America is a nation built by immigrants, and its cities are supposed to be melting pots where people of different backgrounds, ethnicities and races interact and learn from one another. The reality, however, is that cities are oftentimes divided by race and ethnicity. And when it comes to racial segregation, Denver…
As we’ve reported, Colorado’s Gerald Foos says spied on the guests of his Aurora motel for decades. Now, according to the eighty-year-old retiree, he is receiving unwanted attention of his own, in the form of threats against his life. The threats come on the heels of an April 11 feature…
We’ve all seen shows like House of Cards, where D.C. politicians are lobbied by smooth operators in backroom meetings involving shady deals, offshore bank accounts and questionable campaign promises. But let’s say we move away from the realm of blackmail and briefcases of cash for a moment. How does a…
There was a time when Mikey Smith would show up with his keyboard to the Meadowlark’s Monday-night jazz jam not knowing if he’d have a drummer to play with. Now there are nights when nine or ten different drummers show up, each hoping they’ll have a chance to play more…
On the rooftop of an apartment building, I find the congregation of Deer Tick super fans. Or at least, “Deer Tick super fans” is what they call themselves. My three friends — Rachel, Mikal, and Aryn — have been talking about the concert we’re seeing tonight, headlined by Deer Tick,…
On March 23, Westword made a number of Colorado Open Records Act requests to the Denver Department of Human Services and the Mayor’s Office for internal documents related to the planning of the homeless sweeps that the city has been conducting over the past month. Westword did not receive responses…
Today, thousands of fans and revelers will flock to Denver’s Ballpark neighborhood as the Rockies play their first game of the season. But not everyone hanging around Coors Field will be there to celebrate. At 12:30p.m., Denver Homeless Out Loud is staging a protest at 20th and Blake streets against the…
Cindy Cervantes, aka Bgirl Emerge, remembers what it used to feel like to participate in breakdancing battles as a woman. Throughout the 2000s, Cervantes would show up to events around Denver where “it was like one B-girl to sixty B-boys,” she says. “So there’s a lot of expectation on you…
The cops arrived at ten in the morning, setting up a perimeter around the two dozen homeless individuals who were camping in the area known as “Resurrection Village,” near the former Big Wonderful site at the intersection of 26th and Arapahoe streets. The officers didn’t come alone. Their arrival was…
Former East High School student Elhadji Samba Dioum has taken a plea deal in a criminal trial connected to a police lockdown that occurred on East High’s campus on December 3. On Friday, March 25, Dioum pleaded guilty to third-degree assault – a misdemeanor – as part of a deal…
Inside a nondescript brick building on the corner of Colfax Avenue and Glenarm Place, directly across the street from the Lindsey-Flanigan Courthouse, is a room filled with trash cans. They’re the same kind of trash cans that many Denver residents roll out to the curb each week – green, with…
March 24 marks one year since Colorado rapper Rachel Aboytes was killed in a drive-by shooting in East Denver. In November 2015, Westword ran “Rhymes to Die For,” our cover story about Rachel’s life and music – and questions that have risen around her posthumous fame. Since the article ran, the family…
When RedPeak Properties first approached her about developing a five-story apartment complex in her district, Susan Shepherd remembers thinking, “Whoa, this is going to be controversial.” Even so, the then-city councilwoman never expected the mudslinging she would encounter at a community meeting she set up between the developer and her…
Last week, legislators considered a “homeless bill of rights” at the State Capitol, but representatives at a House committee meeting ultimately voted the proposal down five to six. It was a major defeat for homeless activists who were counting on passage of the Right to Rest Act — sponsored by…
The members of Kneebody, an avant-garde jazz collective, have been playing gigs together for so long that they don’t even live in the same parts of the country; they simply fly from their respective locations in New York, Los Angeles, Denver and Reno and jump on stage together whenever they…
Denver is usually quick to point out all the money it’s spending to help the homeless, but what does the city spend to police them? That’s a question that a group of law students from the University of Denver’s Sturm College of Law recently set out to answer. In a…
This past year has seen an upsurge in the fight against sexism in the music industry, with several high-profile stories gaining national attention. In a Pitchfork piece early in the year, journalist Jessica Hopper asked, “Why are misogynist lyrics still entertainment in 2015?” Then, in August, Hopper used Twitter to…
By the time the TV news teams showed up at Sustainability Park on October 24, most of the arrests had been made, and the city’s dump trucks were already in the process of hauling away five tiny houses that had been built there by dozens of homeless people and activists…
Three buses will arrive just after 6:30 p.m. tonight, as they do every evening, at Lawrence Street and Park Avenue in Denver. They’re the types of coaches that one would take on a city tour or a long-distance trip, with fold-down TV screens and luggage racks above rows of bucket-seat…
Denver’s Marade, in honor of Martin Luther King Jr., usually attracts thousands of people, who march as one united community from City Park to Civic Center. But on January 18, the 2016 event was interrupted by demonstrations by local activists, including Black Lives Matter 5280 co-founder Amy E. Brown, who…
“Don’t get out of the car unless we say so.” Those were the cop’s orders to Rebecca Meyers, a Jefferson County child-welfare caseworker who was waiting to make a home visit. From the driver’s seat of her car, she watched as at least a half-dozen officers went up the street…
Some of the most worthwhile events in Denver happen when the music community comes together and rallies around a social cause. What cause is more pressing right now than homelessness in Denver? Over the past year individuals experiencing homelessness had their tiny houses torn down in Sustainability Park, had possessions…
