BLACK LIVES MATTER (DIE-IN AT DENVER MAYOR'S OFFICE)

WALKABOUT - CITY PARK - Dec. 23. 2014

Opinion by Gerald Trumbule

I drove down to 23rd and York and entered City Park. After winding around past the circle and tennis courts, I came upon this wall of various fences, one of which is an "art work" called Avian Front. It looks pretty much like a rusted iron machine fashioned into a fence with tall grass in front of it. It keeps you from seeing the western portion of the Zoo's acreage. It is not aesthetically pleasing, despite the attempt to "artify" it.

Looks like the entrance to an abandoned junk yard

Around the corner looking east toward Duck Lake

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Civic organizations that exist that you can participate/communicate with regarding City Park West

(From Ean Tafoya on FB)
Happy Holidays Everyone,
I have been following the conversations regarding CPFAN and I wanted to take a moment and list a few other civic organizations that exist that you can participate/communicate with regarding our lovely neighborhood rather then starting another group. I suggest visiting them all included CPFAN before you decide which one you would like to dedicate your time too. You can also voice park opinions monthly at the Denver Parks and Recreation Advisory Board. There is open public comment at the beginning of each meeting on the second Thursday of each month at 5:30.

CIVIC ORGANIZATIONS
City Park West Neighborhood Organization- I understand that Elizabeth Pearlman is still interested in gathering people to make CPWNO a reality again. I can say that after working to get it off the ground in the past with Liz and neighbors that I it is take a lot of work from committed neighbors to get all the outreach and organizational pieces together. i.e. regular meeting spaces, website, email distribution of content, plus agenda building. I highly encourage people to work towards this with Liz.
If you like to participate on smaller committees or projects with organization that are more established and cover the same boundaries I would suggest:
Uptown on the Hill, Capitol Hill United Neighborhoods (CHUN), or the City Park Alliance.
Uptown on the Hill has a board and several committees that are working on annual block parties, park beautification, and other community projects. Uptown also tracks zoning and other issues that the City informs RNO's about. Frank Silady Locantore is the President of the Board and I am sure he would love to talk to potential members about City Park and Uptown.
CHUN - is one of Denver's first Neighborhood groups. It covers a large area including CPW, South City Park, Congress Park, Chessmen Park, Cherry Creek and Capitol Hill. It two follows city issues and zoning, liquour, park issues, in addition to running the People's Fair and other civic issues. I am currently a member of this board and would lover to talk to people about our organization chunddenver.org
City Park Alliance - was formed in 1999 with a vision of restoring City Park. The bring together community, corporate and government resources to support park improvement projects. City Park Alliance gathers and engages the community, and mobilizes partners and resources for capital improvements, programs and events, and advocates for and communicates with all stakeholders on issues affecting City Park.
The City Park Alliance is run by a volunteer board of directors. Representatives from Denver Parks and Recreation, the Denver Zoo, and the Museum of Nature and Science sit on this board as well as several community members with a particular interest and commitment to City Park. Contact them directly at cityparkalliance@gmail.com
I am available to answer questions on the thread regarding my suggestions.

Between 17th Ave and 16th Ave, the alley between High St & Race St.

(From Nextdoor - City Park West)
Hello everyone. I have been in touch with Albus Brooks, our town councilman. We are planning to discuss the problems with drug dealers, gangs, and other problems that are not being addressed by the Property Managers of the Low Income Housing, Section 8, etc.
While the vast majority of those residents are good people and need this assistance, we are trying to get the owners/property managers to do a better job with regard to the bad tenants that are making our neighborhood littered and unsafe. We see a LOT of drug use in the alley that connects 2 of these Low Income Apartment Bldgs.,
If anyone out there is having problems with tenants in the Section 8/ Low Income Housing, please contact me. We have had quite a bit of trouble with violent drug dealers in the apartments on E 17th Ave. (while shooting at rival gang members driving by on 17th Ave, on a Friday evening, 4 bullets went into our building, 2 went thru the front door of our neighbors and were lodged in their wall). We worked closely with the police and were able to get them evicted last April. We also just helped the Property Manager get rid of another tenant that is part of this same gang.
Lets work together to keep City Park West safe and beautiful.
Chris Kahlmeyer
UPDATE 12/23/2014

