The topic: A special tax district in Cherry Creek.

Last month, after significant pushback from residents in the ritzy neighborhood, discussions of implementing a general improvement district, which would have paid for improvements by increasing property taxes, were abandoned.

“I’ve never personally seen that big a pushback on a district — and so early,” said Jamie Giellis, a local consultant hired to facilitate the process.

Special taxing districts have been on the rise in Denver.

Ballpark property owners and residents voted overwhelmingly last November to establish a general improvement district, or GID. RiNo’s business improvement district, or BID, was renewed for another decade in May. And next month, those along Broadway south of downtown will head to the ballot box to decide whether to establish a GID there.

But a GID won’t be coming to Cherry Creek.

Councilwoman Amanda Sawyer, who represents the neighborhood, initiated discussions about one earlier this year and said she hired Giellis for $15,000. Giellis, who has been involved with the Ballpark, RiNo and Broadway districts, set about gathering community feedback and establishing a possible framework.

Special tax districts, like GIDs and BIDs, are quasi-governmental entities set up to provide additional services to an area. Most are financed by levying an additional tax on properties within the district.

Sawyer said she initiated discussions of a possible GID in Cherry Creek because she is regularly approached by residents who “want things that the City of Denver is never going to pay for.”

“What I hear is, we want what the BID has,” she told BusinessDen. “We want that lighting, we want that landscaping, there’s no security service.”

The BID in this case refers to the Cherry Creek North Business Improvement District, which was the first BID in the Denver metropolitan area when it was formed in 1989, according to the organization’s website. It covers the neighborhood’s business district north of the mall, from University Boulevard to Steele Street between First and Third avenues. One major spending area has been private security, which grew from nothing in 2019 to $800,000 in 2023.

Sawyer said establishing a GID is a way for residents to get their desired improvements.

“At the end of the day, the GID is the right tool,” she said.

But the possible GID attracted an organized opposition effort over the summer, despite the formation process being far from landing on local ballots.

The effort was concentrated in the residential part of Cherry Creek North. Yard signs went up, as did a website, showing the words “New Tax New Tax New Tax” flanked by siren emojis.

Among the organizers of that effort was Wayne New, a Cherry Creek resident who represented the neighborhood on the Denver City Council from 2015 to 2019. He said residents are “very tired of increasing property taxes.”

“It was Democracy 101. So we felt good about that,” New said about Cherry Creek’s defeated GID effort.

When New was on the council, he facilitated discussions about a possible GID in the Golden Triangle, which at the time was still early in its development boom.

“I thought a GID was more for undeveloped areas,” New said.

That GID effort also fizzled before landing on ballots. New said residents in the Golden Triangle just weren’t interested. He said a GID in Cherry Creek “didn’t make sense to me.”

“Cherry Creek doesn’t fit,” he said. “We pay the highest amount of property taxes in the city. We could easily pay for our own improvements if we wanted to.”

Sawyer said Cherry Creek is the No. 1 neighborhood in Denver in terms of the per-capita revenue it provides the city. In terms of total revenue, she said, it����ap No. 2, trailing only downtown.

“That is a source of frustration for them,” Sawyer said of residents.

Dana Busch, another resident who opposed the GID, said residents feel they’re the city’s “cash cow” and are increasingly paying more and getting less with Denver now charging for trash pickup and sidewalk maintenance. She said that, with the exception of private security, she doesn’t think neighbors were asking for things a GID would do.

“We live in a very nice area. … I think the neighbors got really blindsided and continued to not really understand where this was coming from in the first place,” she said.

Sawyer said she’s fine that Cherry Creek decided not to pursue a GID. But she doesn’t like how it went down. She said she repeatedly apologized to Giellis for how she was treated.

“I’m surprised by the level of vitriol and intentional sharing of misinformation,” Sawyer said.

Busch acknowledged that some “very direct messages” were sent, but said that came when residents asked questions and got “defensive” nonanswers.

“All that did was leave people more frustrated,” she said.

Giellis said opponents saw a GID as “just a money grab.” They falsely said the money collected would go to the city’s general fund and not actually be spent in the neighborhood, she said.

“The announcement of all the budget cuts in the middle of the process certainly didn’t make it any easier,” she said, referencing Denver laying off 170 employees in August.

New voiced a similar concern in an interview Monday with BusinessDen.

“Obviously the city doesn’t have a lot of money,” he said. “They’re looking for local sources.”

New said there was “a lack of information” about the possible GID, including what things would cost. Many details just hadn’t been finalized yet, according to Giellis, who said opponents fabricated numbers.

New noted that there would be no way for residents to opt out of the GID, and that it would be in place for years. GIDs are overseen by boards made up of district representatives. He said the structure meant “we sort of would be losing a bit of control over our neighborhood.”

New doesn’t see a GID as the only way to get improvements. The nearby Country Club neighborhood has roaming private security, he noted. But it����ap not financed by a special tax district — some, but not all, residents just directly pay for it.

In a July survey conducted by Giellis, 65% of respondents said they were not interested in continuing to explore creating a GID. The process, however, continued for two more months. Sawyer said some of the uninterested respondents also wrote that they didn’t have enough information to answer.

“I feel bad for the residents of Cherry Creek,” Sawyer said. “It was meant to be a solution, and what has happened is it pitted neighbors against each other.”

Busch said other neighborhoods should see this as a model to emulate.

“You can affect change,” she said. “But you have to get enough people involved and you have to have a strategy.”

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Brough conceded shortly after 10:15 p.m. Tuesday.

Introduced by his wife Courtney, an animated Johnston took the microphone on stage inside Union Station’s cavernous Great Hall to double down on his message of hope at a time when Denver is facing monumental challenges around housing affordability, growing homelessness, school safety and an uncertain economic future for its downtown.

“We believe in a Denver where everybody that loves this city and serves this city and believes in this city ought to be able to afford to live in this city,” Johnston said. “We believe in a city where kids will be safe on playgrounds and in schools and in neighborhoods in our downtown corridors. Because in every neighborhood, you ought to be able to walk out your front door and know this is your home — and in your home, you feel safe.”

He urged his supporters not to give in to the voices of doubt that might creep into their thoughts amid Denver’s recent struggles. He urged them, instead, to dream of what they want Denver to become.

“Let’s now go to work to build this into America’s best city,” he said, before wrapping his arms around his three children.

Johnston beat Brough 55.15% to 44.85%, according to final unofficial results released by the Denver Clerk & Recorder’s Office. With roughly 1,500 discrepant ballots still eligible to be cured and counted and a small number of military and overseas ballots potentially yet to arrive at the elections division office, Johnston’s margin of victory was 16,738 on the afternoon after Election Day. He got 89,644 votes to Brough’s 72,906, per that tally. The results won’t be certified until June 20.

Turnout in the runoff landed at 163,598 voters, according to the unofficial final count. That’s roughly 31% of the city’s total number of registered voters and down from the 175,588 Denverites who cast ballots in the April 4 general election. In the city’s 2019 runoff race, more than 165,000 voters cast ballots, good for a participation rate of 35% of what was then a smaller electorate.

Johnston, 48, will be sworn in as Denver’s 46th mayor on July 17.

Outgoing Mayor Michael Hancock, who is serving the last of three terms allowed by Denver’s charter, congratulated Johnston, saying in a statement that he was “confident the city will be in good hands, and my team stands ready to support the incoming administration.”

Brough addressed a crowd of supporters on the dancefloor in the ReelWorks event hall in Denver’s Five Points neighborhood moments before Johnston gave his victory speech. She said the room was filled with the type of energy that money couldn’t buy.

“I still believe in this campaign and the work we did,” she said. Her advice to young people in the audience was, “Go for everything you want in life.”

