Everett Martinez, , alleged in the federal lawsuit brought against the city Wednesday that he repeatedly warned Denver officials that their actions in both the council’s vote against Key Lime Air and the land-swap deal to acquire the Park Hill Golf Course could violate the airport’s agreement to receive funding from the — and put all future grants in jeopardy.

Jon Ewing, a spokesman for Mayor Mike Johnston, called the lawsuit’s allegations “horse(expletive) from a disgruntled employee” and denied any wrongdoing by city officials.

“The city attorney didn’t say the things listed here,” Ewing said. “No one called for a fake investigation on Key Lime. And the Park Hill deal was and is entirely legal and followed all FAA obligations as well as federal law.”

The lawsuit alleges that city officials ignored Martinez’s legal advice and then retaliated against him, culminating in placing him on administrative leave on March 11 with the instruction that he needed to resign by Wednesday or he would be “removed,” according to the 42-page complaint filed in U.S. District Court for the District of Colorado.

Martinez remained on administrative leave Wednesday afternoon, said his attorney, Steven Murray.

The City Council’s Dec. 15 vote to reject Key Lime Air’s request to lease space at DIA because the airline works with ICE drew national attention this month when U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, called for a review of the airport’s grant funding. He estimated the airport could lose as much as $385 million in grants.

The city was aware that rejecting the contract put at least $90 million in grant funding at risk, Councilwoman Sarah Parady said in December. Martinez claimed he warned top city officials that rejecting Key Lime Air’s contract over ideological concerns — rather than safety issues — would violate the airport’s grant agreement with the FAA and could result in the airport losing access to all of its federal funding.

Two weeks after the vote, the FAA emailed the airport to “express concerns” about the City Council’s vote, according to the lawsuit. A spokeswoman for the airport, Courtney Law, declined to comment on the lawsuit Wednesday.

“…The stated rationale for the lease denial appears to be unrelated to airport operational, safety or capacity considerations and instead is based on opposition to the tenant����ap aeronautical activities,” the FAA’s Dec. 31 letter read, according to the lawsuit.

Ian Gregor, spokesman for the FAA, could not immediately say Wednesday whether the agency was investigating the airport’s compliance with grant funding requirements.

A few days after the FAA’s notice, during a Jan. 6 meeting between and airport leadership, Brown asked airport officials to investigate Key Lime Air for safety concerns, Martinez alleged in the lawsuit.

“If the FAA comes knocking, I want to be able to have it in my back pocket that council was also voting because of safety issues, but that they ran out of time to get talking about that before voting,” the lawsuit alleges Brown said during the meeting.

Melissa Sisneros, spokeswoman for the Denver City Attorney’s Office, declined to comment.

Martinez rejected Brown’s proposal, which he considered to be unethical and illegal, he alleged in the lawsuit.

“It was a fabricated investigation, a fabricated reason,” Murray said. “The city had already acted. This was a cover-your-backside investigation, and he refused to do that.”

The Key Lime Air situation was not the first time Martinez believed the city’s actions put grant money at risk. He also raised concerns that Denver’s land-swap deal to acquire the Park Hill Golf Course violated the FAA’s rules for federal funding, he said in the lawsuit.

In that deal, the city gave 165 acres of airport land to developer Westside Investment Partners in exchange for the 155-acre Park Hill Golf Course. Martinez believed the airport received less than fair market value for the land it gave up, which he believed violated FAA mandates, among other issues with the deal.

Martinez alleged in the lawsuit that one city official instructed him to withhold information from the FAA about the developer receiving the property and instead inform the FAA only that the city and airport were swapping the land. He refused, according to the lawsuit, but it was not clear what information the city and airport initially shared with the FAA.

He additionally alleged that Acting City Attorney Katie McLaughlin called him at 7:09 p.m. Aug. 6 and told him not to keep records of the deal. Martinez immediately called three people to tell them about the call, the lawsuit says, among other allegations.

“Due to the shocking nature of the call, he documented it immediately,” Murray said.

Martinez alleged in the lawsuit that city officials retaliated against him after he raised concerns in the two cases, including by passing him over for a reclassification that would have resulted in a $50,000 raise. He received a poor performance evaluation in January after he filed a complaint with human resources.

