Boulder Weekly 7.30.2020

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What will happen to Boulder’s 2020 citizen initiatives?

By Emma Athena

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What will happen to Boulder’s 2020 citizen initiatives?

by Emma Athena

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The Anderson Files: Fascist spectacle on the American democratic stage Guest Column: Boulder needs equal housing access in the City charter Heavy Rotation: Charley Crockett’s deep dive into the

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Publisher, Fran Zankowski Editor, Matt Cortina Circulation Manager, Cal Winn EDITORIAL Senior Editor, Angela K. Evans Arts and Culture Editor, Caitlin Rockett Special Editions Editor, Michael J. Casey Adventure Editor, Emma Athena Contributing Writers, Peter Alexander, Dave Anderson, Will Brendza, Rob Brezsny, Paul Danish, Sarah Haas, Jim Hightower, Dave Kirby, John Lehndorff, Rico Moore, Amanda Moutinho, Leland Rucker, Dan Savage, Alan Sculley, Ryan Syrek, Christi Turner, Betsy Welch, Tom Winter, Gary Zeidner SALES AND MARKETING Market Development Manager, Kellie Robinson Account Executives, Matthew Fischer, Sami Wainscott Advertising Coordinator, Corey Basciano Mrs. Boulder Weekly, Mari Nevar PRODUCTION Art Director, Susan France Senior Graphic Designer, Mark Goodman Graphic Designer, Daisy Bauer CIRCULATION TEAM Dave Hastie, Dan Hill, George LaRoe, Jeffrey Lohrius, Elizabeth Ouslie, Rick Slama BUSINESS OFFICE Bookkeeper, Regina Campanella Founder/CEO, Stewart Sallo Editor-at-Large, Joel Dyer Cover photo, Emma Athena July 30, 2020 Volume XXVII, Number 50 As Boulder County's only independently owned newspaper, Boulder Weekly is dedicated to illuminating truth, advancing justice and protecting the First Amendment through ethical, no-holds-barred journalism and thought-provoking opinion writing. Free every Thursday since 1993, the Weekly also offers the county's most comprehensive arts and entertainment coverage. Read the print version, or visit boulderweekly.com. Boulder Weekly does not accept unsolicited editorial submissions. If you're interested in writing for the paper, please send queries to: editorial@ boulderweekly.com. Any materials sent to Boulder Weekly become the property of the newspaper.

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Fascist spectacle on the American democratic stage

by Dave Anderson

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n 2017, Trump’s political strategist Steve Bannon called Robert Kuttner out of the blue about forming an “economic nationalist” alliance of the right and the left.

Kuttner is a progressive journalist and editor of The American Prospect who has been highly critical of procorporate “free trade” agreements like NAFTA and the Trans Pacific Partnership. He is also fervently anti-Trump.

The phone call was shortly after the horror of Charlottesville and Trump’s unwillingness to denounce the fascists. Kuttner was “stunned” that Bannon thought that some shared opinions between them “might somehow paper over the political and moral chasm on white nationalism,” he wrote in a 2017 Prospect article. Bannon was the Darth Vader of white nationalism who used Breitbart to stir up racial bigotry, misogyny and Islamophobia. He helped create Trump’s far-right base.

So Kuttner asked Bannon what was the connection I

between his “economic nationalism” and the white nationalism typified by the racist violence of Charlottesville. Bannon said the far rightists were “a fringe element” and “a collection of clowns” who can be “crushed.” Then he told Kuttner: “The Democrats — the longer they talk about identity politics, I got ’em. I want them to talk about racism every day. If the left is focused on race and identity, and we go with economic nationalism, we can crush the Democrats.”

Bannon never said the phone call was off the record.

He lost his White House job shortly after Kuttner’s article was published.

Reflecting on Bannon’s remarks today, Kuttner says that this strategy helped Trump win in 2016 but it isn’t working so well now. As he wrote recently in The Prospect: “Thanks to four years of Trump egging on America’s worst instincts on race, compounded by escalating police violence, most white Americans are not doubling down on racism. They are saying, enough is enough.”

Trump’s reality TV show has not only become tiresome and repulsive but it is deadly. His spectacular failure in dealing with the COVID-19 pandemic has resulted in see THE ANDERSON FILES Page 7

JULY 30, 2020

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Boulder needs equal housing access in the City charter

by Eric Budd

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JULY 30, 2020

n most of Boulder, it’s illegal for more than three unrelated people to live together in a home. The Bedrooms Are For People ballot measure would guarantee that all people have equal access to housing options through a change to the City of Boulder’s charter. Our measure would allow up to one person to live in each bedroom of a home, plus one additional person. Boulder needs to stop discriminating against people based on their relationship status — even if “It’s Complicated.”

A U.S. Supreme Court case in 1974, Village of Belle Terre v. Boraas, clarified that cities may not legally enforce home occupancy limits against traditional families. Families in Boulder are not and cannot be subject to home occupancy limits. At that time, the court gave an opinion that cities did have the right to use their “police power” to discriminate in housing based on family status.

In 2020, the City of Boulder still uses occupancy limits to control who is allowed to live together. Its rules are not for the purposes of health and safety, but for purposes of social and behavioral control. Rather than using its regulatory powers to control the possible nuisance impacts such as parking, noise or trash issues of specific “problem” households, the City leverages discriminatory occupancy limits against an entire class of people who are unrelated by not allowing them to share a home.

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Boulder first enacted occupancy limits more than 45 years ago. But with each passing year, the negative effects on people in our city become more dire and pressing.

