some of the victims, hugs SarahDawn Haynes, of the Environmental Center at the University of Colorado Boulder. (Cliff Grassmick/Staff Photographer)
Margie Whittington, mother of King Soopers victim, Terry Leiker, adds dirt to the memorial tree. The University of Colorado Boulder is dedicating a tree to the people killed in the Boulder King Soopers shooting. It was planted to be within sight of where the Golden Buffaloes Marching Band practices. Victim,Teri Leiker was a fan of the marching band. (Cliff Grassmick/Staff Photographer)
BOULDER, CO, March 31, 2022: SarahDawn Haynes, of the Environmental Center, puts flowers next to the memorial tree on March 31, 2022. The University of Colorado Boulder is dedicating a tree to the people killed in the Boulder King Soopers shooting. It was planted to be within sight of where the Golden Buffaloes Marching Band practices. Victim,Teri Leiker was a fan of the marching band. (Cliff Grassmick/Staff Photographer)
Christopher Wood adds dirt to the tree during the ceremony on March 31, 2022. The University of Colorado Boulder is dedicating a tree to the people killed in the Boulder King Soopers shooting. It was planted to be within sight of where the Golden Buffaloes Marching Band practices. Victim,Teri Leiker was a fan of the marching band. (Cliff Grassmick/Staff Photographer)
Juniper Loomis, left, a former employee of King Soopers and friend to some of the victims, stands with SarahDawn Haynes, of the Environmental Center at the University of Colorado Boulder. The University of Colorado Boulder is dedicating a tree to the people killed in the Boulder King Soopers shooting. It was planted to be within sight of where the Golden Buffaloes Marching Band practices. Victim,Teri Leiker was a fan of the marching band. (Cliff Grassmick/Staff Photographer)
A catalpa tree was chosen as the memorial tree, planted next to Farrand Field. The University of Colorado Boulder is dedicating a tree to the people killed in the Boulder King Soopers shooting. It was planted to be within sight of where the Golden Buffaloes Marching Band practices. Victim,Teri Leiker was a fan of the marching band. (Cliff Grassmick/Staff Photographer)
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https://www.dailycamera.com/2022/04/01/boulder-county-cancels-april-testing-of-outdoor-emergency-sirens/
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Boulder County will skip this month’s testing of its outdoor emergency sirens due to “the recent wildfires and community impacts.”
The sirens were scheduled to be used on Monday, as the county usually conducts two tests on the first Monday in warm-weather months.
But the county in a release today said it would not be conducting a test in April. Boulder County is still working to fully extinguish the NCAR fire in south Boulder and is only a few months removed from the Marshall Fire in December and the anniversary of the King Soopers shooting in March.
The county will still conduct weekly “silent” testing of the system.
Audible siren testing will resume on May 2. The test will occur at 10 a.m. and 7 p.m. unless Boulder County experiences severe weather.
For updated information, visit www.BoulderOEM.com. To sign up for emergency alerts, visit boco911alert.com.
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https://www.dailycamera.com/2022/04/01/boulder-death-investigation/
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Boulder police are investigating a suspicious death after a body was found in the 4800 block of Pearl Street early Friday morning.
Boulder Police spokesperson Dionne Waugh said an unresponsive person was found in the street about 6 a.m. by a passerby, and police responded to the scene and found the person dead.
Waugh said the body did have “traumatic injuries,” but no further information on the cause of death was available at this time.
The Boulder County Coroner’s Office will release the person’s identity and conduct an investigation into the cause and manner of death.
Waugh said there is no immediate public threat and that there are no details on the person’s identity yet.
The investigation still is in the “very early, early” stage, she said.
Officials have closed Pearl Street between 47th and 49th streets while the investigation is ongoing, and Waugh said it was likely police would be there for most of the day.
There is also a separate area taped off east of 49th Street that police said was also related to the investigation.
ALERT: We are currently monitoring what #Boulder police have called a death investigation in the 4800 block of Pearl Street. Incident commander is on scene. No further details at this time. Pearl is closed between 49th and 47th. pic.twitter.com/LOmnd41oz1
— Mitchell Byars (@mitchellbyars) April 1, 2022
Waugh said drones were being deployed at the scene, and evidence markers could be seen placed along Pearl Street.
Anyone who was in the area this morning or who has information about the incident is asked to call Boulder police Detective Ashly Flynn at 303-441-1850 or Detective Scott Byars at 303-441-1970 in reference to case No. 22-02957.
This is a developing story.
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https://www.dailycamera.com/2022/04/01/broomfield-officials-issue-potential-breach-warning-to-extraction/
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Broomfield officials have issued a notice of a potential breach to Extraction Oil & Gas regarding the March 12 fire at Interchange Pad A.
An email from City and County Manager Jennifer Hoffman, which was sent Monday and released three days later on Broomfield’s Oil and Gas Snapshot, stated that city officials believe the March 12 incident shed light on a breach of the operator agreement on Extraction’s part.
“Broomfield staff, elected officials and residents are extremely concerned about fire danger from oil and gas operations,” Hoffman wrote in the email. “This concern has only increased given the incidents that occurred on Nov. 9, 2021 (fire caused by failure to maintain mud/gas separator cleanout) and Jan. 14, 2022 (smoke plume caused by a separator valve malfunction).”
The email from Hoffman requested that Extraction should confirm in writing “the steps it is taking to address the human error documented by the Root Cause Analysis.”
“Broomfield recognizes that Extraction/Civitas has modified the separator, moving the port from the bottom to the side. Although this design improvement has benefits, the original design should not plug if properly maintained,” the email reads. “It is clear to Broomfield that human failure in maintenance and monitoring caused this fire.”
The email also demands that Extraction update the 2018 Risk Management Plan to “specifically address increased wildfire risks.”
Steven Emmen, community and government affairs coordinator at Civitas Resources, said Civitas couldn’t provide comment on the matter.
“We appreciate the opportunity to address this matter, but we generally refrain from publicly discussing legal matters,” Emmen wrote in a response to the Enterprise.
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https://www.dailycamera.com/2022/04/01/former-firestone-charter-academy-teacher-accused-of-trying-to-meet-juveniles-for-sex-in-washington/
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A former Firestone Charter Academy teacher was arrested last week in Washington and accused of trying to meet underage children for sex, but officials said there is no evidence at this time he ever targeted students while in Colorado.
Andrew Hammond, 50, was arrested by the Redmond Police Department on March 25 and is charged with four counts of communication with a minor for immoral purposes, second-degree attempted rape of a child and third-degree attempted rape of a child, according to a release.
Hammond is being held at King County Correctional Facility on $100,000 bail.
According to the release, Redmond police detectives initiated a proactive undercover operation in which they used decoy profiles on location-based social networking and dating apps to meet Hammond, now an elementary school teacher in McMinnville, Ore.
Starting in October 2021, Hammond communicated with a detective posing as a 14-year-old female and another posing as a 13-year-old. Police said Hammond continued to engage in sexually motivated conversations with the detectives, believing they were minors.
After months of “sexually motivated communications,” police said Hammond proposed meeting with the minors at a hotel in Redmond to engage in sexual activity, and was arrested after checking into his hotel room. Police executed a search warrant on his vehicle and located additional evidence indicating Hammond was planning to engage in sexual acts with the minors, including condoms, lubricant, handcuffs, and duct tape.
“I’m proud of our officers and detectives for their dedication to such an important initiative in keeping our children safe,” Redmond police Chief Darrell Lowe said in a statement. “Any time we can take child predators off the streets for such egregious crimes against children is a win for our community. The important message for parents is to monitor your children’s activities on their phones and computers.”
Police did not state in the release the reason for initiating the proactive operation.
Firestone Charter Academy sent out a letter to parents notifying them of Hammond’s arrest, but said, “We do not have any information that would lead us to believe that any student at Firestone Charter Academy was harmed by Mr. Hammond.”
Hammond taught fifth grade at the school from August 2017 to May 2021, according to the letter.
“I want to take this moment to emphasize our highest priority of ensuring safe and positive learning environments for our students,” Principal Jessica Cervantes wrote in the letter. “Given the sensitive nature of this issue, we are not able to provide more information.”
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https://www.dailycamera.com/2022/04/01/from-the-community-editorial-board-rent-control/
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Rent control is a policy that has some great pros and some big cons. Among the pros is, of course, the ability of the city to control rent. With the existing housing crisis in Boulder and rents skyrocketing, this solution seems like a perfect fit for our city. However, government-based solutions tend to solve one problem, but create multiple others. There are two things I would like to see discussed before the city would move forward:
1. How will it affect investment and housing development? While rent control might be able to maintain rents at a certain level, it may discourage development investment, which would slow down the already short housing supply in Boulder in the long term.
2. Will it promote out-of-state investments rather than local landlords? The only groups that will be able to buy investment property will be the ones that have already bought property prior to the rent control enforcement. A rent-controlled property would not affect their profits much because they can average the cost basis of their investments among multiple investment properties. Therefore, I think an unintended consequence of rent control in Boulder will be that only out-of-state interests will find it profitable to be landlords in the city. Corporate landlords tend to care even less of the state of the house, and this will affect neighborhoods more so than now.
Although I oppose rent control for reasons I explained above, I believe the Colorado Legislature should give the power to enforce or not enforce rent control back to the cities. There is no reason the state should give itself the jurisdiction to be the only and final voice in this manner. It violates Boulder’s home rule authority and is an unjust infringement on our city’s ability to solve its own problems.
Hernán Villanueva, chvillanuevap@gmail.com
In thinking through the various – and loud – arguments for and against rent control (or, more precisely, rent stabilization) in Boulder, I find myself returning to the fundamental question: Does it work? Some say yes, some say no. Some point to particular successes, some point to spectacular failures. Yet no one, I think, has answered the primary logical “final cause” question (as Aristotle would define it), of what the purpose of rent control would be here?
Answering the question of “Does it work?” requires defining the intended outcomes of such proposed regulation. Is it to increase the breadth of the workforce? Is it to build diversity (cultural, racial, age, gender, etc.)? Is it to level the playing field for being a Boulder citizen? I have read elements of all of these used to promote implementation of rent control efforts, but I am also fairly certain that none of these will happened sufficiently without a whole lot of other stuff that has to happen beyond simply keeping rents in check. Like many things here, it seems that a more comprehensive plan might have a better shot at success (though, admittedly, it is a lot harder to do).
Aristotle’s thoughts on causality extended beyond just the “final cause” of what a thing is for to include origin of the thing, intent, etc. Not gonna bore you with a full exposition here, but I think it is important to understand that the fundamental fracture underlying any of the housing issues discussed in Boulder is the impossible disconnect between two different “formal causes”: housing as a human right vs. housing as a commodity. In reading the various pros and cons on both sides, it is clear to me that the vast majority of the difference in positions depends on which of these two beliefs the various authors hold. Where does Boulder stand?
Fintan Steele, fsteele1@icloud.com
My husband and I were looking for an apartment in New York 35 years ago and we jumped at a newspaper ad that was offering a two-bedroom apartment at a market-rate rent that was five times what the rent was for our university-owned apartment at the time. We called and made an appointment as quickly as we could. The apartment was in dilapidated building in a seriously rundown section of Brooklyn. We met the broker at the apartment and he gave us a tour. He showed us the first bedroom and then he pointed to a room that had a sofa and chairs and a TV and told us that was the second bedroom. We were confused. “If this is the second bedroom then that means there is no living room,” we told the broker, who looked at us like we were the crazy ones. “No, there’s no living room – you never mentioned that you wanted a living room!”
We kept thinking that something had to give, that rents could not keep increasing in New York or everyone would be priced out of the market. But 35 years later rents are at record highs, and people are making long commutes or doubling and tripling up in a single apartment.
This situation has now made its way to Boulder. Affordable housing only helps a small number of low-income families, and the rest, including middle-income families, pay an increasing percentage – sometimes as much as 70% of their income – on housing.
We, as a society, need to rethink housing. Is it a necessity like water, heat and electricity that should be available to all and regulated as such or is it simply a privilege – a perk for those who have the money – with available housing going to the highest bidder? I suspect it is the former but because of the power held by those who profit from the status quo, it will continue to be treated like the latter.
Fern O’Brien, fobrien@fobrienlaw.com
We should definitely have rent control in Boulder! In retrospect it seems so obvious. I mean, have you heard of an “affordable housing shortage?”
If we control the price of rent, then we’ll have loads of affordable housing! In fact, this could solve our in-commuter problem. With rents fixed at artificially low rates, all those people living in Louisville and Longmont and further afield will move here. We’ll lower our carbon footprint. Talk about a win-win-win-… you get the idea. Of course, we’ll need to build a boatload of more housing to accommodate these people. Oh, and the units must be “livable,” so granite countertops will be required. Duh.
What if we don’t build this boatload? Won’t the restricted rent cause some landlords to pull their units off the market? I’m way ahead of you there. If rent control is great, then mortgage control is great too. Let’s fix all mortgage payments so that all houses are affordable. Now people who own property will have no problems with rent control. Someone is going to have to talk to the banks, though…
But what about cash flow to the landlords, especially with record inflation? No problem: food control, fuel control, utility control, etc. It’s brilliant. My favorite: Tesla-price control. Who doesn’t want a Telsa? They’re electric and therefore green. Boulder is great now, hence the high demand for housing, but once we fix the rental rates and the Tesla cost, Boulder is going to be paradise. Hmmm, probably more people will want to live here, but, and this is key, we are already here! In the rent-controlled apartments!
Let’s recall JFK’s inspirational words about seeing the world as it could be and asking why not? But, make sure you don’t try to answer why not? Thinking beyond stage one of a policy isn’t wise. Let’s just imagine an ideal world and pass laws to, as Jean-Luc Picard would say, “Make it so.”
Bill Wright, bill@wwwright.com
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https://www.dailycamera.com/2022/04/01/lafayettes-particulars-art-gallery-offering-marshall-fire-victims-free-classes-studio-time/
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The physical devastation caused by the Marshall Fire will likely take years to repair.
Local creatives are hoping to help combat the emotional stress brought on by the destructive blaze by letting folks join in on painting sessions, leather journal making and more at no charge.
Teachers at Particulars Art Gallery & Teaching Studio in Lafayette are offering the gift of free art classes until 2023 to those impacted by the recent Marshall Fire.
“When we started Particulars 14 years ago, we built into our mission that we would look for opportunities to support our community,” said Suzanne Connolly-Howes, one of the cooperative center’s owners. “Over the years, we have done different fundraisers and community art projects. When the Marshall Fire happened, we decided that offering free classes and free studio time was something we wanted to do for our community.”
Those interested in learning more can contact Connolly-Howes at Szconnollyhowes@gmail.com.
“Art can be transformative,” Connolly-Howes said. “The process of creating can put us into a meditative state, calm our nervous system and be an outlet for processing that goes beyond words. We want to create a safe haven for people to be able to come and learn new skills and be in a supportive environment.”
Connolly-Howes said she is already seeing students return for more instruction.
“I have worked with one young man, and just the offer of support was a release for him,” Connolly-Howes said. “He will be coming to a couple of my April classes.”
So far, eight teachers are leaving spots open in their classes for those impacted.
“It’s the least I can do for my community,” said artist Molly Hargarten. “I want to give something of myself to them.”
Other instructors participating in the free classes are Laurie Adams, April Christenson, Scott Roebuck, Jeanne Hougen, Jeff Becker and Colleen Tucker.
In addition to allowing folks time to tap into their own self-expression and explore different mediums with an instructor, Particulars is also offering free studio space and time for artists who lost supplies and studios in the Marshall Fire.
The drop-in studio times are 12:30-3:30 p.m. Mondays and one Saturday and Sunday a month, from 10:30 a.m.- 5:30 p.m. on May 7, May 22, June 18, June 19, July 23, July 24, Aug. 13 and Aug. 21.
Those taking free classes can also come to the drop-in studio time should they want to practice outside of scheduled sessions. Some art materials will be available to use.
“Art provides the artist with an outlet for emotions that may be hard to deal with and overwhelming,” Hargarten said. “In my own case — when my mother passed away 10 years ago — I found myself sitting in my studio painting tulips. Somehow the fact that there was still beauty in the world, despite my intense feelings of loss, helped me through a difficult time. It was nice to feel pleasure in a dark time.”
From May to June and from November to December, Particulars will hold community shows where artists submit work done on 6-inch-by-6-inch boards.
The gallery plans to sponsor up to 10 Marshall Fire survivors to participate in the shows. Artists will receive 100% of the proceeds from their sold pieces.
In 2021, Particulars created a community art project called “Tree of Hope” where visitors could add to an evolving collage mural. Those who contributed were encouraged to donate $10, which was then given to Sister Carmen Community Center.
Connolly-Howes is excited to host an upcoming collaborative felted-quilt project — “Memories for the Future” — to foster healing and to help those impacted by the Marshall Fire process their trauma and grief.
The four quilt panels will be displayed at the gallery. Throughout the project, donations will be collected to provide funding for Marshall Fire victims.
The panels will eventually be donated to the towns of Superior, Louisville and Lafayette, with one panel submitted to the Governor’s Art Show in Loveland. All participants will have the opportunity to create a 12-inch-by-12-inch keepsake image for themselves.
“I hope to start the project this spring,” Connolly-Howes said. “I will be supplying all the materials and the lessons needed. People can participate one time or for as long as it takes to complete the quilt. It will be an ongoing project throughout the year, as the healing of trauma and loss comes in waves and cycles.”
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https://www.dailycamera.com/2022/04/01/letters-to-the-editor-redtail-ridge-yes-because-louisville-deserves-better/
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Caleb Dickinson: Redtail Ridge: “Yes” because Louisville deserves better
The Redtail Ridge General Development Plan has been a long, contentious, complicated process. I’ve served on City Council for 2.5 years and it has been going on for my entire tenure. Louisville is full of thoughtful, bright people who find themselves in agreement on most things, but divided by this project and its considerable pros and cons. It’s confusing and it depends a lot on one’s perspective, not just their hopes. I’ve never held a strong position “for” or “against” the development itself. Rather, I’ve been focused on the merits of the current GDP against our criteria and comparing it to the old, 2010 version. Louisville deserves better than the 2010 GDP. In nearly every imaginable way, the 2021 GDP is better, thanks to the work of all seven of our Council members and our brilliant staff and the local developer and the incredibly engaged residents.
We got:
- More Open Space
- All LEED Certified Buildings
- 3MW of on-site solar
- EV charging stations
- Parks and bike paths
- Protected habitat areas with permanent easements for keystone species
- Critical completion of Campus Drive to the east
- Zoning to enable Avista Hospital to move to this site
- Clustering of buildings to the south and Open Space to the north
So why are environmentalists against this shining example of responsible development? When you compare the development to an empty field it’s worse in many ways.
- Decades of construction and the environmental harm that comes from any building
- Increased traffic and the pollution that comes with that
- Disruption of wildlife and natural spaces
I’m also concerned by the rapid, never-ending growth in Colorado and in our surrounding communities, but the problem is that voting no doesn’t fix any of the negatives. The 2010 GDP allows for a 2.5m square foot development (RTR is 3m) and all the negatives remain without any of the positives we’ve negotiated over the past 3 years. A no vote does not stop this development, it overturns our aggressively restrictive GDP for that development.
Others have claimed that Council still has oversight to make the 2010 GDP better and fix some of the shortcomings. But, by that logic, doesn’t council have that same oversight to improve on the much better 2021 version? Why would we go backwards to try to get more?
If no prevails, it is possible that the developers will go back to the drawing board and come back with something even better and smaller, but they’ve said they won’t go down that path. It is possible that they’ll just pack up and move on and no one will ever develop this land, but that’s incredibly unlikely. If we assume that this private land will be developed in the near future, I sure hope it is to the 2021 GDP standard that we already passed.
I will be voting yes.
Given the challenges our community is facing, my hope is that regardless of the outcome of this vote, we’re able to work on coming together as a community and working together to care for our people and our planet as we rebuild and envision what we want to accomplish together.
Caleb Dickinson
Louisville City Councilor, Ward 1
John Tayer: Boulder Chamber: No, we aren’t tied to the U.S. Chamber
I was wondering how best to respond after reading the editorial swipe at me and the community organization I serve, the Boulder Chamber, by a self-styled “eco-terrorist” in response to an opinion piece I wrote about our community’s diversity efforts. (“Jeffrey Dumas: Chamber cheers development? No surprise there” March 28)
I could explain, for the umpteenth time, even referencing a previous letter to the editor that a simple fact-check in this newspaper’s archives would have revealed — www.dailycamera.com/2009/10/23/letters-to-the-editor-oct-24-2/ — that the Boulder Chamber has no affiliation with the U.S. Chamber (much due to the type of policies the editorialist condemns).
I could let the writer know that, instead of the false assertion that we take orders from an “omnipotent parent,” thoughtful dialog among local business and nonprofit leaders guides every policy position of the Boulder Chamber, which we openly share with the public in policy statements and on our website: https://boulderchamber.com/advocacy/ .
I could note, contrary to the author’s insinuations, that the Boulder Chamber actually was the only community chamber organization in Colorado to publicly support the last statewide minimum wage increase.
I could defend the Boulder Chamber’s pride in standing with the Sierra Club in support of the CU South annexation agreement, along with alignment on much of the environmental principles our two organizations share, from the value of sustainable development to climate protection.
I could comment on the irony of such a corrosive attack in response to my earlier opinion piece about our shared community efforts to address Boulder’s diversity, equity and inclusion goals, which was actually entitled, “No villains on this journey,” in an effort to promote constructive discourse (v. the more provocative title this newspaper chose).
But no . . . instead I’ll just reference what I wrote in my column:
“Those of good faith are all working hard to address historic practices and current systemic barriers to diversity, equity and inclusion in our community. At the same time, we want a thriving economy that supports businesses, their workforce and meets our need for a secure tax base. And I think we can universally agree that we want to preserve Boulder’s legacy as, in Opinion Editor Julie Marshall’s words, “the mecca of environmentalism and smart growth in Colorado.” No one individual or organization has the solution and there are no villains here . . . We’re all just on a journey and the better for it.”
John Tayer
President & CEO, Boulder Chamber
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https://www.dailycamera.com/2022/04/01/photos-ron-cardenas-gets-diploma-37-years-later-from-ehs/
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Ron Cardenas finally has his high school diploma. Erie High School is hosted a special graduation ceremony for Ron Cardenas, a student in the Class of 1965 who deployed to Vietnam in his junior year of high school. Cardenas never received his official diploma, despite earning all his graduation credits while in the U.S. Marines.(Cliff Grassmick/Staff Photographer)
Friends and family of Ron Cardenas give him a standing ovation at the ceremony. Erie High School is hosted a special graduation ceremony for Ron Cardenas, a student in the Class of 1965 who deployed to Vietnam in his junior year of high school. Cardenas never received his official diploma, despite earning all his graduation credits while in the U.S. Marines.(Cliff Grassmick/Staff Photographer)
Ron Cardenas tells his story on April 1, 2022. Erie High School is hosted a special graduation ceremony for Ron Cardenas, a student in the Class of 1965 who deployed to Vietnam in his junior year of high school. Cardenas never received his official diploma, despite earning all his graduation credits while in the U.S. Marines.(Cliff Grassmick/Staff Photographer)
ERIE, CO, April 1, 2022: Erie High School Principal, Matt Buchler, talks about Ron Cardenas' devotion to the community. Erie High School is hosted a special graduation ceremony for Ron Cardenas, a student in the Class of 1965 who deployed to Vietnam in his junior year of high school. Cardenas never received his official diploma, despite earning all his graduation credits while in the U.S. Marines.(Cliff Grassmick/Staff Photographer)
Ron Cardenas shakes the hand of Principal Matt Buchler during the ceremony. Erie High School is hosted a special graduation ceremony for Ron Cardenas, a student in the Class of 1965 who deployed to Vietnam in his junior year of high school. Cardenas never received his official diploma, despite earning all his graduation credits while in the U.S. Marines.(Cliff Grassmick/Staff Photographer)
Newspaper clipping about Ron Cardenas from the mid-1960's. Erie High School is hosted a special graduation ceremony for Ron Cardenas, a student in the Class of 1965 who deployed to Vietnam in his junior year of high school. Cardenas never received his official diploma, despite earning all his graduation credits while in the U.S. Marines.(Cliff Grassmick/Staff Photographer)
Ron Cardenas finally receives his athletic letter and high school diploma. Erie High School is hosted a special graduation ceremony for Ron Cardenas, a student in the Class of 1965 who deployed to Vietnam in his junior year of high school. Cardenas never received his official diploma, despite earning all his graduation credits while in the U.S. Marines.(Cliff Grassmick/Staff Photographer)
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https://www.dailycamera.com/2022/04/01/regulators-approve-scl-health-merger-with-utah-based-intermountain-healthcare/
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Local care provider SCL Health and Utah-based health nonprofit Intermountain Healthcare will merge after receiving approval from the Colorado attorney general’s office.
A review conducted by the Colorado Department of Law found there would be no change to the organizations’ charitable missions and no material transfer of assets out of Colorado.
The merger between the two health groups closed March 31, and further statements on future plans will be announced April 5.
The headquarters of Intermountain Healthcare will remain in Salt Lake City, while SCL Health’s facilities in Broomfield will become a regional office after the merger. Officials from the department of law found no evidence access to health care services in communities served by SCL Health would be reduced.
SCL Health is a nonprofit Catholic health system operating in Colorado, Kansas and Montana. The merger with Intermountain Healthcare would span 33 hospitals in six states. SCL Health was founded in 1864 by the Sisters of Leavenworth, a Catholic organization offering health care across the western United States.
Intermountain Healthcare operates 25 hospitals in Idaho, Nevada and Utah. The Salt Lake City-based nonprofit employs around 42,000 workers in the region. The merger will combine staff from both organizations, employing more than 58,000 health care workers. No layoffs or transfers are expected with the merger.
Statements from the companies have pointed to the merger as a new model for secular and faith-based health organizations to operate in tandem. The secular Intermountain Healthcare will operate all facilities being merged, but allow SCL Health hospitals to retain their traditional Catholic names and community boards.
This article was first published by BizWest, an independent news organization, and is published under a license agreement. © 2022 BizWest Media LLC.
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https://www.dailycamera.com/2022/04/01/ride-share-driver-sentenced-to-jail-probation-in-longmont-sex-assault-case/
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A ride-share driver accused of sexually assaulting a woman in his car was sentenced to jail and probation Friday.
Tyrone Rivers, 49, pleaded guilty in December to second-degree assault — drugging and invasion of privacy for sexual gratification.
Boulder District Judge Thomas Mulvahill on Friday sentenced Rivers to 90 days in jail followed by eight years of sex offender intensive supervised probation. Rivers will be allowed to serve the probation sentence in California, and he will have to register as a sex offender.
Rivers, who had been out of custody, was remanded into the custody of the Boulder County Sheriff’s Office after the hearing to begin serving his sentence.
