Union Station panel weighs proposals from developers
Staff from the agencies charged with selecting a master developer for Denver’s historic Union Station will review today the qualifications of those wanting the job.
They will present their recommendations to the Executive Oversight Committee on Monday. The committee will determine who will be invited to submit proposals in October.
“We have left open the opportunity to short-list directly from the submittals or to do interviews,” said Jason Longsdorf, the project manager for Union Station. “It could be a hybrid where we short-list some number less than 11, then short-list further from interviews.”
The staff also will discuss whether Donald Trump should be allowed to submit more information regarding his qualifications – more than two weeks after the Aug. 19 deadline. Trump’s team submitted a two-page letter indicating its interest in the project, while other development groups submitted hundreds of pages.
The Union Station project, one of the most significant attempted in Denver, will serve as a gateway to downtown and link the Lower Downtown and Central Platte neighborhoods.
DENVER
Frontier gets OK for flights to Acapulco
Frontier Airlines has received approval from the U.S. Department of Transportation to fly to Acapulco from Denver. The airline applied for the route with plans to operate up to two flights a week on a seasonal basis beginning in December, making Aca pulco the seventh Mexican city Frontier flies to from Denver.
DENVER
Pueblo nightclub sued by major music labels
A handful of major music labels have sued a Pueblo West nightclub, claiming that its “unauthorized public performance of musical compositions” infringes on their copyrights.
Broadcast Music Inc. (BMI), Sony/ATV Songs, Songs of Universal and other music companies sued Kickers, bar manager Sheri Long and bar owner Etcetera Inc. on Tuesday in U.S. District Court in Denver.
The suit claims that 12 songs – including Willie Nelson’s “Crazy,” Charlie Daniels’ “Devil Went Down to Georgia,” and Don Von Tress’ “Achy Breaky Heart” – were performed at Kickers without proper license on March 26 and 27, and that other unlawful performances also have taken place. The suit says BMI has warned Kickers repeatedly to stop the performances.
CHICAGO
United seats filling on reduced capacity
United Airlines said Tuesday its planes were 84.8 percent full on average in August, up from 83.8 percent a year ago. The August performance was the highest passenger load factor United has had. It was the result of a 5.6 percent reduction in capacity, or available seat miles, and a 4.4 percent decline in traffic, or revenue passenger miles. United’s load factor for the year through August was 82.1 percent.
DENVER
3 indicted on felonies in worker’s comp case
State authorities have indicted the operators of a staffing company for allegedly forging worker’s compensation coverage certificates for its laborers. Verna Ray Brown, 49, and Rodney Glenn Fessenden, 39, both of Greeley, and Nicole Ray Brown, 22, of Denver, operators of Full Spectrum Staffing, were charged with violations of the Colorado Organized Crime Control Act, forgery, influencing a public official and other crimes.
The felony charges were filed Friday in the 19th Judicial District in Greeley after a statewide grand jury handed up a 90-page indictment, the Colorado attorney general’s office said. Verna Ray Brown and Fessenden were arrested in Greeley on Friday and charged with 44 felonies.
NEW YORK
KPMG ex-execs plead not guilty to fraud
Eight former KPMG LLP executives, including the accounting firm’s one-time deputy chairman, and an outside tax lawyer pleaded not guilty Tuesday to charges of conspiring to commit tax-shelter fraud. The nine men include Robert Pfaff, a former KPMG tax partner in Denver.
DOUGLAS COUNTY
Dish talks to 4 towns about name change
Dish Network is talking to officials in four towns about its “city makeover campaign.”
Dish, owned by Douglas County-based EchoStar Communications, has offered free satellite TV to any city in the United States willing to change its name to Dish.
The towns are Brookvale, in Clear Creek County; Clark, Texas; New Strawn, Kan.; and Bainbridge Township, Ohio. Dish hopes to announce a winner by November.
A newspaper in Duluth, Minn., reported a local uproar in Cable, Wis., over purported talks to change the town’s name to Dish.
OMAHA
Weitz & Co. may seek role in Six Flags sale
Value investor Wallace Weitz may seek talks with management of Six Flags Inc., the world’s second-largest amusement park operator, which last month put itself up for sale.
Weitz & Co., which converted its ownership in Six Flags from a passive to an active role, may also enter into talks with third parties concerning a possible acquisition, according to a U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission filing Tuesday. The firm, an investment adviser in Omaha, is the third-largest investor in Six Flags, owner of Six Flags Elitch Gardens amusement park in Denver.
SAN FRANCISCO
Blum Capital boosts its stake in Janus
Blum Capital Partners LP, which invests about $4 billion in public and private companies, said it raised its stake in Denver-based mutual-fund manager Janus Capital Group Inc. to 6.7 percent.
Blum Capital, which owned about 6 percent of Janus as of June 30, bought 1.5 million shares between July 28 and Aug. 29, bringing its holdings to about 14.2 million shares, according to a filing Tuesday with the Securities and Exchange Commission. Janus, the manager of $130 billion, has lost assets as clients withdrew money because of poor returns and a fund-trading scandal in 2003.
SEATTLE
Defector to Google cites tirade by Gates
Former Microsoft Corp. executive Kai-Fu Lee accused the software titan of incompetence in its plans to gain a business footing in China, and testified Tuesday that an expletive-filled tirade from chairman Bill Gates was a low point before he defected to rival Google Inc.
In testimony during a hearing on Microsoft’s lawsuit against Lee and Google, Lee said he wrote a memo to another Microsoft executive saying he was “deeply disappointed at our incompetence in China – that we have wasted so many years in China with little to show for it.”