Chris Kahlmeyer, City Park West
Hello everyone,
I just received an email confirming an appointment with our City Councilman, Albus Brooks on December 31st.
If you are having trouble with the tenants in the Low Income Housing, please send me as much information as you can, I want to share as much information as possible with Mr. Brooks when we meet.
In a 1 block radius from my house alone, I estimate close to 300 Low Income Housing units, compared to only about 15 -20 townhouse/apartments/duplexes in the same area.
We want to work with our Councilman and the Property Managers to keep the crime and criminals out of the Low Income Housing in our neighborhood.
Please share any information regarding issues with the Low Income Housing in City Park West.
Thanks so much!
Chris

DENVER AUDITOR GALLAGHER ENCOUNTERS "FOOT-DRAGGING" AT SHERIFF'S DEPARTMENT

DEFLECTION FROM POLICE BRUTALITY ISSUE?

See also here

Photo Radar and Photo Red light program, by Dennis Gallagher, Denver Auditor

On Monday night, the Denver City Council passed a six-month extension on the contract for the Photo Radar and Photo Red light program.  The intention is, apparently, to use the six months to prepare a new contract that likely will expand the program.
During Council remarks on the extension, I heard a lot of talk about promoting public safety.  I never heard any talk about proving that these two programs actually improve public safety.
In 2011, we conducted an audit of the Photo Radar and Photo Red Light Program.  The audit found that the Denver Police Department had not shown the public safety impact of either program.
It is critically important that both programs be supported with solid Denver-based data, so we do not maintain public policy on the basis of wishes and hope and anecdotal evidence that may not accurately represent Denver driver behavior. To that end, we recommended that it was important to conduct objective analysis and study of both programs to determine their actual impact on improving public safety.
Among the recommendations we made in our original audit, three dealt with study or analysis of the safety impact of the Photo Radar Program and three dealt with study or analysis of the safety impact of the Photo Red Light Program.
Our follow-up work through 2014 indicates that those studies have never taken place.  The Denver Police Department still cannot demonstrate that either program has had a tangible impact on improving public safety.
If they are not having a tangible impact on improving public safety then perhaps other options for that improvement need to be investigated and implemented that might be better at improving public safety.
We also noted that these two programs are generating over $7 Million combined annually.  Because these programs were sold as public safety enhancements but are widely viewed as a ‘cash grab’ by the public, it undermines public trust to maintain photo enforcement programs that are profitable but whose safety impact has not been conclusively shown.
We are all concerned with reducing accidents; protecting the safety of our children in around our public streets; and ensuring that pedestrians are not at risk when they step off the curb and into the street.  However we need to ensure that any program we undertake, does indeed do that.  As I have said, without verifiable and objective data we cannot confirm these programs do that.
It is interesting to note that it is very likely that the Police Department will want to expand each program.   Among our recommendations we stated that the Manager of Safety should not expand either the photo radar of photo stoplight programs until the program’s safety benefits are adequately demonstrated through objective analysis.  The department agreed with the recommendations but did not do either study.  They stated that they would not expand either program.

Dennis
 

Testimony of Bridget Walsh, to City Council , December 15 in re Denver Zoological Foundation Permit Application

(Did you know that the Zoo is planning on burning animal waste to produce energy, on site?)