“The bottom line is, there was a woman who was not in a position of being able to consent, and you took advantage of that,” Mulvahill said.
According to an affidavit, Rivers said he was working for Lyft when he picked up a woman around 5 a.m. Jan. 1, 2021, and they had consensual sex, and she went to sleep in the back of the vehicle.
According to the affidavit, a man in Lafayette called police on Jan. 1 after he received three photos of a woman naked in the backseat of a vehicle from a number he did not recognize. The man did not recognize the woman but was worried about her safety and contacted Lafayette police. An Uber and Lyft sticker were visible in the window of the vehicle the woman was in, and police were able to track the phone number to Rivers, who lives in Longmont.
But when police tracked down the woman later that day, she said she had no memory of the ride. She said she had been drinking with her boyfriend at a friend’s house in Longmont when she ordered a Lyft alone. She told police the next thing she remembered, she woke up fully clothed in Rivers’ vehicle near her home.
The woman said she did not recall having sex and did not feel like she had sex. When police told her Rivers claimed they did have sex, the woman said it would not have been consensual.
“I’m a protector, I like to protect people; in this case I didn’t protect her,” Rivers said. “I’m truly sorry, I didn’t mean for any hurt or harm to come to anyone.”
Rivers added that at the time he thought the woman was aware and that the sex was consensual, but said “I know now that it wasn’t.”
Mulvahill said he believed Rivers thought that at the time, but said it did not excuse his actions.
“Here’s the problem, as you’ve now come to recognize: She was intoxicated to a significant degree,” Mulvahill said.
The sentence largely followed the recommendation of a pre-sentence investigation except for the jail sentence. The probation department had recommended the jail sentence be suspended, but Boulder County Deputy District Attorney Michelle Sudano said the “serious nature of what happened” deserved a punitive sanction.
Sudano pointed out that police found out about the incident when Rivers accidentally sent nude photos of the woman to a wrong number, and that person contacted police.
“The only reason this case came to law enforcement’s attention is because of the actions of essentially a Good Samaritan,” Boulder County Deputy District Attorney Michelle Sudano said.
Mulvahill said that was true, but also noted Rivers was forthcoming with police when he was interviewed.
“I’m trying to take all that into account,” Mulvahill said.
But while defense attorney Yasmin Forouzandeh said a jail sentence would be “counterproductive” to getting Rivers getting his life back on track, Mulvahill said he felt a punitive sanction was necessary.
“(Forouzandeh) is right, but I have some other things to consider,” Mulvahill said. “I’m glad we’re not standing here debating whether you need to go to prison, but I do think you need to go to county jail.”
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https://www.dailycamera.com/2022/04/01/business-leaders-confidence-in-national-economy-tanks-but-optimism-remains-for-state/
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Colorado business leaders are looking increasingly pessimistic about the national economy heading into the second quarter of 2022, but remain mildly optimistic about the state economy.
While the threat of COVID-19 wanes, new challenges such as inflation and the war in Ukraine have the business community on edge, according to the University of Colorado Boulder Leeds Business Research division’s quarterly Business Confidence Index released Friday.
“As we exit one crisis, of course, we enter another,” said Brian Lewandowski, executive director of the research division.
The quarterly report marks Colorado business leaders’ expectations for the state and national economies, industry sales, industry profits, hiring and business spending.
Overall, the index pinned business confidence at 53.9 ahead of the first quarter 2022, down 4.1 points from the previous quarter. A score of 50 is considered neutral and the index stood at a record low 29.7 in the first quarter of 2020 before hitting a record high of 67.3 in the third quarter of 2021.
The index rated confidence in the state economy at 51.9, national economy at 40.4, industry sales at 59.1, industry profits at 55, industry hiring at 60.4 and capital expenditures at 56.7.
Looking forward to the second quarter of 2022, the overall confidence index is 53.3
The index was developed by analyzing 195 responses to a survey conducted between March 1 and March 21.
The difference between business leaders’ outlook on the state economy and national economy is 11.5 points, the greatest gap in nine years.
Economists are noting “pretty significant drop offs” in national confidence surveys, and Colorado’s results “seem pretty consistent” with the nationwide attitude, said Rich Wobbekind, senior economist and faculty director of CU’s Business Research Division.
Inflation, which has brought with it some of the “highest headline price changes that we’ve seen in this country in the last 40 years … (and) casting a shadow of uncertainty about the near future of the economy,” Lewandowski said.
The COVID-19 pandemic caused previously unseen levels of uncertainty and volatility in the economy and that seems to have had a lasting impact on business confidence.
Business people are telling economists that they “have record breaking numbers but we’re not feeling good,” Wobbekind said.
This article was first published by BizWest, an independent news organization, and is published under a license agreement. © 2022 BizWest Media LLC.
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https://www.dailycamera.com/2022/04/01/cu-search-for-new-president-regents-five-candidates-finalists/
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University of Colorado regents are nearing completion of their search for a new president and on Friday announced they’re mulling at least five candidates, but declined to name them or release demographic details on candidates considered so far.
One confirmed candidate for the job is CU’s interim president Todd Saliman.
CU officials last year promised a transparent process for selecting a president after the two-year tenure of the last president, Mark Kennedy, who resigned amid controversy over his conservative political positions last June after faculty censured him for “failure to lead” on matters of diversity, equity and inclusion.
A 19-member search team including faculty, staff, students, deans, alumni and donors from around Colorado this month sent the nine-member, publicly elected Board of Regents a list of at least five “highly qualified candidates.” The regents in a written “communiqué” Friday morning lauded this as a tremendous effort that drew on community talent and expertise.
They revealed that they interviewed those candidates this week. They announced they’ll now evaluate the candidates and consider all the input they’ve received. “Ultimately, the board will announce the finalist or finalists, and then there will be a two-week period when the public can meet the individuals on our campuses before the board votes publicly to elect a president,” regents wrote.
They plan to make a decision by April 29.
The Denver Post requested demographic details on the pool of candidates under consideration for the job.
“We can’t comment on candidates in the pool right now,” CU spokesman Mike Sandler said. That information is expected to be made public when regents announce a finalist or finalists.
Hispanic advocacy group Colorado Latino Leadership Advocacy and Research Organization this week bristled after they say regents ruled out a favored candidate — former Colorado Lt. Gov. Joe Garcia, who runs the state’s community college system.
CLLARO president Mario Carrera told the Post group officials are planning to request an investigation by Colorado’s attorney general into the fairness of CU’s selection process.
The CU Board of Regents “has not decided” who they will announce as finalist or finalists, Sandler said this week as regents met in closed executive sessions.
“They have not made that decision yet. They are not going to be making any decisions this week.”
In December, CU’s interim president Saliman confirmed he would apply for the permanent position after notifying CU’s governing regents as their team began a national search for candidates with help from the Pennsylvania-based firm Storbeck Search. Saliman has been running CU’s four-campus system since the resignation of Kennedy.
He previously served for eight years as a state lawmaker, including work on the legislature’s Joint Budget Committee from 1998 until 2002. He also served under Gov. Bill Ritter as director of the Office of State Planning and Budgeting, which involved working with lawmakers to set spending levels. At CU, he has worked as a senior vice president for strategy, government relations and as chief financial officer.
An interim presidency contract for Saliman stipulated that he wouldn’t apply for the permanent position, and a CU news release last year stated “Saliman has said he will not apply for the permanent position.” But the regents in September changed the contract to allow Saliman to seek the job. CU presidents are paid about $850,000 a year.
Courts have backed up CU’s position that it does not have to name finalists. CU administrators contend they cannot attract strong candidates if names are made public because that could hurt candidates in their current jobs.
On Friday, regents reiterated that stance in their communiqué.
“We are fully aware that some members of our university community would like a final stage when the public can view more than one candidate and provide input on a final selection. We also know that naming one candidate a finalist, which is a common practice in higher education in Colorado and across the country, enhances the possibility of attracting and hiring an accomplished leader,” the regents wrote.
“We know from conversations with other university presidents, governing boards, our search consultant and others that most top candidates for president would withdraw from the search if they had to be part of a public group of finalists. This is because many candidates believe they could lose their current job if they were publicly announced for this one but not selected. The Board of Regents is carefully weighing those dynamics as the search enters its final stages.”
In the past, CU has named single finalists before announcing presidents, including former U.S. Sen. Hank Brown and oil businessman Bruce Benson.
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https://www.dailycamera.com/2022/04/01/florida-man-sentenced-to-jail-probation-in-boulder-child-pornography-case/
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A Florida man accused of downloading and sharing child pornography while living in Boulder in 2016 was sentenced Friday to jail and probation.
Alejandro De Varona, 35, pleaded guilty in January to sexual exploitation of a child — possession of 20 or more items, a Class 5 felony.
As part of the plea deal, attorneys agreed De Varona would be sentenced to sex offender intensive supervised probation and would not serve any prison time.
Boulder District Judge Norma Sierra on Friday sentenced De Varona to five years of probation, but also added 30 days of jail time.
While a pre-sentence investigation recommended only three years of probation, Boulder Deputy District Attorney Michelle Sudano said De Varona in interviews failed to take responsibility for his actions.
“Given the fact that he is in such a significant level of denial, the people believe he will need a longer period of treatment,” Sudano said.
De Varona’s attorney, Anna Geigle, said a jail sentence was not necessary because he was a low risk to reoffend and that his lack of contrition could be addressed in sex offense treatment.
“While he is in denial, that is not a reason to place him into custody and punish him,” Geigle said.
De Varona told the court, “I have great empathy and emotions toward other individuals.”
“I assure the court I would never do anything to harm anyone or never do anything in any capacity to damage another individual,” De Varona said.
But Sierra said she agreed with prosecutors that De Varona’s denial warranted a longer period of probation and a punitive sanction. She said De Varona’s statements indicated he “does not express an understanding of the fact that there are victims” of downloading child pornography.
“While there are varying degrees of denials in many of the (pre-sentence investigations) that come before the court, Mr. De Varona did almost entirely cast responsibility on others,” Sierra said.
De Varona will receive credit for 20 days of time served, and Sierra allowed a brief stay of the sentence so De Varona, who had traveled to Boulder from Florida for the hearing, to get his affairs in order before going into custody.
De Varona will also be allowed to transfer his probation to Florida, but will have to comply with day reporting in Boulder County after his jail sentence until his case is transferred out of state.
According to an arrest affidavit, in August 2016 a Boulder County Sheriff’s Office detective investigating online child pornography alerted Boulder police when he was able to download two files containing child pornography from a peer-to-peer network user connected to an IP address in Boulder.
Police were able to obtain a warrant and tracked the IP address to De Varona, and obtained another search warrant for his residence and electronics.
Boulder police conducted a forensic search of De Varona’s computer in April 2017 and found he had deleted the two files containing videos of child pornography that detectives had been able to download from his IP address in August.
Police also found 181 photos containing child pornography.
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https://www.dailycamera.com/2022/04/01/gender-and-sexuality-alliance-summit-youth-to-offer-assistance-to-area-youth/
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New research shows that young adults in the LGBTQIA+ community experience poor mental health at higher rates and have a more difficult time connecting with peers.
That’s where groups such as the Open and Affirming Sexual Orientation Support (OASOS) program at Boulder County Public Health comes in. OASOS and its related programs are a big part of a widespread initiative to combat mental health issues through support and guidance for LGBTQIA+ youth.
The group puts on several community events each year, including the biannual Gender and Sexuality Alliance Summit. This year’s spring event will be from 11:30 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. Saturday at the St. Vrain Community Hub, 515 Coffman St., in Longmont.
The event offers an opportunity to build connections, cultivate positive mentorship, and improve mental, behavioral, and physical health for area youth, according to a Boulder County Public Health news release.
Within OASOS, high school students across Boulder County comprise YAC, or Youth Advocating for Change, a group that was youth-created and is led by teens. The student group is the driving force behind these community events.
“The GSA Summit is an opportunity for us, the YAC members, to get involved in community organizing and leadership and to unite our community under shared experiences and knowledge,” said organization member and Silver Creek High School student Julia Wall. “It has a nice educational focus and this year, we’re going to do a focus on the culture of Black, Indigenous, and people of color with a panel of speakers.”
Wall also said the event will focus on African American queer culture and that a “Know Your Rights” presentation will be given as part of their educational efforts for attendees.
Jax Gonzales, who serves as the OASOS program coordinator, said it is more important than ever for youth to have positive and accepting adult mentors, and that many adults within the LGBTQIA+ community will speak at the event.
“What we utilize in our programming and with the YAC is a focus on queer and trans joy. We ask ourselves, how do we create space to celebrate queer and transness among youth and create community with each other in support and in celebration of that?” Gonzales said. “Having adults who are positive mentors is really important to our programming and what we’re doing. The Gender and Sexuality Alliance Summit helps us build community around this primary idea of a celebration of queer and trans joy.”
Registration remains open for the event, and the sign-up link can be found at bit.ly/3K3MPZB. Following the workshops and activities, dinner will be served to all attendees, and students are invited to participate in a “Kiki Ball” competition from 6-9 p.m.
The application period for a spot in the 2022-2023 Youth Advocating for Change group also will open Saturday and closes near the end of April. Participants receive a stipend and serve a yearlong term with the group. Students who are interested in applying should contact Jax Gonzales at jgonzalez@bouldercounty.org for more information.
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https://www.dailycamera.com/2022/04/01/longmont-man-sentenced-to-jail-work-release-and-probation-in-child-abuse-case/
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A Longmont man accused of sexually and physically abusing a child was sentenced to three years in jail followed by work release and probation Friday.
Chad Basnett, 32, pleaded guilty to second-degree assault, child abuse and violation of a protection order in March.
As part of the plea deal, attorneys agreed on a stipulated sentence in which Basnett would serve three years in jail on the child abuse and protection order counts followed by seven years of sex offender intensive supervised probation with one year of jail work release for the assault count.
Boulder County Deputy District Attorney Michelle Sudano said Friday that the victim’s family advocated for the sentence, even though a pre-sentence investigation noted the facts of the case could have warranted a prison sentence.
“I want to start by acknowledging the huge impacts this had on (the victim),” Sudano said. “(She) went through something no child should ever have to go through.”
Sudano said that since Basnett will not be getting credit for the nearly two years he spent in custody prior to pleading guilty, the victim’s family believed the lengthy jail sentence followed by work release would actually keep Basnett off the streets longer than if he were to be sent to prison.
“I absolutely understand why probation is saying this is somebody who deserves to go to the Department of Corrections” Sudano said. “This resolution is not to minimize the conduct. He is going to be getting treatment and has a significant sentence hanging over his head should he not take advantage of probation.”
Basnett’s attorney Emily Briggs did not state in open court the reasons she felt the stipulated sentence was appropriate, though Sudano said she had received information from Briggs and the two attorneys had a bench conference with Sierra.
Basnett also issued an apology in a brief comment to the court.
Sierra said she had some “concerns” about a jail sentence, especially given that Basnett recently picked up a third-degree assault charge while in custody. But she went with the stipulated sentence, acknowledging avoiding “the traumatic experience of facing the defendant” at a trial was a “valuable consideration.” She also noted the sentence was in line with the wishes of the victim and the family.
“The court values the input of the named victim heavily,” Sierra said.
According to an affidavit, a person called Longmont police to report a possible child abuse on May 16, 2019, prompting an investigation into abuse that was believed to have occurred between April 2018 and August 2018.
During interviews, the named victim told a forensic interviewer Basnett had touched her inappropriately and also smacked her back, legs and butt “out of nowhere” multiple times, sometimes causing her so much pain that running or sitting hurt.
The girl also said Basnett watched her when she was unclothed. She said once when she got out of the shower, he was standing there and pulled away her towel and struck her on the butt, according to the affidavit. She also described him watching her while she was trying to get dressed and that it made her feel “uncomfortable.”
In a second interview, the girl said Basnett would wake her up and force her to watch porn by physically holding her head in place and smacking her if she started to fall asleep, according to the affidavit.
The Times-Call is not specifying how the girl knew Basnett, to protect her identity.
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https://www.dailycamera.com/2022/04/01/longmonts-dyer-realty-merges-with-structure-property-group/
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Two longtime Longmont real estate companies have merged, effective Friday.
Dyer Realty Inc. will merge into Structure Property Group. The combined operations will work from the former Dyer Realty office at 515 Kimbark St., Suite 103, but take on the Structure Property name.
“Doing this by myself was not as much fun anymore,” said Deanna Dyer in reference to the passing four years ago of her father, Marvin Dyer, and the more recent retirement of her mother, Lois.
She said in a press statement that “operating a successful real estate company was more about teamwork than retaining the Dyer family name on the door. Structure Property Group was chosen after many suitors extended substantial offers.” Reid Williams will be managing broker of the new company.
Dyer selected Structure Property because it permitted the company to continue on without “losing control of the cornerstone elements that made Dyer Realty successful: customers, relationships, and trust.”
Dyer Realty was formed in 1988 after Marvin Dyer worked 20 years as a loan officer at Longmont National Bank. His first real estate sale was the land to build the Taco Bell on Colorado Highway 119 near Interstate 25. Numerous commercial deals followed, including Vista Commercial Center, Milky Way Business Park, Highland Development in Mead; Meadowlark Business Park in Frederick, along with others.
Structure Property Group, established in 2008, is a real estate and property management company. Its seven agents cover nearly all facets of the real estate spectrum from residential resale, commercial sales and leasing, property management and leasing, water and farmland sales, commercial and multi-family development. Principals are Williams and Mike Baucom. Realtors are James Graham, Jerry Schlagel, Michelle Snyder, Patrick Weyand and now Deanna Dyer.
Deanna Dyer and Williams are former board chairs of the Longmont Association of Realtors and have both won the
Realtor of the Year Award in 2010 and 2011, respectively.
“They do more property management. I do more vacant land sales,” said Dyer in describing how the merger brings together skill sets to benefit the new company.
This article was first published by BizWest, an independent news organization, and is published under a license agreement. © 2022 BizWest Media LLC.
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https://www.dailycamera.com/2022/04/01/marshall-fire-debris-removal-program-set-to-begin-later-this-month/
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The post-Marshall Fire debris removal program will begin in mid-April with the areas of Eldorado in Louisville, Sagamore and Original Town in Superior and Marshall in unincorporated Boulder County up first on the schedule.
According to information from Boulder County, it developed the cleanup schedule by analyzing imminent environmental hazards, including proximity of homes to waterways as an effort to protect area water supplies and efficiencies of removal with input from DRC Emergency Services, the contractor conducting the work.
It also considered demographic factors using the Environmental Protection Agency’s environmental justice screening and mapping tool to identify areas with low-income residents, people of color and those age 64 or older.
Each jurisdiction — Superior, Louisville and unincorporated Boulder County — prioritized the schedule for neighborhoods within their community.
The areas were divided into 48 runways throughout Superior, Louisville and unincorporated Boulder County. Runways correspond to a list of streets within a specific area that will be included in that runway’s cleanup.
Property owners can opt in or out of the program until work commences on the runway that includes their property, county officials confirmed in an informational meeting earlier this week.
Thirty crews will work on the regional project, including 15 in Superior, nine in Louisville and six in Boulder County.
Boulder County will soon be contacting property owners by email to verify the right of entry form, where people either opt in or out of the program, and to obtain final permissions and an official assignment of benefits authorization allowing the county’s team to work directly with insurance providers.
At that point in the process, people can share what they’d like to be removed and what they’d prefer to keep.
Homeowners will be notified when debris removal is set to begin at their home. When this happens, people can request a site visit and walk-through to discuss the planned work.
As the project proceeds, the county plans to develop an online map so people can track the progress.
The debris removal program, expected to last about four months, includes a variety of steps such as removing the remaining ash and structural debris, the foundations and the driveways, sheds and detached garages that were damaged or destroyed.
Boulder County earlier this month signed a $60 million contract with DRC Emergency Services to conduct the work. The county as well as Superior and Louisville approved an intergovernmental agreement that guides the program.
In Tuesday’s meeting, there were hundreds of questions from residents who are participating in the private property debris removal program, including many about the specifics of the program and the way the county would work with varying insurance providers.
Participating property owners will contribute the amount of money dedicated for debris removal in their homeowners’ insurance policy. Those who are underinsured or uninsured will be covered through the program.
Some were curious to know how much the county intended to charge their insurance for the contractor’s work and whether a person would be considered uninsured or underinsured if their policy did not cover debris removal work.
“My understanding is that it’s actually pretty rare that there is no debris removal proceeds in your policy,” Assistant County Attorney Carrie Doyle said.
However, policies vary in terms of where the debris removal insurance proceeds can be found. The county is researching the question with an intention to provide more information soon.
For more information about the debris removal program, including a recording of the meeting from earlier this week, visit bit.ly/3qSiVjp.
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https://www.dailycamera.com/2022/04/01/photos-fairview-vs-fruita-monument-girls-lacrosse-4-1-22/
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Fairview High School’s Camille Johnson (No. 6) shoots and scores past Fruita Monument High School’s Maryn Brown (No. 3) and Emily Acosta (No. 50) on Friday, April 1, 2022. (Matthew Jonas/Staff Photographer)
Fairview High School’s Allie Hartmann (No. 2) drives toward the net while covered by Fruita Monument High School’s Addie Stehman (No. 7) on Friday, April 1, 2022. (Matthew Jonas/Staff Photographer)
Fairview High School’s Allie Hartmann (No. 2) drives toward the net while covered by Fruita Monument High School’s Addie Stehman (No. 7) on Friday, April 1, 2022. (Matthew Jonas/Staff Photographer)
Fairview High School’s Abigail Day (No. 10) looks to make a move around Fruita Monument High School’s Heather Starkweather (No. 13) on Friday, April 1, 2022. (Matthew Jonas/Staff Photographer)
Fairview High School’s Mia Reinke (No. 17) looks to pass in the game against Fruita Monument High School on Friday, April 1, 2022. (Matthew Jonas/Staff Photographer)
Fairview High School’s Camille Johnson (No. 6) shoots and scores against Fruita Monument High School on Friday, April 1, 2022. (Matthew Jonas/Staff Photographer)
Fairview High School’s Allie Hartmann (No. 2) and Emerson Massimino (No. 24) celebrate a goal by Ava Welty (No. 5) against Fruita Monument High School on Friday, April 1, 2022. (Matthew Jonas/Staff Photographer)
Fairview High School’s Abigail Day (No. 10) looks to get around Fruita Monument High School’s Sarah Mathwig (No. 9) on Friday, April 1, 2022. (Matthew Jonas/Staff Photographer)
Fairview High School’s Emilia Brown (No. 18) collides with Fruita Monument High School’s Heather Starkweather (No. 13) on Friday, April 1, 2022. (Matthew Jonas/Staff Photographer)
Fairview High School’s Tessa McCollester (No. 27) shoots between Fruita Monument High School’s Heather Starkweather (No. 13) and Aleah Danner (No. 15) on Friday, April 1, 2022. (Matthew Jonas/Staff Photographer)
Fairview High School’s Finnley Dancy (No. 11) tries to move between Fruita Monument High School’s Maryn Brown (No. 3) and Cloie Carmosino (No. 4) on Friday, April 1, 2022. (Matthew Jonas/Staff Photographer)
Fairview High School’s Emilia Brown (No. 18) looks to pass in the game against Fruita Monument High School on Friday, April 1, 2022. (Matthew Jonas/Staff Photographer)
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https://www.dailycamera.com/2022/04/01/photos-the-left-hand-artists-groups-absurd-april-fools-day-parade/
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The Left Hand Artist's Group hosted an "Absurd April Fools Day Parade" in Longmont on April 1, 2022. More than 100 people participated in the parade. (Cliff Grassmick/Staff Photographer)
Patty Fabian makes an impressive peacock in the parade. The Left Hand Artist's Group hosted an "Absurd April Fools Day Parade" in Longmont on April 1, 2022. (Cliff Grassmick/Staff Photographer)
Residents at Saint Vrain Senior Manor came out for the parade. The Left Hand Artist's Group hosted an "Absurd April Fools Day Parade" in Longmont on April 1, 2022. (Cliff Grassmick/Staff Photographer)
Anand Sharma, left, tries to get his son, Aalansh, 9, in the spirit of things before the parade. The Left Hand Artist's Group hosted an "Absurd April Fools Day Parade" in Longmont on April 1, 2022. (Cliff Grassmick/Staff Photographer)
The Left Hand Artist's Group hosted an "Absurd April Fools Day Parade" in Longmont on April 1, 2022. More than 100 people participated in the parade.(Cliff Grassmick/Staff Photographer)
Mike Bentley adds bubbles to our world during the parade. The Left Hand Artist's Group hosted an "Absurd April Fools Day Parade" in Longmont on April 1, 2022. (Cliff Grassmick/Staff Photographer)
Two women get a "Karma Wash" before the parade. The Left Hand Artist's Group hosted an "Absurd April Fools Day Parade" in Longmont on April 1, 2022. (Cliff Grassmick/Staff Photographer)
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https://www.dailycamera.com/2022/04/01/water-main-break-closes-street-in-northeast-longmont/
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A water main break on Friday afternoon has closed part of Mountain View Avenue in northeast Longmont while crews make repairs, according to the city.
Mountain View between Lashley Street and Martin Street is closed to traffic, according to a news release. Work to repair the break is expected to continue into the evening, with updates provided on the city’s Facebook page.
Crews also are spot flushing the water distribution system in the area. Residents may notice low water pressure, discolored water or no water for short periods of time. The water will remain safe to use, according to the city.
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https://www.dailycamera.com/2022/04/01/wayne-pacelle-and-tamara-drake-rep-neguse-is-on-the-right-side-of-animal-welfare-sen-hickenlooper-should-join-him/
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By Wayne Pacelle and Tamara Drake
It wasn’t your typical highway crash.
Surely, there was a dazed and injured driver after his speeding truck flipped on a four-lane highway on a Pennsylvania highway in January. But the truck had a very large group of passengers in the rear. Nearly 100 monkeys, on their way to a research laboratory.
Some were injured inside their cages. The crash broke open other enclosures, and the hapless animals spilled onto the pavement. Those who didn’t die from blunt force trauma escaped into the brush. Law enforcement chased down and shot the confused and injured animals who simply sought cover in an alien world.
While truck crashes with monkeys are rare, the trade in wild primates for lab use is an everyday event. In 2019, researchers used 69,000 non-human primates in the U.S., importing half from 13 different countries that capture them from the wild. Cambodia has become, by a long shot, the biggest trafficker of the wild monkeys.
In many cases, there are scientifically valid alternatives to using these cognitively complex, social animals. Yet putting these alternatives to use for drug development isn’t an option because the FDA is bound by a Depression-era statute mandating animal testing.
That’s precisely why the Center for a Humane Economy and dozens of animal welfare, pharmaceutical, patient advocacy, and medical groups want a change in the law. The animal testing mandate is archaic, and the FDA Modernization Act, introduced by U.S. Sens. Rand Paul, R-Ky., and Cory Booker, D-N.J., as S. 2952, and by Reps. Vern Buchanan, R-Fla., and Elaine Luria, D-Virg., as H.R. 2565, would lift that mandate. Colorado Reps. Joe Neguse and Jason Crow are cosponsors.