When she called Johnston to concede, she said, she “wished him Godspeed in the work ahead, because our city is challenged and it needs a lot of work.”

Wearing the green blazer that became her trademark on the campaign trail, she walked off the stage to chants of “Kelly! Kelly! Kelly!”

After a crowded first-round election on April 4, the runoff featured two of the more moderate contenders — Johnston, a former state legislator and nonprofit leader, and Brough, a former top aide in the Denver mayor’s office and then leader of the Denver Metro Chamber of Commerce.

Johnston’s victory marks a comeback after two previous unsuccessful attempts to win higher office, first by running for Colorado governor and then the U.S. Senate.

“I feel very moved and inspired by where the city has ended up,” Johnston told reporters late Tuesday. “I loved being out of politics. And then I thought there was a vision for what the city could do and where it could go. This seemed like a moment where the city would be compelled by someone who both cares deeply about those communities that have been most underserved, and (who) can lead complex organizations that deliver transformational results. And that’s what we’re excited to do. I can’t wait to build a broad coalition to take that on.”

Johnston opened early lead in results

Johnston opened with a significant lead in the first results Tuesday night, and his margin only grew as the counting continued. The crowd at his Union Station event erupted in cheers just after 7 p.m. as a TV screen displayed the first batch of results. A short time later, the song “Lovely Day” by Bill Withers played on the speakers.

“I feel very positive about the people who are here,” former Denver Mayor Federico Peña said, referring both to the party and the runoff coalition Johnston had built. “This is a very diverse group of supporters. They are very energetic, they’re optimistic, and I’ve talked to several people today who have been walking (campaign) walks for weeks for Mike.

“And Mike set the tone — he’s the one who has the highest energy of everybody.”

Less than two miles to the north, at ReelWorks, the crowd of Brough supporters milled about under a disco ball as early results painted a grim picture.

While campaign manager Sheila MacDonald preached patience, Brough aide Hashim Coates confronted the possibility of defeat. Her campaign faced an uphill climb to overcome the white male patriarchy and a substantial money disadvantage, he said.

“This is not a total loss if it doesn’t go the way I want it to go,” Coates said. “She’s a breath of fresh air. People want an honest politician; people want someone not to sell them on dreams. That’s Kelly Brough.”

Johnston won as high as 59% support in later batches of results added to vote totals, according to The Denver Post’s analysis, suggesting that ballots turned in later broke significantly in Johnston’s favor.

He was boosted during the runoff by endorsements from several progressive first-round candidates, including third-place Lisa Calderón and fifth-place Leslie Herod, a state representative. Herod fired up the crowd in two moments Tuesday night before Johnston took the stage, getting them to chant “Mayor Mike!”

Johnston said he felt those endorsements, and others from prominent Denver figures and groups, mattered.

“I sure believe that they do,” he said after his victory speech. “I think they show the breadth of the coalition you can build, from a Federico Peña to a Leslie Herod to the labor supporters that we have, to the business leaders. … That looked like Denver to people, and I think that mattered.”

With the election’s outcome, Denver’s streak of never having elected a woman mayor will continue. The city’s persistent glass ceiling was only a small part of a long runoff race, despite the Brough campaign’s efforts to emphasize that fact to voters.

Candidates struggled to mark contrasts

The runoff period lasted more than twice as long as the second round in past Denver elections, owing to city voters approving a recent change that moved up the general election to early April from early May. The long inter-election period may have contributed to a muted campaign between the two moderate Democrats, who at times struggled to differentiate themselves from one another and from the Hancock administration.

They have policy differences when it comes to homelessness. Both intend to keep enforcing the city’s urban camping ban, but Brough has said she would use arrests as a last resort to clear homeless encampments when Johnston said he would not incarcerate people.

“This has actually been, by election standards, a pretty boring election,” said Alton Dillard, a former spokesman for the Denver Clerk & Recorder’s office who is now a private consultant. “The two corporatist Democrats pointing fingers back and forth over who has local money vs. national money — but it all spends the same.”

Johnston is a former state senator, school principal and, most recently, the past CEO of the politically active philanthropic organization Gary Community Ventures. His work on education reform earned him dedicated supporters in the liberal donor class and an advisory position with President Barack Obama’s 2008 campaign. That work, particularly a 2010 bill he sponsored that tied teacher evaluations to student academic growth, has also brought plenty of criticism from people who view him as an adversary to public education.

In recent years, Johnston has been a serial candidate for higher office. He lost to Gov. Jared Polis in the Democratic primary in 2018 and dropped out of the 2020 U.S. Senate race in Colorado after eventual winner John Hickenlooper entered.

Johnston ran a campaign centered on ambitious plans to address the city’s more pressing challenges, including housing affordability and homelessness. His pledge to solve unsheltered homelessness in his first term in office hinges on his ability to deliver 10 to 20 “micro-communities” of tiny homes that would allow the city to relocate entire encampments of people living on the street to safer, more stable places with on-site services.

The Brough campaign sought to paint that idea as a pie-in-the-sky overpromise. Relying on a combination of one-time federal stimulus funding, dedicated sales tax revenue and money from Proposition 123, a statewide property tax redistribution measure Johnston championed while running Gary Community Ventures, he’s stood fast by that goal.

“It����ap very reasonable you could do it in four years,” Johnston said of ending homelessness in Denver.

Johnston’s plans, including addressing gaps in housing affordable for moderate-income earners, won him the endorsement of YIMBY Denver, a pro-housing development group.

Alison Torvik, a YIMBY group lead, said at Johnston’s Election Night party that she had the sense that Brough had hopes to address housing, while Johnston had firmer plans.

“There’s so many people who are just balancing on the edge — like my friends who are (restaurant) servers, or teachers or firefighters,” Torvik said. “You shouldn’t have to drive until you can afford it,” by moving to the suburbs.

“So I hope that all of his promises and all of his plans will come to fruition,” she said. “I think we’re going to have a great opportunity to get some missing middle (projects) — or just more housing.”

Brough, 59, ran a campaign anchored by her deep experience with city operations. Being ready to step into the mayor’s role with no learning curve was one of her central electoral sales pitches.

“What I know, with me, is I’ve done that before. I know how to do it. And so I think we can move faster to make progress on some of the critical issues we face today,” she told The Denver Post of her ability to manage the city.

Being the first woman chosen to do that job would also mean extra scrutiny and a higher threshold for what success looks like, she said.

Born and raised in Montana, Brough often said on the campaign trail that every good thing that came in her life was a result of her decision to move to Denver with her late husband in 1986. Her career included time spent as an analyst for the Denver City Council and as a director of the city’s human resources department.

She rose to the level of chief of staff in then-Mayor John Hickenlooper’s administration, working on delicate projects such as helping to plan for the 2008 Democratic National Convention and renegotiating contracts with the city’s police, fire and sheriff’s department unions amid the Great Recession. Fifteen years later, those unions endorsed her in the mayor’s race.

But Brough’s most recent high-profile job — a dozen years as president and CEO of the chamber of commerce — proved to be her most consistent political hurdle.

While she was in charge, the chamber opposed legislation and ballot measures that would require paid sick leave for workers, boost renter protections, specify greenhouse gas reduction targets and allow Colorado cities to set a minimum wage, among other issues.

She argued that the work she did at the chamber didn’t always match her personal beliefs — even confronting Johnston after a debate last month for what she viewed as repeated misrepresentations of her positions and background.

Many progressive political leaders and labor unions backed Johnston and opposed Brough in the race’s final stages.

Runoff narrowed largest mayoral field in at least 50 years

Brough and Johnston made it into the runoff after advancing from a field of 16 candidates in the first round of the race.