Occupancy limits disproportionately affect working class people, people without family support systems, and people who are less likely to have the means to live in Boulder without pooling resources. Limits affect our LGBTQ community who are often estranged from their families. The gap in wealth along racial lines puts people of color at further disadvantage.

In a university town, the law snags undergraduate students, who often live illegally, as well as grad students, post-docs and university faculty and staff whose incomes have not kept up with housing costs in recent decades. Many young professionals also struggle with occupancy limits, as the price of buying into Boulder has risen out of reach of most people who work in town. Rather than living together and forming new families, most have to choose between living in Boulder and having children at all.

The human costs of living illegally are serious. Dozens of people are evicted for over-occupancy in Boulder each year, which upends lives and becomes part of a permanent record. Many others are forced to live in the shadows — “extra” occupants are left off of leases, shy away from their neighbors, and avoid participating in civic matters for fear of evicsee GUEST COLUMN Page 7

BOULDER COUNTY’S INDEPENDENT VOICE

THE ANDERSON FILES from Page 5

S outhweSt A cupuncture c ollege unnecessary mass death and sickness.

His White House “coronavirus task force” is being stifled.

Trump refuses to use the Defense Production Act to produce medical supplies so public health officials can perform tests to quickly identify and isolate infected people and find out who they were in contact with.

Trump is simultaneously a weakling and a strong man. When confronting the virus, Trump refuses to be a national leader. He tells mayors and governors who ask for help with the pandemic that they are on their own.

At the same time he is sending secret federal troops into big cities run by “the radical left” to suppress supposedly out-of-control “violent anarchists” and criminals. The mayors and governors don’t want the troops.

Germans are afraid, according to Paris-based New York Times columnist Roger Cohen: “No people has found the American lurch toward authoritarianism under President Trump more alarming than the Germans. For postwar Germany, the United States was savior, protector and liberal democratic model. Now, Germans, in shock, speak of the ‘American catastrophe.’”

Michael Steinberg, a professor of

history at Brown University and the former president of the American Academy in Berlin, wrote to Cohen: “The American catastrophe seems to get worse every day, but the events in Portland have particularly alarmed me as a kind of strategic experiment for fascism. The playbook from the German fall of democracy in 1933 seems well in place, including rogue military factions, the destabilization of cities, etc.”

Steinberg continued, “The basic comparison involves racism as a political strategy: a racist imaginary of a pure homeland, with cities demonized as places of decadence.”

This sort of happened awhile back.

Shortly before 2018 midterm elections, Trump ordered a surge of U.S. military forces to the Mexican border in order to protect it from “invasion” by “caravans” of asylum seekers traveling from Central America. Fox News provided fevered “coverage.”

This time, he is sending secret federal forces into the interior of the country to combat supposed sinister forces considered to be internal enemies. It might be a dress rehearsal for bigger spectacles.

This opinion does not necessarily reflect the views of Boulder Weekly.

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tion. In Boulder, occupancy enforcement is complaint-based, which provides rife opportunities for selective punishment.

Residents of over-occupied housing live at the mercy of their more powerful and secure neighbors.

It is critical that we address non-discrimination in housing in the City’s charter, which outlines the function and essential procedures of the City government. All people deserve certainty and stability in their housing options, even if they are not related to each other.

But at a recent City Council meeting, Mayor Sam Weaver dismissed this argument, stating that “land use doesn’t work in the charter” and “zoning is even worse.” But citizens have previously enshrined at least two such provisions in the City’s core documents — the Blue Line, which restricts water utility services to existing urban areas beneath the western foothills, and the 55-foot height limit, which protects views of the mountains.

If we can use the charter to protect these natural elements that define the BOULDER COUNTY’S INDEPENDENT VOICE

character of our city, we should also use the charter to protect the people who live within it.

Boulder has a long history of exclusion, especially in regard to housing. In a 2013 column, then-Boulder Weekly editor Wayne Laugesen recalled an interview with former Ku Klux Klan leader Thomas Robb: “Boulder had done everything right... by planning and zoning to exclude — complete with growth caps known as the Danish Plan — Boulder had made itself inhospitable to working-class minorities who reproduce.”

Now is the time for the people of Boulder to work to repair its exclusionary past, and reforming occupancy limits is one step along the way. We won’t stop our efforts to get the Bedrooms Are For People charter amendment on the November 2020 ballot, and we are asking for your vote.

Eric Budd is an organizer with Bedrooms Are For People.

This opinion does not necessarily reflect the views of Boulder Weekly.

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EMMA ATHENA

ALLI FRONZAGLIA, an organizer for OMOC, gathers signatures for both BAFP and OMOC initiatives, employing social distancing, sanitizing and masks to help prevent the spread of COVID-19.

What will happen to Boulder’s 2020 citizen initiatives?

First a pandemic threatens signature-gathering, then City officials deliver wrong information.

By Emma Athena

This article starts a four-part series analyzing online signature-gathering’s role in the future of direct democracy in 2020. Reporting for this series was made possible, in part, thanks to the Solutions Journalism Network.

Para leerlo en español, por favor visita boulderweekly. com.

T

he steed of Susan B. Anthony’s democracy was a steel single-speed. For Chelsea Castellano, it’s an e-bike. One Monday in June, she pedals around South Boulder with a colorful “Vote! Vote! Vote!” mask strapped across her face. She’s making three stops today, her first destination a quiet house on Toedtli Drive. She steps off the bike, throws out her kickstand, and draws supplies from her pannier bag: a clipboard, hand sanitizer and pens.

