West Side Story

Auraria's neighbors don't trust its latest development scheme.

A A A Comments By Harrison Fletcher Thursday, Oct 7 1999

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But even with supporters like these, McBroom isn't sure whether to move ahead and submit plans to the city. He says he'll decide within the next few months.

"We're frustrated," he says. "We see the merits. We feel we've made compromises. But we've got to determine if it will still work given the concessions we've made. At some point you kind of throw your arms up and say, 'Let the project stand on its merits and let the chips fall where they may. You can take a horse to the water, but you can't make him drink.' What more can we do?"

James Bludworth

"We say no": LeRoy Lemos says the west side has already given too much to the Auraria campus.

James Bludworth

Gateway to a comunity: The site of the proposed student center.

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Josie Acosta has a suggestion: Build the student center somewhere else.

Compromises or no compromises, she's heard it all before. "I don't trust these people," she says. "They all say one thing and do another. You give them an inch and they'll take a foot. We're not overreacting. Look what they did already."

Acosta, past chair of PODER, knows the benefits of light rail and stopping urban sprawl. But she also knows that she likes her neighborhood the way it is, poor as it may be. Her neighbors have spent many years sinking roots and nurturing families. They don't want to hand that over to a campus that has already taken so much from them.

"This is the only barrio left in the whole city of Denver," she says. "We want to keep it the way it is. We don't want anyone coming in here and telling us, 'This is for your benefit.' We know what's for our benefit, and this isn't."

And so, as she did over two decades before, Acosta will attend meetings and wave protest signs and stand before microphones. She remembers the past, she says. And she has learned from it.