It was the most mayoral candidates Denver has seen in at least 50 years. And with the recent adjustments to the election calendar, voters weighed in earlier than in prior municipal elections, shortening the campaign a bit. The June runoff date didn’t change.

The city’s Fair Election Fund program was a significant driver behind the crowded field. Making its maiden electoral voyage after Denver voters approved it in 2018, the fund provided participating candidates with matching taxpayer dollars on donations of up to $50 from Denver residents. It distributed more than $7.1 million to would-be mayors, City Council hopefuls and other candidates during the cycle.

With that public funding in the mix, the mayoral field was also more diverse than any in recent memory. Candidates included an IT professional and former boxer from Curtis Park, an anti-gang activist from Park Hill and a political science professor from the University of Colorado Denver.

In the end, the two best-funded candidates advanced to the runoff. Johnston, in particular, pulled in vast amounts of outside money, including nearly $2 million alone from Reid Hoffman, the billionaire co-founder of LinkedIn.

In terms of direct fundraising, Brough and Johnston each raised just over $2 million as of the end of May. Brough’s total included $937,500 in Fair Elections Fund dollars, the maximum amount a mayoral candidate could draw from the program, while Johnston’s matching funds reached $766,923. 

By participating in the matching program, Brough and Johnston agreed to $500 contribution limits in the race. Those limits do not pertain to independent expenditure committees, the outside spending groups that can accept unlimited contributions but aren’t allowed to coordinate with the campaigns of the candidates they are working to elect. 

Johnston benefitted from more than $4.9 million in outside spending backing his candidacy, including major payouts from Hoffman, former New York City Mayor and media mogul Michael Bloomberg and Kent Thiry, former head of Denver-based dialysis company DaVita. 

Brough, meanwhile, was backed by $1.4 million in outside spending, led by more than $470,000 underwritten by the National Association of Realtors’ political fund.

In the 2019 mayor’s race in which Hancock won a third term by defeating Jamie Giellis in the runoff, his campaign raised just shy of $3 million and benefited from just $67,000 in outside spending.

The dark money disparity spurred the Brough campaign to host an event in Civic Center Park in the last week of the race in which supporters chanted, “Denver is not for sale.” 

Denver political analyst Eric Sondermann noted there was just no way for Brough to keep up with Johnston when a single donor in Hoffman gave more than her independent expenditure committee was able to raise in the entire race. Johnston also had an edge in liberal Denver by being endorsed by labor unions and several more progressive former challengers, including Calderón and Herod.

“Having eliminated those two and being faced with a choice of two very Anglo, very establishment types, (voters) chose the one that was two degrees or three degrees to the left of the other one,” Sondermann said.

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In the next six weeks, key distinctions are likely to emerge between the well-funded candidates — as will new endorsements, consolidated coalitions and fine-tuned campaign messages that together will determine which one becomes Denver’s 46th mayor.

Though several self-identified progressive candidates failed to make the June 6 runoff, including third-place Lisa Calderón, their voters could determine the outcome. That is among the big X-factors that experienced Denver political operatives and observers say give both Brough and Johnston viable paths to victory.

“I think it����ap a mistake to assume they are identical,” said City Councilwoman Robin Kniech, who’s finishing up her third and final term as an at-large member and has stayed neutral in the race. “We need to look more closely at these two candidates.”

The people doing that looking potentially include not only voters who opted for the 14 other candidates in the crowded April 4 election, but also the nearly two-thirds of registered voters who didn’t turn out. While turnout rarely increases substantially in Denver’s runoffs, that is among the uncertainties at play.

So is the role of identity politics in an open mayoral runoff that, for the first time in more than 40 years, has no Hispanic or Black candidate — but also holds the possibility of electing the first woman as mayor.

Voting for mayor is about more than finding the best policy match. For many, it’s also about a candidate’s vision for the city, their trustworthiness and their authenticity, however those are judged.

“Both are experienced. Both are very dynamic in terms of their grasp of their issues,” said Jeff Fard, a Five Points activist known as Brother Jeff who voted for Calderón in the first round. “And so I think they have to convince someone like myself, who doesn’t have a candidate right now.”

In the first round, Johnston, a former state senator and leader of Gary Community Ventures, finished first with 24.5% of votes. Brough, a former city official and leader of the Denver Metro Chamber of Commerce, captured 20%. An outright majority was needed to avoid a runoff, and both fell far short.

Each has earned a big endorsement from a former mayor since then, with and after previously endorsing state Rep. Leslie Herod, one of the progressives, in the first round.

The lower-placing candidates come from a broad spectrum, and both runoff contenders have been courting them. Calderón, who won 18.2% of the vote, so far has said publicly that she’s focused on helping progressive candidates win several City Council district runoffs — leaving it unclear if she’ll make an endorsement; her campaign manager, Sarah Lake, declined to comment on her behalf.

On Monday morning, after this story was published, Herod joined Johnston at a news conference in Civic Center to endorse him. She came in fifth in the first election, receiving 10.7% of votes. Earlier, 10th-place finisher Thomas Wolf, who netted 1% of votes, endorsed Brough.

An attempt to reach state Sen. Chris Hansen (who was sixth, at 4.8%) wasn’t successful. But others, including Councilwoman Debbie Ortega, who came in seventh (at 4.5%), and eighth-place Ean Thomas Tafoya (1.6%) say they may weigh in.

“I definitely want to make sure the interests that are important to my supporters are referenced and addressed by the candidates,” said Tafoya, an environmental justice activist. He expressed hope that others, including Calderón, would not pass up a “huge opportunity to really leverage policy” by negotiating an endorsement.

The fourth-place finisher, Andy Rougeot, a self-funder who won nearly 12% of the vote as the only Republican-affiliated candidate, has made his intentions clear to The Denver Post.

“I will not be endorsing either candidate,” Rougeot said in a statement. “I don’t believe either Mike Johnston or Kelly Brough will do what����ap needed to keep our city safe by adding police officers and aggressively enforcing the camping ban.”

That leaves it up to the candidates to attract Rougeot’s voters — though Kniech was among observers who said appealing to his supporters by taking an even harder line on crime or homelessness may put off the vast majority of Denver voters who are left-leaning.

Johnston has momentum. Could Brough make history?

The runoff candidates emerged from the first round with well-honed pitches and evidence of some strengths with voters.

Johnston, 48, has the momentum of finishing first. He’s run an energetic campaign animated by the vision of making Denver the country’s best city, drawing on nearly eight years of legislative experience and work spearheading initiatives such as Proposition 123, a state affordable housing funding mandate that Colorado voters approved last fall. He’s also leaned on ties he built within the city’s Black community as a legislator representing northeast neighborhoods.

As ballots were counted this month, his vote share held steady, reflecting strength both among early-voting older voters and the younger and more ethnically diverse electorate that turned in ballots on Election Day. He finished first in precincts in several pockets spread around the city, while finishing second to Herod in several precincts in predominantly Black neighborhoods.

Brough, 59, carries the potential of making history, a prospect buoyed by the five women candidates in the first round winning nearly 54% combined. She’s run a campaign focused on both a compelling personal story — including humble beginnings and hardship — and on the nuts and bolts of governing. She’s leaned heavily on her executive experience, including in city government, where she rose to then-Mayor John Hickenlooper’s chief of staff in late 2006, and then a dozen years as the Chamber of Commerce’s president and CEO.

She performed well among older voters and those who returned their ballots ahead of Election Day, with her vote share declining as later ballots were counted. Her strongholds were mostly in southeast Denver, though she finished second to Johnston in many well-heeled neighborhoods and occasionally was second to other candidates in more conservative-leaning or low-income areas.