She rings the doorbell and takes four steps back.

A young guy opens the door, curls his mask around his ears and steps outside. Castellano waves, announcing she’s there to deliver the petitions he’d “ordered” online.

She offers him hand sanitizer, then the clipboard and pen. She’s part of the “Bedrooms Are For People” (BAFP) campaign petitioning to amend 8

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Boulder’s charter to change the City’s home occupancy limits. Also stacked on the clipboard is information about another charter amendment campaign, “Our Mayor Our Choice” (OMOC), proposing to give constituents the ability to directly elect the mayor. Both are citizen initiatives, where the power of signatures cannot be understated. If the campaigns can gather enough signatures, their initiatives will be guaranteed a spot on the November ballot. If a majority of citizens then vote for the proposed changes, they will alter the City’s charter through direct democracy.

The guy’s roommate pokes her head out the door. She gives her signature to both petitions before handing the clipboard back to Castellano, who offers hand sanitizer, apologizing for not extending the courtesy before. Then Castellano tucks the clipboard with the signatures back in her pannier, rebuckles her helmet and rides off to the next house.

She never saw herself as a democracy messenger, but drastic times call for drastic measures.

• • • • What began as a normal election season earlier this year quickly disintegrated as the coronavirus JULY 30, 2020

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pandemic hit; Boulder officials made no provisions to accommodate petitioners’ health concerns, then later acknowledged they’d published incorrect information about the citizen initiative process. This resulted in missed deadlines and lost opportunities for constituents after they’d spent months employing creative ways to navigate COVID-19.

Citizen initiatives, the petitioners knew, were the only way to get a measure put on the ballot without support from City Council. Only 24 states have provisions for citizen initiatives as part of the democratic process. An idea, a demonstration of community support, a majority vote of the people: It’s as direct as it gets.

Months ago — back when multiple citizen initiative campaigns were still finalizing their paperwork for the city clerk’s office — no one could’ve imagined problem-solving for a global pandemic.

Although Boulder voters approved an online signature-gathering system back in 2018, the City has yet to implement it. So in order to collect signatures, volunteers would need to enter close proximity with strangers, even as Boulder County’s health department was explicitly advising against it.

Despite health concerns, the petitioners didn’t BOULDER COUNTY’S INDEPENDENT VOICE

feel like they could sit out this election season.

“People who maybe aren’t as typically engaged in politics tend to be more involved in presidential years,” Castellano explains. “There’s more voter turnout, more awareness of what’s going on.”

In January, the future was just as unknown in the offices of the city attorney and the city clerk. They were preparing to publish a set of new guidelines, based on their reading of the city charter and recommendations from a 2018 elections working group, explaining exactly how someone like Castellano can use a citizen initiative to bypass City Council en route to the ballot. Neither office had any idea they could be facing lawsuits six months down the road.

At the time, the city attorney’s office (staffed by four lawyers tasked with interpreting the laws governing Boulder) relayed information about the citizen initiative process to the clerk’s office, which is in charge of running Boulder’s elections. The clerk’s office published two sets of guidelines: to get a measure on the ballot, citizens proposing a new municipal ordinance had to collect 3,337 by June 5, and citizens wanting to amend the city charter had to collect 4,048 signatures by Aug. 5.

These signature thresholds are designed to prove enough community members are interested in voting on a given measure.

This year, two campaigns for municipal ordinances were the first to start collecting signatures. BAFP and OMOC — both seeking charter amendments — were also approved by the clerk’s office. All four campaigns were given the aforementioned signature volume and deadline information after filing paperwork, which included, in small italics, a recommendation that they seek independent legal counsel to review the City’s guidelines.

Both the BAFP and OMOC campaigns knew collecting 4,048 pen-and-paper signatures would require serious organizational human power, but when the statewide Stay At Home order took effect in March, their opportunities to collect signatures vanished. “[We were] approved to collect signatures but also told not to leave our house,” Castellano says. “We realized something that was going to be hard before was going to be almost impossible now.”

Traditionally, citizen initiative campaigns spend the spring before an election walking door-to-door, hosting parties and soliciting signatures at community events, explains Jan Burton, treasurer of the OMOC campaign and a former Boulder City Council member. “We didn’t feel like people would be comfortable with any of that,” she says, herself an asthmatic. “I’m over 60 and when they first were talking about [COVID-19, I was] thinking, oh my God, there’s no way I’m going outside my doors.”

Since then, she’s spent nearly 30 days outside colBOULDER COUNTY’S INDEPENDENT VOICE

lecting signatures.

It wasn’t long before members of all four initiative campaigns began speaking up at City Council meetings, held over Zoom to avoid in-person contact. Numerous weeks in a row, people asked if any provisions could be made — any deadline extensions or alternative signature collection methods — especially considering they knew City Council wouldn’t take the measures up themselves. In 2019 Mayor Sam Weaver explicitly told some BAFP volunteers that the sort of change they sought would best be delivered via a citizen initiative, according to Castellano.

City Council ultimately determined the rules for

that meant the deadlines and number of signatures published in the clerk’s guidelines were wrong for the charter amendment campaigns. They would only have 90 days to collect signatures under the state constitution’s rules, which brought BAFP’s deadline up to June 21, and OMOC’s to July 30. Also, both would need to gather twice as many signatures — 8,096 each, not 4,048 — in order to get their measures placed on the ballot.

Carr didn’t respond to Pomerance’s first email.

He was busy taking care of all the other issues the pandemic was causing: drafting new ordinances about public gatherings, masks, building closures, and more, Carr says. “That alone could be a fullEMMA ATHENA time job, and that has to do with public safety.”