“Martinez has not been asked to violate the law or city policy,” said Ewing, the mayor’s spokesman. “He has not been drawn into a conspiracy. What he has done is violate his ethical obligations to the city by taking personal positions that were in opposition to those held by his own client — which is the city and county of Denver — and by disclosing information protected by attorney-client privilege.”

In the lawsuit, Martinez said he considered himself to be an attorney for the airport, not for the city.

“The city went from being, I think, careless and not dotting the i’s and crossing the t’s to at some point just ignoring what he had to say,” Murray said.

The added acreage granted to Westside Investment Partners was needed to supplement the deal, a city spokeswoman said Tuesday, after officials discovered that two underground fiber optic lines would make part of the original allotment impossible to develop. But the need for extra land wasn’t announced publicly before the deal closed earlier this month.

Mayor Mike Johnston’s administration initially had agreed to swap 145 acres of empty city-owned land near Denver International Airport in exchange for Westside Investment Partners’ 155-acre former golf course property in northeast Denver. But an appraiser found that the city would need to add 32 more acres to the parcel to generate the same value, a city spokeswoman said Tuesday.

“The City and County of Denver deals fairly and is transacting an additional 20 acres to Westside with compensation for the other 12 acres that we are not delivering,” said Laura Swartz, with the Denver Department of Finance. “There is no added cost to the city.”

CBS News Colorado on the added acreage involved in the swap Monday night. The addition means Westside was given 165 acres in total.

The deal’s intent was for each property involved in the swap to be worth $12.7 million. The city still transferred $12.7 million from its Parks Legacy Fund to pay for its side of the deal, but it gave slightly less, $11.8 million, to the airport — and the rest went to Westside to offset the final difference in acreage “to ensure the land swap still has a total value of $12.7 million for both Westside and the city,” Swartz said.

While the initial land swap is final, the transfer of the added 20 acres is still underway. That portion of the deal is expected to close in the next few weeks.

Johnston announced in January that the city planned to take over the former golf course’s land and convert it to a park after voters rejected Westside’s plan in 2023 to partially convert the parcel into housing and other uses.

While Johnston said the park would open to the public over the summer, the land swap took longer than anticipated to finalize. The city didn’t close on the deal until Oct. 2.

Denver City Councilwoman Shontel Lewis, whose district contains the new park, said she didn’t know about the added acreage in the swap until the deal was done. She added that she found it concerning that there wasn’t more transparency with the council — which had approved the land swap deal in May — as it was concluded in the months after that.

“That����ap not how we should do business,” she said.

A spokesman for Johnston said the mayor did share the update with the council once city officials “felt it was at a good point and solid.”

“It didn’t require a new vote, but it was something we were happy to share publicly,” Johnston told The Denver Post on Tuesday about the added acreage. “It was just (that) we were trying to negotiate to get to that agreement, because it was a pretty significant change to the layout of the land that we swapped.”

Denver Parks and Recreation hosted an event to celebrate the park’s opening on Tuesday afternoon.

“Today has been years in the making, and we are here only because of the tireless efforts of community advocates and city employees who want to see this land transformed into Denver’s next great park,” Johnston said during the event. “But the work is not finished.”

The park, which still needs extensive renovations, will be open only during daylight hours. Parkgoers will be limited to passive uses of the park, including walking and jogging, according to the city’s announcement.

The project will receive an infusion of $70 million in upgrades under the Vibrant Denver bond package if voters approve it in next week’s election.

Denver Parks and Recreation officials are still deciding which features and amenities they will construct at the park.

The Nov. 4 off-year election will feature two state ballot issues and a wide array of local measures and candidates running for office, but no federal or statewide races.

At the state level, voters will consider Propositions LL and MM, both aimed at shoring up funding for , which was created by a measure voters passed in 2022 to provide free school meals to any student regardless of family income.

If Proposition LL is approved, the state would be in tax revenue that has already been collected for the program above initial projections. (The Taxpayer’s Bill of Rights requires the state to return the excess money unless voters grant that approval.)

Proposition MM would per year by increasing income taxes on households earning $300,000 or more annually. That increase would take the form of lower limits on deductions that higher earners can claim on their state income taxes.