Michael Dino, a longtime Democratic strategist, sees a thematic alignment in the endorsements from Peña, who served from 1983 to 1991, and his successor, Webb, who served through 2003. (Hickenlooper, now a U.S. senator, has suggested he won’t issue an endorsement, and neither has outgoing Mayor Michael Hancock.)

“Mike Johnston certainly has a bit of Federico Peña in him, in terms of the vision and laying out what he thinks Denver can be,” Dino said. Brough, for her part, “has a lot of the traits that (Webb) possessed, in terms of strong administrative skills, good executive experience and experience working in the city.”

The question is which approach voters will favor this year, he said.

Broader debate — and more scrutiny on candidates

Kniech predicts a broader debate in the runoff that moves well beyond the so-far prevailing issues — homelessness, housing affordability, and crime and public safety, all ranking among Denver’s knottiest problems — that dominated the first round’s debates and forums. She also expects there will be far more scrutiny on each candidate’s experience, background and past positions.

“I don’t think we had a close look at either of them,” she said, given how much competing attention there was in the first round.

For Johnston, that means closer looks at a legislative record that includes major liberal victories, such as a bill providing in-state tuition for undocumented students in Colorado. But he also took divisive stands as a leader on education reform, which has alienated some educators and teacher’s unions during his previous unsuccessful runs for governor and U.S. senator.

And for Brough, it means more attention to the positions taken by the Chamber of Commerce while she led it. Some were pro-business stands that she says didn’t reflect her personal opinions, including against paid family leave, while in other cases, she pushed the chamber to support gay rights and other liberal-leaning causes.

This will all play out during a longer runoff campaign than usual, thanks to Denver moving up the first-round election by a month. The runoff period now lasts nine weeks instead of four, and voters will receive their mail ballots the week of May 15.

Some analysts suggested the longer runoff could blunt Johnston’s momentum, but Camilo Vilaseca, his campaign manager, is optimistic.

“I feel like we’re in a pretty strong spot right now,” he said, “and are moving in the right direction in building the coalitions that historically have been important in winning mayor’s races” — including by working on appeals to different types of progressive voters.

His counterpart in Brough’s campaign agrees that Johnston started the runoff in a stronger position — though it has much to do with Johnston having twice as much outside spending backing him, including from several donors who have written six-figure checks.

“We’re the underdog, but we are ready,” said Sheila MacDonald, who also ran Jamie Giellis’ unsuccessful campaign against Hancock four years ago. “We’re running a grassroots effort here, and that means being with neighbors. That means going door to door. That means coffees across the city (and) in living rooms.”

TV ads soon will return, though Vilaseca says the campaigns may struggle to replenish their coffers because of the $500-per-individual-donor limit they accepted as part of the city’s new Fair Elections Fund donor match program.

Those limits don’t reset in the runoff, though the Denver Elections Division says it is granting Brough $187,500 and Johnston $153,385 as their runoff distributions from the matching program. Each runoff candidate receives 25% of what they earned in matching funds in the first round.

By all accounts, the rich backers who flooded independent-expenditure committees with money on each candidate’s behalf — $2.2 million has been reported for Johnston so far and $1.1 million for Brough — are reloading for more.

That outside money, and where it comes from, likely will continue to come under scrutiny, several political observers say.

Poll suggests Johnston is making inroads

The only public poll released so far suggested the candidates are in a tight race that’s within the margin of error, though Johnston came in at 39% to Brough’s 34% in a model weighted to slightly more conservative turnout than the April 4 election. That could understate Johnston’s support, his backers say.

The poll’s cross-tabs show that so far, Johnston is having an easier time attracting liberal voters than Brough. The candidates are more even with moderates, while Brough appeals more to conservative-leaners — a smaller piece of Denver’s pie.

“Voters who might have voted for Lisa Calderón or Leslie Herod — I don’t know how they’ll break, but I can imagine some of Mike’s (record) being appealing to them,” said Paul Teske, dean of the University of Colorado Denver’s School of Public Affairs.

But he’s among longtime political observers in Denver who caution that local politics is harder to predict, and voters of different stripes don’t always do what’s expected of them. While Brough’s business ties make her vulnerable, Teske said, Johnston’s recent history of being a “professional politician” by running for several offices might turn some voters off.

How to address homelessness, public safety or addiction “are not left-right issues, and I don’t think they necessarily think they play to the strengths of someone who is making a play for the far left,” said Alan Salazar, Hancock’s current chief of staff. “That said, it would be crazy not to acknowledge that there is a left orientation with a significant number of Denver voters.”

Tafoya says he thinks those voters will show up and make a choice in the runoff. But there are some conflicting signals, with Councilwoman Candi CdeBaca, who’s facing her own runoff in District 10, saying she urges progressive voters to focus on electing progressives to the City Council, even if it means skipping the mayor’s race.

Reaching progressives may require some attention to policy, said Wendy Howell, the state director of the Colorado Working Families Party.

“What they are looking for is people who are actually speaking to the solutions that they know work,” she said. That includes housing plans that have the city address the affordability gap by intervening more in the housing market, she said, and safety plans that address the root causes of crime rather than relying simply on hiring more police officers.

For now, it’s no guarantee that turnout will hold steady in the runoff. In past mayoral runoffs in recent decades, it’s been just as likely to decrease as increase.

Four years ago, Hancock and Giellis — both seen as moderates in a six-way race — made the runoff, leaving Calderón, the strongest liberal, in third place that time, too.

Ultimately, nearly 21,000 fewer voters participated in the runoff compared to the first round, with a small share of voters taking the option to sit out the second round.

Just one day after the April 4 election, a nonpartisan group called announced the formation of the Denver Deserves Democracy Committee, which will advocate for the city to make the switch to what’s also called instant-runoff voting.

This method lets voters rank candidates on their , first, second and third, up to the number of allowable options. If one candidate gets the majority of voters’ first-choice rankings, that person wins the election. But if no candidate secures an outright majority, candidates are then eliminated through subsequent rounds of counting. Votes go to the candidate that voters ranked as their next choice on a ballot until a majority-vote winner succeeds.

The committee will need to get the City Council’s approval to refer a measure to the ballot asking Denverites whether they want to adopt ranked-choice voting. Organizers of the effort say they already have some current and newly-elected council members on board. But if the City Council doesn’t agree to refer the measure, advocates plan to pursue it through a citizen initiative.

Linda Templin, executive director of Ranked Choice Voting for Colorado, called Denver’s current election process haphazard, noting that fewer than half of voters chose the two mayoral candidates now headed toward a runoff.

Because none of the 17 candidates on the ballot received more than 50% of the vote, Denver residents will have the opportunity to vote between top two vote-getters Kelly Brough and Mike Johnston in a runoff election June 6. This scenario is not unique: In 2019, five candidates ran against incumbent Mayor Michael Hancock, but no candidate reached the threshold for an immediate win, so Hancock faced off against Jamie Giellis before winning his third term in office.

Ranked-choice voting would eliminate the need for a runoff, and Templin noted that while overall voter dissatisfaction is high, the Pew Research Center found ranked-choice voters are more satisfied, as seen in Basalt and Santa Fe, New Mexico, elections.

“Reasons can include that they can more fully express their preferences instead of limiting their choices to those who have a chance of winning a plurality race,” she said. “Voters also like that the campaigns have become more issue-focused, because they have a better understanding of what the candidates plan to do.”

In 2021, the Denver City Council considered two recommendations from the clerk and recorder’s office to fix a timing conflict between state and municipal election laws: move the election from the first week of May to the first week of April, or transition to a ranked-choice voting model. The council opted to move the date of the election.

Denver County Clerk and Recorder Paul López has said that although the City Council decided against implementing ranked-choice voting, should a new council or citizen initiative lead Denver to go that route, “I remain confident that we can run a ranked-choice election model with excellence.” But, he added, it has to be paired with public engagement, especially in areas that historically have had low voter turnout.