Around this time in March, he was also preparing a presentation for City Council with an update on the City’s online signature gathering system — which initially gave the initiative campaigns a glimmer of hope.

Carr explained the system was not yet ready, and wouldn’t be until the 2021 election cycle. Council still asked him to draft an ordinance that could accommodate some type of online signature-gathering during the pandemic to help the petitioners. Then Carr came back with a draft ordinance in mid-April for a temporary online signature-gathering method. Council voted against adopting his idea.

By May, City Council asked Carr to draft an ordinance clarifying the deadlines for petition signatures, but ultimately postponed the conversation CHELSEA CASTELLANO citizen initiatives couldn’t be changed. “You until after the November election, delivers petitions to know, pandemics happen and it doesn’t according to Carr. While acknowledgdoorstops via bike change the law,” Weaver says. Council memas part of the BAFP ing Pomerance’s deadline concerns, and OMOC ber Bob Yates put it another way, at the Carr defended the original Aug. 5 campaigns’ April 21 council meeting: “We’re not inhibdeadline for charter amendments.

“Democracy on iting democracy; COVID has inhibited Meanwhile, the initiative campaigns Demand” service. democracy.” scrambled to react as the County Organizers from the four campaigns extended the Stay At Home Order, and weren’t the only ones pressing City Council with City Council continued to reject ideas that could questions and raising red flags about the 2020 citihelp keep petitioners safe. Castellano says it was diszen initiative process. As early as March, Steve appointing “hearing from City Council members in Pomerance, a former City Council member who has the heart of the pandemic: ‘Hey, just go out to stayed involved in local politics, started sounding the parks,’ when they’re also telling everyone to stay alarm about the legal frenzy that would follow. home. ‘You can risk your lives and ask anyone else While researching the initiative campaigns, who wants to participate in direct democracy to risk Pomerance noticed a dissonance between the guide- their lives,’ like, ‘You go for it, there’s nothing stoplines published by the city clerk and what he underping you,’ when it seems like there was a lot stopstood the city charter and state constitution said ping us.” about the process. On March 14, Pomerance sent After months of fundraising and community meethis first email to City Attorney Tom Carr, expressings, Burton says on behalf of OMOC, “We were so ing concerns that Carr had mixed up when to apply far down the path. We didn’t want to give it up.” rules from the state constitution, and when to apply • • • • rules from the city charter. Pomerance thought As the weeks went by, Pomerance grew more municipal ordinances should be governed by the city and more convinced that Carr’s interpretation of the charter and charter amendments should be governed charter initiative was wrong. Pomerance himself had by the state constitution. If Pomerance was right, see INITIATIVES Page 10 I

JULY 30, 2020

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INITIATIVES from Page 9

been a member of the Campaign Finance/Elections Working Group that was enacted at the beginning of 2018, tasked with cleaning up a series of mistakes Carr and his office had made.

During the 2016 election cycle, a citizen initiative’s charter amendment — that codified City Council term limits which voters passed — had been wrongly placed on the ballot. This was after an “error was made by staff but ... not noticed at the time,” Valerie Yates, a former regulatory lawyer and another working group member, explains via email.

She, like Pomerance, only discovered this discrepancy this year. The signature threshold that Carr’s office publicized back then, according to Yates, was far lower than what it should’ve been. Weaver confirms this.

The following year, in 2017, the city attorney’s office tried to streamline deadline information and give more discretionary power to the city manager during the petitioning process. They drafted a ballot measure of their own, 2Q, which passed in the 2017 elections, but it was “so terrible that the [working group] was convened in 2018 to fix the problems they created,” Yates writes. The working group helped draft another measure, 2E, that tried to clarify ambiguous language, lower some signature thresholds, and establish a timeline for the petitioning process. The working group determined the charter outlined rules for municipal ordinances, and the state constitution determined the rules for charter amendments.

This year is the first time citizen initiative groups have solicited petitions since 2E’s passage in 2018, says Carr, and thus the first time the new guidelines have applied to the initiative process. Carr explains his staff member tasked with reviewing the new guidelines “tried to balance the views of the working group with state law, and has a theory that cities can alter state law, as long as it doesn’t conflict with state law, and if they do it in a way that benefits the petitioners. So the guidelines were written with that philosophy.”

In essence, Carr’s office tried to blend different provisions of state law with City codes, attempting to give petitioners a longer time period to collect signatures with a smaller number of signatures required. Carr says he wasn’t aware of his staff ’s approach “until much later.” Not until Pomerance started emailing him about it.

Carr communicated with campaigns, and concerned citizens like Pomerance, on an irregular and inconsistent basis, according to emails provided by the campaigns. He told them they “might” be held to state law (i.e. the earlier deadlines), but continued to reiterate he was advocating for the Aug. 5 deadline. Often he wouldn’t respond to emails, his days long and busy, still dealing with the fallout of the coronavirus. “I hate to keep saying this, but I have a full-time job in a pandemic. There’s a lot of other stuff going on,” he says.

Several times Pomerance raised issues with Carr, warning him of potential lawsuits to come, but the 10

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city attorney’s office didn’t do a sweeping review of the guideline information until June.

Carr gathered a group of lawyers with “something like 120 years of legal experience,” and “as a group we decided that the clearest interpretation is that the charter intends to exempt the City from state law.” In other words, the charter amendments should’ve been treated the same as the municipal ordinances, with only 3,337 signatures required and a June 5 deadline.