Denver voters may face the longest ballot on Nov. 4, with the five-measure “Vibrant Denver”  bond package — ballot issues 2A through 2E — asking to authorize the city to take out $950 million in general obligation bonds, which officials would then pay back through property taxes. The money would finance about 60 capital projects spread across five categories, including a park at the former Park Hill Golf Course, improvements to Red Rocks Amphitheatre and various road repairs.

Among a few other ballot questions, Denver voters will also decide Referendum 310, a measure that asks whether they want to retain the ban on sales of flavored tobacco products that the City Council passed late last year. If 310 fails, the measure will be repealed.

Colorado’s third-largest city, Aurora, will have races for five seats on its 11-member City Council. Those races raise the possibility of a substantive change in direction and philosophy on the beleaguered body, which for more than a year has faced numerous protests and disruptions during meetings.

Elsewhere on the ballot, many voters will see school board races and local ballot measures.

Voters will have until 7 p.m. on Election Day to return their ballots, either through the mail, at a drop box or by voting in person at any number of county voting centers.

Mayor Mike Johnston first announced that the city would acquire the land in January after his administration came to an agreement with the property’s owner, Westside Investment Partners. Under the deal, officials agreed to swap a city-owned parcel near Denver International Airport in exchange for the former golf course.

Johnston celebrated the start of public access in a news release Thursday morning.

“We welcome Denver to see this park not for what it is today but what it can be,” Johnston said in the release. “For years, we have heard from the community about not only what this land means to Northeast Denver, but the value it brings to our entire city. Our work will continue until the park, and every improvement that comes with it, reflects the wishes and needs of a neighborhood that has fought tirelessly for this day to come.”

At the time of the land-swap announcement, Johnston said the city planned to open access to the park during the summer. But the complicated deal took longer to conclude than anticipated.

The park, which still needs “extensive renovations,” including lighting, will be open only during daylight hours, the release says. Parkgoers will be limited to passive use of the park, including walking and jogging, according to the city’s announcement.

The property would receive $70 million worth of improvements if voters approve the Vibrant Denver bond package on November’s ballot. Denver Parks and Recreation officials are still deciding which features and amenities they will construct at the park.

The property has long been a source of tension among Denverites, some of whom wanted to see the land — one of the last plots of undeveloped land in the city — partially developed with housing. Others pushed to keep it as open space.

Westside purchased the property for $24 million in 2019 and intended to develop it, incorporating a park with some housing and other uses, but voters handily rejected that plan in 2023. It has been closed to the public ever since.

The former golf course is set to become the city’s fourth-largest park.

The city closed on its purchase of the 155-acre property along Colorado Boulevard on Oct. 2, eight-and-a-half months after Mayor Mike Johnston announced that the city would do a land swap deal with Westside Investment Partners, the course’s now-former owner.

Under the deal, Denver agreed to give Westside 145 undeveloped acres south of Denver International Airport in exchange for the Park Hill property. Both properties were appraised at $12.76 million, according to the city.

Denver plans to turn the property, which hasn’t been used for golf since 2018 and which has been fenced off since 2023, into a park.

Westside, led by Andy Klein, bought the property for $24 million in 2019 and had hoped to develop a portion of the land and build a park on the remainder of it.

In the late 1990s, however, Denver had paid a previous owner of the property $2 million to put a conservation easement on it, which required that the property remain a golf course.

Westside’s efforts to have the easement lifted were ultimately stymied by Denver voters at the ballot box.

City officials previously said they hoped to lease the land from Westside ahead of the purchase, so that residents could gain access to the property this summer. But no deal was reached and the land remained fenced off.

Laura Swartz, a spokeswoman for the city’s finance department, which handles real estate deals, said in an email last week that “there was no lease as we focused our efforts on the land exchange,” but she didn’t give a reason for that.

Denver Parks and Recreation didn’t respond to a request for comment Tuesday asking when, in light of the deal closing, the property would be accessible to the public.

Lisa Lumley, the city’s director of real estate, previously said the easement would automatically go away upon Denver buying the property because the city owns the easement.