Also in 2021, the Colorado legislature passed a law that would allow ranked-choice voting through county clerks’ offices with support from the secretary of state’s office for towns, cities or counties that opt to use the method for nonpartisan municipal elections. Prior to this legislation, cities and towns were on their own if they chose to implement ranked-choice voting.

Colorado Secretary of State Jena Griswold remains neutral about counties or cities that decide to use the method, but her office said it would provide technical support as required under the law.

“The ranked-choice voting model may provide certain benefits to both voters and election administrators,” spokeswoman Annie Orloff said in a written statement. “To date, Colorado has a handful of cities and counties that have adopted this law and this fall’s elections are the first opportunity for communities to utilize RCV on the ballot.”

Home-rule cities like Fort Collins have passed ranked-choice voting, and ​​the towns of Basalt and Carbondale use instant-runoff voting in their municipal elections if they have enough candidates running. The city of Boulder and the city and county of Broomfield also have announced that they plan to use ranked-choice voting in November.

Despite the method’s rising popularity, some say it could be confusing to voters and cause disenfranchisement — something advocates strongly dispute.

What do ranked-choice opponents say?

Denver City Council member Kevin Flynn has been a vocal opponent of such a move, calling it “a great leap backward.”

Flynn provided a spreadsheet of 46 municipal elections using ranked-choice voting across the country that he analyzed, saying that only five resulted in a majority winner after all rounds of counting. In one San Francisco election he reviewed from 2010, 22 rounds of counting resulted in three out of every five ballots being discounted because voters, who only had three allowable choices, did not include the ultimate election winner in their rankings.

With runoffs, Flynn said, everyone gets a second chance to vote.

While ranked-choice proponents point to Denver’s April 4 election as a solid reason to pursue instant-runoff voting, Flynn views it as a strong case against it.

He said he heard from people who couldn’t decide who to vote for out of the 17 mayoral candidates — many didn’t even know that one person had dropped out prior to the election — and they surely wouldn’t be able to easily rank them. Plus, if voters only rank three or four candidates, but those candidates end up getting eliminated during the counting rounds, then their votes ultimately don’t count toward the final result, he argued.

“The system we use right now, every vote counts,” Flynn said. “Even the people who did not vote for Johnston or Brough. They get a second chance now to vote between the two.”

Proponents of the system, however, argue that turnout for races in ranked-choice elections tends to be higher than in plurality or top-two runoff elections, and that only a small number of ballots become “inactive” when voters don’t have an active choice remaining. Although current guidelines recommend six rankings, clerks will have discretion as to how many choices voters will get, Templin said.

“Regardless of the number of candidates, RCV finds the consensus of a majority,” Templin said. “City charter does not require that the hard number of votes for a majority be the same in the runoff. The majority percentage yields a different hard number in each round whether the system is top-two or RCV.”

Another concern of Flynn’s is the cost to transition to ranked-choice voting, while Templin argues that ranked-choice voting will actually save the city money by getting rid of the second runoff election.

City costs to run an election fluctuate, depending on various factors, including the number of voters, length of a ballot and personnel needed. Although exact costs are still being calculated, the Denver Clerk and Recorder’s Office estimates that the April and June municipal elections will cost about $2 million each, according to spokesperson Lucille Wenegieme. In comparison, the cost of the November 2022 election was just under $4 million, and the 2024 general election is expected to be around $5 million.

The Colorado Secretary of State’s Office said that any cities or counties that use Dominion Voting Systems software licensed through the Secretary of State’s Office, as Denver does, should already be set up to use ranked-choice voting and therefore will not have to change their equipment.

There’s still an additional cost for the license to use the ranked-choice module and a recurring yearly support fee to the election management system — estimated at about $80,000, though that could decrease if other counties also license the software at the same time, or increase as Denver’s population goes up, according to Lucille Wenegieme, a spokesperson for the clerk’s office.

Wenegieme said the clerk’s office doesn’t yet have a cost estimate for the implementation of ranked-choice voting, which would include increased paper use, because ranked-choice voting ballots tend to be longer due to their layout; extensive voter education and engagement; and the reissuing of all voter instructions and translations.

Two forms for ranked-choice voting

While ranked-choice voting is used primarily in municipal elections, Alaska and Maine use it for state primary, congressional and presidential elections.

Lee Drutman, a senior fellow at New America, a civic organization based in Washington, D.C., was among the authors of a report published in November 2021 analyzing ranked-choice voting use across the nation.

“Broadly, the research shows that RCV is an improvement over the more traditional single-vote plurality voting system, with clear benefits in some areas — especially campaign quality and descriptive representation — and more marginal or no apparent benefits in other areas,” the report stated. “The research should also allay fears that RCV is too confusing or discriminatory: voters understand RCV, and learn to like it, too, particularly with experience.”

Drutman told The Denver Post that ranked-choice voting works best for crowded local nonpartisan elections, and that voters understanding the process is less of an issue than voters fully utilizing their rankings. Still, he said, in the majority of cases, ranked-choice voting often just reinforces the plurality winner.

Although proponents say ranked-choice voting will increase turnout and detractors say it will decrease it, the research shows that the method doesn’t affect turnout much — what does is the competitiveness of an election, according to Drutman.

“The effects of ranked-choice voting are much more minor than either its critics or its boosters make it out to be,” he said.

Ranked-choice voting tends to increase the number of candidates running in the first election after it’s implemented, Drutman said, but that levels off.

And while evidence is limited, ranked-choice voting seems promising for more people of color and women running for office, according to the report.

There are two forms of ranked-choice voting: single-winner (such as for mayor) and multi-winner (such as for City Council).

The city of Portland, Oregon, just approved multi-winner ranked-choice voting, which Drutman said is superior to single-winner voting in terms of representation.

In Denver, the proposal is for at-large seats, which are dual-winner seats, to be elected proportionally, so that means someone has to get one vote over the 33% threshold to win (the threshold is calculated by one over the number of seats to be elected, plus one).

“That gives everyone a fair share of the say,” Templin said. “Instead of a simple majority being represented, a broader array of viewpoints get representation. Proportional representation has also been used to settle civil rights complaints in other cities.”

State and local policy teams are beginning discussions about expanding proportional representation “because it eliminates the power of gerrymandering. Single-winner RCV is the best method of finding an executive that people agree upon. RCV for proportional representation is ideal for deliberative bodies because it includes more viewpoints,” she added.

Updated 1 p.m. April 17, 2023 This story has been updated to correct the spelling of New America senior fellow Lee Drutman’s name.

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All of these have fueled recent flashpoints over race and gender as a historically large, and notably diverse, field of candidates campaign to be Denver’s next mayor in the April 4 election.

Disputes over campaign tactics have put two white candidates — Mike Johnston and Chris Hansen — on the defensive. And a group of 25 Black elected officials and community leaders endorsed March 8 that condemned media portrayals of Black candidates, messages promoted by some campaigns, and the exclusion of lower-funded candidates from debates and forums as organizers have sought to narrow the field of 17 ballot-qualified contenders.

Among the motivators cited by those signers in interviews were Johnston’s flyers, Hansen’s ad and media coverage of state Rep. Leslie Herod’s management style.

It all points to the sometimes explicit, but often subtle, ways that race, ethnicity and other facets of identity, including gender, play out in political campaigns. This year’s mayor’s race has been no exception, with examples that some people might easily dismiss or view as open to interpretation — while others decry them as blatantly offensive.

“The truth of the matter is that the psychology of voting and political behavior and opinion is still deeply tied into race and gender,” said Phil Chen, an assistant professor of political science at the University of Denver whose research focuses on the impact of identity in politics. “It����ap going to take a much more concerted long-term effort to see that shift.”