Still, Carr continued to defend the original guidelines as “a matter of fairness” and that information remained on the City’s website until July 6. On June 19, he emailed the OMOC campaign after they requested further clarification: “I am sorry for the confusion. I thought that it was clear that the city was going to honor the advice that was given to the committees.” A month later, on July 17, he affirmed, “My view is we should honor what we told the committees and council should put the matter on the ballot.”

As such, campaigns stayed focused on gathering thousands of signatures — each a potentially infected vector for a terribly contagious and deadly virus.

But citizens were not pleased; between March and July, more than 40 people spoke up at City Council meetings. Even more sent emails and made phone calls, all criticizing the City’s unwillingness to adapt the initiative process in light of the pandemic.

Council maintained their stance: No online signatures allowed, no mail-in or email-in options even after Governor Jared Polis recommended the tactic in a statewide executive order on May 15, and a majority was not interested in discussing direct referrals. Although Council has the power to place any measure they want on the ballot for the people to vote on, anytime that option came up as a way to honor the work of the campaigns, and relieve them of their in-person signature-gathering tasks, Council voted it down.

Each of the campaigns realized they had to get creative. “While a lot of our volunteers are willing to go out and risk their lives and collect signatures, we couldn’t expect that from the community,” Castellano says.

The idea for the “Democracy on Demand” service — biking to people’s homes with the petitions — hatched in the BAFP group. “We were seeing people getting their groceries delivered, their food delivered, as much as they could get anything delivered they were getting it delivered, so we figured, well, there’s no reason we can’t deliver a petition. It’s the same thing,” Castellano says.

BAFP reached out to the other campaigns, asking if they wanted to be included. This inter-campaign collaboration is unprecedented, Castellano says. Burton, who has worked with citizen initiative campaigns in the past, also said this was the first time she’s witnessed such collaboration.

“Not every volunteer supports every measure, but we are out there in support of democracy, not necessarily in support of every other measure we JULY 30, 2020

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carry,” Castellano says. “Whatever decision the community makes is up to the community, but the ability to have that decision is what’s important.”

By late June, BAFP had amassed more than 60 volunteers and crested 4,000 signatures, 422 of which had been collected at 246 households via bike. They orchestrated social media campaigns, conducted waves of community outreach, advertised on every platform they could think of.

OMOC was also working with 12 volunteers, setting up tables outside of grocery and hardware stores, at trailheads and public parks — anywhere they could stand outside and try to interact, safely, with other constituents. At grocery stores they competed with paid state petitioners, and the large population of commuters who aren’t registered to vote in Boulder. That, plus masks, which only made it easier for people to avoid interaction.

Neesha Schnepf, a BAFP volunteer, says, “If I think about the number of people who got near me when signing it, then, yeah, I start feeling uncomfortable about things, because all those people were definitely within six feet of me when they were signing.” Still, she says, “I’d rather this get on that ballot and eventually pass, even if it means I get sick.

“Obviously, like everyone in the campaign, I wish City Council would have spent a bit more effort trying to think of more pandemic-safe alternatives, you know? I do think we could have thought of something better than having to do signatures in person.”

• • • • On June 18, another citizen initiative group led

by Save South Boulder filed for permission to petition for a charter amendment, motivated by a recent City Council vote on a CU South annexation strategy that they wanted to amend, believing they had until Aug. 5 to collect signatures. However, the clerk’s office denied their petition, citing grounds that the deadline had already passed.

According to the Save South Boulder campaign, it was Carr, not the clerk, that responded to followup questions about why their petition was denied.

Carr explained to them on June 30 that the guidelines, which were still live on the clerk’s website at the time, were “incorrect.” They finally came down six days later.

A week after that, the Save South Boulder campaign wrote in email to Council, “The City Attorney has cast great confusion over our election process” and “has acted in an arbitrary and capricious manner granting some citizens rights to collect signatures under special rules while denying the same privilege to others following the same published rules.”

BAFP and OMOC reached out to Carr for clarification shortly after learning about the issue with Save South Boulder’s petition, but Castellano says Carr didn’t email them back.

A few days later, Carr did publish a public message on the City’s hotline: “I wanted to take this opportunity to clarify the city attorney’s office posiBOULDER COUNTY’S INDEPENDENT VOICE

tion on pending charter amendment initiative petitions,” he wrote, explaining “charter amendments are governed by the charter and not by state law.” This meant BAFP and OMOC deadlines had officially passed on June 5.

In the hotline, Carr acknowledged “two petition committees relied on the city’s inaccurate guidance and have worked to gather signatures.” He then promised to ask the city clerk to verify signatures submitted by Aug. 5, “to be fair.” If either petition supplies 4,048 verified signatures, he continued, “I will ask the clerk to forward the petition to the city council without a certificate of sufficiency” but “with my recommendation that the council place the measure on the ballot for the November 2020 election.”

The campaigns were furious. It went directly against what they understood as Carr’s earlier position.

Without a certificate of sufficiency, Castellano says she knew “our only chance to be on the ballot [is] through a referral of the City Council, which is the exact legislative body that this process of direct democracy is supposed to circumvent.”

Nick Grossman, another BAFP organizer, adds, “In effect what the City has done is bend its own rules — whether intentionally or not they have bent their own rules. And if they then delay this to another year, or try to change the language, or make it not a charter amendment, then they’re subverting the will of the people and actually circumventing direct democracy.”

“We’ve risked our lives to do this. The community has risked their lives to do this, to sign in-person,” Castellano says. “And it’s the City’s mistake — it may not have been intentional at first, but if they don’t correct it, then it is intentional.”