The yet-to-be-named park will be the city’s fourth largest, behind City Park, Sloan’s Lake Park and Wash Park. Design firm Sasaki has been tapped to lead a community engagement process to inform on the development of the park. A bond package going before city voters in November would earmark $70 million for park build-out.

Denver Parks and Recreation, which is still working to finalize the acquisition of the land, would get $70 million to transform the golf course into one of the largest parks in the city.

It����ap not yet clear exactly what the dollars will be used for, since the city hasn’t finished a detailed plan for amenities at the 155-acre park. The new park is likely to need major infrastructure updates, though.

The park allocation flew somewhat under the radar as City Council members debated which projects should be included in the $950 million bond proposal. The council approved the package’s five bond questions for the ballot on Monday after weeks of back-and-forth with the mayor’s office over the process.

Save Open Space Denver, a group that has opposed new development on the land in favor of green space, was pleased to see the project included in the bond.

“We are happy with the $70 million allocation,” said Penfield Tate, a former state senator and mayoral candidate. “I think it����ap safe to say we wish it was more.”

The property has long been a source of tension among Denverites, some of whom wanted to see the land partially developed with housing while others pushed to keep it as open space. But Denverites handily rejected a plan to develop the land in 2023, and the site has been closed ever since.

In January, Mayor Mike Johnston announced the city would acquire the property through a land swap with the owner, Westside Investment Partners, for property out by Denver International Airport.

While the council approved the agreement in May, the deal is still under a 90-day due diligence period before it����ap finalized. That will happen in early October at the latest, said city spokesman Jon Ewing.

While officials initially said they would aim to open the park this summer with minimal enhancements, that milestone may not happen until early fall, he said.

Denver Parks and Recreation is working to develop a full-area plan, executive director Jolon Clark said. That includes potential amenities it has solicited ideas for.

“What we’re working with the community on right now is: Where do those things go? How does it interact with its nearby neighbors?” he said during a July 28 council meeting. “And what are the things that might be different and special about this regional park than other parks?”

Clark also said the department will need to make repairs on the property.

“There are concerns that the irrigation system has been vandalized and damaged,” he said. DPR will also have to set up lighting throughout the park, he said.

Tate said originally, his group estimated the cost for the entire park conversion project to be $125 million, in part due to the poor condition of the infrastructure there.

“Major work needs to be done,” he said, referencing damage to the clubhouse and the irrigation system.

Mayor Mike Johnston told Denver Post journalists this week that he anticipates the $70 million will finance the entire buildout.

“It����ap not the Cadillac version, but it is 155 acres of a fully functional, accessible park,” he said of what the bond project would bring.

Denver has a park fund filled by a 0.25% dedicated sales tax, but Johnston said using that bucket to pay for the buildout would take far too long.

“There have been three citywide votes of every Denver resident on this topic,” he said. “To say, ‘We’ll work on this, but we’ll bring it to you in six installments over eight years,’ I think, would not be a reasonable response.”

Instead of waiting the typical 10 years to ask voters to approve a slate of big infrastructure projects, Johnston and the Denver City Council will ask voters this fall to approve almost $1 billion for dozens of projects big and small across the city.

The Denver Post editorial board met with the mayor and was skeptical about the need and wisdom of a bond, as well as some of the proposed projects. Why take on more debt now, as the city is about to make painful budget cuts? What about the risk of the economy going south? Wouldn’t it be more prudent to pay for maintenance needs out of the general fund?

We were convinced, however, by the arguments: A city struggling to recover needs investments in its infrastructure. The city has the debt capacity. Failing to seek this bond will not forestall layoffs and budget cuts. A shaky economy is the time Denver most needs an influx that could bring work and development.

Despite the tight time frame, the mayor and council engaged the community to help select projects and provide feedback on proposals, a shortened version of the work that has gone into previous bond proposals.

Denverites also won’t suffer a property tax increase because of the bond issue. Johnston plans to use revenue raised by the existing 6.5 mill levy for past bonds, including the . The mill levy usually floats up and down with Denver’s property values to make sure revenue is just the right amount to pay the debt service on historic bonds. Because of booming values, the mill levy has dropped from 8 mills in recent years to service the same debt, and now Johnston would use capacity under the 6.5 mills to take on new debt.