I am Bridget Walsh, a member of CPFAN.
I would like to read excerpt from experts about the risks of the gasification process: From Wikipedia on the subject of biomass gasification:
Environmental advocates have called gasification "incineration in disguise" and argue that the technology is still dangerous to air quality and public health. "Since 2003 numerous proposals for waste treatment facilities hoping to use... gasification technologies failed to receive final approval to operate when the claims of project proponents did not withstand public and governmental scrutiny of key claims," according to the Global Alliance for Incinerator Alternatives.[14] One facility which operated from 2009-2011 in Ottawa had 29 "emissions incidents" and 13 "spills" over those three years. It was also only able to operate roughly 25% of the time.[15]

The second is from a European Commission Report , 2009:
Guideline for Safe and Eco-friendly Biomass Gasification
The technology of biomass gasification differs from other energy conversion technologies based on renewable energy sources because it inherently involves the production, treatment and utilization of flammable and toxic gas mixtures, plant media and utilities. Therefore, an adequate risk assessment is strongly recommended and is often a legal requirement for placing the plant into the market and running it. A risk assessment is aimed at protecting the workers and the plant itself.
Manufacturers/operators have to keep in mind that accidents and ill health can ruin lives and can affect the business too if output is lost, machinery is damaged, insurance costs increase or there is the possibility of prosecution [Ref 16].A risk assessment consists of a careful examination of what could cause harm to the people and environment in the plant, and the adoption of reasonable control measures. The manufacturers/operators have to produce a complete and well documented assessment of the risk relative to:

• Human and animal health hazards such as dangers from toxic gases

• Safety issues such as explosion hazards and fire hazards, and

• Environment hazards from plant emissions and loss of containment ! relating to toxic substances.

Well, Denver voters may never have the opportunity to judge the risk assessment plan at the Zoo’s industrial waste plant, because much like highly profitable oil and gas companies who refuse to give First Responders information about the trade secret contents of the fracking solutions that they inject into the earth , the Zoo has wrapped up much of the data needed for robust citizen and government agency review of their proposals as trade secrets or “Confidential Business Information.”
I suggest that citizen health and safety is much more important than the future profits of the Denver Zoological Foundation, who along with DPR run the Zoo with an iron hand that is symbolized by the ugly, Gulag-style Gate 15, the back door to the Zoo, but an ugly, deep wound on historic City Park.
I implore you to put this project on hold until there is a legitimate Citizens Advisory Committee set up to evaluate for the first time the Zoos gasification proposal in the light of day. The risks seem very serious and potentially deadly for park users and neighborhood residents. Thank you.

To Members of City Council from Tom Morris

The Denver City Charter identifies the branch of government responsible for the city’s land use as City Council.  In 2010 you assigned that responsibility to the Manager of Parks and Recreation.  Several controversies have arisen over that policy.

This latest one involves the Manager approving as a “Park Use” a fecal-matter-to-energy operation adjacent to the Pavilion, the main road in the park and those of us who use Ferrill Lake as a location for exercise.  Inasmuch as the District Court denied a ruling that the city’s Park and Recreation Department’s offices were a legal “Park Use,” for the Pavilion, it would appear that some sort of public process should have been conducted on the question of a plainly industrial use in City Park. 

Since the issue was decided unilaterally by the Manager, Council, as the Charter custodian of city land use, should require a public hearing prior to final approval of this significant land use decision.

Tom Morris

City Park

Denver

PUNCHING AND TRIPPING

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NEIGHBORHOOD LEADER VICTIMIZED

Friday night Dec 12, thieves broke into the home of Cole Neighborhood President Cynthia Wake.  The perpetrators broke the door, ransacked the house, trashed personal belongings, stole the TV, and other electronics.  

The thieves even stole the presents from under the tree, as well as many personal family treasures.

Cynthia and her 11-year-old son were out for the night and her daughter was away at college.  Everyone is safe.
Cynthia works full time, goes to college, and is a single mother of two children.  Yet she is well-known for making time to always be helping others.

In addition to her neighborhood leadership, Cynthia is a graduate of the first class of the Emerge political training class in Colorado (http://www.emergeamerica.org/colorado).  She is also a Steward for the Communications Workers of America.

Her activities in Cole include organizing neighborhood events and collecting gifts for area children at Christmas.

A fund is set up – http://www.gofundme.com/CynthiaWake – to help Cynthia repair her life, replace the presents from under her tree and hopefully re-build a beautiful holiday season and a happy new year for her family.