The change in messaging and obstruction of opportunity did not go unnoticed.

Soon other members of the 2018 Campaign Finance/Election Working Group, in addition to Pomerance and Valerie Yates, started to weigh in, asserting Carr was still wrong in his interpretation.

The state constitution governs charter amendments, they argued, not the city charter.

When asked — despite denying Save South Boulder’s petition — Carr says that it’s entirely “possible” the state constitution would supersede. Save South Boulder asked for a legal hearing, “and I was pretty excited about that,” Carr says. “I would love for a judge to tell me what the law is. I don’t really have strong feelings about which — I’m just trying to get it right, and if a judge tells me that state law applies or that our regional advice has to be followed, I’m fine with that.”

Ultimately the campaign dropped their hearing request, realizing they wouldn’t have enough time to gather signatures if the hearing was in mid-July.

As Pomerance and others continued to alert Council about this confusing stream of information,

Council planned a formal discussion: If the deadlines had truly passed, as Carr now claimed, should they directly refer the citizen measures to the ballot for the public to vote on, or not?

Carr and his senior assistant city attorney, Luis Toro, put together a presentation for Council explaining the three possible legal interpretations at hand: either the city charter, the state constitution, or the blended guidelines Carr’s office had drafted should control the rules for charter amendment initiatives. Ultimately, Carr explained, it’s up to Council to determine which interpretation is correct; they are Boulder’s legislative body. It’s Carr’s job to simply advise them.

I would love for a judge to tell me what the law is. I don’t really have strong feelings about which — I’m just trying to get it right, and if a judge tells me that state law applies or that our regional advice has to be followed, I’m fine with that.

BOULDER COUNTY’S INDEPENDENT VOICE

— Boulder City Attorney Tom Carr

After the 30-minute presentation and a public open-comment period (20 citizens were granted permission to speak due to time constraints, despite 80 requests), a majority of Council first voted to have the state constitution govern all future charter amendment initiatives.

By the end of the night, the Council majority decided not to refer any measures directly to the ballot. They will hold OMOC and Save South Boulder to the state guidelines, requiring 8,096 signatures by July 30 and Aug. 5, respectively. However, this means that BAFP’s deadline passed on June 21 and now have no way to get their measure on the ballot — unless, Weaver explains, someone on Council changes their mind and another vote to refer the initiative is requested.

• • • • City Council has until Sept. 1 to decide on referring any measures to the ballot. While some argue that this is more a question of the democratic process than the content of the measures, others disagree.

Weaver, for one, believes it’s his duty as mayor to I

JULY 30, 2020

consider a measure’s content. “I am not compelled, personally, that it’s anti-democratic to not bend the rules and put something blindly on, which I don’t think will serve the community,” he says. “That’s not saying I’m not going to listen to what the intent of the initiatives are. It’s just that [amending] the charter with flawed measures is not something, or even opening the possibility of doing so, is just not serving the community in the long run. So I understand the short-term unhappiness. I sympathize with it.

You know, if I were in their shoes, I would be disappointed as well.”

Council member Yates agrees. At the July 21 meeting, he said it’s “not only our prerogative but our obligation” to consider a measure’s content before placing it on the ballot. Corroborated by an email Carr sent on July 14, Yates’ opinion of at least the BAFP measure is clear: when Emergency Family Assistance Association (EFAA) announced it was supporting BAFP, Yates leveraged his personal donations against the organization.

Council members Rachel Friend and Aaron Brockett, on the other hand, think the measures’ content should not be considered.

“Rather than trying to figure out exactly how we feel about the measures — are they measures that we fully support or love or hate? — let’s honor the process of direct democracy and put them directly on the ballot, like we would be required to do if the City had stood behind the guidance that had been given,” says Brockett, who was under the impression Carr would be defending the original Aug. 5 guidance until he read Carr’s hotline message.

Several of the campaigns have since called for Carr’s removal. As Save South Boulder wrote in an email to Council, “To rectify this situation, we respectfully request that Mr. Carr be removed from all duties pertaining to city election matters, effective immediately. He has shown that he cannot be trusted to do his job (or guide others) promptly and fairly. This is a failure of great significance for the citizens of Boulder that impacts our constitutionally guaranteed right to petition the government. We firmly believe that Boulder should no longer accept Mr. Carr’s authority in these matters.”

To date, Council has not publicly discussed any sort of reprimand for the confusion and mistakes stemming from Carr’s office. On July 21, BAFP publicly announced its intent to sue the City for the debacle. On July 29, the campaign delivered 7,500 handwritten signatures collected on paper petitions to the city clerk’s office. As of press time OMOC is planning on submitting 5,900 signatures before their deadline on July 30.

Regardless of what happens, thousands of citizens have signed the petitions, and a hundred more have deployed themselves collecting signatures around town. That’s a lot of footsteps around this city; it’s a long walk to direct democracy.

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BOULDER COUNTY’S INDEPENDENT VOICE

The most compelling issue in the world

Global Greengrants to be the perfect partner.

Independent of how I got to know Global Greengrants, one thing that has become very clear for me in the last few years is that above all, environmental justice and what’s happening to the degradation of the environment and the climate breakdown is for me the most compelling issue in the world. And everything else falls under it. Even social justice issues like gender equality do not have any meaning if the world is destroyed.