When the Federal Food Drug and Cosmetics Act (FFDCA) was enacted in 1938, animal models seemed like the best way for drug developers to study how therapeutics might act in humans. But it turns out animals don’t perform very well in forecasting the human reaction to drugs. Ninety to 95 percent of drugs that pass animal trials fail during human clinical trials due to toxicities not predicted by traditional animal tests or because of lack of efficacy.
The animal testing paradigm hasn’t dramatically helped our ability to cure the worst afflictions that cause suffering and death. For example, despite billions in funding for animal research into Alzheimer’s disease and cancer over several decades, the failure rate in drug development remains 97 percent for cancer and 99 percent for Alzheimer’s.
And even when drugs clear regulatory checkpoints and hit the market, there’s no assurance they are safe. Adverse reactions to drugs, taken as prescribed, are the 4th leading cause of death in the United States, causing 1.9 million hospitalizations per year and 128,000 fatalities.
The average time to market for a new drug is 10 to 15 years – a sharp contrast to the one-year, successful sprint drug developers made on the SARS CoV-2 vaccine.
The FDA Modernization Act won’t produce any immediate cure for diseases and conditions that strike down so many people and cause grief and loss for countless families. But by allowing the use of the most promising testing methods, we may be able to develop drugs that palliate pain and other symptoms and cure more diseases, at a lower expense, with quicker delivery of life-enhancing medications, and with fewer side effects and more effectiveness.
Human-relevant cell-based assays, organs-on-a-chip, human-on-a-chip (microphysiological systems), and computer modeling have been developed to more accurately predict human response to new drugs.
“We are at the tipping point of the modernization of drug discovery,” according to the co-founder of Moderna, Robert S. Langer. We are entering the era of personalized and precision medicine in health care, and that trend further exposes the defects of our regulatory framework. Here again, animal models will have little value since other species can hardly be expected to capture biological variation among humans. Nonclinical tests or studies using human cells and tissues can, however, portray biological variation among the human population.
Holding onto a Depression-era testing standard makes little sense when it comes to patient well-being, animal welfare, or drug pricing. Democrats and Republicans are finding common purpose in the FDA Modernization Act, and Sen. John Hickenlooper and Rep. Diana DeGette, given their health committee assignments, can play a role in getting this legislation over the finish line.
Wayne Pacelle is president of Animal Wellness Action Tamara Drake is Director of Research and Regulatory Policy for the Center for a Humane Economy.
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https://www.dailycamera.com/2022/04/01/xcel-energy-marshall-fire-cause-lawsuit/
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Xcel Energy failed to maintain and monitor its power lines and did not immediately contact authorities in December after sparks from its downed lines were a “substantial factor” in the ignition of the devastating Marshall fire, a group of Boulder County businesses and homeowners allege in a new lawsuit.
The class action complaint, filed Thursday in Boulder County District Court, lists an unnamed married couple — “John and Jane Doe” — as well as Eldorado Liquor and Eldorado Enterprises as plaintiffs.
“Defendants’ powerlines and energy utility equipment were a substantial factor in the cause, origin and continuation of the deadly Marshall fire,” according to the lawsuit. The complaint alleges that Xcel “unreasonably failed to maintain, monitor, and/or supervise its property in a manner so as to prevent an arcing event from causing a fire.”
The married couple is remaining unnamed in the lawsuit because of the trauma they are still dealing with just three months after the fire, their attorney, James Avery, told The Denver Post.
“The victims are marginalized, put on the sidelines,” Avery said. “But they’re not spectators in a football game — they’ve lost homes, lost business effects, personal effects. They’ve been put out in the cold.”
Michelle Aguayo, an Xcel Energy spokeswoman, said in an email: “Our own investigation shows that our equipment in the area of the fire was properly maintained and inspected, consistent with our high standards, and we have not seen evidence that our equipment ignited the fire.”
Boulder County officials have not determined the cause and origin of the fire, and on Thursday announced their investigation is expected to take several more months.
In the Dec. 30 wildfire’s immediate aftermath, officials said they believed the fire was likely sparked by power lines downed by heavy winds, which reached gusts of more than 100 mph. The following day, Boulder emergency management officials said Xcel Energy “inspected all of their lines within the ignition area and found no downed powerlines.” Instead, the utility company found “compromised communication lines that may have been misidentified as powerlines.”
Later, however, investigators said they were looking into a number of potential causes that could have started the fire, including power lines, a long-smoldering underground coal mine and human activity.
The Marshall fire killed two people and destroyed more than 1,000 homes and businesses in Superior, Louisville and unincorporated Boulder County, becoming the most destructive wildfire in Colorado history.
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https://www.dailycamera.com/2022/04/01/vietnam-veteran-receives-erie-high-diploma-58-years-later/
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Ron Cardenas left Erie High School his junior year, joining the U.S. Marines in 1963 and deploying to serve in the Vietnam War.
Though he earned his remaining graduation credits while in the military, the school principal at the time denied his request to receive a diploma when he returned. He and his wife, Dolores, went on to become lifelong Erie High advocates, supporting the school as parents, grandparents and great-grandparents. Cardenas also volunteered his time as an Erie High football, baseball and wrestling coach.
Friday, Erie High presented him with an official diploma in a ceremony in the school auditorium, 58 years later. The ceremony ended with a standing ovation.
“It has been a very special day for me,” Cardenas said.
Erie High Principal Matt Buchler said he first learned Cardenas hadn’t received his diploma a couple of years ago, but his plans for a ceremony were scuttled by the pandemic. He restarted the plans in December.
“He’s kind of an icon here,” Buchler said.
At Friday’s ceremony, school board member Meosha Brooks presented the diploma before an audience of family members, friends and current students. Cardenas also received the “athlete of the year” award to honor his high school athletic career.
Buchler said the couple continue to support the school by attending most home games, joking that the voice you hear yelling at the referee to reconsider a call likely belongs to Cardenas.
Cardenas said discrimination was rampant in Erie when he attended high school, with white students supported if they struggled academically while Hispanic students were counseled to drop out.
He watched a friend get expelled for leaning down near two white girls to retrieve a pencil. School administrators accused his friend of trying to look up their skirts — a claim the girls denied, he said. An argument he had with a coach over what he called an unfair cancellation of a football game, resulting in the coach threatening to paddle him, was enough to push him to drop out.
He said he had wanted to become a Marine since elementary school.
He described the two weeks of boot camp as “pure hell,” saying he wondered what he had gotten himself into. After another year and a half of training, he celebrated his 19th birthday on a ship to Da Nang, Vietnam.
He spent about three months in Vietnam before he was seriously injured during an ambush. He was taken to a military hospital in California to recover before returning to Erie to his parents and his wife, who was eight months pregnant. Only two of the 26 Marines in the ambush were uninjured, while 15 died. Cardenas ended up losing an eye.
As a young 19-year-old, he said, he saw “things that would make you sick” and still has flashbacks.
Though he didn’t attend college, his children and grandchildren have gone on to earn college degrees and become successful, he said. He encouraged the high school students in attendance to strive for excellence.
“You reach up and grab that star, and you let that star take you as far as you can,” he said.
Though his own school experience was challenging, he said, he loves the town and Erie High.
“Erie is mine,” he said. “Erie is me.”
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https://www.dailycamera.com/2022/04/01/foolishness-on-parade/
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The Left Hand Artists Group hosted an Absurd April Fools’ Day Parade on Friday in Longmont. More than 100 people participated in the parade.
The Left Hand Artists Group hosted an Absurd April Fools’ Day Parade on Friday in Longmont. More than 100 people participated in the parade.
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https://www.dailycamera.com/2022/04/01/music-arts-agriculture-are-all-ideas-for-longmont-sugar-factory-area-redevelopment/
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Could a slice of Longmont and sugar factory property be a place for a music venue and conference center? What about the space being home to a new park, higher-density housing, greenhouses and a distillery?
These were among the concepts that members of Longmont’s City Council heard Tuesday night, as project planners with the city’s planning and redevelopment divisions and consulting company Stantec shared details for transforming roughly 275 acres of land. The area is described as bounded by East Ken Pratt Boulevard and Third Avenue on the east to Main Street on the west from Third to Boston avenues.
The ideas shared Tuesday are part of an ongoing effort to transform the area, which has been identified by the city as a redevelopment priority. The proposed redevelopment area includes the vacant Great Western Sugar Factory that was constructed in 1905 and shut down in 1977.
During a presentation Tuesday night to the City Council, Stantec urban designer Nancy Locke said planners were looking at two concepts each for the science, technology, engineering, arts and mathematics and sugar factory areas. While the areas are conjoined, the STEAM area is the west side and the sugar factory area is on the east.
In the STEAM area’s roughly 90 acres, Locke said one concept is to have a cultural arts core, where a performing arts and live music venue would be located. Locke said a conference center and hotel could be in this location and anchored along a plaza or park space that could be used for outdoor festivals. The site would be surrounded by higher-density residential housing.
The second concept for the STEAM area looks at creating a “mixed-use hub” with office space, food markets, conference center, retail and housing.
For the sugar factory area, the concepts included redeveloping the land into a cultural arts campus with a performing arts center, park space and artist studios or an agricultural hub and maker-doer campus with greenhouses, research facilities, food incubator spaces and a brewery and distillery. Both ideas for this area include a range of housing options.
Longmont principal planner for Planning and Development Services Erin Fosdick told the Times-Call on Thursday that project leaders took several pieces of feedback away from councilmembers Tuesday.
She said her sense was that the majority of councilmembers wanted to see the potential cultural and performing arts center in the STEAM area, rather than the sugar factory area.
Thinking about broader connections, like how the redevelopment could tie into future transit systems, options for higher-density housing in the STEAM area and parking needs were also topics brought up by the Council that will help to inform design work, Fosdick said.
City staffers last presented on the redevelopment in December. Since then, they’ve been working to gather the public’s input. During a virtual meeting March 2, more than 100 people shared their feedback. The city is also involving third-grade students from Indian Peaks Elementary to participate in sharing ideas through a classroom design challenge.
During the meeting, Fosdick said it is unlikely the STEAM and sugar factory areas would be developed without some public-private partnership.
“We have been working with some potential developers,” Fosdick said during the meeting. “One of the things we will be looking at (is) what are some of the high-level costs of this plan and how might we phase things.”
Tony Chacon, Longmont redevelopment program manager, told the Council on Tuesday that the Environmental Protection Agency has spent in excess of $100,000 on the environmental assessment of the sugar factory property, with soil and water sampling completed.
“Right now, based on the numbers from a remediation standpoint, you’re talking anywhere from (a rough cost of) $10 to $15 million in remediation,” Chacon said. “That’s to get rid of the asbestos and possibly some of the ground (contamination).”
Chacon also pointed out that another challenge is industrial equipment remains inside the sugar factory buildings. He said some of the equipment is so “monstrous” that it will have to be taken apart to be removed.
Despite the aging buildings’ appearances, Chacon said the buildings are structurally sound because they are made of a steel membrane, and that the brick is a facade that may be able to be taken out to access the equipment.
Fosdick said Thursday that city staff and planners will work to develop a “preferred alternative” that likely will be a hybrid of the options shared Tuesday night. She said planners will be putting in some work on a design, with hopes of bringing that idea back to the Council for approval in the second quarter of the year.
The time frame for when the redevelopment will be a reality, as well as estimates for the overall cost, are still phases of the project that don’t have a definitive answer now, Fosdick said.
Community input remains an important part of the process. While Fosdick said the city will be looking at events to engage with people, residents can also share their feedback online at engage.longmontcolorado.gov/sugar-mill-steam.
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https://www.dailycamera.com/2022/04/02/boulder-county-youth-corps-extends-summer-job-application-deadline/
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Boulder County Youth Corps is extending its summer job application deadline to next week.
Applicants will have until 11:59 p.m. April 8 to turn in their application, according to a county news release.
Applicants must be Boulder County residents who are 14 to 17, as of the first day of work, which is June 13. Corpsmembers will start at $12.56 an hour.
The county is also seeking adults to serve as team leaders. Assistant team leaders must be 18 or older and will start at $17.70 an hour. Team leaders must be 21 or older and will start at $19.70 an hour, according to the release.
The release said youth corps teams will work 30 hours per week, Monday through Thursday, from June 13 to Aug. 3 on a variety of conservation and stewardship projects including trail construction and maintenance, historic preservation, forest thinning, construction and repair of fencing, landscaping and removal of noxious weeds.
Boulder County Youth Corps program staff said they’re excited to return to the field this season. Due to the coronavirus pandemic, the 2020 and 2021 seasons were canceled. Boulder County Public Health pandemic guidelines will be followed as they develop to ensure the safety of all participants, the release said.
For more information and to apply, visit bouldercounty.org/youthcorps.
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https://www.dailycamera.com/2022/04/02/longmont-library-giving-out-free-formal-wear-for-teens-in-time-for-prom/
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The Longmont Public Library will host a pop-up shop this month to give teens the chance to choose from free formalwear in time for prom and other formal events.
The shop is open to sixth through 12th graders from noon to 2 p.m. Sunday, April 10, at the Teen Space inside the library, 409 Fourth Ave., according to a city news release.
Donations in 2020 contributed to the items available in the shop. The release said Longmont teens can browse free, gently-used dresses, suits, accessories and other fashions for the prom season and other formal events.
Those interested in participating can enter the library at the east entrance off Emery Street. There is no registration necessary. The library is not able to take donations for the pop-up shop at this time. Anyone with questions can call the Children’s and Teens’ Services Desk at 303-651-8477.
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https://www.dailycamera.com/2022/04/02/jim-martin-3/
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I’ve often wondered why we don’t take mental health problems as seriously as we do physical health woes, and don’t provide far more treatment for the former.
Mental illness carries a heavy stigma, and many people have misconceptions about what it is and what to do about it. That’s because presently, the mental health care safety net is failing across Colorado and the nation.
The United States has a large mental health crisis, one of the worst in the industrial world. We must urgently act to provide financial support for more patient beds and better access to services at the state level to slow the alarming rise in suicides, depression, mental distress, anxiety and more.
According to the American Psychiatric Association, in 2022 approximately 40 percent of adults in the United States reported symptoms of anxiety or depressive disorder. That’s up from 10 percent that reported these symptoms in 2019.
Mental Health America, which addresses the needs of those with mental illness and promotes mental health for all, provided some key findings about mental health both pre- and post-pandemic in 2021:
In 2019, prior to the pandemic, 19.86% of adults – the equivalent of 50 million Americans – experienced a mental health illness.
Over half of adults with mental illness (more than 27 million people) do not receive treatment.
The Center for Disease Control and Prevention warned Thursday that more than 40 percent of teens reported they feel consistently sad or hopeless, and 20 percent say they have contemplated suicide.
Over 60% of youths with major depression do not receive any mental health treatment.
At the end of 2021, Vincent Atchity, CEO of Mental Health Colorado, said about 400 Coloradans who were presumed innocent were being held in jail, awaiting access to mental health care, because they were too incompetent to participate in a judicial process.
The United States has been inconsistent about its support for mental health initiatives for a long time.
President Jimmy Carter’s administration passed the Mental Health Systems Act shortly after he took office in 1977. It was meant to bring more awareness and funding to mental health services throughout the country.
But in 1981, President Ronald Reagan and Congress all but repealed Carter’s legislation by passing the Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act, which greatly reduced federal funding for mental illness, dumping that responsibility onto the states.
In Colorado, we have 17 regional health care centers throughout the state and have relied on them for more than a half-century to help those that are indigent, on Medicaid or underinsured, or pay for private treatment to stabilize people in crisis. Unfortunately, there’s a vast disparity in accessibility, quality and speed of centers’ services.
Dr. John Talbott, president of the American Psychiatric Association, said, “The psychiatrists involved in the policymaking at that time certainly oversold community treatment,” he said. Policies were based on “wishful thinking, partly on the enormousness of the problem and lack of a silver bullet to resolve it,” he said.
Widespread homelessness emerged in Colorado in the 1980s, partially because states put mental health patients out on the streets.
Colorado had more mental health beds in the early 1980s than we do today. Since then, the state population has doubled from 3 million to almost 6 million. A minimum of 50 beds per 100,000 people is considered necessary to provide adequate care for severe mental illness; Colorado has about 10 beds for every 100,000 residents.
Colorado ranks 51st – dead last – in access to mental health services and treatment, according to Mental Health America. The number has grown worse because of the pandemic, insufficient funding and a lack of focus on forming a uniform statewide approach.
“The centers and the state have been failing people,” said Robert Werthweim, former director of the Office of Behavioral Health in Colorado.
In July, that office will become the Behavioral Health Administration under the direction of Dr. Morgan Medlock, who becomes a new member of Gov. Jared Polis’ Cabinet. Its mission will be to streamline and improve the mental health care system.
We need to thank Boulder-based state Rep. Judy Amabile, who is sponsoring two critical mental health bills in the current legislative session: HB22-1256 and HB22-1303.
“It’s time for our state to make a bold, robust investment that provides treatment to Coloradans with severe mental illness,” Amabile wrote in the Colorado Sun.
Ask your representatives to support both bills, particularly HB22-1303, which increases the number of in-patient residential behavioral health beds. It allocates $65 million from the American Rescue Plan Act to increase the number of beds to 16 at the Colorado Mental Health Institute at Fort Logan as well as 125 additional beds statewide. This is only a start to addressing the much-larger problem.
HB22-1256 expands patients’ rights when they’re under mental health holds. The sponsors say, among key changes, it would strengthen the state’s involuntary civil commitment system to protect patients’ and providers’ rights.
Certain conditions make it even more important for immediate and long-term mental health care, particularly in the areas of schizophrenia, bipolar disorders and other psychotic disorders, often fed by severe addiction problems.
Access to care was reduced further on Feb. 6 when Boulder Mental Health Partners, a private nonprofit serving Boulder County and one of the 17 regional health centers, abruptly closed its weekend walk-in crisis center and cut its weekday hours of operation.
In Boulder County, the reduction in services came at a time when it has dealt with mental health challenges that have resulted from two tragedies, the King Soopers mass shooting in March 2021 and the Marshall Fire in December 2021.
All this at a time when economic insecurity and grief linger as the pandemic stretches into its third year.
As a result, many mental health patients end up in jail, emergency rooms or shelters, or are put back on the street with no treatment.
Colorado’s mental health system has not been meeting the needs of our most vulnerable residents, neighbors and family members for a long time. Let’s change that for the better.
Jim Martin can be reached at jimmartinesq@gmail.com
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By Matt Jones
Louisville’s election campaigns are typically clean. That’s why the Redtail Ridge developer’s campaign turn to the dark side is so disturbing. In the past few days, it has been revealed that:
Nearly $50,000 of the developer’s corporate money has been used to pay for digital marketing, yard signs and other advertising efforts promoting Redtail Ridge. Plain and simple, the developer is trying to buy the upcoming Redtail Ridge Special Election.
The developer used a political operative with a history of establishing “dark money” nonprofits to create the “Yes for Louisville” nonprofit.
A recent “Yes” campaign mailer was so obviously deceptive that the Boulder Daily Camera printed a clarification that it had not endorsed any position in the Redtail Ridge Special Election.
Redtail Ridge is a massive, proposed development on Louisville’s southeast edge on the old StorageTek site. Last fall, after City Council approved the sprawling plan on a 4-3 vote, residents collected almost double the signatures required to place a measure to overturn the decision on the ballot. A successful “No” vote will likely result in the developer submitting a proposal that better fits Louisville’s character.
On March 30, the City of Louisville released campaign finance data showing the “Yes” campaign has outspent the grassroots “No” campaign by a staggering 26 to 1. The vast majority of the “Yes” spending has been done by the developer. The campaign finance report reveals the developer’s corporation has made $48,912 in contributions for marketing efforts. Louisville voters are being bombarded with online commercial and print ads the developer’s money has bought. This is not the small-town Louisville we know and love.
Why would “Yes for Louisville” use political operative Katie Kennedy, who has deep ties to the oil and gas industry, to file as a nonprofit corporation and not just a regular campaign account? A likely answer? To hide contributors. In 2020, Kennedy helped establish the nonprofit “Unite for Colorado,” an entity that was heavily fined for concealing millions through a shell nonprofit corporation.
Despite what the “Yes for Louisville” ads proclaim, a “No” vote will almost certainly result in the developer submitting a new plan. The developer’s campaign implies with a “No” vote that it will be stuck with the single company Conoco Phillips General Development Plan. The developer has repeatedly demonstrated through words and actions they do not want to develop under the 2010 Conoco Phillips GDP. It’s important for Louisville voters to realize that the developer is actually a private equity fund, and their plan all along has been to “part out” the property for other companies to develop. They will almost certainly make more money with multiple companies than just one. The chance they will not submit a new plan is nearly zero.
The current Redtail Ridge plan is not only too shifty; it is too big, too tall, and too congested.
Too Big – The proposal is twice as big as StorageTek. It will have less open space than was required for other big Louisville developments. Centennial Valley development dedicated over 35% of the land area to open space while Coal Creek Ranch development dedicated over 46%.
Too Tall – They can build up to five stories, and are not limited to three stories.
Too Congested – There are projected to be 20,000-plus new car trips every day and there’s no requirement for the developer to pay for all the needed road improvements, leaving taxpayers on the hook. The massive plan will create more air pollution and greenhouse gases.
Please vote “NO” to the current Redtail Ridge proposal and say:
- We reject dark money campaigns in Louisville.
- We will not be fooled by misleading campaigns.
- The developer needs to propose a downsized plan consistent with Louisville’s character.
Remember to turn in your ballot that will be mailed to you by April 19. And vote NO so the old StorageTek site is developed to fit Louisville’s small-town character.
Matt Jones served in the State Senate and House where he worked on campaign transparency and oil and gas safety issues. He is currently a Boulder County Commissioner but has written this column as an individual Louisville resident and is not representing the County.
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Cal-Wood Education Center, a Jamestown nonprofit group, saw its operating revenue disappear as school after school canceled when the pandemic hit in March 2020.
Overnight field trips from Front Range schools, many in Boulder Valley, make up a majority of the outdoor education center’s business. Cal-Wood Executive Director Rafael Salgado wasn’t sure how to keep the center open.
But a federal Paycheck Protection Program loan for close to $177,000 in April 2020, as well as monetary help from the center’s foundation for a restoration project, allowed Cal-Wood to continue to employ its small staff, he said.
Instead of working as counselors or manning the kitchen, staff members painted buildings, repaired railings and improved trails. Families also were invited to camp on the site that summer, generating some revenue while following COVID-19 distancing rules.
“We had to be creative,” Salgado said. “The money gave us time to come up with other options. It was a big help.”
Then came the wildfire that burned through 600 acres of Cal-Wood’s property in October 2020. Cal-Wood received a second paycheck protection loan, also about $177,000, in January 2021. Combined with community fundraising efforts, Salgado said, the center was able to keep going, even when a COVID-19 variant last fall again scuttled school field trips.
It wasn’t until December that the Boulder Valley School District gave schools the option to participate in overnight outdoor education trips, he said.
“It’s been pretty tough the last few years,” he said. “I don’t know how we did it. Looking back we were lucky. It was a lot of stress. If we had closed down, it would take a few years to reopen. The funding came right at the right time. Hopefully, 2022 is going to be the year we’re back to business.”
Cal-Wood received the only large — above $170,000 — Paycheck Protection Program loan given to an organizatin in Jamestown, a small mountain community west of Boulder.
Altogether, data compiled by Denver Post business reporter Aldo Svaldi shows 1,175 Boulder County businesses were allocated $1.26 billion in federal Paycheck Protection Program loans. Of Colorado’s 64 counties, Boulder County received the fifth-highest amount of money through the program, despite ranking 10th in terms of largest population.
The federal loan program was originally created in March 2020 as part of the $2 trillion CARES Act to distribute $600 billion in forgivable loans to small businesses. More money, and a second application period, was added in December 2020, for a total of $800 billion in funding.
While the rules on who could apply and what’s required for loan forgiveness were loosened after the program was created, the intent was to help small businesses keep workers or rehire those who were laid off because of pandemic disruptions. Loan amounts were based on average monthly payroll costs.
Of Boulder County businesses receiving loans over $170,000, a company based in Boulder — Gores Vitac Holdings — received the highest amount, almost $8.5 million. The company, which didn’t respond to a request for comment, provides closed captioning and subtitling services and reported 500 jobs.
The second-highest Boulder-based loan, about $7 million, went to GCSES II Holdings, an oilfield services company headquartered on Walnut Street that reported 457 jobs.
The third-highest loan to a Boulder organization went to Spectra Logic Corp., an IT hardware firm that manufactures data storage and management solutions that reported 373 jobs. Spectra Logic received about $6.3 million.
“Spectra Logic has been in business for more than 40 years with headquarters in Boulder. The PPP loan enabled Spectra to preserve jobs for employees and meet customer requirements during the pandemic,” Spectra CEO and founder Nathan Thompson said in a written statement.
Rounding out the top five largest loan recipients in Boulder are Boulder Medical Center, with a $5.2 million loan and 387 reported jobs, and The Kitchen Restaurant Group, with a $4.9 million loan and 500 reported jobs. The Kitchen, a collection of restaurants founded in 2004 and headquartered in Boulder, also received a $10 million federal grant through the Restaurant Revitalization Fund.
In Lafayette, Clinica Campesina Family Health Services received about $8 million, the highest loan amount to an organization in that city. Along with the loan, Clinica received federal money through other relief programs, including money to expand capacity for coronavirus testing.
Clinica, which is headquartered in Lafayette, provides primary care services to low-income people with limited access to health care at six community-based clinics in south Boulder, Broomfield and Adams counties.
Clinica Chief Financial Officer Brian Johnston said the paycheck protection loan was used only for payroll, offsetting the cost for the company’s 600 employees through the latter part of the pandemic. Clinica, which received the loan in March 2021, wasn’t eligible until the rules were changed that year to allow larger nonprofits to apply, he said.
He said the pandemic significantly impacted revenue in both 2020 and 2021 as fewer patients made primary care appointments. In 2020, before the loan was available, Clinica furloughed employees. Almost all those furloughed were brought back within six months, he said.
“This (loan) really was a lifeline,” he said. “The program did exactly what it was supposed to do and allowed us to continue to staff our organization and see patients.”
Lignetics Inc., which manufactures wood pellets, fire logs, fire starters, wood flour and animal bedding, got a $6 million loan, the largest to any company based in Louisville. The company, which is on South Boulder Road and reported 490 jobs, didn’t respond to a request for comment.