NOT 1 MORE ACRE! LATEST DOD MACHINATIONS

December 11, 2014 not 1 more acre!  PO Box 773  Trinidad, Colorado 81082          HC-130 brownout  Players at the Liar's Poker table -- Department of Defense (DOD), its contractors and politicians -- are running a shell game.   They've hidden three southeastern Colorado military expansions connected to Piñon Canyon Maneuver Site (PCMS) under three separate "studies." While piling weapons of drone warfare onto the 236,000-acre PCMS that DOD planners claimed for over a decade it had to have 6.9 million acres to test and operate  -- on the last native shortgrass prairie, displacing thousands of people -- Joint Forces are also: 1) At last going public with secret "casual use" agreements between public land management agencies, BLM and USFS, to expand and intensify Joint Force combat aviation operations onto fragile lands north of PCMS for thousands of helicopter landings and takeoffs, aerial refueling, and Joint Force maneuvers;  2) Expanding drone warfare operations at Bullseye Airfield, east of Colorado Springs;  3) Repackaging The Nature Conservancy (TNC) and partners' scheme to transform southeastern Colorado into a National Heritage Area by including those very "historic conservation lands" in the DEFENSE DEPARTMENT'S POLICY AND SPENDING BILL! Every taxpayer can thank the SE Colorado Private Property Rights Council for recognizing TNC's acquisition plans as military expansion in disguise, and defeating DOD's National Heritage Area, but beware! The Nature Conservancy is still at the trough wanting more DOD taxpayer money that feeds the Liar's Poker table. Every step we have taken to remove these threats to the cultural heritage, lives and livelihoods of the people and wildlife that thrive on the high plains of southeastern Colorado has been met by DOD, its contractors, and politicians with massive deceitful escalation of efforts to circumvent the law and extend drone war operations deeper into our lives and the pockets of every American taxpayer.  ARMY TANKS ON THE STREETS OF TRINIDAD, COLORADO   A                                                  Strykers in the 16th annual Trinidad Parade of Lights, Nov. 29, 2014  The only way to end this nightmare is to CLOSE PCMS!   COMMENT DEADLINE IS MONDAY, DEC 15! Please click the link and comment now. usarmy.carson.imcom-central.list.dpw-ed-nepa@mail.mil Challenge everything that is wrong with American politics today!    Tell the players at the Liar's Poker table: No more!  CLOSE PINON CANYON MANEUVER SITE! usarmy.carson.imcom-central.list.dpw-ed-nepa@mail.mil  View the PCMS Draft Environmental Impact Statement here:     http://www.carson.army.mil/DPW/nepa%20documents/PCMS_Training_and_Operations_Draft_EIS.pdf  Pick a page - any page - it is all a shell game!

CRIME ALERT - 12-9-2014

NOT YOUR NEIGHBORHOOD, NOT YOUR PARK

Opinion by Gerald Trumbule

ARTS methadone dispensary at 6:15 this morning.
The parking lot lights are either turned off or burned out. Not safe.

People often refer to the area they live in as "my neighborhood", and similarly they feel that the nearby park is "my park". But recent events prove that this is often not the case.

The introduction of a methadone dispensary directly across the alley from my property, without a hearing or notice of any kind, has me and my neighbors upset. We've had meetings with our City Councilman, Albus "This one is a done deal" Brooks , meetings with the staff that runs the clinic (ARTS), and a meeting with the owner of the property who rented to ARTS, Victor Kolouch of Kolouch Properties. None of this had any effect on the occupancy of this property by an organization (non-profit) which brings over 100 methadone addicts to this address, 1620 Gaylord St., six days a week, starting a 5:30 am, to take their "hit", get back in their cars, sometimes with their kids, and drive away.