If voters say no, Johnston said the city would not float the mill levy down to reduce taxes, but would instead pay off old debt faster.

The city will get roads and bridges, upgraded recreation centers, repaired library buildings, investments in our many cultural facilities, and a 155-acre park where the old Park Hill Golf Course had operated.

“This represents a balance of things. A lot of them are unsexy projects like rehabbing old recreation centers and libraries that don’t have air-conditioning that works or reading rooms that are accessible,” Johnston said. “But those are deeply important to those places and people in neighborhoods who rely on them.”

For example, two of the city’s outdoor pools — Cook Park and Harvey Park — would get much-needed rehabilitation dollars.

The most controversial part of the proposal is also the most expensive. Two separate projects will add connectivity to the towering 6th Avenue and 8th Avenue bridges east of Interstate 25 to support some future proposed development at Burnham Yard. Currently, both bridges “fly over” a huge section of undeveloped land just west of downtown, which made sense when it was an industrial rail yard, but will hinder any future development in the area.

By now, most Denverites know that the Denver Broncos’ ownership team is highly considering acquiring the dilapidated and contaminated Burnham Yard site from the state to build a new stadium and entertainment district.

The plans to lower the portion of the 8th Avenue viaduct down to grade-level through Burnham Yard is the single most expensive item on the list, coming in at a cool $89.2 million for a road that sees about 14,000 vehicles a day.

Meanwhile, on-ramps and off-ramps will be added to 6th Avenue to “improve connectivity, capacity and efficiency” on one of the city’s busiest thoroughfares, where 64,000 vehicles pass into and out of the city on a daily basis.  The cost will be about $50 million.

Even if the Broncos decide not to call Burnham Yard their new home, these projects need to be done. Both bridges need repairs, and unless the land under these overpasses is connected to the city, development may not occur for decades. If the Broncos do buy Burnham Yard, the team should share in the costs of these needed infrastructure investments for their project.

The Vibrant Denver GO Bond projects will accomplish much for a city that is struggling due to an onslaught of external and internal factors. Money flowing into our local economy will help create jobs and Johnston said some of the funding will help save city jobs by creating more work for internal departments to handle.

We don’t love everything on the list – but Denver City Council did a good job of parsing through and setting priorities as best they could.

We hope voters say yes, this fall.

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The five bond questions, which will appear on the November ballot, would allow the city to take out $950 million in general obligation bonds, which officials would then pay back through property taxes. The debt would finance about 60 capital projects.

Despite weeks of negotiations and frustration among council members, they approved the package, called the “Vibrant Bond,” nearly unanimously. That comes despite complaints that Mayor Mike Johnston’s administration, which announced the bond in February, rushed the process. Johnston’s team negotiated with council members in recent weeks to secure enough votes to get the proposal to the ballot.

“This bond is as good an example of anything I’ve ever seen of not letting the perfect be the enemy of the good,” said Councilman Paul Kashmann.

The requests for debt allowance will be divided into five topics on the ballot:

• $441 million for transportation and mobility
• $244 million for city facilities
• $175 million for parks and recreation
• $59 million for housing and shelter
• $30 million for health and human services

If a single question fails, others can still pass. The projects are meant to take six years to complete.

The bond proposal wouldn’t raise taxes because it would replace existing debt that the city is paying off now. If voters rejected the proposal, however, taxes could go toward paying down prior bonds faster.

A “companion ordinance” will list projects that the council designated for the bond dollars. It includes $35 million for accessibility improvements at Red Rocks Amphitheatre, $70 million for the buildout of a park at the former Park Hill Golf Course and $29 million for improvements along Santa Fe Drive. The costliest project is $89 million for repairs and improvements on the Eighth Avenue viaduct. A full list is

The council only considered one amendment Monday, which added $13 million for affordable housing efforts, pulling $5 million from transportation and mobility and $8 million from city facilities. Those changes cut projects for street paving and electrification of city facilities and reduced the budget for improvements at Red Rocks Amphitheater.