Decades ago, non-white candidates often faced overt racism and even formal barriers to running. Chen and other experts say the strides made in American law and society since then have ensured equal access to the ballot, while leaving behind a more complex set of challenges in 2023.

Subtle perceptions and biases still color how voters, campaign operatives, journalists and even potential donors evaluate candidates of different backgrounds, Chen said — no matter that Denver is a city that has elected a Latino mayor to two terms and two Black mayors, each to three terms. That includes outgoing Mayor Michael Hancock.

In this year’s field, which narrowed to 16 on Thursday after Tattered Cover CEO Kwame Spearman threw in the towel, non-Hispanic white candidates are a minority. Nine of the remaining candidates are Latino, Black, Native American or multi-racial. Five are women.

The six or seven candidates recognized as the top tier of the field include four women, three of whom are Black or Latino: Herod, community activist Lisa Calderón and City Councilwoman Debbie Ortega. Kelly Brough, the former leader of the Denver Metro Chamber of Commerce, is white.

That ethnic and racial diversity is a big part of what excites Jeff Fard, a Five Points activist known as Brother Jeff, about this year’s race. It still hasn’t produced clear front-runners but could result in the city’s first woman mayor.

He signed onto the recent letter, he said, because of worrisome signs that subtle biases and bad campaigning decisions were creeping in, even if he lauds the candidates’ respectful treatment of each other in debates. He sees the incidents thus far as glaring exceptions — and hopes to nudge others to check their racial blind spots in a city that counts 29% of its population as Latino and 9% as Black, according to census estimates.

“Hopefully that letter is putting folks on notice that we as a community are watching,” Fard said. “We don’t want to have a norm established where we as a community are being portrayed in a certain way or excluded.”

Khadija Haynes, who leads a public affairs consulting firm and is on the board of the Montbello Organizing Committee, said the letter was the result of people reacting to individual events and comparing notes.

“If we all feel it, then there’s some truth in it,” she said. “And we need to expect more and we need to demand more — not just from our candidates, but from our media, from our (debate) moderators … and the supposed thought leaders.”

“All Votes Matter” on Johnston flyer draws rebukes

Four years ago, it was on Fard’s online streaming show that Jamie Giellis ran into trouble.

Giellis, who is white, had made it into the runoff against Hancock, and during a live interview, she couldn’t remember what NAACP stands for. (It’s the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People.) Soon after that lapse, she came under scrutiny for an old tweet in which she questioned the value of Chinatowns, prompting her to take down social media accounts as she went into defensive mode.

Fard and others said they experienced a similar sense of disbelief late last month after Denver Public School Board Vice President Auon’tai Anderson .

Two similar flyers touted Johnston’s work to help Black families afford homeownership, but they had different headings — one that was left on vehicles outside a Black church said “Black Votes Matter,” while the other, intended for a mostly white audience, said “All Votes Matter.”

It is unacceptable and deeply concerning to see the campaign engaging in such disgraceful tactics. By selectively using different slogans at different churches, they are shamelessly pandering to the Black community while simultaneously disregarding the value of…

— Auon’tai M. Anderson (@AuontaiAnderson)

Anderson tweeted that the flyers, using language that echoes the debate over “Black Lives Matter” and “All Lives Matter” during the 2020 protests, amounted to “segregationist tactics.”

Johnston, a former state senator and head of a philanthropic organization, that he had not seen or approved the flyers, adding that “as soon as I saw them I pulled them entirely out of circulation.” He attributed them to campaign supporter John Bailey, who chairs the Colorado Black Round Table; Bailey to use divisive language. Campaign finance records show Johnston’s campaign has paid Bailey $10,000 for his consulting services.

Fard suggested that Johnston failed to take full responsibility for the distribution of flyers that represented his campaign.

“This is an opportunity to show leadership in terms of how you will lead,” he said. “These are very telling moments.”

Hansen came under nearly universal criticism at a debate in mid-February, just after he’d launched focused on addressing crime and homelessness. Though the ad used real footage, including from a porch camera that captured a mailbox thief, candidates including Ean Thomas Tafoya saw the people portrayed, who appeared to be mostly Black or Latino, as perpetuating racial and ethnic stereotypes.

At the debate, Tafoya, an environmental justice advocate, asked other candidates to raise their hands if they agreed.

“The whole stage raised their hand — and the whole audience raised their hand,” said Tafoya, who is Latino and Native American, in an interview. “That gives me hope that we are seeing the change from the (2020) protests,” in terms of a greater recognition of subtle racism.

But Hansen, in a campaign statement, stood his ground, denying any racist intent and chalking up the criticism to politics: “This is what happens when you challenge the status quo, you get attacked.”

“We are tired of seeing this,” official says

Anderson, who has endorsed Herod, was among the organizers of , which brought together people from the city and across the state to express concerns about “the blatant anti-Blackness that has been pervasive in the 2023 municipal elections in Denver.” University of Colorado Regent Wanda James, another Herod supporter, also played a key role, but the majority of the signers had not donated to or publicly endorsed Herod.

“We are tired of seeing this,” James said of the flyers, the ad and other infractions. “It����ap time for all of these campaigns to come down and speak with people (in the Black community). Understand what you’re doing wrong.”

James said her participation in the letter was motivated most strongly by two recent news stories, published online by and , about Herod. The stories zeroed in on claims — mostly from unnamed sources — that Herod mistreated her legislative staffers, which one woman described as “degrading” to Denverite. Others characterized Herod as having high standards, and Herod, for her part, disputed some characterizations to Denverite and said she wasn’t aware of others. Neither story examined the records of other candidates.

“First off, we have to come to the conclusion that the difficult black woman is a racist trope,” James said, suggesting that diving into the histories of several other candidates and elected officials would “get the same response.”

Haynes also was animated by those stories.

“Leslie is not an angry woman, and if you want to see an angry woman, then keep this up,” said Haynes, who has donated to Herod’s campaign. “We are tired of it. We are tired of being servants of our community and being passionate and being direct and not having time for (expletive) that gets mischaracterized. … It is the sexism and racism at play here, and if we don’t see that, then I just don’t know what to say to people who can’t see that.”

Chen, the DU political science professor, said subtle negative perceptions still factor heavily into how women are perceived by voters and pundits, who might judge them as weaker on certain leadership qualities. Even political donors tend to donate less to female candidates who are Black or Latino, he said.

While women have won elections at all levels of government, he said, there are distinctions — with voters more willing to elect women to “communal-based” positions.

“So women running for city councils or the legislature … the stereotypes don’t necessarily hurt women as much as they do for executive-level jobs” such as mayor, Chen said.

Updated 6:30 a.m. March 21, 2023 This story has been updated to clarify the number of terms Denver’s Latino and Black mayors served.

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On Monday night Denver City Council, our elected officials, will vote to commit tax dollars to help make it happen, but those dollars come with a twist: about $30 million has been diverted from Denver Public Schools and about $20 million has been diverted from the city’s general fund to support this project over the past several decades, at a time when both entities desperately need dollars.

Are we really okay spending about $50 million of city and Denver Public School’s money on a non-essential project, while both entities are simultaneously cutting budgets for our most basic essential services?

Let me provide some context. There is an organization called the Denver Urban Renewal Authority (DURA) that oversees something called tax increment financing (TIF). TIF districts transfer a portion of the money paid by taxpayers — in this case property owners downtown — into a special fund and use that fund to invest in projects like private sector developments.

Currently, $56 million (including money from other taxing entities) is sitting in the downtown TIF fund, and that money can either be returned to the city and schools, or invested in the sprucing up of the 16th Street Mall.