A conversation with Global Greengrants Fund’s new CEO and president, Laura Garcia

by Angela K. Evans

W

hen the COVID-19 crisis hit, it was just one more thing on Laura Garcia’s list of major life changes. Garcia moved from Mexico City to Boulder in early March as the new CEO and president of Global GreenGrants Fund (GGF), a non-profit supporting grassroots environmental activism on a global scale. Her first, and last day, in the Boulder headquarters was March 13, where she addressed how the organization would adapt to remote work and quickly canceled travel plans to connect with grantees around the world.

“It’s been definitely a different experience from my initial onboarding plan,” she says. “But because I [was already making] such a huge change, you know changing jobs, moving to another country and arriving here to a different culture, I feel like I had perhaps a little bandwidth for change.”

Similarly, she says, GGF grantees have quickly adapted their work to address issues raised by the pandemic.

Garcia recently spoke with Boulder Weekly about this and more. The interview has been edited for length and clarity.

HOW DID YOU BECOME CONNECTED WITH GGF? For the last 10 years, I was part of and led a fund in Mexico called Fondo Semillas (seeds in English) which provides women-led grassroots organizations working for gender equality with financing and capacity building.

And through that work, we had a program of pushing for women’s right to land property. In Mexico, and the rest of the world as well, even though women produce globally 80% of the food, only 5% of them hold a land title. It’s a huge gender equality issue. It’s connected also to genderbased violence. So anyway, we were working on that and indigenous leaders that we were supporting started asking us, “What’s the point of defending land rights if the whole territory is at risk?” So they started becoming environmental defenders themselves, and we started supporting them with that. And through that evolutionary process we started reaching out to other funders who specialized in environmental justice, and we found BOULDER COUNTY’S INDEPENDENT VOICE

Basically, by customary or indigenous law, communities are led by these committees held by men. In very concrete terms, women’s lack of rights in political participation did a disservice to the possibility of having a stronger environmental movement in that locality.

So, to tackle and address this, we need to look at justice in an intersectional perspective where we advance on the different angles of injustice at the same time. I am committed to working to ensure that GreenGrants’ intersectionality perspective is deeper.

HOW IMPORTANT IS GRASSROOTS ACTIVISM IN THAT PURSUIT? Environmental destruction around the world COURTESY GGF seems like such an insurmountable problem at the macro level: government-to-government negotiations or negotiations around the international community through U.N. bodies and the conferences on climate change. But the problem is so connected to economic power and to the structures that hold governance around the world, that tackling the issue there has been very disappointing because very little change is seen, very little legal commitment is given.

Meanwhile, we have in parallel, local and alternative solutions that when you look at them, are the real stories of hope and change.

What we in Greengrants are very much committed to is making sure that people don’t see all of these different alternatives as small and useless examples, but on the contrary, grassroots movements are creating by far the most useful ENVIRONMENTAL JUSTICE EXISTS AT SUCH AN examples of systems change that we can see in the INTERSECTION OF DIFFERENT ISSUES. WHY IS IT world.

IMPORTANT TO LOOK AT IT HOLISTICALLY LIKE THAT? HOW ARE GGF GRANTEES RESPONDING The systems of oppression and discrimination TO THE PANDEMIC? in the world work to reinforce themselves, and When the COVID crisis hit, what we have societies have created these systems of oppression been seeing is that they haven’t shifted their with the purpose of amassing power and excluding understanding of the social problems and social others. The system that provokes gender inequalijustice issues that they address, but that they ty, supports environmental degradation to continue incorporate the COVID crisis as part of the same happening and to continue favoring environmental problem. And they start addressing it with specific degradation is the result of a system that economi- actions, but that are not completely unrelated to cally favors white men in the world, and amassing the work that they already do. power and economic power is very much hand in For example, we have a group in Kenya, who’s hand with patriarchy, as well as white power. addressing waste management by looking into To give you a more concrete example, because mask disposal alternatives. There are also lots of I know that I’m speaking about it in a very people in the slums that are just merely washing abstract sense: In my years working in Mexico, disposed masks with water, not even detergent or what we saw is the very same women that were soap, and are reselling them again, so this creates fighting for land rights started to defend the further risks. But this is a group that has been prewhole territory against extractive industries. But viously working with waste disposal systems. So, these women were not allowed to participate in in a way, these COVID responses are being adaptlocal decision-making bodies that are set up in ed to strategies that are very much interlinked rural areas in Mexico, called comités ejidales. with one another.

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BOBBY COCHRAN

Y’all got it wrong

Tradition and progress collide in Charley Crockett’s country blues

by Angela K. Evans

A

s Charley Crockett drove out of the depths of Death Valley into a field of Joshua trees, the snow began to swirl. He had just finished a tour in Arizona, sent his bus back to Texas, and rented a car, taking the back roads as he headed West. Moving into the high desert, the storm broke, revealing the unruly peaks of the Eastern Sierra. Whitney Portal stood before him, reaching its jagged and rocky edges heavenward, or at least toward the summit of Mount Whitney, the highest point in the lower 48.

“I had a vision right then and there that I needed to do something,” the country-blues musician from South Texas says months later, after he had already turned that vision into his latest record, Welcome to Hard Times.

“I had this viewpoint of this drifter kind of appearing in those Joshua trees with those snow-capped High Sierra in the background on this journey,” he says. “And that’s where the idea was born.”

The scene spoke to Crockett of transcendence, of a journey not bound by the starkness of good and evil, but full of nuance, complexity, conflict and resolution. It reminded Crockett of spaghetti westerns popularized in the 1960s — raw, gritty, often recalcitrant, heroes facing the rugged frontier juxtaposed to classic western films with “squeaky clean characters” facing off with “obvious bad men.”