Other large loan amounts to Louisville organizations went to Fresca Foods, at $4.1 million with 413 reported jobs, and Avid4 Adventure, at $2 million with 116 reported jobs.
businessAvid4 Adventure instructor Trevor Waters catches air off the XL line on June 10, 2020, at the Valmont Bike Park in Boulder. (Jeremy Papasso/Camera file)Louisville-based Avid4 Adventure provides outdoor summer camps in eight states, including local camps. Avid CEO Paul Dreyer said in an email that considering layoffs as the pandemic started was “a low point in my career.”
“We run an in-person, service-oriented business that is also regulated and licensed by the state,” he wrote. “Due to not only uncertainties and changing dynamics, but also state and federal mandates, we simply could not make enough money in 2020 to pay our fixed costs.”
But once the Paycheck Protection Program was approved, he said, the loan allowed Avid to keep employees. The money, he said, went to payroll and rent.
In summer 2020, Avid created new models to continue to operate under pandemic restrictions, including “small group adventures,” an at-home camp option and an online option. Even with the new offerings, the company served only about 30% of the participants it expected, Dreyer said.
As restrictions loosened last summer, Avid saw its participants and revenue return to pre-pandemic levels. But, he said, it still was the most difficult season operationally that his company has seen.
“We were short-staffed the entire summer, which resulted in huge stressors for our whole team, and also the need for us to cancel certain camps — for the first time ever — due to not having enough staff,” he wrote.
In Longmont, Woodley’s Fine Furniture received $2.6 million, the largest loan to businesses or organizations in that city. Woodley’s, which reported 198 jobs, didn’t respond to a request for comment. Sample Supports, which provides disability services and reported 250 jobs, received the second-largest loan in Longmont at $2.3 million.
Cornerstone Orthopedics and Sports received $1.2 million, the largest loan given to businesses based in Superior. Cornerstone didn’t respond to a request for comment. Also in the health care realm, Professional Home Health Care Inc. received $1.3 million, the top loan to Niwot-based businesses. The business didn’t respond to a request for comment.
In the mountain communities, Black Fox Mining received $581,000, the largest loan to a Nederland business. The company, which reported 31 jobs, didn’t respond to a request for comment.
Lyons-based Sierra Sage Herbs received two loans, each for $314,700.
CEO Jodi Scott, who started the business with her mother and sister in 2008, said in an email that they wanted to provide natural first aid products that were just as effective as the traditional, chemical-laden products that were available.
Since then, she said, the 27-employee company has brought the same topical, therapeutic approach to other body care categories, including creating natural products for moms, babies and animals.
At the start of the pandemic, she said, retail partners either couldn’t pay on time or asked to extend payment terms, while suppliers began requiring full payment upfront and sales dropped as customers avoided stores.
“Our cash flow was significantly compromised,” she wrote.
The loans, she said, allowed the business to continue to operate.
“We were able to ensure that we did not have to lay off any employees during the early days of the pandemic,” she wrote.
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https://www.dailycamera.com/2022/04/02/david-takahashi-lets-shutter-this-polluting-underachieving-coal-fired-plant-now/
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By David Takahashi
The Marshall and now NCAR fires make it clear Wildfire Season is all year long and that the fires will be raging in our front yard and no longer “out there” where no one is supposed to build. Climate warming is a magnifier that increases the frequency and intensity of climate events. Do we agree that our world is becoming increasingly inhospitable?
Science tells us that the burning of fossil fuels since the advent of the Industrial Revolution has resulted in the unanticipated warming of our atmosphere due to the greenhouse gas effect. We have been adding heat-trapping greenhouse gas emissions faster than nature can neutralize them. This increase in concentration has an impact on our global temperature. We have managed to overwhelm a system that has provided an average temperature that has been conducive to life as we know it.
In March of 2022, the International Energy Agency declared that the highest quantity of recorded greenhouse gases was introduced in 2021. The report states that: Coal accounted for over 40% of the overall growth in global CO2 emissions, now standing at an all-time high; CO2 emissions from natural gas also rebounded well above 2019 levels. The most significant greenhouse gas emissions from human activities in the United States are from burning fossil fuels for electricity, heat, and transportation.
Our electric utility built a coal-fired plant in 2010, expecting it to run until 2070. The Comanche 3 unit at Xcel Energy’s coal-fired plant in Pueblo was a state-of-the-art coal-burning powerplant that experienced construction cost overruns. Plagued with repairs, the latest taking the plant offline for nearly all of 2020, the plant will now close by 2035, if not earlier. The plant has been out of commission for 25% of its lifetime. The cost of the June 2020 incident was $20.4 million, and Xcel had to buy $9.5 million in replacement power. The lost production has not been missed, and its continued use ensures further environmental havoc making me wonder why it has not been shuttered.
A sunk cost is a cost that has already occurred and cannot be recovered by any means. The sunk cost fallacy reasoning states that further investments or commitments are justified because the invested resources will be lost otherwise. This situation is often known as “throwing good money after bad.” Here is an example:
A company spends $5 million on building an airplane. Before completion, the managers realize that there is no demand for the aircraft. The aviation industry has evolved, and airlines demand different plane types. The company has a choice: finish the plane for another $1 million or build the new in-demand airplane for $4 million. The $5 million already spent on the old plane is a sunk cost in this scenario. It should not affect the decision, and the only relevant price is $4 million.
According to a Colorado Public Utilities Commission report, the cost of electricity from the plant — $66.25 for each megawatt-hour (MWh) – was 45% more than forecast, and the annual operating expenses, at $34.8 million a year, were 44% higher than projected. In addition, the average cost of wind projects bid in Xcel’s 2017 solicitation was $19.30 a MWh.
“Actually, during September and December 2020, having Pueblo 3 offline saved customers money, raising the prospect of using the unit for the month — or season-specific operations.” — From the PUC report
There is a story in the Midrash of an old guy observed planting a fig tree. When asked if he expected to live long enough to consume the fruits of his labor, he replied: “I was born into a world flourishing with ready pleasures. My ancestors planted for me, and now I plant for my children…” Our grasping to the poor investment in a coal plant is planting a tree bearing the bitter fruit of an inhospitable climate for our children. Let’s close an expensive, heavily polluting, underachieving plant and call it the bad sunk-cost investment it is.
David Takahashi is a Boulder resident active in intergenerational equity. He may be reached at the.dragons.be.here@gmail.com
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Sunday night, Boulder County District Attorney Michael Dougherty received a call from a local police officer who told him that someone within his jurisdiction had just died from a suspected drug-related poisoning.
We use the word “poisoning” because it’s safe to assume that this death, like so many others lately, was the result of the illegal sale and use of a recreational drug unknown by the user to be laced with a synthetic or human-made opioid called fentanyl.
“These calls are coming in far too frequently,” Dougherty says.
While the opioid crisis is difficult enough, the discovery of illicit drugs containing any random amount of fentanyl — a federally regulated narcotic that was developed as a pain management treatment for cancer and is 100 more times potent than morphine — has become a disturbing trend among street drug-related deaths in our communities.
One of the most striking cases occurred in late February inside a Commerce City apartment, where three women and two men likely died within minutes, according to local law enforcement, after ingesting cocaine that they did not know contained a toxic dose of fentanyl. To make matters worse, a 4-month-old baby was at the scene but was thankfully unharmed.
Nationwide, an estimated 105,752 people died from drug overdoses between September 2020 and September 2021, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, with two-thirds of those deaths involving synthetic opioids, such as fentanyl. That’s an alarming number — more than gun deaths and fatal car crashes combined — and a 50% increase over the previous two years.
We are experiencing this rise in drug overdose fatalities here in Colorado with an estimated 1,757 people dying last year, up by 700 from pre-pandemic years, according to preliminary data from the state Department of Public Health and Environment. And of those deaths, an estimated 803 involved fentanyl.
These counterfeit drugs are ravaging our community in Boulder County, with at least 19 deaths last year, according to Boulder County Coroner reports.
The reason drug cartels and dealers have turned to fentanyl is because it is cheap to manufacture and highly addictive. Law enforcement has shown that dealers know they are poisoning and killing our friends, neighbors, coworkers, family members and children. These criminals who put profit above human lives deserve to be punished to the extent of the damage they have done to our communities.
Newly introduced legislation would do just that.
House Bill 1326, introduced March 25 by Speaker of the House Rep. Alec Garnett, D-Denver, and Rep. Mike Lynch, R-Wellington, would make the manufacture or sale of any “material, compound, mixture or preparation containing fentanyl” a Level 1 drug felony when a person died from “using or consuming it.”
This bill will not appeal to those who are not in favor of ramping up criminal penalties to combat illegal drug use and abuse, preferring prevention and treatment instead.
We support all of the above, because it is going to require a massive, all-hands-on-deck effort in order to save lives. The fentanyl crisis is growing and has expanded to where we are hearing from law enforcement that fentanyl is being sprayed on black market marijuana.
And this bill is comprehensive, calling for widespread public education and broader community access to naloxone — a medication used to reverse the deadly effects of opioids — and it provides for mandatory treatment for individuals caught with drugs containing less than 4 grams of fentanyl. There is plenty of time for valid concerns to be heard and for amendments to be made, but this bill is a good first step toward holding those who are preying on a public health crisis accountable while providing much-needed resources for treatment and prevention.
People are going to try drugs out of curiosity and for fun; that is just a given. The young adults who died in the Commerce City apartment didn’t deserve to die, and neither did a University of Colorado Boulder student who died just days before starting his senior year.
We are not condoning illegal drug use, but in an effort to find compassionate and real solutions, it’s important to focus on the tragedy at hand and not judge the user for whatever their reasoning. When it comes to addiction, for instance, science has clearly proven that opioids hijack the brain and with it, all sense and reason. Clinical studies at National Institutes of Health illustrate that laboratory mice with addiction traits will, if given the chance, push a lever for drugs or alcohol until they die, while mice without such biological predispositions won’t.
We are fortunate in Boulder County, where our DA, Drug Task Force, local law enforcement, public health agencies, K-12 school districts and University of Colorado Boulder have been meeting on a regular basis to form a robust response to deaths from fentanyl, including making naloxone available in every school health room in the near future.
Trina Faatz, who facilitates a Substance Use Advisory Group for Boulder County, gave out 500 kits — each kit holds two nasal spray applications of naloxone — to high school students over the last few months.
“This is not to say that 500 kids are actively wanting to use drugs,” she explains. “It’s because these kids realize that there is a terrifying problem out there with any source of street drugs, and they want to be able to help save lives.”
Join in the community effort to help prevent fentanyl overdoses by visiting SubstanceUseAdvisoryGroup.org.
— Julie Marshall for the Editorial Board
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Mile High United Way’s Volunteer Connection: Part of the United Way movement founded in 1887 in Denver, Mile High United Way connects people and strengths communities through volunteer engagement. Below are opportunities available in our communities in Boulder and Broomfield counties. Become a member at volunteer.unitedwaydenver.org/group/events/8945 to search our site for other opportunities, including those in the rest of Mile High United Way’s service area in the greater Denver area, or email the Mile High United Way Team at volunteer@unitedwaydenver.org with questions.
A Precious Child, a nonprofit whose mission is to empower disadvantaged youth by providing them with opportunities and resources to reach their full potential, needs volunteers. Volunteers are the core of of A Precious Child’s work — more than 6,700 volunteers who donate hundreds of hours of service is needed annually to fulfill its mission. Individuals, corporate groups, churches and community organizations are welcome. The nonprofit is in need of baby wipes, masks, cleaning supplies, hygiene items, spray bottles and diapers. For more information email Volunteer@APreciousChild.org.
Boulder Seniors Foundation supports older adults in the Boulder community with emergency assistance for rent and utilities, WiFi access, medical, dental, optometry, hearing and counseling expenses. In addition, the foundation co-sponsors educational and other programs at the Age Well Center, 909 Arapahoe Ave. in Boulder, at the intersection of 9th Street and Arapahoe Avenue. Any donation helps keep Boulder’s older adults safely in their homes and helps them avoid food insecurity. Information: boulderseniorsfoundation.org.
Boulder Shelter Most needed items at this time are sugar, coffee, hand sanitizer, masks, Tylenol/Advil/Aspirin, cough and cold medicine (alcohol free), laundry detergent, soap, travel-sized shampoo, body wash and lotion and vitamins. Things can be ordered online and delivered to Boulder Shelter for the Homeless, 4869 N. Broadway, Boulder, CO, 80304. Monetary donations are also accepted at www.bouldershelter.org or by mailing a check to the address above.
Boulder Treasures: Help transform the lives of adults living with developmental disabilities. You might know us through our job training apprentice program hosted at Ramble on Pearl. Our parent nonprofit, Boulder Treasures, creates pathways to purpose and community, and we’re growing with new programs and services that came online in 2021. Do you enjoy writing, telling stories, making media, setting up email marketing systems, or do you simply want to be part of a fantastic team having fun and making the world a better place by walking alongside this amazing group of people? Check us out at www.rambleonpearl.com or contact us at volunteers@bouldertreasures.org. We could use your help spreading the word — join us today!
Bridge House invites volunteers to help support people transitioning out of homelessness into employment and housing by becoming a mentor, volunteering in its kitchen, helping serve food or choosing another volunteer opportunity. Donations also are needed, including sunscreen, bug repellant, toiletries, and other specific weather-related items. For information or to volunteer, email Scott@BoulderBridgeHouse.org.
Broomfield FISH: A grocery store donation box is available at King Soopers on 120th and Sheridan, Hwy. 287 or 136th and Zuni and at Safeway on 144th and Lowell as well as Sprouts on 120th and Sheridan. Top needs are cereal, oatmeal, mac n cheese, Spaghettios, canned meat and peanut butter. For more information go to www.broomfieldfish.org or mail donations to 6 Garden Center, Broomfield, CO, 80020.
Cake4Kids, a nonprofit that provides birthday cakes to at-risk and foster youth, needs creative at-home bakers. Volunteers should have good baking and decorating skills. No minimum volunteer commitment is required. Volunteers must be 18 years old or older, but teens ages 16 or 17 can participate alongside a parent or guardian. Sign up for an orientation at www.cake4kids.org or email amy@cake4kids.org with any questions.
Circle of Care, an arts and aging nonprofit that works to end isolation for older, vulnerable adults through arts, culture, lifelong learning accessibility and intergenerational social belonging, is seeking volunteers who love the performing arts and older people to serve as performance companions who help older adults attend great concerts and events. Help end social isolation for people as they age. Circle of Care volunteers provide door-to-door rides and caring support and help build community for all ages while enjoying the arts, culture, community, and concerts together at great local arts and cultural venues. Tickets are provided for free to Circle of Care volunteer driver/escorts. Volunteers must wear a mask at all times with clients and must be highly responsible and dependable. Volunteers who will drive clients must be at least 21 years or older with an excellent driving record. Volunteers must provide proof they are fully vaccinated with their current COVID vaccine card, and show a driver’s license and auto insurance information. Volunteers also must attend an orientation. Call or email 303-358-4300 or office@circleofcareproject.org, for more information. Details: circleofcareproject.org.
COVID Recovery Center is seeking vaccinated volunteers to warm up meals and do laundry on-site as needed for those experiencing homelessness who are recovering from COVID at the center. Personal protective equipment is supplied for each shift. There is no contact with clients and staff are on site. Food is delivered with contactless protocols. Many hands are needed for four-hour shifts, 24 hours daily. Sign up on countmein.bouldercolorado.gov/d/hhs.
Cultivate is in need of volunteers to support its senior neighbors through programs such as rides to medical appointments for military veterans and their senior family members; grocery shopping and delivery; minor home repairs; snow shoveling and yard cleanup. Opportunities available throughout Boulder and Broomfield counties. Visit cultivate.ngo/engage/volunteer or call our office at 303-443-1933.
Feet Forward is an all-inclusive, nonprofit organization in Boulder providing individuals experiencing homelessness with increased access to hot food, beverages, clothing and toiletries. These are available every Tuesday near the Glen Huntington Bandshell between Broadway and Canyon from 2:30-4 p.m. For information on how to help or contribute, visit feetforward.org or email jenniferlivovich@gmail.com.
Flatirons Habitat for Humanity: We are currently working on two new home construction sites in Boulder that will provide affordable homes for 22 families. Come as an individual or as a group, and there is no need for prior construction experience. We will provide all necessary tools, training and instruction. For more information, including a list of available volunteer opportunities, visit our volunteer portal at flatironshabitat.volunteerhub.com. If you have specific questions or would like to schedule group builds, contact volunteer@flatironshabitat.org, or call Pam at 303-667-6474.
Harvest of Hope Food Pantry provides healthy, supplemental food to people in need of food assistance within a safe, welcoming, and non-judgmental environment. Its most-needed food items are: cans of black beans, red beans, chicken, shelf-stable alternative milks, dry pastas, and travel-sized toiletries including shampoo, condition, bar soap, toothpaste, sunscreen and razors. Find out more about hosting a food drive at hopepantry.org/fooddrive. Donations are accepted between 9 a.m. and 2 p.m. Monday through Friday at the pantry’s new location, 4830 Pearl St., Boulder. Ring the bell at the loading dock on the east side of the building. Consider volunteering: hopepantry.org/volunteer. Volunteers work in small groups, greeting participants, packing bags, stocking, weighing donations, and helping with other tasks. Donations can also be made at: hopepantry.org/donate.
Impact on Education supports the critical needs of students in the Boulder Valley School District. They have ongoing opportunities for volunteers to support their programs and events. Visit www.impactoneducation.org/volunteer to learn more or sign-up for volunteer orientation.
Intercambio Uniting Communities needs volunteer teachers to help adult English learners improve their English. There are students who live in Boulder County and all over the U.S. waiting to connect with volunteer teachers. Curriculum, training and ongoing support are provided to volunteer teachers. Volunteers commit to meeting with a student for 90 minutes twice a week. Volunteer from anywhere in the U.S.! Visit Intercambio.org/teach or contact volunteer@intercambio.org with any questions.
Longmont Meals on Wheels, 910 Longs Peak Ave., Longmont; is seeking weekly drivers, substitute drivers and kitchen helpers. Visit www.Longmontmeals.org/volunteer or call 303-772-0540 to volunteer.
Longmont Public Safety is seeking adult volunteers for its Citizen Volunteer Patrol (CVP), Victim Advocates, CERT (Community Emergency Response Team) and Front Range Chaplains and as general support to public safety staff. Youth also can volunteer as college interns working with line level staff and middle or high school students can get involved with the Police Explorers. Additional information and application information can be found by visiting www.longmontcolroado.gov and searching “public safety volunteers’ or by calling 303-774-4440.
Meals on Wheels of Boulder is seeking volunteers for its Eat Well Café at the Age Well Center West, 909 Araopahoe Ave., Boulder. Servers, cashiers, and hosts are needed. Volunteer cashiers in the Niche Market at the northeast Boulder location, 3701 Canfield St. Boulder; also are needed. Those interested should email Lisa at volunteers@mowboulder.org.
OUR Center needs food donations, especially protein items and toiletries, both family and travel size. Cash donations can be made at ourcenter.org/donate or mailed to 220 Collyer St., Longmont, CO, 80501. Contact Elaine at elaine@ourcenter.org for questions.
Sister Carmen Community Center needs volunteers for its food bank and thrift store, both of which have increased services since the Marshall Fire. Opportunities include weekly shifts in the food bank and drop-in shifts in the thrift store, after training. Volunteer tasks in the food bank include welcoming donors, receiving donations, sorting food donations, putting away donations and assisting clients as they shop for food. Food bank volunteers are asked to make a three-month commitment. Volunteer tasks in the thrift store include sorting and hanging clothing, putting priced items on the sales floor and merchandising. Please see our website sistercarmen.org and contact ann@sistercarmen.org or call 303-665-4342 ext. 142 to volunteer.
Tgthr, formerly Attention Homes, is in need of volunteers to donate hot dinners for youth residing at its facilities. Volunteers can visit the Tgthr website to learn more and sign-up to donate a meal: tgthr.org/meal-donations/. It also is in need of in-kind donations of nonperishables such as soups, Tasty Bites, rice, Chef Boyardee products, instant flavored oatmeal, Pop Tarts, tuna and other canned meats, ramen, mac-n-cheese cups, fruit cups, peanut butter and granola bars. It also can accept donations of shelf-stable fruit such as bananas, clementines, oranges and apples, and donations of paper products such as toilet paper and paper towels, cleaning supplies like Lysol wipes and hand sanitizer, and cold-weather items such as hand/toe warmers and gloves. Donated items can be dropped off from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. at 1440 Pine St., Suite A, Boulder. For questions about the 10th annual Sleep Out or other volunteer opportunities, contact Tgthr’s Volunteer Manager Kathryn Quinn, at kquinn@tgthr.org.
TRU Thrift Shop earnings support compassionate end-of-life care, grief support, and education. The nonprofit thrift shop needs volunteers to sort donations in the following departments: clothing, electronics, furniture, household items, art, books, and linens. All donations are processed for quality, pricing and displaying. Volunteers must be at least 18 years old unless accompanied by an adult and shifts are typically for four hours. Contact Lynn McCullough at Lynnmccullough@trucare.org or 303-604-5353 for more information.
Virtual volunteer opportunities
The Boulder Seniors Foundation (BSF) is seeking volunteers to join its board of directors in supporting Boulder’s Older Adult Services and the Age Well Centers. BSF provides Boulder’s citizens with a way to make tax-deductible donations specifically to benefit Boulder’s older adults. It provides funds to assist low-income older adults with emergency expenses and also sponsor programs of interest (nutrition classes, 55+ job fair, Chautauquan lecture series) for all older adults. Visit the website at boulderseniorsfoundation.org or call 720-267-6933.
Sister Carmen invites community members to host virtual friends and family food or coat drives. New, or clean and repaired, children’s and adult’s coats, gloves and hats are needed for the nonprofit’s warm rack this winter. Information: sistercarmen.org/food-donations.
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https://www.dailycamera.com/2022/04/02/photos-first-day-of-boulder-and-longmont-farmers-markets/
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Justin Killing, of MycoCosm Mushrooms, sells his produce to Sam Allen and Daughter, Emma,5, during the first day of the Boulder Farmers Market on April 2, 2022.
Jonathan Krohn, right, of Aspen Moon Farm, gets a bag of spinach for a customer during the first day of the Longmont Farmers Market on April 2, 2022.
Norma Perez, of Pupusas Familia, puts together a plate of food during the first day of the Longmont Farmers Market on April 2, 2022.
Kyle Monroe checks over his produce from Monroe Organic Farms during the first day of the Boulder Farmers Market on April 2, 2022.
Anna Mahorski has found what she was looking for at the Aspen Moon Farm stand during the first day of the Longmont Farmers Market on April 2, 2022.
Kelly Jean Moore has microgreens on display during the first day of the Longmont Farmers Market on April 2, 2022.
Paulette Middleton, left, buys vegetables from Katie Daoust, left, and Mia DeJohn, from Black Cat Farm during the first day of the Boulder Farmers Market on April 2, 2022.
Nina Kahn sells unique drinks from Green Belly Foods during the first day of the Boulder Farmers Market on April 2, 2022.
Christy Reysen looks at the cucumbers at the Rocky Mount Fresh stand during the first day of the Boulder Farmers Market on April 2, 2022.
The crowds arrived early for the first day of the Longmont Farmers Market on April 2, 2022.
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https://www.dailycamera.com/2022/04/02/boulder-police-21-year-old-man-arrested-in-connection-to-friday-death-investigation/
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Boulder police said a 21-year-old man was arrested Saturday in connection to a person who was found dead in the 4800 block of Pearl Street.
Alan Moody is charged on suspicion of vehicular homicide, a Class 4 felony; and causing an accident
involving personal death or personal injury, a Class 3 felony, according to news released Saturday by Boulder police.
The release said “good police work” led detectives to identify Moody just after midnight Saturday.
Just before 6 a.m. Friday a passerby notified police of an unresponsive person in the road. Officers arrived within minutes and found a person dead. Police said the person had suffered traumatic injuries.
Police temporarily shut down Pearl Street between 47th and 49th streets Friday to investigate.
The Boulder County Coroner’s Office will determine the exact cause and manner of death, as well as identify the person and notify the next of kin.
Police are asking anyone with any information related to this investigation to call Detective Ashley Flynn at 303-441-
1850 or Detective Scott Byars at 303-441-1970 and reference case 22-02957.
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https://www.dailycamera.com/2022/04/02/boulder-county-farmers-markets-are-a-delicious-way-to-support-local-businesses/
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The smell of freshly ground coffee beans and the sound of bluegrass trickled through the Boulder County Farmers Market on Saturday where vendors sold crates piled with fresh vegetables, potted herbs, trays of baked goods and jars of amber honey at the fairgrounds in Longmont.
Hundreds moved among the booths Saturday in both Boulder and Longmont for the markets’ opening day of the season, which runs through Nov. 19. After months of winter, vendors, organizers and visitors alike said they were glad to see the market make its return.
Longmont’s market featured dozens of vendors and live music from bluegrass band Orchard Creek.
Browsing pots of herbs at Aspen Moon Farms’ booth were Brenna Giannini and Patryck Minter. The Longmont couple had just arrived at the market at the Boulder County Fairgrounds. It was the first time Minter had visited the market.
“I wanted to see what they had,” Minter said.
Giannini said she wanted to show Minter the farmers market, while also supporting local businesses.
“We moved to Texas last year, and they didn’t have stuff like this,” she said. “This (farmers market) is one of many across the Front Range. Every weekend you can go and check out local companies.”
Mickey Davis, Boulder County Farmers Market food access specialist, watched as customers, farmers and small business owners talked face-to-face Saturday. She said she “loves the community that the market creates.”
This season, Davis said farmers market staff hope to spread the word about available food access programs, including the Double Up Food Bucks program. For every dollar that a person spends on their SNAP EBT card, the market will match up to $20. Those interested in using the program can go to the information booth at the farmers market to find out more about how the program works and redeem their farmers market dollars.
Behind a table of potted spinach, lettuce, sugar snap peas and arugula, Dave Thomas sold “plant starts” from his Rough and Ready Farm in Longmont.
Thomas has been vending at the Boulder County Farmers Market since last year.
“This is our main marketing outlet,” Thomas said.
Thomas said he was enjoying the sunny spring day, as temperatures climbed into the 60s. He said he looked forward to just being at the farmers market this season and seeing all the people.
After securing some tamales, a kale plant, kombucha and fresh lamb, Mellie Lonnemann and her family were on the hunt for fresh eggs Saturday at the fairgrounds.
While her husband, Peter Alexanian, searched a nearby booth, Lonneman waited with their 3-year-old son Joseph.
“We started coming last summer,” Lonnemann said. “It’s a really nice market.”
Supporting local farmers, the coffee shop and the live music were all things that inspired the family to come to the market, Lonnemann said. She hoped the visit also helped to teach her son about where food comes from.
Over in Boulder, vendors sold their wares to the hundreds who crowded the market throughout the day. Sitting on a curb, Nicole Schroeter and Edwin Hassenstein dug into crepes from Savory Saigon.
“I love it,” Schroeter said. “I come every time it’s open.”