A facelift for the 16th Street Mall might have been a good idea when the money was flowing, but we have entered into a financial crisis due to COVID-19 that is crushing the finances of our city and Denver Public Schools.

I’m standing up for the families and taxpayers of Denver as well as the employees of DPS urging the City Council to vote “no” to using the money for the 16th Street Mall, returning it to our woefully underfunded school district and city. I’m joined by fellow activists Jamie Giellis and Amy Duclos, Councilwoman Candi CdeBaca, The Colorado Latino Forum and nearly 3,000 people who signed a petition on the website change.org.

But the dire economic situation isn’t the only reason to oppose the city’s plan. Consider:

The lack of confidence in big project budgeting
The City of Denver has had a difficult time delivering projects on budget in recent years. Most recently Denver’s $650 million airport project reported $350 million of cost overruns. What assurances do council members have that this project will meet budget and timing expectations? If the budget is overrun, how will the city of Denver fund a shortfall? Is this a risk that Council Members are willing to take now?

It’s a bad deal for Denver Public Schools
The City has argued that investing in the 16th Street Mall will increase the overall tax base of the city, thereby putting more future dollars into DPS’ pockets. But this doesn’t add up. DPS receives its local funding from property taxes and this project will not directly create any new property tax revenue for our district. Without investing this money directly in a property tax generating building, any potential hope for DPS to get their money back from this project is a
longshot and through an indirect method.

With DPS facing a $65 million shortfall we look to DPS Treasurer and DURA appointed board member Angela Cobian to advocate for our schools on this matter, but the silence from her and DPS on taking a position on this matter has been deafening. Director Cobian, what is your position on this topic? Will you attend the City Council meeting tonight and advocate for DPS?

Timing is everything
The city and the Downtown Denver Partnership are arguing that there is no better time to invest in infrastructure projects, and that if we don’t move the project now, we may lose some other funding that is attached to it. But is that the case? Can the other funds still be used to take care of maintenance and repairs or a trimmed-down project?

The pavers do need to be repaired from a mobility perspective and a bathroom there would be a welcome addition, but the city could accomplish that with a more limited project scope, lower-cost budget and without using our precious education dollars.

Finally, there is concern that the TIF monies wouldn’t be returned right away to the city and schools, but that is completely up to the discretion of the mayor, council and DURA.

Council is being asked tonight to use taxpayer’s money to fund a legacy project, something we understand the attraction to, however, when you look at this through the lens of our youth, the other people whom you may be taking money from are the children of Denver. Now is not the time.

Paul Vranas is a parent of a DPS student and serves on the board of his local registered neighborhood organization and collaborative school committee.

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It has also, however, revealed our common good. Our community has united to lighten the load of those hit hardest in so many ways. I myself have spent my days sewing — part of an army of people across the city making masks for our front-line workers and others in need. Each stitch represents hope, and I believe we have every reason to hope that something good will come out of these long, challenging days.

Ensuring that happens means our city leaders must seize the opportunities for change this crisis has presented. Reverend Martin Luther King, Jr. once said that we live in an “inescapable network of mutuality” and this pandemic has laid that bare. Nobody is untouched by its impacts, and light has been shed on the economic vulnerability of so many. Old recession playbooks won’t work to pull us all out of this together. Instead, investing in programs that help us rebuild a sustainable and resilient economy must be our approach going forward. Housing, jobs, small businesses, food security, health care and equity are core to that.

As we all individually adjust to new realities, we must ask our leadership to do the same. The city of Denver faces a dire financial future – $180 million in lost tax revenue already with bigger losses to come. Tough decisions will need to be made about projects to keep or cut. It is time to step back and hit the reset button on our priorities. If we carry on as before ignoring the deep fissures in our system, we will only perpetuate this crisis. Our city’s leaders must focus on rebuilding with resiliency – lifting up and creating a safety net for those this pandemic has impacted most – our small businesses and workers, our community of individuals experiencing homelessness, our elderly community, our kids. The pandemic has forced Denver to act on issues that have long challenged all of these groups; our legacy coming out of it should not be temporary interventions, but permanent changes.

A critical component to this is pivoting away from big physical infrastructure projects that are no longer relevant, freeing up resources to focus on the wellbeing of the people of this city. This means:

• Substantially paring back the renovation of Denver International Airport to focus only on the necessary. We’ve already lost hundreds of millions of dollars to mismanagement; as airlines and concessionaires face extraordinary losses of their own, this is not the time to add more cost burden.
• Halting the expansion of the Colorado Convention Center. The bid-rigging scandal cost taxpayers tens of millions, and now conventions themselves face an uncertain future.
• Shelving indefinitely the $100 million 16th Street Mall renovation. The city should work with the Denver Urban Renewal Authority (one of the major funders) to redirect those dollars to city and school coffers for essential programs and services.
• Reimagining the vision for the National Western Complex to one that����ap focused on community resiliency, particularly for Globeville and Elyria-Swansea. The Complex is now home for our homeless – let����ap find a way to make housing, services and jobs a permanent part of National Western’s legacy.
• Spending the nearly $1 bllion general obligation bond approved by voters in 2017 on only critical physical infrastructure, redirecting the remainder to social infrastructure.

We also need to make strategic cuts in what appears to be a bloated city of Denver budget. Can we reduce the pay of our top elected leaders and political appointees? Can we encourage early retirement options? Let����ap take the lead on creatively and thoughtfully trimming costs while preserving critical jobs and services. This is a new day. There is no going back to where we were – but that is not something to fear. Instead, this is a moment to rethink the city we want to be – one that lifts people up first. We should become a place where social issues bear more weight than legacy projects.

As I watch the people of this city fight to stay afloat, and as I engage in gut-wrenching conversations with my 10-year-old son about a return to “normal,” I realize we have been given a gift, an opportunity to create our new normal together. The people of this city are working hard to reimagine the future. It is time for our government to join us.

Jamie Giellis is president of the urban planning consulting firm Centro Inc. and a former mayoral candidate for the city of Denver. She can be reached at jamie@becentro.com.

Here is the latest look at the battle for Coloradans’ votes. In the last week, most of the major candidates in the Democratic field visited the state, suggesting it’s one of the more competitive Super Tuesday contests.

Ballot returns: Republicans outpace Democrats

Colorado voters returned 523,938 ballots through Sunday, representing 15.3% of active voters who received a ballot, according to figures released by the Colorado Secretary of State’s Office. Forty-nine percent of returned ballots were Republican primary ballots and just under 39% were Democratic primary ballots, with the rest still being processed.

Democrats are either less engaged or, more likely, sitting on their ballots until closer to next week’s primary to see what shakes out in the crowded and volatile race.

Klobuchar’s ad buy

A Klobuchar campaign memo out Monday said she will spend $4.2 million on cable, broadcast and digital ads in Colorado, California, Massachusetts, Minnesota, Texas and Utah in the next week. It’s unclear how much of that will be in Colorado, where the campaign announced the hiring of a half-dozen staffers just last week.

Endorsements: Among 15 Colorado endorsements announced by Klobuchar were state Sen. Pete Lee, who introduced her at her Aurora event last week; state Rep. Matt Gray; Gail Schoettler, a former state lieutenant governor and treasurer who ran unsuccessfully for governor in 1998; former Senate President Lucia Guzman; and Tom Mauser, a gun control advocate whose son, Daniel, died in the Columbine High School shooting.

Surrogate: Klobuchar’s daughter, Abigail Bessler, was set to take part in five campaign events along the Front Range on Monday and Tuesday, including stops in Fort Collins, Denver and Pueblo.