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MORE MARIJUANA MUCH - 12-1-2014

Airport pot amnesty boxes get used, but not for weed
http://www.thecannabist.co/2014/12/01/airport-marijuana-amnesty-boxes-rarely-used-weed-disposal/24339/

Arvada Doctor Faces Prison Over Medical Pot Registry Cards
http://denver.cbslocal.com/2014/12/01/arvada-doctor-faces-prison-over-medical-pot-registry-cards/

Breath test for pot in the works
http://kgmi.com/news/007700-breath-test-for-pot-in-the-works/

'High Maintenance' gives weed delivery man's view of NYC
http://m.nydailynews.com/entertainment/high-maintenance-article-1.2027034

How one congressman could stop DC decriminalization
http://www.boulderweekly.com/article-13713-how-one-congressman-could-stop-dc-decriminalization.html

Legal Pot In The U.S. May Be Undercutting Mexican Marijuana
http://m.wunc.org/?utm_referrer=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.google.com%2F#mobile/46077

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THE FUTURE OF GLOBEVILLE by Tom Anthony

The future of Globeville:  an 80 acre trucking distribution facility, the trucks from which will beat the streets of Denver to death while Adams County reaps the taxes.  Only in Globeville would such a thing be seen as an improvement.  Oh, maybe Eads.
Meanwhile, the children of Globeville will continue to attend Garden Place Elementary, a 4 story, 1904 structure in the armpit of I-70 and I-25, two blocks from the Burlington Freight Yards.  A nice enough building, but shouldn't it be transitioned to a use that isn't full of developing lungs of "disposable children?"
What a reflection on the wonderful "non-profit community" that this plan passes unanimously:  the trucks are the future and not the children.  Meanwhile "glee-mania" runs rampant over the billion dollar stock show expansion plan.  The cow groomers get new digs but the children of Globeville will continue to be sent to spend their days studying in a fog of chemicals, a stone's throw from 100 ea 30,000 gallon chemical cars.  As to a new school for all the anticipated new residents to be drawn in by the North Metro commuter rail station?  Oh, those people won't have children!
Meanwhile the City has yanked my Use Permit after I've lived here 16 years, due to my having some outside storage in the back of my art studio (raw materials for future finished products) across the street from 10 acres of outside storage on the stock show property.  Onwards and upwards, eh?  Can hardly wait to see what's next.  More "hush money" in the pipeline, I'm sure.
The carrots, the sticks, and the "walkable, sustainable communities."  OH MY.
See more here.

ANOTHER BLOW TO CITY PARK, DENVER

Apparently saturating the lawns and filling the lakes of our parks with toxic chemicals from Superfund Site Lowry Landfill is not enough. Now the Zoo wants to burn animal waste on site to produce power. Ed.note: Oh well, no matter, I gave up some time ago.

Letter to City Council regarding Zoo's new Waste Disposal System.
This letter is provided for your information. It has not been adopted by the CPFAN Board of Directors but many of the directors have signed it as individuals.
December 1, 2014

Denver City Council
Dear Council Members:
We, the undersigned individuals, residents of City Park neighborhoods, write to express our concerns regarding the Denver Zoo’s animal waste reprocessing plant, and our dismay at its location inside City Park. We are responding to the announcement of your Infrastructure and Culture Committee meeting on Wednesday, December 3, at which you plan to discuss this issue.
You may wonder why we bother to write to you now. After all, the plant’s construction was completed two years ago, the Zoo has received kudos and awards for their forward-thinking and energy-conscious design, Walmart has donated $1.2M worth of micro-turbine generators. What’s left to say? What’s not to like?
While we commend the Zoo's determination to cut energy costs by burning animal waste products, the location of this plant appears to us to indicate a complete lack of regard by the Denver Zoo and the City Administration (Denver Parks & Recreation) for the formerly pastoral park that houses the Zoo and for the people who use it to unwind from the pressures of city living or to get a small taste of being at peace in a verdant landscape. Had the Zoo placed their industrial facility within the interior of the Zoo or along their 23rd Avenue border, which has nothing but fences, gates, and parking, then its impact would have been contained to the Zoo.
To our knowledge none of the RNOs and neighborhood groups who received notice of this project were told the gigantic machine to convert fuel to energy, along with its buildings and gate, would be fronting City Park Road, just yards away and very visible from:

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