“I love Boulder and really enjoy farmers markets,” said Hassenstein, of Denver. “Today is the first day of the season, so pretty psyched about that. I only moved to Colorado about eight months ago. This is definitely a cool market.”
Since moving to Boulder four years ago, Schroeter said the fresh produce, “vibes” and crepes bring her back to the market almost every weekend during the season.
The couple said they were next off to explore thrift stores and wander around the Pearl Street Mall.
Back in Longmont, as people drifted among the booths, Davis said there are numerous reasons people should come to their local farmers market this season.
“You’re supporting your neighbors. You’re supporting farmers and small local businesses that are doing so many services for the environment,” Davis said. “They’re creating biodiversity. They’re sequestering carbon into the soil. They’re treating their workers fairly. This is how we build community resilience. It’s just such a delicious way to do so.”
Know before you go
Longmont: 8 a.m. to 1 p.m. Saturdays at the Boulder County Fairgrounds, 9595 Nelson Road
Boulder: from 8 a.m. to 2 p.m. Saturdays and 4 to 8 p.m. Wednesdays (starting May 4) at 13th Street between Arapahoe Avenue and Canyon Boulevard.
To learn more about the farmers market, visit the website at bcfm.org.
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https://www.dailycamera.com/2022/04/02/cleaning-up-longmont/
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Longmont began its Clean Up, Green Up campaign April 2, and it will continue through April 23. City staff are inviting businesses, civic groups, schools, neighborhoods and families to come together to clean up Longmont’s parks.
Longmont began its Clean Up, Green Up campaign April 2, and it will continue through April 23. City staff are inviting businesses, civic groups, schools, neighborhoods and families to come together to clean up Longmont’s parks.
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https://www.dailycamera.com/2022/04/02/water-main-break-in-longmont-repaired-friday-night/
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Longmont city staff said the water main break at Mountain View Avenue and Martin Street was repaired Friday.
In a Facebook post about 8:30 p.m. Friday, city staff said that all customers had since been placed back in service. Crews remained on scene until about 9 p.m. to flush the system.
The water main broke Friday afternoon, closing part of Mountain View Avenue between Lashley and Martin streets. As crews made repairs, residents were told they may notice low water pressure, discolored water or have no water access for short periods of time. City staff said that the water remained safe to use.
City staff said that crews on Friday worked to restore the site until permanent repairs could be made. The Times Call reported late Friday that the road had since reopened.
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https://www.dailycamera.com/2022/04/03/rescuers-assist-injured-climber-saturday-afternoon-in-eldorado-canyon-state-park/
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Members of Boulder County rescue groups assisted a climber who was injured Saturday at Eldorado Canyon State Park.
About 12:53 p.m. Saturday the Boulder County Sheriff’s Office got a report of a climber who had fallen while climbing in the area of the Rosy Toit route on the Red Garden Wall, according to a Sheriff’s Office news release.
Rescuers from Eldorado State Park, Rocky Mountain Rescue Group and Mountain View Fire Protection District hiked into the area and found the patient, who was on the ground, the release said.
The 29-year-old climber, who is from Fort Collins, was stabilized and carried downhill to an ambulance. The climber was then transported to a Boulder-area hospital with injuries that were not life-threatening.
The rescue took approximately one hour, the release said. Assisting agencies included the Boulder County Sheriff’s Office, Eldorado State Park, Mountain View Fire Protection District and the Rocky Mountain Rescue Group.
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https://www.dailycamera.com/2022/04/03/david-gardner-last-minute-tax-tips/
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This time of year we are busy reviewing client tax returns, whether self-prepared or done professionally. Most of our tax discussions revolve around proactive planning, but for them to be effective, we must work closely with the tax preparer. This tax year, here’s what I’ve seen as the most common opportunities for taxpayers to boost their refund.
Charitable deduction available without itemizing. When the Tax Cuts and Job Act passed in 2017, key changes in the tax code meant that fewer than 10% of taxpayers now itemize deductions. That means no deductions for mortgage interest, state and local taxes, and charitable contributions. The good news is for 2021 only taxpayers can deduct up to $300 (single filers) or $600 (married filing jointly) for cash donations to most charities if they don’t itemize their deductions.
If you stopped tracking your cash donations, I suggest you dig out your receipts for 2021 for some possible tax savings. You should also know that Colorado (and select other states) permit you to deduct charitable contributions on your state taxes in most years, even if you’re not itemizing your deductions.
Stimulus round three. About this time last year, President Joe Biden signed the American Rescue Plan Act that authorized a $1,400 federal tax credit for individuals in households below certain income limits, from $75,000 for single filers to $150,000 to married couples filing jointly. Most qualified for these credits automatically through their 2019 or 2020 tax returns. But for those whose incomes exceeded the limits in previous returns, the 2021 tax return represents the final opportunity.
Child tax credits were also increased through this same legislation to up to $3,600 per qualifying child ages 6 and under and $3,000 for older children through age 17, subject to income limits. If you didn’t receive these credits automatically deposited into your checking account, you may qualify for them when you file for 2021.
Retirement plan for self-employed workers. A common reaction of entrepreneurs who have their first profitable year is elation. That feeling of abundance can come crashing down when they prepare their taxes and see that they owe not only income taxes on their profits, but also self-employment taxes in the form of Social Security and Medicare taxes. Most new business owners are not expecting that 15.3% additional tax hit.
Fortunately, we now have the option of implementing a solo 401(k) plan. Just like a retirement plan at a bigger employer, a solo 401(k) permits business owners without full-time employees to establish a 401(k) for little charge at most custodians. A solo 401(k) could permit you to put aside up to $58,000 a year pre-tax for 2021, depending on the profits of your business. Those who had at least turned 50 by last year could qualify to put aside an additional $6,500.
While these individual retirement plans are not new, it’s only in recent years that the IRS has permitted small business owners to set up these plans for the previous calendar year if the plan is established before the tax filing date, including extensions. That means a sole proprietor could establish a plan as late as October of this year to reduce their taxable income for 2021. This gives the solo worker the opportunity to put a plan in place now to save on last year’s taxes.
Marshall Fire and straight-line wind tax changes. If you read the Presidential declaration coming out of the Marshall Fire, it says all taxpayers in Boulder County who were affected by the winds or fire are eligible for delaying the payment and filing of their taxes until May 16. I wouldn’t recommend taking advantage of the extra month unless you need it, given that I’ve seen routine correspondence with the IRS become more problematic.
Those who have suffered financial setbacks due to the catastrophe may be able to deduct their unreimbursed losses on their 2021 return. Any losses may also be carried back to an amended 2020 tax return if that would be more advantageous to you. Working with an experienced tax preparer can help ensure you’re taking full advantage of these strategies.
David Gardner is a certified financial planner professional at Mercer Advisors practicing in Boulder County. The opinions expressed by the author are his own and are not intended to serve as specific financial, accounting, or tax advice. They reflect the judgment of the author as of the date of publication and are subject to change.
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https://www.dailycamera.com/2022/04/03/boulder-area-cities-seek-consistency-in-energy-codes/
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If you’re searching for a good phrase to cut off a conversation, “Let’s talk about building codes” would rank highly on the list. They are a technical and complex topic that many residents encounter only when a developer applies for an exception to a height restriction.
But they have a massive role that is often overlooked: For municipalities that want to become more sustainable and energy efficient, building and energy codes are one of their most effective tools. Buildings, especially commercial and industrial ones, are huge producers of greenhouse gasses. In Boulder, commercial and industrial buildings are responsible for 53% of the city’s total greenhouse gas emissions. By adopting more-stringent building codes, cities and towns can mandate how sustainable new buildings must be.
“Every municipality in Boulder County has greenhouse gas emissions goals,” said Collin Tomb, climate and health strategist for Boulder County. “But a lot of what produces greenhouse gasses is determined by things outside of their control. Building codes are one of the few things that municipalities can control. It’s a huge lever that we have.”
With this in mind, governmental entities in the Boulder area have formed the Colorado Department of Local Affairs Code Cohort. Their goal is to standardize building codes throughout the various counties and municipalities in the area to bring them in line with the 2021 International Energy Conservation Code, which is America’s model energy code.
Boulder County, Broomfield, Erie, Lafayette, Louisville, Longmont, Northglenn and Superior are members of the cohort.
The city of Boulder is not a part of the cohort because it has adopted its own standalone energy code that is more stringent than the 2021 IECC. It plans to update its code by 2023, said Carolyn Elam, energy program strategy manager for Boulder.
“Everybody should benefit from good, efficient, resilient building stock,” Elam said.
This standardization is necessary, in part, because Colorado is one of eight states that lacks a statewide building code. It is also a home-rule state, which means that individual municipalities have the power to govern themselves as they see fit so long as they adhere to the Colorado Constitution. These two factors effectively mean that the state has no consistency in its building codes from city to city and town to town. Boulder County enforces a building code for unincorporated territories, but the county has no authority over the codes of municipalities.
This has created an environment where most of the municipalities in the cohort have different energy codes and there is little consistency within the area. Not only does this mean houses built in different towns have different levels of energy efficiency, but it also forces developers to build to different codes in different municipalities.
“If I want to build in Louisville, Superior, Boulder, they all have their own code they follow, appendices they adopted, tweaks they’ve made,” said Frank Wetenkamp, co-owner of sustainable homebuilder Living Craft Design-Build and former president of the Colorado Green Building Guild. “I need a license from each municipality to conduct work there. If I want to do a project in Broomfield, I have to get a license and dig into their code.
“I could see there being some benefits there to not having to necessarily relearn code and dig into the little details.”
By making building codes more uniform around the Boulder region, the cohort is hoping to make their cities more sustainable, their buildings more comfortable and their developers’ lives easier.
“There was a three-pronged approach,” said Christine Brinker, senior buildings policy manager for the Southwest Energy Efficiency Project. “One, the drive for more consistent codes is something builders want. Codes in general can be lengthy and complex. Having to find differences from community to community takes a lot of time and resources. Two, it’s simplifying the process for local governments, too. As builders understand codes better, governments get more compliance. Then finally, there’s the local communities that are in this cohort that have an interest in increased sustainability. This is how you can improve sustainability.”
Additionally, a bill in the Colorado General Assembly, House Bill 22-1249, would require any local jurisdiction with a building code to adopt the 2021 IEnergyCC by 2025.
So what does this standardization look like? Mostly, it also involves getting every municipality to adopt the 2021 IECC, which serves as a model energy code for the U.S. It is updated every three years when representatives from states and municipalities vote on proposed changes.
For example, the 2021 IECC includes provisions such as a mandate that floor insulation be installed in permanent contact with the subfloor, a requirement for duct leakage tests and a stipulation that all interior lighting have a built-in dimmer or motion detector.
The 2021 IECC also has additional amendments that communities can choose to adopt. When adopted, these further require that new buildings have the capabilities for solar power, electric appliances and electric vehicle charging stations.
So far, Louisville and Superior have adopted all three of those amendments, and Longmont has adopted one for electric vehicles.
According to cost estimates provided by the cohort, these amendments cost homeowners about $900 up-front for a new home and about $4,800 to retrofit into an existing home. In either case, however, the energy savings would pay for themselves, and the home would be more comfortable for the occupant.
“Generally with code changes, especially energy code, the benefits are that you have a more resilient house,” Wetenkamp said. “Your interior temperature won’t drop as much if you lose power and your heat goes out. The general energy consumption will go down. Those are the trends you’ll see as codes improve over time.”
This isn’t the only recent update to building codes in the area. Boulder in 2016 also adopted the Building Performance Ordinance Program. That mandates that all existing commercial buildings larger than 20,000 square feet and all new commercial buildings larger than 10,000 square feet undergo a multi-year process of rating and reporting their energy usage to the public, conducting an energy assessment, upgrading lighting and implementing cost-effective retrocommissioning to improve the building’s performance.
Currently, 439 buildings in Boulder are affected by this ordinance, including some of the city’s most prominent commercial structures: the Ball Aerospace & Technologies Corp. headquarters, the Google Inc. building in Pearl Place, Boulder Community Health, the St. Julien Hotel and Spa, and several buildings on the University of Colorado Boulder and Naropa University campuses.
In addition to the regular building codes, these buildings are required to comply with the standards published by the American Society of Heating, Refrigerating, and Air-Conditioning Engineers, which add another layer of efficiency and sustainability requirements.
The deadlines for buildings to have their retrocommissioning completed are quickly approaching, with buildings larger than 50,000 square feet and all new buildings required to retrocommission by May 31, 2023. For buildings that fail to meet the standards, the penalties for owners and occupants will be onerous: fines of one-quarter of a cent per square foot per day, up to $1,000 per day. The hope is that those fines are enough of a stick to force developers and property owners to comply.
Those heavy fines get at another important issue with building and energy codes — how can municipalities incentivize or force developers and property owners to build to their standards?
In terms of building codes, the stick is simple. If a building isn’t up to code, there are no financial penalties. Rather, developers would be unable to secure permits, and tenants wouldn’t get the certificate of occupancy that would allow them to move into the building.
“The penalties are construction delays and occupancy delays,” Brinker said.
For incentives, developers say that education and entitlements will go a long way toward easing their transition to building to a new code.
“Any incentives you can give, specifically financial, will help,” Wetenkamp said. “Developers will have to build to code either way, but we can make that transition easier … for a builder to change from one energy code to another, they have their systems and how they like to do things. Revamping that every few years could be frustrating and time consuming.”
Brian Hludzinski, owner of green homebuilding company Boulder ZED Design Build, agreed. He said that educating developers about green building science and ensuring that they have people on staff with that expertise will go a long way toward making the transition to new codes easier.
“Some builders know the details, but a lot don’t,” Hludzinski said. “A lot of architects didn’t get this kind of building science training in architecture school. Not many have the tech savvy. There’s still a lot of knowledge to be gained on the building side … You have to get subcontractors on board, or somebody on staff like a project manager or superintendent to understand green building science. It’s really the guy on-site who is taking care of the details, and the devil is in the details.”
Now, the municipalities and counties in the cohort will go about actually changing their building codes to fit the 2021 IECC. The goal is for all of them to have adopted it by the end of the year. The process for that varies from municipality to municipality, but it generally involves some form of outreach to both the local community and developers and builders in the area. Once feedback from stakeholders has been received, the formal adoption process begins where the code must be approved by the planning commission and city council.
Then, ideally, the cities and towns in the Boulder Valley will have set themselves up to build more sustainably and efficiently for years to come.
“When we think about priorities, we need to think about what is actually important to us, and the health of our occupants should be the most important thing,” Wetenkamp said. “Buildings are for people, and we should design around their patterns, health and needs.”
The Marshall Fire Piece
In November 2021, Louisville adopted the 2021 IECC with amendments requiring new homes be solar, electric-vehicle and electric-appliance-ready. Less than two months later, the Marshall Fire destroyed more than 550 homes and businesses in the city.
With that in mind, the city council passed an ordinance allowing homeowners with destroyed or damaged homes to rebuild to Louisville’s previous building code instead of the one passed in 2021. For homeowners who do desire to rebuild to the new building codes, Xcel Energy is offering rebates to help offset the cost. Residents can visit bit.ly/3K4mZVm for more information about the rebate program.
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https://www.dailycamera.com/2022/04/03/boulder-city-council-and-boulder-county-commissioners-set-to-meet-for-joint-hearing-on-library-district/
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After years of back and forth, research and debate, the Boulder City Council and the Boulder County Commissioners this week will decide whether to form a district that encompasses all of Boulder and parts of unincorporated Boulder County.
If the two entities approve a district, it would end more than 100 years of municipal control and set the library up with property tax funding, which some argue is a more stable source of funding.
When Rylan Bowers thinks about what the Boulder Public Library offers the community, his support for a library district feels like a no-brainer.
“I’m a lifelong library user and love the system,” he said. “I love what it provides the community for free. It’s pretty mind-blowing, actually.”
The city and county will hold a joint public hearing Tuesday. The City Council will vote after the hearing. The County Commission will vote Thursday.
If the library district is approved, the City Council and County Commission will need to seat a board of trustees for the district and begin negotiating the intergovernmental agreement. A property tax increase is likely to be on the ballot in the November municipal election.
As a Niwot resident, nestled in unincorporated Boulder County between Boulder and Longmont, Bowers does not have a neighborhood library to use. He is a library card holder with both Boulder and Longmont public libraries and typically checks out books from both systems.
In terms of whether he’d prefer a district in Boulder or Longmont, Bowers said he thinks both should have one. However, he’s currently advocating for the district in Boulder, given the impending vote and the fact that a Niwot branch is among the things that could be funded through district formation.
The formation of a library district has been part of the conversation in Boulder since Library Director David Farnan took the job eight years ago. It was recommended in the 2018 Boulder Public Library master plan.
If a district is approved and voters approve a tax increase to fund it, the library has said it plans to address the facility maintenance backlog, restore library hours to pre-pandemic levels, fully fund the new North Boulder Library, open branches in Gunbarrel and Niwot, and improve outreach to the Latinx community, among other things.
A survey commissioned by the Boulder Library Champions, a group advocating for the district, and conducted by Keating Research in March showed 88% of respondents have a favorable view of the Boulder Public Library and more than 7 in 10 voters supported the measure.
The survey was conducted via telephone interview and included a poll of 500 likely voters.
While many people who support a district are regular patrons, that’s not always the case.
As an Eldorado Springs resident with children who are now grown, Gina McAfee does not often visit the library to check out books.
However, after the 2016 election, she became involved in social justice and immigrants’ rights issues and started using the library facilities to assist with that kind of work.
“I realized how much of a resource it was to all members of our community — people that don’t have any money, people that really need support in one way or another,” McAfee said.
How it works elsewhere
Library districts are the most common form of library governance in Colorado, with 56 districts across the state.
The Colorado Department of Education conducted a comparison of the three forms of governance: municipal, county and district.
In a municipally controlled system such as Boulder, funding comes most often from sales tax and can fluctuate year to year based on other needs of the government.
In a county system, the degree of autonomy is up to the county commissioners, and property tax is the principal source of funding.
A library district, according to the Department of Education, has the highest degree of autonomy. Property tax is the principal source of funding with a set mill levy passed by voters.
When looking at how neighboring communities govern libraries, it’s a bit of a mixed bag.
Longmont and Broomfield have a municipally controlled system, while Lyons, Nederland, Estes Park and Fort Collins all have formed districts. Jefferson County has a system run by the county.
Days before the 2013 flood, Lyons agreed to form a library district, which encompasses parts of Boulder and Larimer counties. Because of the timing, the property tax increase failed on the first try. It was successful in 2014, passing by a narrow margin.
Districts are often permitted to coordinate multiple elections if the first is unsuccessful.
For Bill Palmer, president of the Lyons Regional Library District Board of Trustees, it’s been beneficial to form a district.
“The great thing is that we’re not subject to the whims of the town board,” Palmer said. “We have a steady source of income that has actually continuously gone up as property values have gone up since it’s totally funded through property tax.”
This has been an advantage for Lyons, which built a large, new library soon after forming a district.
However, now that the library is very obviously funded by taxpayers in the community, Palmer said there is a near=constant pressure to ensure the money is being spent well and that people understand how their tax money is being used.
“It makes it contingent on us as a board and staff to do everything we can to make sure that our patrons are getting their money’s worth and to let them know, to keep continuously doing (public relations) basically,” he said.
The tax question
The Library District Advisory Committee, a group formed by Boulder City Council that met to discuss details of the intergovernmental agreement that will guide the district, recommended a property tax of up to 3.8 mills.
If approved by voters, that would equate to about $27 per $100,000 of a home’s assessed value.
According to the library and the committee, that’s the amount necessary in order to bring in the $20 million required to expand services.
But that amount is one of the biggest drawbacks for those who oppose it.
“Raising the taxes makes it even less affordable to live in Boulder,” resident Pat Hood said.
“I love many things about (Boulder) but I just hate that it’s not open to people,” she added.
Hood also worried about the impact on small business in Boulder. The state’s Gallagher Amendment saddles commercial properties with a larger percentage of the property tax burden.
The Boulder Chamber has not yet taken an official position on the district. However, it did share some thoughts in a Boulder Business Roundup email.
“The Boulder Chamber has heard significant outcry from businesses that a mill levy increase of this magnitude comes at the worst possible time when they are recovering from the impacts of COVID — with reduced patronage, higher costs for labor, equipment and materials and reduced customer traffic.”
Some of those who support it expressed concern about the tax increase, too.
“I do think about folks on fixed incomes. I worry a little bit about what that will look like for them,” Bowers said.
But for McAfee, it’s well worth it.
“Knowing that part of my property tax is paying to make sure that people that really need the library, that have a reason to go can go there is huge to me,” she said.
Supporter Julia Hanke agreed. The library provides a great value, even when factoring in the additional tax. With elementary-age children, Hanke saves a lot of money on books because of the library.
“I feel like we really use all the services, and I think it would be a great asset,” Hanke said.
Since Boulder’s library is currently funded through the city’s general fund, it estimates that district formation would provide anywhere from $9 to $10 million in direct cost savings with an additional $2 to $3 million that it expects to save in other costs such as administrative and maintenance work.
Staff has identified a variety of areas the money could be reallocated including implementation of the facilities master plan, transportation system maintenance and improvements, homeless services associated with council priorities and funding initiatives to meet the city’s more aggressive climate targets.
Details left to sort out
The appointment of new board members has been a continued point of contention. The initial board of trustees will be appointed by the City Council and the County Commission. However, after that, the board of trustees could be tasked with that responsibility.
Many members of the City Council argue it makes sense for the district board to appoint its own replacements, considering the Council and County Commission will be responsible for ratifying the new members no matter what.
Others would like the city and county to have full control over appointing the members.
Hood, who opposes the formation of a district — at least as it’s currently being proposed — argues that if taxpayers are financially supporting the district then they should be electing members of the Board of Trustees.
“Although we’d be paying taxes to support this district, we wouldn’t have any say in what they do,” Hood said.
In Lyons, the Board of Trustees appoints new members, though Palmer acknowledged that the circumstances are different in a smaller community where it can be tough to find people to serve on boards.
There’s also been debate about whether the city should transfer ownership of or lease the three library branches it owns — the main library, the George Reynolds branch and the Carnegie Library for Local History.
The last time the Boulder City Council discussed it, members were split on whether to transfer or lease the buildings.
Additionally, though it was not a unanimous preference, members of the City Council opted to allow the district as many elections as it wants with a 2024 cutoff. This means if voters reject a property tax increase in November, the measure could be placed on the ballot again the following year or the year after that.
If the property tax increase is never successful, the library will remain under municipal control. The library district fronts the cost of the election if it’s successful, whereas the city and county will have to work together to cover the cost if it’s unsuccessful.
There are details left to work through and discussions still to be had. While the Boulder City Council has sorted through many of the remaining questions and seems likely to support the district, it remains to be seen how a joint hearing with the county commissioners will go.
But either way, with the library district public hearing approaching Tuesday, it appears as though the multiyear conversation is winding down.
If you watch
What: Boulder City Council and Boulder County Commissioners joint meeting
When: 5:30 p.m. Tuesday
Where: The City Council, County Commission and staff will meet virtually. Residents can watch on Boulder’s YouTube channel or Channel 8.
Agenda: bit.ly/34geMhj
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https://www.dailycamera.com/2022/04/03/timothy-thomas-our-common-future-in-boulder-and-the-region/
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By Timothy Thomas
There has been a fierce debate occurring recently on these Op/Ed pages. One side advocates for more affordable housing. The other side consists mainly of long-time local environmental protection activists fighting to protect what makes Boulder “special”: slower growth, Open Space and building restrictions.
Some pro-affordable housing opinion writers, myself included, seek inclusion, economic justice and the end of NIMBY-ism in Boulder. Opposition writers plea for the protection of the environment and describe the pursuit of more affordable housing here as a misguided idea sought merely “in the name of diversity.”
Both camps seem to agree on a desire to protect the environment and fight climate change. Both camps use the popular term “sustainability” in their rhetoric. How can both sides be seeking truly sustainable policy solutions when they are so diametrically opposed?
Either they agree on a common definition of sustainability, their definitions are different, or one side might be misusing the word.
Let’s look at where the term sustainability came into modern usage and see if both camps are using the word correctly, as it was originally intended.
In 1987, the U.N.’s World Commission on Environment and Development, a.k.a. the Brundtland Commission, published Our Common Future. Ms. Brundtland was the former Prime Minister of Norway and Chair of the Commission. The primary message of the report was of the need for the global community of nations to achieve “sustainable development”. They defined this specifically as meeting “the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs”.
In her forward to the report, Brundtland speaks about the formative period of the Commission. She said that at one point, some people wanted the Commission to limit its work “to ‘environmental issues’ only”. She successfully resisted that path. And I quote:
“The environment does not exist as a sphere separate from human actions, ambitions, and needs, and attempts to defend it in isolation from human concerns have given the very word ‘environment’ a connotation of naivety in some political circles”.
She continues:
“…the ‘environment’ is where we all live; and ‘development’ is what we all do in attempting to improve our lot within that abode. The two are inseparable”.
She makes an excellent point. The environment is a place. Development is how we thrive in that place. Thus the Commission uses the term “ecology” throughout the report where others would use the term “environment”. As any lawyer will tell you, words matter.
Based on the context in which it is used, it appears as though the authors intended for the term “ecology” to include people, ALL people, in its description of what had to be protected, in addition to the air, animals, vegetables and minerals. Let’s check.
Brundtland writes “Many critical survival issues are related to uneven development, poverty and population growth” placing “unprecedented pressures on the planets’ lands, waters, forests and other natural resources”. She is clearly seeking protection for the people AND the planet.
So in advocating for sustainable development, is she talking about sustainability as defined by a foundational three-legged stool of economic vitality, social justice AND environmental protection or is she solely concerned with nature?
Brundtland says “What is needed now is a new era of economic growth – growth that is forceful and at the same time socially and environmentally sustainable”. There you have it.
The affordable housing team, including myself, appears to have aligned its missions and goals much more closely to the original meaning of “sustainable development”, as opposed to the incorrect, incomplete, and misguided goal of primarily focusing on the “sustainability” of the environment.
Those who advocate only for the latter neglect the critical goals of a socially just society and an equitable economy in achieving true sustainable development. I invite Boulder environmentalists to join us in incorporating sociological and economic factors into their policies. To do anything less is to continue to perpetuate a social geography of environmental and economic haves and have nots.
How can one claim be trying to save our precious biosphere if we ignore the very people who live on it?
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https://www.dailycamera.com/2022/03/24/lion-gulch-trail-review-boulder-longmont-lyons-hikes/
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If you drive down U.S. 36 to get to Lyons, Longmont or Boulder, you may have noticed a trailhead near mile marker 8 on your way down the hill.
This is the start of Lion Gulch Trail which is a 6.3 mile out and back hike in the Roosevelt National Forest.
The trail is considered moderately challenging and takes an average of three-and-a-half hours to complete.
