Down Pat Is it any coincidence that Colorado’s two biggest mouths–Schroeder and Calhoun–share the first name of “Patricia”? I don’t think so. Nor is it a coincidence that Calhoun would write a column championing her heroine (“Standing Pat,” April 16), when Schroeder has done nothing more heroic than write a…
In November 1996, Amendment 15 got more votes than any other measure or candidate on the Colorado ballot. Voters approved by a two-to-one margin the package of campaign-finance reforms, which for the first time placed limits on the amount individuals and political action committees can give to candidates for state…
On April 7, 1987, a hooded man was led into a chamber in the United States Capitol. Great care had been taken to conceal his identity; in addition to the hood, screens shielded him from the eight assembled U.S. representatives, their staffers and the media. The man was flanked by…
Earlier this month, Colorado corrections officials pulled all the state’s prisoners out of a juvenile jail where thirteen-year-old Matthew Thomas Maloney hung himself this past February. But was it concern for the boys that prompted the swift action against the High Plains Youth Center in the farming town of Brush,…
What up, fool? East High School’s Spotlight student newspaper got itself into one big stink recently with its annual April Fool’s edition. Could it have had something to do with the article reporting that “rug-munching” had hit an all-time high at rival Regis Jesuit High School? Or this handy public-service…
Last year, under pressure from the federal government, the Colorado General Assembly finally passed a measure that had been kicked around for seven years: a law authorizing the state to suspend or revoke the professional licenses of accountants, dentists, acupuncturists, nurses, real estate agents and other white-collar types who owed…
A fundraising event for a kidney transplant ended up feeling like a kidney punch to its organizers. On March 23, Regas Christou, owner of The Church nightclub, at 1160 Lincoln Street, held a benefit for one of his former employees who needs money for a new kidney. The event and…
The 27 million Americans who play golf–and 100 million who don’t–understand that Jack Nicklaus is the best ever to put on yellow plaid trousers. In his day, he was the longest, straightest driver and the finest clutch putter of all time. Among the four-score trophies in his breakfront are a…
Conservative Estimates Regarding Ward Harkavy’s “Life of the Party,” in the April 9 issue: Okay, I get the impression that Ward Harkavy won’t be voting for Bill Owens for governor. From the cover of your paper, showing him with fingers crossed (implying that he’s a liar), to the negative spin…
He can almost see her. Henry Johns stands in the back of his mother’s house on Monroe Street and pictures her kneeling beside the fence, turning soil, planting seeds. She liked to grow things. The smell of wet dirt, the way flowers unfolded to the sun. Hollyhocks and tiger lilies…
You take your chances walking into a political rally with no stickers on your body. You feel like the first sailor off the boat stepping into a gaggle of prostitutes. Smiling people move toward you, seeking to press your flesh and slap names on your chest. Hands come out of…
What happens when the city wants to evict you but your landlord doesn’t? He could lose not just a tenant, but also his property. Bob Brown owns a house at 1339 Ogden Street; for the past five years he’s rented the carriage house to Michael Pisarck. Last December Pisarck was…
Neighbors of the old Lowry Air Force Base are teed off over a proposed golf course that would locate several holes on top of an abandoned landfill there. And while the Lowry Redevelopment Authority has signed off on plans to build the course, which is supported by hundreds of senior…
Beware of geeks bearing gifts: Where do you want to go today? Well, if you’re Microsoft mogul Bill Gates, we know where you don’t want to go: down to the Denver Public Library to read a children’s story to a bunch of future customers. A group of local kids had…
As Pokey Reese can tell you, this is the year in which some of baseball’s most cherished records are likely to be demolished. Pokey himself got the ball rolling on opening day by committing four errors at shortstop in support of his Cincinnati Reds’ 10-2 loss to San Diego. There’s…
Cockeyed Optimists Wonderful column by Patricia Calhoun on the legacy of Gary Hart’s Monkey Business (“Ship of State,” March 26). It’s hard to believe that this country has gotten even more cynical than it was a decade ago, but reading through all those hopeful letters to Hart, I realize it’s…
Monica Thomas is in the enviable position of being able to say yes to almost all the requests she gets–and she rarely gets the same request twice. “Now, who is that woman in Arvada?” Thomas asks herself. “She called for permission to dress up her RTD stop, to change it…
For years, Ann Bonnell has been a volunteer at the Denver Botanic Gardens’ Chatfield Arboretum. The former farm next to the Chatfield Reservoir has been operated as a nature preserve since the 1970s, and volunteers have planted thousands of trees and bushes on the property that parallels Deer Creek. Bonnell…
Bounty hunter Duane “Dog” Chapman may be about to retire, but he still looks like a Hell’s Angel. His hair is long and blond, and his teeth look like they’ve been regularly kicked out and then put back in place. His upper canines are as big as fangs, and his…
This past summer, Joe Smith, a young, up-and-coming Colorado deputy attorney general, decided to run for the top law enforcement job in the state. He has already gotten off to a rocky start. For beginners, on the day that he notified the secretary of state’s office of his intention to…
How much does one ten-hour hostage situation cost? Plenty, if you’re talking about the United States Postal Service. This past Christmas Eve day, seven postal employees at the USPS’s General Mail Facility, situated near the old Stapleton airport, were taken hostage by a former postal worker. They were released, unharmed,…
Good fellows: An effort to recruit minority teachers to the Denver Public Schools spearheaded by Denver mayor Wellington Webb hasn’t done diddly to get black and Hispanic role models into teaching jobs at DPS. In fact, the “Mayor’s Fellows” program produced such lackluster results that it’s been given the ax…