The amendment, brought by Councilwomen Shontel Lewis, Sarah Parady and Jamie Torres, also clarified that the projects funded with the money should be for both affordable housing and mitigation of residential displacement. In the first of several votes on the amendment, it was approved 12-1 with Councilwoman Amanda Sawyer casting the sole “no” vote.

A week earlier, Sawyer proposed an amendment to remove $18 million from the affordable housing allotment to pay for safety improvements on 13th and 14th avenue between Colorado Boulevard and Quebec Street. She said she thought the description of the fund was too vague.

The council members took several votes on the overall package, with a vote needed for the affordable housing amendment and for each individual topic. Each passed nearly unanimously but some council members voted no on certain questions.

Councilman Chris Hinds and Councilwoman Flor Alvidrez voted no on the transportation and mobility question. Parady and Hinds voted no on the parks and recreation question. Alvidrez also voted no on the city facilities question.

“I feel like it does short change our BIPOC community, our Elections Division, our cultural facilities,” she said about the bond package. Alvidrez, along with other council members, have also scrutinized the selection of two bridge projects near Burnham Yard for the package. The Broncos are considering that site for their next stadium.

Election day is Nov. 4.

The $950 million “Vibrant Denver” bond, approved on first reading late Monday, would pay for nearly 60 projects if council members give the list their final thumbs-up next week — and if voters approve the proposal on Election Day. If the bonds pass, the projects included in the list are intended to begin immediately and are scheduled to take only six years to complete.

“It allows us to control our own destiny amid federal funding and state funding shortfalls,” said Patrick Riley, the bond program manager, in remarks to the council Monday.

Included in the list are $75 million for a newly consolidated first responder training center, another $75 million for road improvements and to build a railroad underpass at the National Western Center, $70 million for the buildout of a city park at the former Park Hill Golf Course, and $39 million at Red Rocks Amphitheatre for backstage expansion and accessibility improvements.

The most expensive project — and the one that has gotten the most scrutiny — is $89 million set aside for improvements to the Eighth Avenue viaduct. Another $50 million would go to repairs and improvements on the nearby Sixth Avenue viaduct.

Council members and residents have raised their eyebrows at the proposals, which are next door to the Burnham Yard site where the Denver Broncos are considering building their next stadium. City officials have said there are other factors at play, too, including the viaducts’ deteriorating conditions.

On Monday, council members took several votes on proposed amendments before giving first-reading passage to the five ballot questions — which are broken down by project type — and a separate measure that contains the project list. The vote on the latter was 10-3, with Shontel Lewis, Chris Hinds and Flor Alvidrez voting no.

The members generally said they were waiting to comment on the package as a whole until it’s up for the final vote next Monday.

The votes come after a tense back-and-forth between the council, the mayor’s office and community advocates over the project list in recent weeks. Mayor Mike Johnston announced the bond process in February. In the months since then, the city has hosted 50 public neighborhood input meetings.

Project ideas were then whittled down by several topic-specific committees and, finally, an executive committee. The mayor’s office then presented a final list to council members — several of whom responded with frustration about the list and the process.

But after negotiating with council members and tweaking the projects included, the mayor’s office lined up enough votes to move forward.

If approved in November, the ballot measures would allow the city to sell $950 million in bonds and use the borrowed dollars to pay for capital improvements. They would then pay back the bondholders over time through property taxes. The bond proposal wouldn’t raise taxes, officials say, because it would replace existing debt that the city is paying off now.

If voters rejected the proposal, however, taxes could go toward paying down current bonds faster.

The bond projects fall into five topics: transportation and mobility, parks and recreation, health and human services, city facilities, and housing and shelter. A full list .

Monday’s council votes came after an hourlong public hearing in which residents shared their opinions on the list. Some complained about the allotment for specific project ideas, like the viaducts, and others criticized the lack of dollars allocated to safety improvements for pedestrians and cyclists.

Some said they don’t want to see the city take on new debt at all. Police escorted one man, Jason Bailey, who runs the organization Citizens For No New Debt, out of the chambers. The public comment period had ended before he got a chance to speak, and he began shouting at council President Amanda Sandoval.