The day my friends and I went to the Lion Gulch Trail, it was a bit more than “moderately” challenging. Recent snows created some deep drifts in the upper part of the trail. The parts in the shade were difficult to slog through, even with our spikes and poles.
We made it about two-and-a-half miles in before we had to turn around and go back. The effort to slog through the snow zapped our energy.
However, while we were on the trail, we had a wonderful time.
The trail starts with a jaunt down to the north fork of the Little Thompson River. Lion Gulch (named for mountain lions) follows the waterway for most of its path. In fact, part of the fun is crossing the wooden bridges back and forth across the water. When we went, however, the water was ice. Higher up on the trail, hikers cross the water using rocks.
After the first descent into the gulch, the rest of the trail is a moderate incline with elevation gain.
We were able to hear traffic from the highway for the first half mile or so, but after that, only the sounds of nature accompanied us on our hike. We felt remote and isolated and at one with the environment around us.
The trees in this gulch are absolutely stunning. They are some of the tallest trees I have seen in Colorado. Majestic ponderosa pines stretch to the sky. They are fed by a constant source of water and shielded a bit from high winds down in the gulch. Aspens and Douglas firs also abound. Some of these tall trees have fallen across the trail and it was fun to duck under them.
On the cusp of spring, we heard many birds and saw a chipmunk skittering over the snow, but no other wildlife on this mid-March morning.
One nice aspect to Lion Gulch Trail is that hikers can take their dogs on a leash. We passed several people taking in the scenery and the fresh air with their pups.
Mountain bikers are also allowed on the trail. It is quite rocky, though, with man switch backs. Horses are allowed and there is a restroom at the trailhead.
We did not make it to Homestead Meadows where you can see historic structures, but in the summer, I hope to hike this trail again. If you make it to the top, the elevation gain is about a thousand feet. The trail starts around 7300 feet and the highest points get to 8700 feet, though the meadows start around 8300 feet.
According to the Larimer County website, “The Lion Gulch trail offers access to the Homestead Meadows National Historic District, which is the location of a number of homesteads that were established in the late 188’s and inhabited through the 1940s. It is also part of critical winter range and migration corridor for elk.”
Upon further research, I learned the Lion Gulch Trail was damaged in the flood of 2013 and did not reopen until 2017.
The Poudre Wilderness Volunteers cite that the Lion Gulch Trail is one of the three highest use trails in the Canyon Lakes Ranger District.
This trail is open year-round and has a dirt parking lot right off of US36. The Forest Service says that lot can accommodate up to 35 vehicles. The best times to go are June through August, but I loved seeing the vistas cloaked in fresh snow.
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https://www.dailycamera.com/2022/04/03/annual-wildlife-trail-closures-begin-in-boulder-county/
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In January, the City of Boulder’s Open Space & Mountain Parks division announced several seasonal closures of designated outdoor areas in order to protect various wildlife species.
Those closures from OSMP began Friday, with Caribou Ranch off-limits to hikers until July 1, and the western section of Lagerman Trail will be closed until Sept. 1.
These locations are home to many nesting birds and groups of elk. As these birds become migratory in the spring and the elk prepare for their calving season, seasonal closures ensure that the animals stay safe during those periods.
Additionally, near the west side of Lagerman Reservoir in Longmont, a pair of ospreys nest on top of a large pole each year. The closure there will protect these birds while they are in nesting season.
The east face of the climbing formation known as Der Zerkle will be closed until Sept. 1 in an effort to reduce the chance of people introducing White-Nose Syndrome to bats. A buffer surrounding Mallory Cave, the climbing routes on the east face of The Hand, the standard route on the Finger Flatiron, and all of Shark’s Fin will be closed until Oct. 1.
Humans can spread deadly fungus from one bat hibernaculum to another by accidentally carrying the fungus on their shoes, clothing, or gear, which is why the areas will be closed. The City of Boulder is separately implementing these specific closures, and more information can be found at bit.ly/3LzdRsb.
All designated trails around these closures will remain open. To view an interactive map showing current seasonal closures, visit bit.ly/36Gy7tr.
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https://www.dailycamera.com/2022/04/03/boulders-two-way-electric-vehicle-charging-system-shows-savings-in-first-year/
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Boulder is finding success a year into a pilot program testing a bidirectional electric vehicle charging system at the North Boulder Recreation Center.
The city partnered with Fermata Energy, a Virginia-based energy technology company, to test the electric vehicle charging system, meant to reduce the city’s energy load and lower utility costs by using two-way electricity from the building to the car and from the car back to the building.
So far, it’s done just that.
According to an annual report released earlier this week, the two-way charging system in 2021 reduced costs by about $250 a month, reducing the recreation center’s monthly electricity bill by about 3.4%. It’s a modest savings, but the results are promising, the city noted.
Traditionally, electric vehicle charging stations have a one-way flow from the grid or the building to the car.
For the pilot program, which began in 2021, the city is using one of its fleet vehicles, a Nissan LEAF, which is used within the city’s Parks and Recreation Department.
The car charges overnight when demand at the recreation center is low and provides power to the building during the day when demand is higher. The battery retains enough charge to power the fleet vehicle’s everyday duties. When it’s not being used by Parks and Recreation, the vehicle is connected to the two-way system.
For David Slutzky, CEO of Fermata Energy, Boulder’s success “really consistently shows how valuable bidirectional charging is to the electric vehicle industry.”
The company has been testing the technology in other locations, including at the Alliance Center in Denver.
While there are different circumstances in different places, “we have not had a single deployment with a bad outcome,” Slutzky said.
The city isn’t paying anything for the pilot program. It provided the car, and Fermata Energy provided the charger in order to test it and collect data.
The pilot program in Boulder received national attention. IDC Government Insights, a global data corporation that works with governments to provide better services, recognized the program in its annual Smart Cities North American Awards.
Boulder’s electric vehicle charging station program won in the smart buildings category.
Now that the program has thus far proven successful, the city is considering how to proceed into the future.
Using more bidirectional chargers could lead to greater cost savings for the city.
To combat the fact that nearly one-third of Boulder’s emissions come from transportation, the city has committed to transitioning its fleet to one that’s all-electric by the end of the decade. It currently has more than 30 electric vehicles within its fleet.
But it’s also looking into other ways to use the technology, according to Matt Lehrman, an energy utilities policy adviser for the city.
For example, while demand management is important, bidirectional technology could also be used to provide backup power, Lehrman noted.
Slutzky said this is technology Fermata Energy has already developed.
“It’s really disruptive technology,” he said. “The bidirectional technology makes electric vehicles a really good backup power solution.”
But overall, when Lehrman considers the first year of the pilot program, there is perhaps one takeaway that outweighs the rest.
“It works,” he said. “This type of technology is something that’s been a dream for a long time.”
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https://www.dailycamera.com/2022/04/03/colorado-county-clerks-association-election-deniers/
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Boulder County Clerk and Recorder Molly Fitzpatrick wants Colorado voters to know that thousands of dead people did not vote in the 2020 election.
This rumor was one of several that Fitzpatrick and other Colorado county clerks refuted during a news conference hosted by the Colorado County Clerks association on Sunday outside the Denver Elections Division in Denver, where Republican, Democratic and unaffiliated clerks gathered to address allegations of election fraud put forth by election deniers and conspiracy theorists.
In the past two years, election conspiracists have targeted Colorado clerks, citing fraud and security issues within Colorado’s election systems. Some of these false claims have ranged from accusations that China hacked Colorado’s voter registration database to reports claiming that Colorado’s voting systems are not properly certified.
Fitzpatrick sought to set the record straight.
“Unfortunately, over the last several months, there have been claims from election deniers that purport to prove fraudulent elections in Colorado,” Fitzpatrick said. “These claims are often lengthy, and they’re often full of jargon, and they do not provide proof or data. They consistently demonstrate a lack of understanding of our process.
“This is a pivotal moment, and these disproven conspiracies are intended to move us towards an election model that is less secure, less accurate, and less accessible,” she said.
Together, the group of county election officials, who also included Weld County Clerk Carly Koppes and La Plata County Clerk and Recorder Tiffany Lee, challenged election deniers and conspiracy theorists to prove their claims by providing “clear and compelling” evidence to law enforcement officials or Colorado Attorney General Phil Weiser.
To increase election security and election transparency, the County Clerk’s Association is hoping to employ a four-point list that aims to prevent future accusations of election fraud. These measures, according to Koppes, will include providing ballot images online for free so the public can look at the cast vote record, increasing signature verification audit processes to make them more consistent across the state, and making sure that elections stay properly funded.
La Plata County Clerk and Recorder Tiffany Lee emphasized the importance of standing up to these rumors.
“We have taken the unprecedented step to gather today as each of our county’s chief election officials because we can no longer stand by while a small group of well-funded conspiracy theorists prepare to gather on our Capitol steps to further share their half truths and lies,” Lee said.
Koppes added that rumors and accusations of election fraud are dangerous to the democratic process.
“We have a living, breathing government and every person’s access to that living, breathing government is the ballot. When you’re having questions about it and you’re having people not wanting to cast that ballot, that decreases the involvement in our government that we have,” Koppes said.
“That is why it is so vitally important for us to stand here today and make these demands of these people, to have them understand that your voter suppression is not going to keep going on here in Colorado. We are here to stand up for it, because we want to make sure that the greatest equalizer that every person in Colorado has – the ballot – is kept sacred, and we keep fighting for it.”
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https://www.dailycamera.com/2022/04/03/editorial-republicans-have-finally-had-enough-of-madison-cawthorn/
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U.S. Rep. Madison Cawthorn seems to have finally struck a nerve with his party.
Since he first emerged on the political stage just a couple of years ago, the first-term congressman from western North Carolina has made a name for himself as a far-right extremist and overall embarrassment to the state.
And, for the most part, Republicans have said and done very little to distance themselves from him. Until now.
His most recent indiscretion — and the one that has most drawn the ire of his fellow Republicans — occurred during a podcast appearance last week where he spoke of “sexual perversion” among politicians in Washington, the kind you’d see on a political TV drama like “House of Cards,” Cawthorn said.
In the interview, Cawthorn alleged that some of his older colleagues have invited him to orgies at their homes. He also claimed that “some of the people who are leading on the movement to try and remove addiction in our country” have done “a key bump of cocaine” right in front of him.
Needless to say, Republicans were not happy.
House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy met with Cawthorn on Wednesday to discuss the situation, as he has done in the past with other members who mire themselves in scandal, such as Paul Gosar and Marjorie Taylor Greene. McCarthy told reporters after the meeting that Cawthorn, who apparently admitted the allegations were exaggerated, has lost his trust and warned there could be consequences if he doesn’t “turn himself around.”
North Carolina politicians were similarly displeased.
“I thought it was a silly statement and it’s not the first one,” U.S. Sen. Thom Tillis told CNN.
Said U.S. Sen. Richard Burr: “On any given day, he’s an embarrassment.”
Just a few weeks ago, comments made by Cawthorn drew similar criticism from his colleagues after a video surfaced in which he called Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy a “thug.” At the time, it was one of the few instances in which Republicans had condemned any of Cawthorn’s transgressions. Now, it seems like it may have been approaching the last straw.
It is, of course, refreshing to see Republicans taking a stand at last against their party’s worst. But it’s hard to overlook all the times they didn’t.
There have been plenty of opportunities. A string of sexual harassment allegations surfaced shortly after his inauguration. There have been reports of him bringing weapons to school board meetings and airports. He may or may not have played an outsize role in the U.S. Capitol insurrection, and he’s threatened and incited violence on more than one occasion.
After all that, these salacious but rather immaterial allegations about cocaine and orgies are what finally pushed the GOP over the edge. Only now that his apparently active imagination has threatened the rest of his party do his colleagues seem willing to speak up. Moore, for example, has seemed more inclined to criticize him ever since Cawthorn decided, briefly, to run for reelection in the district that was widely believed to have been drawn specifically for the speaker.
Cawthorn, while ostentatious, is hardly an anomaly. Republicans have been equally reluctant to take on other extremists in their party, including Marjorie Taylor Greene. They cower when former president Donald Trump and others spread election falsehoods that chip away at democracy. But now that the fantastical stories involve them, they’re suddenly speaking up? It’s hypocritical. And it’s about time.
— The Charlotte Observer Editorial Board
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https://www.dailycamera.com/2022/04/03/fairview-high-team-wins-state-public-forum-debate-championship-at-50th-colorado-speech-and-debate-tournament/
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Stephen Chen and Wilson He entered the 50th Colorado Speech and Debate Tournament eager to hold down their state championship title from last year’s online competition.
“It just really meant a lot to be able to, especially because it was in person this year; it just felt really amazing to represent our school,” Chen said.
Chen and He, seniors at Fairview High School in Boulder who joined debate together their freshman year, won the public forum category.
“Public forum is a team competition, so there’s two people on each side,” He said. “It’s really basic — it’s on a lot of the current events that are really recent. So I think that’s what really makes public forum special from the other events.”
Chen added that public forum is usually the biggest debate event in these competitions.
Chen and He faced off with students from around the state March 18 and 19. The event was hosted by Cherokee Trail High School, and a total of 72 schools and over 400 participants were involved. Thirteen event state champions were chosen from categories ranging from poetry interpretation to informative speaking.
The tournament is formed by the Colorado High School Activities Association, which provides Colorado students with the opportunity to practice their skills through tournaments, as high school thespians must qualify for regionals prior to the state competition.
Due to COVID-19, the competition was held online last year. Chen and He described the excitement surrounding this year’s tournament, explaining that debate is not complete without the in-person aspect.
“It was a really different experience being in person, especially since the final few rounds were all with spectators and everything, while online it’s just you, your opponents and the judges,” He said.
Chen and He said they enjoyed meeting kids from other schools who share their interests and hope to continue debate in college.
“I think debate is definitely like, a lot of it’s about the experience and the team that you’re with. We won it last year when it was online, but it didn’t feel anywhere as like, I guess, magical as it did this time,” He said.
Chen and He encouraged students to attend a showcase from 6:30 to 8 p.m. April 7 at Fairview High School, where those interested in speech and debate will be given the opportunity to participate in events such as mock debates and speeches.
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Kris Hess: Colorado outdoors: Help preserve it
For all who love the outdoors and wildlife of Colorado you can help preserve it and earn some cash at the same time.
The Colorado chapter of Backcountry Hunters & Anglers (BHA) is offering a $500 reward for reports or information leading to a conviction of those responsible for illegal trail construction on public lands. Illegal trails destroy wildlife habitat by creating higher density recreation traffic and ultimately displace wildlife or alter natural patterns of the ecosystem.
Although “social trails” may be in our history of trail development it can no longer be in our future of trail development. Population and recreation growth ensure a growing negative impact from illegal trail construction. Land managers in Colorado (USFS, CPW, local governments) recognize the issue but they need your help to police our public lands.
This BHA reward program also applies to illegal off-highway vehicle use, e-bike use, and illegal dumping. Full details on the program can be found at www.backcountryhunters.org/bha_s_ohv_reward_fund. When you see illegal activity document it with your phone, a trail camera, etc. to help your local agency enforce the law. If your information leads to a conviction, follow the instructions on the BHA website to claim your reward!
Kris Hess
Backcountry Hunters & Anglers
Boulder County Assistant Regional Director
Nederland
Rebecca Harris Sullivan: Wildland firefighters: Calling for fair pay
Many of us in South Boulder are slowly breathing a sigh of relief as the last curls of smoke rise from the ashes of the NCAR Fire.
My husband and I were among the 19,000 Boulderites who hastily packed our bags and evacuated our home. I firmly believed that we still had a home to return to thanks to the bravery and sacrifice of our wildland firefighters — as well as the year-round remediation work carried out by the City of Boulder’s Open Space and Mountain Parks team. We can never say “thank you” enough.
However, one way we can show our appreciation is by ensuring that these courageous men and women are paid a fair, livable wage.
The majority of federal wildland firefighters are employed by the U.S. Forest Service and risk their lives for an hourly wage of just $13.45. Contrast this with the average hourly wage of a Boulder, CO police officer, which according to ZipRecruiter, is $28 an hour.
We can advocate for our wildland firefighters by supporting Tim’s Act, sponsored by Rep. Joe Neguse. H.R.5631, the Tim Hart Wildland Firefighter Classification and Pay Parity Act, would raise the hourly wage of wildland firefighters to at least $20 an hour and would also expand health care and retirement benefits, as well as provide housing stipends and more.
As we look out to the Flatirons today and see their beauty, not flames, we must ensure that our wildland firefighters are compensated for their bravery and hard work. Supporting Tim’s Act is a good first step.
Rebecca Harris Sullivan
Boulder
Claire Kelley: Library District: Worth the investment
Look around and you’ll notice the cracks in the walls at the Carnegie Library, the reduced hours at your local branch, and paused literacy programs. We are a city that highly values education and culture. It’s time for us to put the Boulder Public Library on a reliable funding path before we lose even more.
This November, voters should get to decide whether the library should move to a property tax-based “library district” model, following the lead of nearly every other region in the state of Boulder’s size and population, including Colorado Springs, Fort Collins, Lyons, Nederland, Estes Park, Greeley, and Pueblo.
Library districts allow library systems to be more resilient and to be able to plan ahead. For example, Fort Collins formed the Poudre Valley Library District in 2006, and in March 2020 they did not have to reduce hours or close buildings like Boulder did when the pandemic hit and our library system’s budget was cut.
The proposed property tax is $27 annually per $100,000 in the county-estimated value of your home. That means that if your “actual” home value on the Boulder County Assessor’s Office website is $500K, you’ll pay $11.25 per month for a district. In return, we will get:
Expanded library services for all community members and renewed print and digital collections.
More programming like storytime, workshops, and classes for families, underserved communities, and seniors.
Restored hours and staffing for all branches and updated facilities to address long-delayed maintenance.
There are 56 other library districts in Colorado for good reason. Establishing a library district via property taxes is the most equitable way to ensure that the library receives sustainable funding to continue to be a precious asset that strengthens our community. This is a historic opportunity to benefit our city for generations to come.
Claire Kelley
Boulder
Bill Kalafus: A new police academy: Yes, but at the state level
Regarding the Daily Camera’s Sunday March 27 editorial: Police staffing at crisis levels. A new Boulder academy will help:
The idea of a Police Academy would certainly be a step forward. However, it should be at the state level. Being at the state level would encourage uniform policing standards statewide to the benefit of all Colorado residents. The necessary funding would need to be worked out between the state, cities and counties.
Bill Kalafus
Boulder
Wallace Westfeldt: Fires: I want to know who is responsible
Who did it?
I want to know who did it. Calwood, Marshall, NCAR, Soul Shine … are our fire forensics that bad? Magwood was recently called accidental. What does that mean?
It doesn’t matter to me if the person(s) who started the fire did it on purpose or by accident, they deserve heavy fines, incarceration, and lawsuits. These fires are a serious matter and carelessness is not an excuse. I want the next hiker, target shooter, cult ceremony, balcony barbecuer, Education Center to be more careful knowing that severe consequences await the irresponsible.
Wallace Westfeldt
Boulder
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The following data is supplied by Colorado Weekly Homebuyers List Inc., 303-744-2020. Listed are the buyer, the seller and the amount.
Boulder
Rhett Heyward — 903 Chinle Ave., Unit H, Kimberly A. Kleinman, $203,600.
Jillian Porter — 2201 Pearl St., Apt. 122, Frank J. Mayer, $454,000.
Kyle Stone — 2930 Bluff St., Apt. 331, Andrew and Justine Smith, $495,000.
Mary McCarthytapp — 4500 Baseline Road, Apt. 3101, Michelle and Jeffrey Horve, $525,000.
Laura and Paul Hudgins — 625 Pearl St., Apt. 6, 625 Pearl St. 6 Invest LLC, $525,000.
Elizabeth Shaw — 3050 Aurora Ave., Karen and Carl Godard, $695,000.
Christina Hunt — 44 Pima Court, Trevor and Heather Dieck, $765,000.
Benjamin and Shannon Casner — 1100 S. Lashley Lane, Marc Delorimier, $849,000.
Celine Wright — 40 S. 35th St., Douglas J. Devoto, $900,000.
Lynn Yanagihara — 1045 Waite Drive, Kevin and Eric Selker, $925,000.
Laurialan Reitzammer — 2610 Cornell Circle, Mark E. Slovak, $962,500.
Alexandre Secunda — 5640 Table Top Court, David Allen Stevenson, $1,126,000.
Bin Fu — 1305 Redwood Ave., Fintan R. Steele, $1,166,000.
Gabriella and Jonathan Burns — 8324 W. Fork Road, Nicholas and Courtney Kerwin, $1,200,000.
Carly Mayer — 938 North St., Unit A, 940 North Street LLC, $1,350,000.
Robin and Steven Kahn — 938 North St., Unit B, 940 North Street LLC, $1,350,000.
Kelly Notaras — 3685 Silver Plume Lane, Ben Cohen, $1,350,000.
Jared and Jessica Schaffer — 3497 Iris Court, Ralph and Sharon Dalebout, $1,400,000.
Nathan Sobo — 936 North St., Unit A, 940 North Street LLC, $1,590,000.
Tim Elenteny — 651 Maxwell Ave., Philip Livingston Blake, $2,150,000.
Rachael Brody — 372 Lefthand Canyon Drive, David P. Rea, $2,200,000.
Heather and Simeon Margolis — 4281 Vinca Court, Jessica and Evan Reilly, $2,300,000.
Nathan and Claire Seitzman — 3881 26th St., Paul and Michele Algreen, $2,405,000.
Ori Lefkovitz — 2460 Agate Lane, Lynn and Christop Golding, $2,429,000.
Matthew and Melissa Katich — 2895 18th St., Timothy Shea, $2,725,000.
Michael and Mia Kantor — 4557 Apple Way, Allison and David Angulo, $2,776,000.
Nikolas Vitt — 437 18th St., Scott Pudalov, $3,960,000.
Broomfield
Gail Collins — 1030 Opal St., Unit 102, Sarah Y. Bowman, $429,000.
Pawel Gach — 13900 Lake Song Lane, Unit M2, Michael and Anit Molacek, $450,000.
Tamara Fox — 13843 Vispo Way, Meritage Homes Colo. Inc., $515,000.
Alesha Arscott — 13839 Vispo Way, Meritage Homes Colo. Inc., $529,400.
Samuel Harrell — 12910 Monarch Court, Carol M. Gorman, $542,800.
Kelly Gorman — 1979 Cottonwood St., Connie Schoenwald, $550,000.
Justin and Lauren Aidinovich — 1998 Cedar St., Alicia Aldrich, $550,000.
Sudha Sylada — 13835 Vispo Way, Meritage Homes Colo. Inc., $556,900.
Kurtis Pinkney — 125 Beryl Way, Alyia Hammondwilliams, $565,000.
Trenton Bryan — 2855 Calkins Place, Theresa Do, $580,000.
Matthew and Monica Dickson — 905 W. 11th Ave., Opendoor Property C. LLC, $595,000.
Dylan Kayyem — 12702 Julian Court, Katalin Boros, $620,000.
Zachary Shechtman — 4455 Lexi Circle, Courtney and Thomas Podolak, $685,000.
Spencer and Robyn Tiehen — 1195 W. 170th Place, Lloyd W. McKenzie, $715,000.
Thomas Arnold — 12487 W. Big Horn Circle, Sandra Glasser Converse, $726,000.
Boguslawa and Mateusz Janik — 17700 Elati St., Lennar Colo. LLC, $737,000.
Sean and Kristen Culliney — 2547 McKay Landing Parkway, Carson and Moni Taylor, $741,000.
Phillip Bower — 1750 Birch St., Brandon Stockellburg, $757,600.
Jean and David Harwood — 16095 Atlantic Peak Way, Marcia and Kevin Howes, $849,000.
Victoria Contreras — 13872 Meadowbrook Drive, Mathew Thomas, $900,000.
Randy and Sara Benson — 508 Rifle Way, Gilbert and Seema Leos, $940,000.
Robert and Kristen Bathmann — 2210 Outlook Trail, Cristian and Andreea Arvinte, $1,025,000.
Karma Yonten — 1701 Aspen St., David Michael Ransom Trust, $1,176,200.
Erie
Chloe Weber — 3095 Blue Sky Circle #13-303, Brandon S. Davis, $400,000.
Pedro and Lidia Cardoza — 335 Pierce St., David Bennett, $415,000.
Yuvraj and Bhavana Chavhan — 1660 Wright Aly, CalAtlantic Group Inc., $498,000.
Van and Phuoc Pham — 366 Norgay Way, KB Home Colo. Inc., $566,700.
Samrat Sharma — 1447 Lombardi St., Violet and Chris Nathan, $680,000.
Ramzi Dalloul — 212 McDonald Court, Mark and Sheila Siemann, $695,400.
Jordan Dyck — 1640 Mariah Lane, Century Land Holdings LLC, $704,600.
April and David Kleen — 1406 Hoffman Drive, Robert E. Davis, $715,000.
Jennifer and Garth Kimbrough — 343 Harvest Point Drive, Opendoor Property Trust I, $750,000.
Holly and John Spiers — 350 Pleades Place, Luis and Bridget Abila, $777,000.
Richard and Kelly Hutchins — 2713 Sunset St., Damon Do, $801,000.
Robert and Bridget Sargent — 1669 Walker St., Matthew and Nicole Jenkins, $821,000.
James and Donna Walega — 91 Summit Way, Paul and Rene Sagisi, $835,000.
Mary Malina — 1412 Westin Drive, Steven and Colleen Stone, $857,000.
Rafael Rivera — 1840 Marquette Drive, Keith and Jennifer Lewis, $916,000.
Guangming Chen — 365 Dusk Court, Eric and Tonja Dripps, $1,050,000.
Cynthia and Bradford Taylor — 942 Carbonate Lane, Gary and Catherine Lennox, $1,100,000.
Bradley Wolfe — 12481 Kenosha Road, Heather V. Ralston, $1,800,000.
Michael and Brittani Colacchio — 2284 Links Place, Ramu P. Raju, $1,950,000.
Lafayette
Clara Ross — 1274 Milo Circle, Unit A, Kyle A. Tacoronte, $356,000.
Estelle Carlton — 1110 Milo Circle, Unit A, Stephanie Henninger, $400,900.
John Bebbington — 990 Milo Circle, Unit B, David K. Deford, $415,000.
Cynthia and Kenneth Birgen — 206 E. Baseline Road, Joellen Christine Domenico, $415,000.
Lisa Robb — 2350 N. Springwood Court, John Morland McMurry, $630,000.
Ethan Tsai — 1140 Nautilus Court, William J. Tiefel, $715,000.
John Leach — 263 N. Cherrywood Drive, Jigme Tanzin, $780,000.
Mark Chan — 757 Kohlor Drive, Vons 25 LLC, $984,900.
Andrew and Nicole Malcolmson — 535 Sawtooth Point, Teresa Bradford, $1,652,400.
