This afternoon at the Colorado state house, the agriculture, natural resources and energy committee will consider what’s being characterized as the nation’s toughest ban of trans fat at schools. Senator Lucia Guzman is surprised by all the attention the measure has received to date, in part because, to her, it’s…
After ex-Arapahoe County Sheriff Pat Sullivan’s November arrest for allegedly trading meth for sex, he was jailed in a detention facility bearing his name. No wonder county commissioners soon began considering a policy forbidding the naming of public buildings after individuals, living or dead. But now, this conversation has been…
During the same week that Debe Bell was convicted on 35 counts of animal cruelty (see the photo at right), a bill to establish a registry for animal abusers failed to get out of the agriculture committee. Why? Here’s the take of Representative Jeanne Labuda, the measure’s sponsor…
Update below: Yesterday’s Denver Police news conference was among the odder in recent memory — but also among the more welcome. The DPD’s concession that Representative Laura Bradford had received special privileges rather than being busted for a DUI, and its willingness to offer details about how it happened, suggests…
As advertised, Ron Paul appeared in Denver today, speaking at the Grand Ballroom of the Renaissance Denver Hotel — one of three scheduled Colorado stops in advance of next week’s caucuses. Look below to see images from his visit, courtesy of photographer Javid Rezvani…
Ron Paul isn’t the only presidential candidate in Colorado today; Rick Santorum is slated to speak at the Lone Tree Golf Club Lounge at 10 a.m. But Paul will certainly make a bigger splash, with three events on tap. And in advance, his surrogates are taking shots at one of…
Growing up and watching Crossfire in Tempe, Arizona, 33-year-old Elena Nunez learned to trust her local government approximately as far as she could throw it. In the late ’80s, Arizona Governor Evan Mecham was impeached on grounds of misusing funds and obstruction of justice, and the event, followed by others,…
The Florida primary takes place tomorrow, with Mitt Romney and Newt Gingrich expected to spend their day slugging it out for Republican votes in the Sunshine State. But not Representative Ron Paul, who’s instead scheduled a full day of campaigning in Colorado, a week before the February 7 caucuses here…
Occupy Denver was among groups in 27 cities to rally in support of Occupy Oakland, which experienced a recent round of 300 arrests. About 125 protesters gathered for an impromptu march that shut down large sections of traffic near Broadway and Colfax between 7:30 and 10 p.m. and attracted the…
It probably shouldn’t have been a surprise that Doug Lamborn, Republican congressman from Colorado Springs, decided to boycott President Obama’s State of the Union Address on Tuesday. Lamborn, after all, is the same guy who referred to Obama’s economic and debt-reduction policies as a “tar baby” in July. (Oops, guess,…
In the war of words over the plan to round up thousands of wild horses on federal lands, it’s the images that speak loudest. Even as the Bureau of Land Management argues that the thinning of herds is for their own good, critics of the program keep coming up with…
The first time Sonia Skakich-Scrima learned about fracking, she was reading the Denver Business Journal almost a year ago to date. What she read alarmed her, but what she Googled afterward tripled that. “I tried to understand why we didn’t care about the environment or the aftermath,” she says. “I…
Of all the constitutional freedoms cited in defense of the Occupy movement, the First Amendment is staked most territorially. But in Occupy Boulder, attorneys defending protesters arrested for illegal camping are using the Fourth Amendment in a push to dismiss evidence gathered when police officers opened tents to look inside…
Earlier this month, Colorado Republican Party chairman Ryan Call argued that this year’s Colorado Republican Caucus will mean more than ever, in part because the date was moved up to February 7. When Mitt Romney looked poised to sweep Iowa, New Hampshire and South Carolina, this claim looked suspect, but…
After six months at the head of Mayor Michael Hancock’s communications staff, Wil Alston began a new position yesterday leading the same function for Denver’s finance department. Hancock created the position specifically for Alston, who joined his administration in July 2011 and has long been a friend. In the interim,…
What Tobacco-Free Aurora lacks in longevity and membership, it makes up for in ambition. Founded a little more than a year ago with a rotating volunteer staff of twelve to thirty, the group recently pushed the entirety of its efforts toward creating a city ordinance regulating the sale of tobacco…
Occupy the Courts supporters met on the west steps of the Colorado State Capitol at 10 a.m. holding signs that read “Corporations Are Not People” and “Restore Democracy” — step one in their two-part protest of corporate personhood under the umbrella title Move to Amend. CleanSlateNow.org, Colorado Common Cause and…
Update: Secretary of State Scott Gessler has been named a possible suspect regarding flaws in the Colorado Independent Spending Report released by the National Institute on Money in State Politics; the report showed a total expenditure for 2006-2010 much larger then was actually the case. However, Gessler’s spokesman says the…
Preliminary numbers show that about 15 percent of the 7,923 immigrants whose cases were reviewed as part of a Department of Homeland Security pilot project in Denver will be allowed to stay in the country, says Laura Lichter, the president-elect of the American Immigration Lawyers Association. Those include local student…
Even though Rick Santorum kinda won the Iowa caucuses, he’s a long shot to pass Mitt Romney and become the Republican pick for president. His last chance appears to be a strong showing in South Carolina tomorrow — one that’ll require evangelicals to get behind him (and not sinful Newt…
On Sunday, at 2 p.m. in the Bemis Public Library, five people gathered to launch the first general assembly of Occupy Littleton. If the idea that democracy takes time ever needed proof, this would be it. One person shy of a round half-dozen, the group appeared dwarfed in the city…
In 2010, Colorado welcomed 2,367 refugees from around the world. That’s more than in 2009, when 2,157 refugees were resettled here, but fewer than in 1980, when 4,200 refugees made Colorado their new home. So where do these refugees come from — and why? As explained in the cover story…