Council members had the chance to offer amendments to the list. But only one change to the allotments, from Councilwoman Amanda Sawyer, was approved. The change took $18 million from the housing allotment to go instead to the transportation and mobility fund. It would be earmarked to make safety improvements on 13th and 14th avenues between Colorado Boulevard and Quebec Street.

Sawyer criticized the description of potential uses under the bucket for housing as too vague. Housing still will have $32 million remaining after the amendment.

Earlier in the day, Johnston’s office sent out a release announcing the addition of $15 million for the American Indian Cultural Embassy, bringing spending for that project up to $20 million and allowing construction costs to be covered. The change came after negotiations with Councilwoman Stacie Gilmore, who represents the far-northeast district where the center would be located.

“That is our dream for this precocious Queen City of the Plains, where we don’t believe in ‘can’t.’ We don’t believe in ‘impossible,’ ” the mayor said. “A place where we turn to each other, and not on each other. A place where we believe in working to build something bigger than us, that includes all of us and lasts longer than any of us.”

He cast his hopeful phrase as the opposite dynamic of “learned helplessness,” or the fear that no matter what someone does, it won’t make a difference.

Johnston, who last Thursday marked two years since being sworn into office, touched on homelessness, immigration, the revival of downtown Denver — with its 7 million square feet of vacant office space — and the city’s role in tackling climate change. Also, to knowing nods in the audience: the future of the Broncos in Denver.

“Yes, we will get a long-term deal to keep the Denver Broncos here in Denver,” the 50-year-old mayor said to several hundred people gathered for the 40-minute speech in the Seawell Ballroom at the Denver Performing Arts Complex. Unlike in past years, the usual daytime speech was delivered at an evening event.

Johnston has scored successes in his first two years. Street homelessness has decreased in visibility under his tenure, the result of a massive sheltering effort. On Monday, the mayor said that data point has dropped by 45% since 2023 in Denver — “the largest multiyear decrease in unsheltered homelessness of any city in American history.” (Overall homelessness has risen, however.)

“We’ve closed every large encampment in the city, and reopened sidewalks to pedestrians and businesses,” Johnston said. “We have moved 7,000 people off the streets and moved 5,000 people into permanent housing.”

But there are layoffs of city workers in the offing — the first in 15 years — amid an anticipated $250 million budget shortfall. Johnston spoke about several other areas of challenge for the city during his speech, saying that efforts so far have not been “good enough.”

“We still have business owners on Broadway who don’t feel safe having staff members close up the shop and walk to their cars after work, and that����ap not good enough,” Johnston said. “We still have teachers leaving our schools and nurses leaving our hospitals to move back home to the Midwest, because they can’t afford to live in this city anymore, and that����ap not good enough.”

The mayor said the city is on the right track when it comes to public safety, noting that Denver’s homicide rate this year has dropped by 46%.

“Adjusting for population, our homicide rate this year is the lowest in the last decade,” he said. “Auto theft is down by over 50%, and catalytic converter theft has dropped by over 90%.”

He credited some of that improvement to better interaction between police and residents.

“We have officers out walking beats, building relationships with our neighbors on trust patrols,” Johnston said. “And in the midst of turbulent political times, our officers have stood up for freedom of speech and kept the peace at more than 200 demonstrations — both large and small over these last two years.”

Part and parcel of reviving downtown Denver, which was beaten down during the COVID-19 pandemic and then had to endure a multiyear 16th Street mall reconstruction project, is revamping the city’s permitting system, Johnston said.

Developers have complained for years that the city’s cumbersome construction permitting process takes far too long, adding costs to projects. In April, Johnston signed his first executive order, creating the Denver Permitting Office.

“We took a process that used to take three years and made a promise: Your permit will be done in 180 days or we’ll refund up to $10,000 in fees,” he said to applause.

But relations between Johnston and the City Council have not always been smooth of late, with some council members expressing frustration with the mayor for not paying enough attention to their concerns. One of those sticking points has been a mammoth bond issue that is being pitched to voters in the November election.

Through the measure, the city would pay for projects like road and park improvements by issuing debt if voters approve the  this fall.

Earlier this year, city officials estimated the proposal would reach about $800 million, but the most recent version — which isn’t yet final — totals $935 million, including contingency and administration costs as well as some added projects requested by council members.