Longmont
Andrew Ellert — 4103 Da Vinci Drive, Joseph and Carmen Wilson, $220,000.
Michelle Barbour — 1129 Vivian St., Robert and Tressa Fine, $450,000.
Heather and Edward Gonzales — 137 E. 15th Ave., Donna Snyman, $465,000.
Julio and Nicolas Olalla — 1331 Cumberland Drive, Nathan and J. Scheidenhelm, $525,000.
Meredith Gross — 139 Grant St., William and Erica Kuntzelmann, $532,000.
Barb and Seth Green — 2132 Daley Drive, Homelight Real Estate II LLC, $550,000.
Martin Banks — 1250 Monarch Drive, Mark Mollenauer, $561,000.
Marcello Capparelli — 1617 Redfern Place, Curryteam Realty LLC, $570,000.
Marjorie Johnson — 1327 Wilkerson Way, Robert S. Vigil, $585,000.
Carolyn Brinkworth — 1601 S. Vivian St., Brien and Kim Carroll, $600,000.
Jennifer and Carl Hulen — 1052 Button Rock Drive, Sinh A. Tran, $676,000.
Joshua and Sara Henderson — 1325 Carnation Circle, Steven and Toy White, $685,000.
Jacqueline and Andrew Hadd — 320 Sherman St., Parrish Group LLC, $724,000.
Carolyn and Michael Thomas — 165 Sunset St., James A. Romano, $805,000.
Timothy and Charlene Walker — 1022 Woodgate Court, Leann and Matthew Knopf, $826,000.
John and Renata McCann — 4205 Riley Drive, Dieball Trust, $875,000.
Alan Stratton — 7191 Elm St., Michael Uhl, $995,000.
Cody Barela — 8189 Neva Road, Leigh and Joseph Romano, $1,700,000.
Justin Meschler — 6440 Monarch Park Court, Richard and Cinda Daggett, $1,725,000.
Sidney and Carey Payne — 14937 E. County Line Road, Robert and Phyllis Bert, $1,780,000.
Gabriel Ettenson — 8536 Foxhaven Drive, Scott and Paula Deemer, $2,750,000.
Louisville
Corey and Travis Beeler — 361 Pheasant Run, Timothy and Carol Melchior, $398,000.
Andrew Nenninger — 214 Pheasant Run, Monica and Christopher Heins, $468,000.
Mary Kah — 1505 Hecla Way, Apt. 204, Clayton M. Lamb, $585,000.
Jeff Creasy — 1408 Fillmore Place, Eric H. Maxfield, $782,000.
Gabriel Stalcup — 677 W. Birch Court, Carol L. Harang, $1,000,000.
Gwen and Patrick Lemieux — 864 W. Mulberry St., Gregory and Monica Adamietz, $1,605,000.
Lyons
Karen Libin — 621 First Ave., Rachel and Stephen Milton, $1,025,000.
Eduardo Valseca — 898 Pioneer Road, Michael Ebeling, $1,675,000.
Jimm and Rhonda Vosburgh — 450 Lake Drive, James A. Weaver, $2,825,000.
Superior
Bradley and Jessica Miles — 400 W. William St., Unit A, Matthew and Vita Holiday, $180,000.
Timothy Sullivan — 620 Promenade Drive, Thb Superior Mf LLC, $705,400.
Jana Ikeda — 1507 Begonia Way, Darla C. Franz, $785,000.
Chastity Rodman — 600 Promenade Drive, Thb Superior Mf LLC, $796,900.
Cynthia and Gordon Banks — 2716 Calmante Place, John and Ash Houston, $896,700.
Susan and Calvin Paxson — 1600 S. Pitkin Ave., 8z Ibuyer LLC, $1,200,000.
Lindsey Sutton — 701 Graphite Way, Tracey R. Hughes, $1,217,500.
William and Kathryn Cullen — 1726 Alma Lane, Stacy and Robert Heilman, $1,300,000.
Christine Abair — 414 Opal Way, Carmen and Eric Drollinger, $1,450,000.
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Q: My thermostat knows when I’m close to home and my car automatically locks when I walk away from it. How does all this work and is it a privacy risk?
A: You’re actually asking about two very different technologies. Let’s talk about the easier one first: Your car works with something called Radio Frequency Identification (RFID). The key emits a very low power encrypted radio signal and the car receives that signal and compares it with the “paired” key. If they match, your car will unlock, start, open the trunk, etc.
You can experiment with this by wrapping your key in a few layers of foil and note how it blocks the signal, effectively rendering your key useless. Unwrap it, and you’re good to drive away.
Your smart thermostat, by comparison, is using a far more complicated system because it’s working with your smartphone. Every minute of the day, your phone is both identifying its exact location — open up a mapping app, it always knows where you are! — and reporting your location to the cellular network so texts and calls can be properly routed to your device.
A smart thermostat like the Nest is connected to the Internet through your home Wi-Fi connection. It connects to the online Nest software system, which is also paired with your smartphone. As you move around, your phone’s location is reported to the cellular network, which then shares that with the Nest software.
In a somewhat indirect fashion, this means that your thermostat and your smarthome know where you are at all times.
So what is Geofencing?
Imagine now that you set up your thermostat to switch from ‘away’ mode to ‘home’ mode whenever you’re within a mile of your house. When you drive away, it switches to ‘away’, turns off your lights, and adjusts your heating and cooling threshold temperatures to lower your energy consumption.
The distance from your identified location — your home, in this example — can be considered an invisible or virtual fence. A geographically-based fence. A… geofence.
It turns out that geofencing can be used in a wide variety of applications. For example, it could notify you when your kids leave campus during the school day (cellphone companies offer this service). Advertisements could pop up on your phone when you’re near their place of business. Imagine a beer promo showing up the next time you walk into Coors Field!
Finally, there are some privacy implications, but they’re more related to your smart devices staying online than any geofencing app. Want to keep your location private? You’ll need to turn off your darn phone, but then you’re offline. As with so much with technological privacy, it’s a trade-off.
Dave Taylor has been involved with the online world since the early days of the Internet. He runs the popular AskDaveTaylor.com tech help site. You can also find his gadget reviews on YouTube and chat with him on Twitter as @DaveTaylor.
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Boulder should see clear skies with highs in the 60s today, according to the National Weather Service.
Today’s forecast calls for mostly sunny skies with a high of 65 and an overnight low of 43, with winds 16 to 20 mph with gusts as high as 30 mph.
Tuesday’s forecast calls for partly sunny skies with a high of 56 and an overnight low of 28, with winds 15 to 23 mph with gusts as high as 34 mph. There is a 20% chance of rain and snow after 7 p.m.
Wednesday’s forecast calls for mostly sunny skies with a high of 49 and an overnight low of 28, with winds 14 to 23 mph with gusts as high as 34 mph.
Thursday’s forecast calls for sunny skies with a high of 55 and an overnight low of 31.
Friday’s forecast calls for sunny skies with a high of 66 and an overnight low of 42.
Five-day forecast
Check out what weather is in store for the Boulder County area here
National Weather Service
See what the National Weather service is predicting here
24-Hour satellite
Watch NOAA’s 24-hour satellite image here
Real-time conditions
See what Boulder’s weather is like now at the National Center for Atmospheric Research here
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For the Democratic majority in the state legislature, it’s not a close call: when Colorado’s economy is strong enough that the state must refund taxpayers, as is the case now, the refund money should benefit the working class before the wealthy.
As Denver Democrat and state Rep. Emily Sirota put it, “A person making hundreds of thousands of dollars, or millionaires, which exist in this state, do not need such a refund. It’s people struggling to pay their rent, to buy food, to pay for gas — those are the folks that need a bigger refund.”
The question now is whether these Democrats plan to act on their vision of fiscal fairness.
It’s a question involving billions of dollars in total, and affecting individual tax returns by hundreds of dollars. The answer, which must come in the next six weeks, will hinge largely on whether the Democrats are willing to fight Gov. Jared Polis, who stands apart from his fellow party members on this issue.
Said Boulder Democrat and Senate President Steve Fenberg, “There might be a bit of a showdown.”
A $2 billion projection
Colorado’s Taxpayer’s Bill of Rights, the voter-approved conservative constitutional requirement known as TABOR, restricts state government’s budget growth, among countless other impacts on policy in this state. The state can hold onto tax revenue up to the point that revenue exceeds inflation plus population growth, and all money above that cap must be sent back to taxpayers.
This cap is why Coloradans are getting back a total of about $525 million on their taxes for the 2020-21 fiscal year. The money will be distributed in three ways: property tax relief for seniors, a temporary cut to the state’s flat income tax rate and sales tax refunds.
Polis has been celebrating the fact that — as his spokesman wrote in a statement sent to the Denver Post — “we are putting money back in the pockets of hardworking Coloradans with a tax refund averaging $95 per taxpayer this year.”
But not everyone will get back close to $95. From the sales tax refund alone, single tax filers making under $44,000 will get back $37, while single filers making above $246,000 will get triple that, according to a nonpartisan analysis.
Those figures are troubling to statehouse Democrats, though it’s too late to do anything about them this year. It’s the 2021-22 tax filings they can yet affect, and the stakes there are much higher: analysts project about $2 billion in refunds, or roughly four times this year’s total. They project another $1.6 billion in 2022-23.
TABOR leaves significant flexibility for the state legislature to decide how — though not if — to administer those refunds. That Coloradans today get money back via the property tax relief, the temporary tax cut and the sales tax refund is a policy choice, not a given. Since TABOR passed on the ballot in 1992, refund mechanisms have taken 21 different forms, with just the current three remaining.
Democrat vs. Democrat
Depending on whom you ask, Colorado’s economy isn’t as healthy as it seems. Polis and the Democrats who run the Capitol are quite nervous that state expenditures are on pace to exceed state revenues in the coming years. This wouldn’t be a problem for them if they could hang on to all the money above the TABOR cap, but that cap means Colorado is barreling toward a structural deficit in which the state has more money committed annually than available revenue.
But TABOR is indifferent to all that. The existence of its cap is not negotiable, and, if out-year projections hold, Colorado will be refunding almost $4 billion by 2023-24. That’s why Democratic lawmakers see such opportunity now.
“I hope we find some ways to target those refund dollars to the people who need help,” said Lakewood Democratic state Rep. Chris Kennedy, “rather than … lots of dollars to wealthier Coloradans, who are doing just fine.”
They’ve run into a familiar problem, however, in Polis. His conservative positions on fiscal matters — he wants to eliminate the income tax altogether, for example — put him at philosophical odds with the Democrats in the legislature, and offer support for Republicans in the minority. The GOP doesn’t have the votes to stop Democratic policies, but those policies can’t be enacted without the governor’s signature.
“I didn’t vote for (Polis), and I won’t,” said Douglas County’s Chris Holbert, leader of the Senate Republicans. “I’d rather have a Republican governor. But it’s interesting when the Democrat governor turns away from where maybe the majority of Democrat legislators would like him to be.”
On the issue of TABOR refunds, it’s clear he’s turned away from the Democrats. While they dream of rewriting TABOR refund mechanisms in a progressive way, Polis cheerleads for this year’s $95 refund average.
Behind the scenes, he also warns Democrats not to overstep.
“The governor has some strong feelings about it,” Kennedy said.
Added Senate Majority Leader Dominick Moreno, a Democrat of Commerce City, “The governor’s office has been pretty strident in their belief that we shouldn’t make any changes to the TABOR refunds as they’re scheduled to go out.”
That means, once again, Democrats must decide whether and to what extent they want to challenge Polis. These lawmakers have backed down time and again when he’s threatened vetoes and demanded bill amendments. There is almost no precedent for them to go against his will and win, and no precedent at all for them to do so on something as consequential as a billion-dollar change to tax policy.
How this ends
The governor declined through his spokesman to be interviewed for this story. But his communications to Democratic lawmakers leave only a few possible paths.
One strong possibility, according to many people with knowledge of these talks, is that Democrats let this go, and not invite a battle.
Another is for Democrats to try to pass the policy changes they want, and dare Polis to veto them. That appears unlikely.
A third option is to try to find compromise. Sirota mentioned one idea: reforming the refund mechanism such that everyone, regardless of income, would get back the same flat sum. That isn’t a progressive policy, per se, but it does shift more money from the rich while still allowing Polis to credibly tout that everyone is getting back a heap of cash. With $2 billion in refunds for 2021-22 and a flat refund, single filers would all get several hundred dollars, nonpartisan analysis indicates.
“It’s something that’s been discussed,” Sirota said.
That’s but one idea being kicked around. Greenwood Village’s Jeff Bridges, a Democratic state senator, told The Post he’s exploring ways to bolster tax credits for poor and middle-class folks, either through expansions of the Child Tax Credit or the Earned Income Tax Credit — or both. Bridges said he might try to add those credits into an existing bill pending at the legislature.
He said he wouldn’t ask to use all of the money above the cap for this purpose, “but enough to make a meaningful difference in people’s lives.”
These Democrats must pick a path soon. If they wish to tinker with refund money for the 2021-22 fiscal year, they only have the final day of the legislative session — May 11 — to do so, barring a highly unlikely special session to review this matter.
Adding to the urgency for the Democrats is the fact that Colorado families have now been without the expanded Child Tax Credit for three months. This pandemic-era program had been sending some $260 million every month to the state, which helped alleviate financial stress for the parents of about 1 million Colorado children. Poverty is back on the upswing, with the expanded Child Tax Credit gone.
Holbert, the Senate minority leader, said Democrats would be foolish to try to fix that problem by messing with TABOR refunds. He’s got a powerful friend in the fight.
“This is an example of where the governor is more aligned with the Republican side,” Holbert said. “I think that’s a fascinating dynamic.”
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The driver accused of vehicular homicide on Friday was reportedly living with the victim in the same car that police said was involved in the deadly crash.
Alan Moody, 21, was arrested on suspicion of vehicular homicide and leaving the scene of a crash involving death or injury.
According to an affidavit, police were called to the 4800 block of Pearl Street at 5:54 a.m. Friday after a person was found in a parking lot.
The person, who has not yet been publicly identified by the Boulder County Coroner’s Office, was declared dead at the scene with significant injuries to their legs and head.
But while the person was not publicly identified and their name was redacted from documents, the affidavit did indicate that police were familiar with the person from previous calls.
According to the affidavit, blood and other physical evidence was found in several parking stalls and a curb and planter next to those spots.
Police in the area then found a black Saturn sedan registered to the victim about a block away from the crime scene with heavy front-end damage and two flat passenger-side tires. The car also had traces of blood and hair along the passenger side.
Police found the victim’s cellphone and camping citations naming both Moody and the victim buried in a dirt mound next to the vehicle. Police said the Moody and the victim had reportedly been living together in the car and had been seen together by Boulder and Broomfield police several times in the weeks leading up to Friday.
According to the affidavit, footage from a security camera in the area showed a black sedan traveling east on Pearl Street at 10:35 p.m. Thursday when the passenger side of the vehicle appears to strike an object, causing the front of the vehicle to raise up shortly before the rear of the vehicle does the same. Detectives said it was noticeable because of the taillights changing orientation, and that the car then appears to level out as sparks can be seen.
Detectives applied for a warrant for Moody’s cell phone data, and detectives said call data places the phone in the 4800 block of Pearl Street two minutes before the time the vehicle is seen hitting something on the security footage.
Using that cell phone data, Moody was located at the Boulder Shelter for the Homeless on Friday evening. An undercover officer talked to Moody, who said a friend of his had left for California and that he was now alone.
Moody was then taken into custody. He had not spoken to detectives at the time the affidavit was written.
Moody is being held at the Boulder County Jail on $20,000 bond with a $2,000 cash option over the objection of the Boulder County District Attorney’s Office, which asked for a $50,000 bond in light of the charges and the flight risk prosecutors believe Moody poses.
Moody is set for a formal filing of charges Tuesday. His booking photo has not yet been released by the Boulder County Jail.
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https://www.dailycamera.com/2022/04/04/biomed-realty-buys-1-million-square-foot-flatiron-park-portfolio-in-boulder/
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After about six months on the market, a portfolio in Boulder’s Flatiron Park business center has been purchased by BioMed Realty LLC.
The roughly 1,000,000-square-foot, 22-building campus sold by Crescent Real Estate LLC is home to a slew of technology companies. Apple is suspected to occupy as much as 240,000 square feet of space in the east Boulder park.
The sale has yet to be recorded with Boulder County, so no price was immediately available. However, several commercial real estate brokers familiar with the offering told BizWest last year that Crescent was seeking at least $600 million.
Jones Lang LaSalle Inc. (NYSE: JLL) brokered the deal.
BioMed Realty is a Blackstone portfolio company that owns about 13.7 million square feet of commercial space throughout the country, according to a news release touting the Flatiron Park acquisition.
“With this significant investment in Boulder, we’re delighted to become a part of this innovation-based community,” Jon Bergschneider, president of West Coast markets at BioMed Realty, said in the release. “In addition to BioMed’s initial investment, BioMed anticipates investing an additional $200 million in redevelopment costs over time, which is expected to create nearly 400 new local construction jobs. Beyond being a preeminent regional tech and life sciences hub, Boulder is a thriving community that couples innovation with a profound respect for natural resources and sustainable practices. We look forward to joining and supporting the Boulder community by not only providing best-in-class workspaces for companies to continue their life-saving and inventive work, but also by creating strong, long-term relationships with local organizations working to maintain Boulder’s unique identity as a gem in the Rockies.”
This story is developing and will be updated as new information becomes available. This article was first published by BizWest, an independent news organization, and is published under a license agreement. © 2022 BizWest Media LLC.
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https://www.dailycamera.com/2022/04/04/colorado-ban-forever-chemicals-pfas/
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Carpeting, furniture, cosmetics, cookware and other products containing PFAS — or forever chemicals linked to cancer and birth defects — would be banned for sale in Colorado under a new proposal from state lawmakers.
The toxic chemicals have contaminated groundwater across the state and caused public officials and environmentalists to turn their attention to the damage caused by the PFAS, or perfluoroalkyl and polyfluoroalkyl substances. The chemicals are likely seeping into hundreds of water sources across the state and the contamination is so substantial that Attorney General Phil Weiser filed a lawsuit in late February against companies that produce the chemicals.
“In Colorado, our water supply is precious, and even small amounts of PFAS have been linked to serious health problems,” Democratic bill sponsor state Rep. Lisa Cutter said in a release. “We can’t afford to equivocate on the well-being of our water and the health of our residents, and this is an important step to eliminate this dangerous toxin from our environment.”
The bipartisan measure, House Bill 1345, would, by Jan. 1, 2024, prohibit the sale of products containing PFAS which include:
- Carpets or rugs.
- Cookware
- Cosmetics.
- Fabric treatments.
- Food packaging.
- Childrens’ products.
- Oil and gas products.
- Textile furnishings.
- Upholstered furniture.
Between the start of the initial ban and 2030, the bill would then require the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment to identify even more products that would be prohibited from being sold in Colorado.
PFAS are also used in certain firefighting foams. While the bill would grant exemptions for some of those foams, it would also require their use to be reported to state officials within 24 hours.
Republican state Rep. Mary Bradfield, who is also sponsoring the measure, said in a release that the Widefield Aquifer in her district is also the largest PFAS contamination of groundwater in the state. The bill creates a timeline for the removal of products containing the forever chemicals and replacing them with safer options, she said.
“Now that we know that PFAS is a potential health risk, we could be very surprised about how many products intentionally contain the PFAS compounds,” Bradfield said.
Not only does the bill have bipartisan support in the House but it also has the backing of multiple environmental groups like Metro Water Recovery, GreenLatinos and the Colorado Public Interest Research Group.
Cutter said the bill is scheduled to be heard in the House Energy and Environment Committee in mid-April.
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Mega-comic Dave Chappelle will play a half-dozen last-minute shows at Comedy Works’ 300-seat downtown location April 5-7, according to an announcement on the stand-up club’s website.
Chappelle, who has sold out Red Rocks Amphitheatre for his birthday shows in the past, visits Denver on and off to play surprise shows at Comedy Works — which also instantly sell out. He came up playing the roughly 300-seat club and has a friendship with owner Wende Curtis, he has said. That’s why he likes to choose such a tiny venue in relation to his audience draw, working out new material in the same way that big comics often visit New York’s Comedy Cellar.
Ticket prices are commensurate with Chapelle’s stature: $156 each, and available first to Comedy Works subscribers. They went on sale at 10:30 a.m. Monday, according to comedyworks.com, and sold out in less than an hour.
As with past shows, Chappelle is asking patrons to leave their cell phones at home. He has been instrumental in testing the Yondr technology, which puts patrons’ cell phones in magnetically locked bags until the show has concluded. Other comics, such as Chris Rock, have gone on to use it at much larger Denver stand-up shows, including at Bellco Theatre.
“Please leave your phones in your cars or at home,” Comedy Works officials wrote. “Everyone is subject to a pat down. Anyone caught with a cell phone inside the venue will be immediately ejected and no refund given.”
RELATED: Denver’s desperately needed 2022 comedy revival is here, and not a moment too soon
Chappelle’s jokes have sparked controversy in recent years as he’s repeatedly hammered home his criticisms of the trans community, mocking the fundamental notion that gender is fluid.
Employees of Netflix, which regularly airs his new specials, staged a walkout in protest of his views in October. In February, Chappelle announced that his classic sketch series, “Chappelle’s Show,” would return to Netflix after Comedy Central reportedly paid him for the rights. Netflix then said it would release four upcoming comedy specials this year executive produced and hosted by Chappelle.
Chappelle also gained attention last month for supposedly trying to block an affordable housing project in his hometown of Yellow Springs, Ohio, where he’s become a local celebrity and investor. However, he reportedly pushed back against that in a statement via his spokesperson, arguing that, “Chappelle didn’t kill affordable housing. Concerned residents and a responding Village Council ‘killed’ a half-baked plan which never actually offered affordable housing.”
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Denver’s 2022 comedy calendar is more crowded than ever, so here are some curated picks to help you sort through the biggest and best stand-up events of the year.
Most shows are 21-and-up; check individual websites for details. You also can view a running list of local shows at 5280comedy.com, and visit denverpost.com/calendar for more.
RELATED: Denver’s desperately needed 2022 comedy revival is here, and not a moment too soon
Denver comic Janae Burris does well in pretty much any venue, from hosting Film on the Rocks at Red Rocks Amphitheatre to slinging jokes at a biker bar, which makes her April 16 taping at the Aurora Fox Arts Center such a treat. She’ll record her first-ever special, “Long Overdue,” before the comic, actor and TV host takes a break after having a baby (due later this month). Shows at 7 and 9 p.m. April 16. $30-$50 (the $50 ticket includes two drinks). aurorafoxartscenter.org
Tig Notaro lived in Denver for a time, but didn’t begin performing stand-up until she decamped to L.A. — where she quickly met Kristen Schaal (“Bob’s Burgers”), who happens to be from Longmont. Ah, the synergy. Now a force on streaming TV (Amazon’s “One Mississippi” and Paramount’s “Star Trek: Discovery”) and also a voice actor, Notaro remains a stellar stand-up who can flatten audiences with the most subtle of intonations and expressions. Her sets are a master class in deadpan humor. Notaro’s “Hello Again” show comes to the Paramount Theatre April 14. $39-$49 (with limited tickets as of press time). ticketmaster.com
Patton Oswalt, one of the funniest, most beloved and most influential comics of the last two decades, returns to the Paramount Theatre May 14 to catch us up on his life, which has been topsy-turvy in recent years while he’s dealt with the death of his wife, solo parenting, remarriage and a busy acting and writing schedule. He has, in my experience, never performed anything less than an excellent set. $45-$75. ticketmaster.com
If you haven’t heard of Chelcie Lynn, who gained online fame a few years back as Trailer Trash Tammy, get ready, because she’s coming for you. Lynn, who will perform at Comedy Works South at the Landmark April 13-16, is shooting a prank show, lining up more film cameos (see “Tangerine”), and consolidating her hundreds of millions of streaming views with merchandise and branding. $35-$85. comedyworks.com
Also worthy at Comedy Works: “The Office” co-star Craig Robinson (at Comedy Works South, April 7-9); Comedy Central roastmaster general Jeff Ross (April 8-10); Nick Swardson (April 14-16); John Novosad, a.k.a. Hippieman, who has a great new album (April 27); Henry Cho (south club, May 6-8); Doug Benson (May 8); Michelle Wolf (May 12-14); Adam Carolla (south club, June 24-25); Tammy Pescatelli (south club, Aug. 18-20); and stand-up queen Maria Bamford (south club, Nov. 20-22), among many others. Various times and prices. Visit comedyworks.com for the evolving calendar.
Comedy Works Presents, the club’s booking arm, has several big shows from touring comics that you can find on their websites — they’re just not at the Comedy Works clubs. That includes Chris Distefano (Paramount, April 9); Mark Normand (Paramount, May 7); trailblazing veteran Rita Rudner (PACE Center, April 10); Anjelah Johnson (Paramount, April 15-16); Paula Poundstone (Paramount, April 29; see below for more on her); and Kathleen Madigan (Paramount, June 4). Time and ticketing details for all shows are also available at comedyworks.com.
The Denver Improv — which has been more of a complement to Comedy Works than competition since the national chain opened in Northfield in 2007 — has upcoming shows from Lynne Koplitz (April 8-9); Stone Cold & The Jackal (April 14); Eddie Ifft (April 15-16) Nick Shelton (April 21); Cowboy Bill Martin (April 22-23); Antoine Scott (April 29-30); and King Bach (June 17-18), among others. Various times and prices. Visit denver.improv.com for details.
John Mulaney returns to Red Rocks Amphitheatre for the first time since the Oddball Comedy Tour played there in 2014 — and for his first headlining gig in the intimidating venue. As he proved in 2014, the Emmy-winning, deadpan (and lately very-in-the-news) comic and former “Saturday Night Live” writer has a knack for commanding his audiences, and these “From Scratch” tour shows should be no different. Shows at 3 and 8 p.m. on April 17, $79-$350. axs.com
Stand-up, improv and public-radio veteran Paula Poundstone performs a different show every time she steps on stage, leaning heavily on the mood and ideas of the audience to craft her sets. It makes sense that they’re such a consistent pleasure when you consider her spot on NPR’s “Wait Wait … Don’t Tell Me!,” her books, and her podcast “Nobody Listens to Paula Poundstone” (haw!). April 29 at the Paramount Theatre, $37.50-$75. ticketmaster.com
Trinidad boosters have lately been hard-pushing the New Mexico border town as Colorado’s next arts enclave, with millions in investments from Denverites moving there to escape what they complain are high rents, traffic and pollution in the Mile High City. That’s potentially creating the biggest audience yet for the Chief Bicycle & Comedy Festival, which references both Trinidad’s historic rail line (the Southwest Chief) and its biking culture (also burgeoning). Creator Wally Wallace and his backers have booked dozens of comics to take over the town’s smaller venues — and expand to Raton, N.M., for the first time — with national and local acts Eddie Pepitone, Emma Arnold, the Grawlix (Denver’s Adam Cayton-Holland, Andrew Orvedahl and Ben Roy, of truTV’s “Those Who Can’t), Babs Gray, David Gborie, Gabby Gutierrez-Reed and more. May 5-6. $20-$160 for passes; $30 for individual shows.. thechieffestival.com
On the internationally known side: Hannah Gadsby, who cleaved the stand-up world in two with her invigorating one-woman-show/”stand-up” set “Nanette,” will bring her new “Body of Work” to the Ellie Caulkins Opera House on June 2. Influential comic Chris Rock, who absorbed Will Smith’s Oscars slap like a champ, returns to Bellco Theatre June 21 to dissect relationships, race, politics and himself. And Tom Segura can lay claim to Colorado’s biggest stand-up show of the year (so far) with his appearance at Ball Arena on July 23. Various times and prices. Visit ticketmaster.com or axs.com for more.