Sanders’ support for airport workers

On Twitter, Sanders Monday for unionized baggage handlers, janitors and wheelchair agents at Denver International Airport who are employed by contractors of United Airlines. United has put those contracts up for bid, and the Service Employees International Union local has expressed concern its workers could lose their protections if different companies are selected. Sanders expressed hope that United would “honor their choice” to unionize.

I stand with Denver airport workers who organized with . Workers stood together, won raises, and voted to join . I hope to see honor their choice.

— Bernie Sanders (@BernieSanders)

Bloomberg sends Sam Donaldson to Denver

Veteran broadcaster Sam Donaldson, who retired in 2013 from ABC News, headlined events Sunday in support of former New York City Mayor Mike Bloomberg, a self-funding billionaire, at campaign offices in Colorado Springs and Denver.

Endorsements: Bloomberg’s Colorado campaign announced the addition of several dozen names to its advisory board, including Zee Ferrufino, owner of Spanish-language radio stations; Denver businessman Ken Gart and his wife, Rebecca; former Denver mayoral candidate Jamie Giellis; and Anna Jo Haynes, a longtime Denver early childhood education advocate.

This time of year used to be when we hoped to make a profit to continue expanding our opportunities. Now, it����ap survival mode. Why? Because succeeding as a small business owner in the Denver metro area is no longer just about survival of the fittest. The taxes, lease rates, fees, wages and benefits we pay to operate here are putting small business ownership out of reach for many if not most.

For a region that used to celebrate the Wild-West entrepreneurial mentality and for a city that made its name on small business enterprises, we are turning our backs on the shop owners and entrepreneurs who make up 98% of all businesses in Denver, employing upwards of 1 million people.

Let����ap start with taxes. The commercial sector here bears the brunt of property taxes because of the debilitating effects of layering TABOR and the Gallagher Amendment. Commercial property owners pay four times what residential owners pay in property taxes. As property valuations have gone up in excruciating amounts for everyone, the commercial sector feels the pain the most.

That said, developers and owners of commercial properties have a release valve, they sign triple net leases, requiring that lessees (our small businesses) not only pay high rents but that all fees and taxes are passed through to them too. For those of us already in business, we’re watching our leases jump 10%, 20% and even 30% overnight, all the while competing with a changing retail marketplace that our leaders have yet to acknowledge or support. Now add to that the extraordinary long permitting times, overzealous inspection requirements and high-priced fees to open your doors, and getting into business is becoming well out of reach for even the most strategic business operator.

And then there’s the other layer of finding — and paying for — employees. The recently passed minimum wage ordinance in Denver was a coup for the workers of our city who are struggling to make ends meet. But it is far from a solution to address either the cost of living or the viability of our small businesses that create those jobs in the first place. Our small businesses may look elsewhere, and then we end up with a higher wage mandate but fewer jobs to fill. Instead, let����ap reward businesses who invest in their employees and the people of this city by making it easier and more sustainable to do business here.

It����ap time for our city leaders to work with state leaders to find a way to support small businesses in Denver, the metro area, and Colorado as a whole. We can’t keep stacking up the costs to operate here and not see that we are slowly eliminating opportunity. This issue is urgent because many are struggling to hold on now and a pending recession will only exacerbate these challenges. So, here’s what we can do.

At the state level, we need to address tax inequities that are burdening small businesses. The Gallagher Amendment was well-intentioned when it passed in 1982, and helped to protect homeowners. Back then, we had a balance of commercial and residential that spread the tax burden fairly. Today, as we see a residential boom, we need to rethink the balance. One perfect example that could be explored is looking at how we tax residential rental buildings. In many states these income properties are taxed as commercial properties. Here in Colorado, they are taxed at the low residential rate — all the while we have developers building massive apartment dwellings across the city, charging extraordinary rents, and paying only a quarter of the taxes a commercial property owner or business owner does. Ensuring rental housing remains affordable would need to be considered, but let����ap take a fresh look at what makes sense in today’s new reality.

At the local level, city leaders should work to create a tax relief program for small businesses, quickly. Municipalities should work together to identify how to provide tax relief via exemptions or rebates modeled after the residential tax relief programs we have for senior citizens and lower-income families.

We should establish offices of small business support within our city offices and the state that are tasked with going beyond traditional economic development, and more focused on advocating for small business needs.

We must review small business permitting processes and create a fast track, streamlined approach that removes costly barriers to opening doors. Remember that businesses typically start paying rent the moment they start renovations to open. When permitting delays opening their doors, they are losing money every day. Starting deep in a financial hole makes success nearly impossible.

As you are traversing our city this new year, the biggest gift you can give is to shop local and support local. With any luck, our elected leaders will give the gift of a comprehensive approach to supporting small businesses now.

Jamie Giellis is president of the urban planning consulting firm Centro Inc. and a former mayoral candidate for the city of Denver. She can be reached at jamie@becentro.com.

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Democrats are once again on track to lose more elections than they should, including the presidential election. The reason? Bad messaging. Democrats are terrible at messaging; Republicans are really good at it.

Here’s just one example. When Beto O’Rourke stated emphatically, “Yes, we’re gonna take your AR-15, your AK-47,” Republicans said, “We told you so. Democrats are coming for your guns.” Democrats responded by saying, “No, we are not coming for your guns.” The battle was lost right there.

Democrats should be saying, “No, guns have nothing to do with it, but weapons of war are another matter.” They should be talking about adding these rifles to the existing category of such weapons that includes machine guns, flame throwers and RPGs, all of which are heavily regulated.

Bob Kropfli, Golden

Too old to be a kid

Re: “Kids at risk, report says,” Sept. 11 news story

Your headline on youth gun violence denies common sense by someone. How do we conclude that 25 years and younger define someone as a kid? In the Vietnam War, 61% of the U.S. servicemen killed in action were younger than 21. My uncle was in the ski troops in World War II and was called the “old man” by his associates at the ripe old age of 27. It seems to me youth classification should be about 14 to 15 years old. But at 25, your brainpower is at its peak and you’re still a kid! Give us a statistical break. As I recall from my draft-age days, everyone figured if you reached 26, you would be too recalcitrant to be a soldier and would be bypassed by the draft board.

John Hawkinson, Arvada

This generation’s mission

Re: “Baby boomers dropped the ball on climate change,” Sept. 25 commentary

Baby boomers naively thought going to Woodstock and celebrating Earth Day was all you had to do to save the planet. It turned out Tinker Bell’s wand had run out of fairy dust. We humans committed original sin when we walked away from the Garden of Eden and embarked on a 2,000-year orgy of environmental exploitation. Our grandchildren have, as of recent, become terrified that adult addictions to cheap energy will lead to their demise. They correctly see vast numbers of policy-makers and bourgeois mercantilists in denial. Some adults would like to pat these kids on the head and tell them not to be afraid. Just remember many of these kids are only five years away from being asked to fight for their country. Put a gun in their hands and they might just decide to fight for planet Earth, instead.

Francis M. Miller, Parker

A place of honor

Re: “Transit agency supports Medal of Honor museum …” Sept. 25 news story

The proposed National Medal of Honor Museum next to the state Capitol is a perfect location being across from the sculpture of Colorado Medal of Honor recipient Joe P. Martinez, World War II and the Colorado Veterans Monument in Lincoln Park.

Tim Drago, Denver
Editor’s note: Drago, a Vietnam veteran, is founder of the Colorado Veterans Monument.

Colfax commitment

Re: “Denver asks residents to accept more density…” Sept. 16 commentary

As the former RTD director in District A adjacent to East Colfax Avenue, I continue to support bus rapid transit along that street. I supported Mayor Michael Hancock in the recent election, but Jamie Giellis is correct. To facilitate the most functional and pleasant urban environment along East Colfax Avenue, enhancement of transit along the corridor is critical.

Bill James, Denver