Amy Schumer, a lightning rod long before her Oscars co-hosting gig last week, returns to Denver for the first time in four years as part of her “Whore Tour.” Having recorded her 2017 Netflix debut “The Leather Special” at Denver’s Bellco Theatre, the Emmy-winning writer, author and actor should be right at home for her quartet of sets at the smaller but no-less-prestigious Paramount Theatre. Limited tickets available, Aug. 27-28. $99.50. ticktemaster.com
Denver’s High Plains Comedy Festival has over its eight years evolved into one of the country’s most notable stand-up and podcast events, with live tapings, showcases, reunions and headlining shows at the stately Paramount Theatre. Even while hosting heavies such as David Cross, Karen Kilgariff, Maria Bamford, Marc Maron, Kumail Nanjiani and Anthony Jeselnik, the event still feels indie, given its main perch along Denver’s hip South Broadway corridor, but also because of its affordable tickets, smart booking and curated local lineups. Performers TBD. Sept. 8-10. See more soon at highplainscomedyfestival.com.
“Weird Al” Yankovic’s storied career may seem improbable at times, but the master musical parodist has stuck to his guns through all manner of pop-culture battles and come out looking smart (also: silly, and intentionally so). He’ll stop in Colorado with stand-up opener Emo Philips for shows at the Ellie Caulkins Opera House (June 3-4) and later, at Colorado Springs’ Pikes Peak Center (Sept. 6), Grand Junction’s Avalon Theatre (Sept. 7) and Greeley’s Union Colony Civic Center (Sept. 9). Various prices. Visit weirdal.com/tour for details.
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https://www.dailycamera.com/2022/04/04/boulder-officials-push-back-finishing-date-on-30th-and-colorado-underpass/
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It’s been more than a year since the beginning of the construction on two underpasses at the intersection of 30th Street and Colorado Avenue, but now the finish date for the $16 million project has been pushed back to January 2023.
Originally, the 18-month plan was slated to finish in fall of 2022. The main reason for the set back can be attributed to having to move around internal structures at and around the intersection.
“The 30th and Colorado underpass project has spent a significant portion of the initial effort on relocating utilities as well as relocating the Wellman Irrigation Ditch,” said Gerrit Slater, the principal transportation projects engineer.
The irrigation ditch on the northeast quadrant of the intersection is near Boulder Creek, and the diversion structure and the relocating of the piping has been the main focus of the project so far.
“We’ve reached the point, in the last couple months, where we are now doing the excavation and folks should start seeing a huge hole in the ground where the underpass will start taking shape,” Slater said.
Officials did not know if there would be any upcoming access issues on adjacent roads as the construction continued.
About 30,000 vehicles and 1,500 pedestrians cross through the intersection at 30th and Colorado per day, and the intersection is a top collision site in Boulder. According to its website, between 2012 and 2016 there were 86 collisions, 18 involving bicyclists.
“This will be the first fully protected intersection in the city,” said Samantha Glavin, the communication program manager. “When we were doing community outreach with the project, the number one concern was safety. And this is one of the biggest intersections in the city, so we designed this project to provide a car-free and less stressful way to cross the intersection.”
A protected intersection features “separated crossing movements for bicyclists,” meaning that bicyclists do not merge with other crossing traffic. The intersection will also feature corner “refuge islands” and stop bars to shorten crossing distances for pedestrians and bicyclists and make them more visible to drivers.
“I’m so freaking excited for this underpass and I absolutely think it’s worth the time and money, despite the current inconveniences,” said Dana Francesca Stamo, who has been a University of Colorado Boulder student for the past eight years. “I think it will contribute to better unifying east and main campus, as it makes it easier and safer to travel for pedestrians. It also makes the roads safer for cars as pedestrians won’t need to rely on breaks in traffic to cross this busy intersection.”
Stamo’s excitement was echoed by fellow graduate student Bri Dobson.
“I think the result of a pedestrian (and) bike underpass is fantastic,” Dobson wrote in an email to the Camera. “30th is a scary street to bike down, and that intersection was already busy.”
However, despite the excitement, Dobson can’t dismiss the disruption the long and now extended construction project has caused. The altered lanes and construction have virtually eliminated bike lanes and pedestrian crossings on 30th Street near the intersection, and drivers have complained about confusing signage and lanes.
“As someone who lives at the corner of 30th and Colorado, the construction has significantly disrupted my life every time I leave my apartment, and even when I don’t,” Dobson wrote. “The way the intersection there works is very unsafe – lanes shift across the intersection, and I have seen people accidentally drive on the wrong side of the street on more than one occasion. It doesn’t help that the lanes changed frequently for the first several months of the construction. All in all, I’m glad they’re doing it, but I can’t help but think that there must be a safer way to manage the traffic at the intersection in the meantime,” Dobson said.
Boulder officials said they recognize the patience residents and commuters have shown throughout the process.
“We understand that big projects like this are a disruption and we really appreciate the community’s patience as we finish this work,” Glavin said. “We’re really excited to introduce these new facilities to the community.”
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https://www.dailycamera.com/2022/04/04/chris-hoffman-accelerate-the-transition-to-clean-energy-not-oil-and-gas-production/
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By Chris Hoffman
“Generals are always prepared to fight the last war.”
It is a quote that has been attributed to Winston S. Churchill and to many others, and the proverb is equally applicable to those who advocate increasing the production of oil and gas to meet the present crisis.
Increasing the production of oil and gas prepares us for the last century, not this one. Nor does it prepare us for the future…if we want to have a better future.
Historically oil and gas have done wonderful things to give us a better world. But now we recognize that their carbon and methane emissions have also given us a contaminated world and threaten our very future.
The latest report from the world’s climate experts, the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, spells it out: “The cumulative scientific evidence is unequivocal: Climate change is a threat to human well-being and planetary health. Any further delay in concerted anticipatory global action on adaptation and mitigation will miss a brief and rapidly closing window of opportunity to secure a liveable and sustainable future for all.”
According to a March 22, 2022 study from Manchester University, wealthy countries such as ours have until 2034 to STOP all oil and gas production. And even that only gives us odds of preventing devastating climate breakdown no better than a simple coin flip.
Most proposals to increase oil and gas production would only further lock us in to obsolescent energy infrastructure and would not even help us in the short run. (For example, export and import terminals for Liquified Natural Gas (LNG) take 3-6 years to build. Proposals to open leasing on public lands, build pipelines, etc. will not help lower current energy prices in the U.S. as they would not increase production quickly.) Furthermore, fossil fuel companies in general are showing huge profits right now. And they’re using that extra cash to reward investors and pay down debts, not invest in new production.
Fortunately the United States military has not exemplified that old proverb about generals, but instead has been leading the way in adopting clean energy. In combat zones, green energy saves lives. And since at least as far back as 2014, the U.S. defense strategy has viewed climate change as a “threat multiplier,” because it has the potential to exacerbate conflict.
Svitlana Krakovska, Ukraine’s leading climate scientist, puts it this way: “Burning oil, gas and coal is causing warming and impacts we need to adapt to. And Russia sells these resources and uses the money to buy weapons. Other countries are dependent upon these fossil fuels, they don’t make themselves free of them. This is a fossil fuel war. It’s clear we cannot continue to live this way, it will destroy our civilization.”
The good news is that a transition to clean energy will also save the average household $500 a year in energy costs, when it includes tax credits and investments in clean electricity, electrification and efficiency.
In addition, clean energy will save lives because it eliminates fossil fuel contaminants in the air we breathe and the water we drink.
Further, by slowing the pace of climate change, we can reduce the risks to health and safety posed by severe droughts, wildfires, and floods, with which we Coloradoans are all too familiar. The U.S. has sustained 310 weather and climate disasters since 1980 where overall damages/costs reached or exceeded $1 billion (including CPI adjustment to 2021). The total cost of these 310 events exceeds $2.155 trillion.
In the deepest sense, our modern mega-wildfires are fossil-fueled.
Instead of doubling down on polluting sources of energy like oil and methane (“natural gas”) we should be accelerating our transition to the clean (and free) fuels of the present and future: wind and solar.
As the Environmental Voter Project put it in a recent tweet: “Remember that time solar & wind energy prices spiked because of a foreign war? Of course you don’t.”
We should encourage Sens. Michael Bennet and John Hickenlooper to support legislation that is robust enough to meet the U.S. goal of 50% carbon reduction from 2005 levels by 2030. And here in Colorado, the Office of Just Transition should be expanded to include coverage for oil and gas workers.
We should do this for the sake of jobs, U.S. leadership, national security, cutting costs for consumers, improving everyone’s health, and – most important of all – to take advantage of the “brief and rapidly closing window of opportunity to secure a liveable and sustainable future for all.”
Chris Hoffman, M.B.A., M.Ed., is a retired management consultant and licensed professional counselor whose experience includes 23 years in the utility industry. He currently devotes most of his time to volunteer work for social justice and a thriving future with a livable climate. https://citizensclimatelobby.org
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Eighteen states all over the physical and political map, including Colorado, California, Arizona, Virginia, Michigan, Montana, Illinois, Oregon, Nevada, Massachusetts, New Jersey and New York, now permit the recreational use of cannabis, opting to regulate and collect taxes from adult use of the substance rather than continue to treat it as a problem to be contained through cops, courts, jails and prisons. Thirty-seven states have made medical marijuana legal. Yet the federal government still lists the weed as a Schedule I narcotic “with no currently accepted medical use and a high potential for abuse,” classifying it among the most dangerous substances in America.
Anyone who isn’t under the influence can see there’s something very, very wrong with this picture.
Fortunately, the U.S. House Friday did something about the biggest current disconnect in American politics, passing a bill — authored, we’re proud to say, by New York’s own Jerry Nadler — to remove marijuana from the Drug Enforcement Administration’s naughty list; impose a 5% tax, which would rise to 8%, on cannabis products; let some pot convictions get expunged; and urge review of sentencing for weed-related crimes — while making small businesses that sell the weed eligible for federal loans and services for which any other enterprise can apply.
Washington’s backwardness isn’t just a moral and criminal justice problem. It amounts to an unfair tax on a budding industry. Because of the federal prohibition, many financial institutions won’t touch cannabis clients with a 10-foot pole. Nor can marijuana travel efficiently across state lines like almost every other product.
Nadler’s MORE Act, which also passed the House two years ago, has some Republican support, but it’s seen as a dead letter in the Senate, where, despite Chuck Schumer’s best efforts, it will struggle mightily to get near 60 votes. Schumer is working on his own legalization bill, with plans to unveil it later this month.
Democrats and Republicans in Congress, battling 20% approval ratings, should have no fear of doing what 68% of Americans, including 50% of Republicans and 71% of independents, say they want. Legalize it.
— New York Daily News Editorial Board
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Milt Strickler: Redtail Ridge: Vote ‘No’ and Campus Drive extension can still happen
Louisville voters will soon decide whether or not to approve the controversial Redtail Ridge development project via special election on April 19. An issue that still confuses many voters is whether alternate access to Monarch High School by the eastward extension of Campus Drive can be constructed if voters reject Redtail Ridge. Since the pro-Redtail Ridge campaign has done a masterful job of stirring the pot of misinformation, I will try to provide some clarification.
The extension of Campus Drive east to 96th Street was clearly part of the 2010 ConocoPhillips development plan, and it is also included in the 2019 Louisville Transportation Master Plan. For ardent supporters of Redtail Ridge — some of whom are former city officials — to claim that alternate Monarch access is impossible without the approval of Redtail Ridge is disingenuous beyond belief.
Monarch access has been an issue for parents for years. The fire has brought this to the forefront, and hopefully it will finally get done. The important point here is that Louisville voters do NOT have to approve the massive unneeded sprawl of Red Tail Ridge to get the extension of Campus Drive.
Those of us opposed to Redtail Ridge have been outspent 26-1 so far by the business groups that will profit handsomely from said development. We are struggling to keep up with the flood of misinformation about Monarch access, Avista hospital relocation, amount of open space and more.
In any case please VOTE NO on Red Tail Ridge, and we can still have safe alternate access to Monarch High School.
Milt Strickler
Louisville
Tam Dalle Molle: Redtail Ridge: Why I am voting ‘Yes’
Driving through Louisville and seeing the smattering of “Yes” and “No” signs saddens me that there is yet one more thing to divide us! I respect those who are voting No, but here is why I am voting YES.
The upcoming election is a choice between the Redtail Ridge and the ConocoPhillips Plan. The “No” folks will tell you this really isn’t a choice between A & B. They’re partially correct: either way this election goes, the developer (Brue Bakoul) will need to come back to work with the council to review each individual parcel of the GDP (General Development Plan). More conversations will indeed need to be held either way. But these are the two GDP’s we have to work with. The developer is not going to spend any more time or money submitting a new GDP. A GDP is like a skeletal framework within which the development will occur.
A group of Louisville residents have been working diligently for the past few years with the Council and our city committees to ask the developer for specific benefits to the city. The developer gave the city everything they asked for, but none of these are guaranteed under the ConocoPhillips plan. My favorites include:
- 93 acres of Public Land (open space, parks, recreation fields, and trails). The Open Space Committee identified space that would be most ideal as public land, and the developer gave them exactly what they wanted. This land was once commercially developed space, so there’s a limited amount that would be suited for this type of use.
- Prioritized expansion of Campus Drive to be completed on the developer’s dime by summer of 2023. Could this occur if the No vote wins? Probably. But we have no idea when. As a Monarch parent for 11 years, I love that this plan, if approved, will get this road completed by next summer.
- Avista Hospital wants to stay in Louisville but voting “No” forces them back into a costly and time-consuming rezoning process that pushes Avista to the back of the line. RTR is already zoned for Avista’s new home, but not the ConocoPhillips plan. Again, could Avista move to this space if the No’s win? Sure. It would just make it less desirable, as it would take more time and money.
Some people have said the YES initiative is simply the developer disguised as a grassroots effort. The developer did contribute to this campaign (which is to be expected) but the YES for Louisville effort includes more than 130 residents who have publicly put their names behind it. And I’m proud to include mine.
Tam Dalle Molle
Louisville Resident & Former Fireside PTO President
Joanne Brothers: Evacuations: We need to be better prepared
Having been evacuated twice from south Boulder in the last three months, two issues seem necessary to address:
First, Traffic flow during the evacuation of South Boulder could be a major deadly problem. On the day of the March 26 fire, Broadway was loaded with traffic going north and south. There was no expedient way for emergency vehicles to go in either direction. All the subdivisions in South Boulder are dumping onto Broadway or Table Mesa. It took us over 45 mins to go from Table Mesa north on Broadway to Baseline Road. Baseline, Table Mesa and Hwy 170 to Superior are the only roads that lead east. During the emergency there were NO TRAFFIC CONTROL OR CONTROLLERS at the intersections of Baseline and Broadway or Table Mesa and Broadway. At 3 p.m. that day, two RTD buses where blocking the northbound intersection at Baseline and Broadway.
If the fire had headed east quickly, like the Marshall Fire, people would be trapped in their vehicles and fleeing on foot. This is a foreseeable problem. Perhaps opening some emergency onramps across the south campus property and one at Cherryvale and Hwy 36 would make sense in an emergency? Boulder and the county need a plan.
Second, we need a better way to inform and warn park visitors of the dangers of fires, cigarettes, joints etc. and how fire with wind creates deadly situations. We have more and more folks from all over the world coming to enjoy our beautiful parks and trails who need better information. Perhaps posted warning signs and/or camera surveillance in the mountain parks and trails could proactively prevent fires from occurring, finding them quickly, and prosecuting the people who are responsible
Joanne Brothers
Boulder
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https://www.dailycamera.com/2022/04/04/outside-begins-outerverse-to-rival-metaverse/
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Outside Interactive Inc., an outdoor-focused media and tech company that publishes, among numerous titles, Outside magazine, today has unveiled plans for the Outerverse, which it described as “an adventure-minded, wellness-driven alternative to the Metaverse.”
According to a press statement, “Outerverse represents the first comprehensive foray into Web3 technology by a major consumer media company. Unfolding over the course of 2022, the platform will consist of three primary parts: an NFT marketplace (Outside.io), a community-oriented creator platform, and an Outside-branded loyalty token. All of the elements will be built in partnership with blockchain innovator SuperLayer.io. NFTs, or non-fungible tokens, are digital assets that represent real-world objects such as art or music.
“The emergence of NFTs, cryptocurrency, and Web3 systems is a game-changing development for media,” Robin Thurston, CEO of Outside, said in a written statement. “Our vision is really bold: We want to harness these new technologies to get the next generation of adventurers outdoors, and we want to infuse blockchain culture with the values that our followers hold dear. Big Tech wants you to live a virtual life; we’re creating experiences and content that will help you live a real life. The Outerverse is a place where technology exists to fuel adventure, inclusivity and sustainability.”
By early June, the company plans the release of a limited-edition NFT called the Outerverse Passport. “Starting today, followers can register at Outside.io to get notified when they can purchase the passport, a unique piece of digital art that comes with real-world benefits along with early access to NFT mintings from Outside as well as dozens of well-known influencers, brands, and nonprofit partners,” the company said in a press release.
Outside will then collaborate with artists to produce collectibles that celebrate its audience’s favorite athletes, destinations, and races, with a portion of the proceeds going to organizations working on sustainability and diversity, equity and inclusion.
The company said that the Outerverse will be built on the Solana blockchain, whose proof-of-stake approach uses less energy than its competitors.
“Outside will also calculate, report, and neutralize 100% of the footprint of the Outerverse — in addition to actions it’s already taken to make the entire company carbon-neutral by the end of 2026. And 20% of the net revenue from the sale of every new NFT will be distributed to a select group of nonprofit partners,” the company said in the press statement.
“The NFT initiative is just the first milestone in a roadmap that will redefine many aspects of our business,” said Thurston. “The Outerverse will also feature a platform that will enable creators to publish content to very large audiences and directly benefit from the engagement and revenue they drive. It will be a home for the world’s best storytellers and artists, with more than 10 well-known creators and athletes already on board to co-create and co-own this new ecosystem.”
This article was first published by BizWest, an independent news organization, and is published under a license agreement. © 2022 BizWest Media LLC.
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https://www.dailycamera.com/2022/04/04/cu-boulder-plans-activities-to-mark-national-sexual-assault-awareness-month/
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The University of Colorado Boulder has planned a series of events to mark National Sexual Assault Awareness month throughout April.
The university will host two panels to further the conversation. On April 5, there will be a panel discussion on “Comprehensive Sexual Assault Response,” which will include representatives from the Boulder County District Attorney’s Office, the campus Office of Institution Equity and Compliance, the Office of Victim Assistance, the CU Boulder Police Department and CU Boulder students.
On April 21, public speaker Bonny Shade will host a panel called “A Conversation to End Sexual Assault.”
Other activities include a storytelling workshop on April 6, and a “Sexual Assault in the LGBTQ+ Community” discussion on April 12. The rec center on campus will host two self-defense classes at 7 p.m. April 11 and at 5:30 p.m. April 13.
According to the CU Women and Gender studies website, one in four female and one in 18 male undergraduate students at CU Boulder are sexually assaulted a year. The site did not cite any data on how many of the assaulters experience repercussions.
Visit bit.ly/3r3pobn for a full list of events.
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https://www.dailycamera.com/2022/04/04/superior-votes-to-take-steps-to-fix-water-supply/
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The Superior Board of Trustees took steps Monday evening toward fixing issues with the town’s water supply.
At a special meeting, the board voted unanimously to approve the rental and installation of a granular activated carbon treatment system at the town’s water treatment plant.
Since the Marshall Fire, several residents have complained about the town’s drinking water having a smoky taste and odor.
In the immediate weeks after the fire, the water was both tested and deemed drinkable by the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment and Boulder County Public Health. However, the taste and odor issue persisted for some Superior residents, so the town worked with an outside contractor, Corona Environmental Consulting, to perform testing to come up with a solution.
Corona did bench scale testing of different alternatives that could address the mitigation of the smoky water coming from Terminal Reservoir, and concluded that installing a granular activated carbon treatment system would best fix the problem.
During the meeting, Corona president Chad Seidel expressed his confidence in the treatment system and its ability to remove the contaminants from the water supply at full scale.
The treatment system, supplied by Evoqua Water Technologies LLC, will be installed in the coming weeks, according to Utilities Superintendent Jim Widner.
Though the board was hoping to have the water system up and running by mid-April, construction is unlikely to be completed until mid-May, said Widner.
Once construction is completed and the system is installed, residents should see a difference in the taste and smell after 3 to 5 days, said Public Works and Utilities Director Alex Ariniello.
The board chose to rent the system rather than purchase the system outright. Some board members said they were concerned about the cost of the system and wondered whether the town would receive any FEMA or state funding, especially because the water issue occurred directly after the Marshall Fire.
Town Manager Matt Magley said he was unable to confirm whether the water system would be eligible for FEMA reimbursement; however, the board remained optimistic that either state or federal funding for the water system would come through in the coming months.
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20220405
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https://www.dailycamera.com/2022/04/04/informational-session-set-for-residents-builders-impacted-by-marshall-fire/
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The Colorado Green Building (CGBG) is having an information session intended for building professionals and members of the community impacted by the Marshall Fire.
With backing from Boulder County, “Building Passive House: Optimizing Costs + Benefits,” will occur Wednesday.
The discussion will be 6 to 7:30 p.m. on Zoom. All homeowners, interested community members and professionals are welcome to attend, according to a news release from Zachary Swank, via the Boulder County Colorado bulletin.
This is the third forum in a yearlong set, hosted by the CGBG and sponsored by Boulder County, providing conversations and training along with a live Q&A about the technical details of building a top-level home.
Xcel Energy issued a $37,500 rebate for Marshall Fire rebuilding projects that follow the passive house standards. Passive house is a discretional standard for energy efficiency with the goal to reduce a building’s ecological footprint by using low energy for space heating or cooling.
CGBG is a nonprofit organization based in Boulder County that encourages green building practices and is comprised of volunteer building professionals from architects to engineers and more.
The presentation will be available in English and Spanish and will be recorded. Registration can be completed at cgbg.org/events/passive-house-case-study.
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20220405
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https://www.dailycamera.com/2022/04/04/police-issue-warning-about-scam-targeting-venmo-users-other-payment-apps/
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Three cases of students losing hundreds of dollars are being investigated by the police department at the University of Colorado Colorado Springs.
The police department is warning anyone who uses popular payment apps such as Venmo to be cautious with their phones. The students were convinced to hand their phone to a stranger and ended up losing hundreds of dollars.
Apparently students are being approached by someone desperately needing to make a phone call, and once they have the students phones they send themselves money through Venmo.
“As much as you wouldn’t hand your wallet to someone, don’t hand your phone to someone,” said Sgt. Eric Edford of the University of Colorado Boulder Police Department (CUPD) in a statement on the Buff Bulletin Board.
Police are investigating other cities in Colorado and other campuses for similar cases.
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20220405
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https://www.dailycamera.com/2022/04/04/bad-news-for-backcountry-hut-users-in-colorado-get-ready-to-pony-up-big-bucks-again-this-year/
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There is some disappointing news for many skiers who love to plan annual hut trips in Colorado’s backcountry: For at least one more winter, the Tenth Mountain Division Hut Association will require users to book the entire hut due to COVID.
Prior to the pandemic, individual users and small parties could book reservations in the huts, which typically accommodate 16 to 20 guests. For the 2020-21 and 2021-22 seasons, Tenth Mountain required “single-party” reservations out of concern over COVID transmission. That will be the case again for the 2022-23 season.
“There’s a lot of people who really enjoy booking less than the capacity of the hut, and for really good reason, that’s what we’re all about,” said Ben Dodge, executive director of the Tenth Mountain Division Hut Association. “That multi-party experience is a fundamental part of what we do. People enjoy it, that’s why they go to the huts – to meet other people – and it’s more affordable that way. We’re committed to returning to that multi-party reservation configuration as soon as we possibly can.”
Here are examples of how it works in practice. It would cost individuals or small parties $37 per person per night plus tax to reserve spots at the Tenth Mountain Division Hut near Tennessee Pass, if not for the single-party requirement. Because of it, though, they would have to book the entire hut (which has a capacity of 16) at a cost of $644.10 including tax.
Similarly the Fowler/Hilliard Hut, located between Vail and Leadville, which also costs $37 per night per person would require spending $778.05 (including a $10 per person Vail Pass Recreation Area fee) for the whole hut.
“It’s a big chunk of change to put out, I know,” Dodge said. “It’s unfortunate for those who want to book a smaller number.”
Dodge conceded it was the “conservative” policy decision to make, but seemed prudent for health reasons.
“I think the idea of having multiple parties — they’ve never met one another — staying in a hut and sleeping together in the same room, that’s the kicker,” Dodge said. “If we had entirely segregated sleeping quarters, I think you could probably feel better about having multiple parties staying in a hut, even with these (COVID) variants. But sleeping overnight in a confined area, there’s potential transmission.”
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https://www.dailycamera.com/2022/04/05/high-of-57-with-strong-winds-and-a-chance-of-rain-and-snow-today-in-boulder/
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Boulder could see some rain and snow along with high winds today, according to the National Weather Service.
Today’s forecast calls for partly sunny skies with a high of 57 and an overnight low of 28, with winds 21 to 25 mph with gusts as high as 38 mph. There is a 30% chance of rain and snow.
There is a red flag warning in place for Boulder County starting at 11 a.m. today.
Wednesday’s forecast calls for mostly sunny skies with a high of 49 and an overnight low of 29, with winds 16 to 25 mph with gusts as high as 38 mph.
Thursday’s forecast calls for sunny skies with a high of 56 and an overnight low of 32, with winds 14 to 22 mph with gusts as high as 33 mph.
Friday’s forecast calls for sunny skies with a high of 66 and an overnight low of 42.
Five-day forecast
Check out what weather is in store for the Boulder County area here
National Weather Service
See what the National Weather service is predicting here
24-Hour satellite
Watch NOAA’s 24-hour satellite image here
Real-time conditions
See what Boulder’s weather is like now at the National Center for Atmospheric Research here
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