“One of the interesting things about the emergence of those kind of flawed characters [in spaghetti westerns], is that they were more complex, which become more relatable to the people watching it, because life puts you in certain circumstances, and you never know what’s going to happen,” Crockett says.

Welcome to Hard Times is as much Crockett’s own story, as any dreamt up character, his own life melding with the drifter in his mind’s eye.

“I’m not saying I’ve got it the worst of anybody, but I’ve had a hard go in my life,” Crockett says in his Texan drawl. “But that’s how I ended up being a performer.”

A distant relative of folk hero Davy Crockett, Charley was born in San Benito, a tiny outpost in the Rio Grande Valley, 14

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where he grew up in a trailer outside of ON THE BILL: ‘Welcome to town. Raised by a single mother, while also Hard Times,’ spending time with an uncle in Louisiana, available July Crockett acknowledges “some ethnic diver31 via Son of sity” in his lineage but focuses more on the Davy Records. experiences and cultures he was exposed to in his early life for shaping who he is today. That and the guitar his momma gave him at 17.

Unequivocally, music saved his life.

“There’s no doubt about it,” he says. “I was totally lost.

Statistically, everything you can find out about me and my life and what’s happened in my life, would lead to incarceration and addiction, all kinds of things. What I grew up around and people who come from my circumstances ... the expression that I found through music definitely saved me from all that.”

Also gifted with a “strong moral compass,” Crockett left Texas after high school to “hobo around and stuff.” He traveled the country, hitchhiking, freighthopping, sleeping in parks, relying on the kindness of strangers. He worked on farms and played music on the streets to get by, everywhere from New Orleans to New York to California. Along the way, he was introduced to all sorts of music and musicians, taking the outlaw country and conjuto music of West Texas and fusing it with gospel, blues, R&B, even a little hip-hop and rap thrown in. Ever the incessant traveler, it’s not unusual for Crockett to play more than 200 shows a year (barring 2020 of course.)

For Crockett, music is about wrestling through conflict — internal or external — and coming out on the other side, finding resolution in the process. It’s what keeps him rooted in country music, even as he incorporates other influences into his sound.

“There’s something impressive or something I like about how conflict can be communicated and struggled through the major key,” he says. “That’s what I love about country music is the haunting emotion that can come through music and written see CROCKETT Page 15

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BOULDER COUNTY’S INDEPENDENT VOICE

Heavy Rotation

D

ocumenting Charley Crockett’s influences is like a history lesson in mid-20th century music. From the pioneer of electric blues to swamp pop to one of the precursors of hip-hop, Crockett digs deep into the American catalogue to find his own kind of country. Listen to the full playlist on Boulder Weekly’s Spotify.

Texas in its heyday in the 1950s and ’60s, with regional hits like this one from Johnnie Allan — a midtempo lovelorn ballad with a steady drumbeat, rocking piano melody and bluesy horns.

“WASTED DAYS AND WASTED NIGHTS,” FREDDY FENDER

“WEST SIDE BABY,” T-BONE WALKER

Rooted in traditional South Texas Tejano and conjunto, while blending blues, rock ‘n’ roll and country, Fender is somewhat of a hometown hero for Crockett. Also from San Benito, Fender became a national star with the re-release of this single in 1975, which Crockett covered on his second record, In the Night. “I found my voice singing my kind of country music, just like Freddy Fender did,” Crockett recently wrote in Texas Monthly.

“LONELY DAYS, LONELY NIGHTS,” JOHNNIE ALLAN

Combining traditional Cajun folk, black Creole zydeco, honky-tonk country and New Orleans R&B, “swamp pop” originated in the Acadiana region of southern Louisiana. The sound quickly traveled into southeastern

When Crockett discovered T-Bone Walker’s music on the streets of New York City, it was revelation. “I realized there was this Dallas blues sound I had naturally been finding, and it seemed like the farther from home I got the more I was finding that sound,” he told Garden & Gun in 2019. Also from rural Texas, T-Bone Walker made a name for himself in the early blues scene as an innovator of electric guitar. His agile guitar riffs are prominently featured in this single from 1948.

“TRUE BLUES,” THE LAST POETS

Also while living in New York (performing with spoken word and rap group Train Robbers on the subway) Crockett was introduced to Abiodune Oyewole, who got his start with The Last Poets, an amalgamation of poets and musicians that arose out of the black nationalist movement of the 1960s and are seen as early influencers of modern hip-hop. By

the time Crockett began going to his house for Sunday night dinners in Harlem, Oyewole was a Columbia professor and his philosophy left a lasting impression on the country singer. “He said that all his poetry had come as resolution to the conflict,” Crockett says. “He was the first place that anybody had ever vocalized that, in a way that resonated with me. And I immediately realized that I was coming from that place too and writing in that way.”

“STOP THE WORLD AND LET ME OFF,” WAYLON JENNINGS

“Everybody loves to praise the old school sound, but they really know nothing about it,” Crockett says, particularly the careers of pioneering outlaw country stars, like fellow Texan Waylon Jennings.

Popularized in the 1970s, outlaw country originated to combat the commercial grasps of Nashville’s over-produced and polished country persona. Jennings came to define the subgenre, with his gritty country soul, but its the hard work he put in during the preceding decade that most inspires Crockett, typified by this 1966 single.

CROCKETT from Page 14

in the popular major key.”

Crockett’s music harkens back to the country music of yesteryear, the storytelling, the deep baritone, the quick-tempoed guitar chords set to steady snare beats. There’s a certain nostalgia to Crockett’s sound, but he’s not stuck in the past.

“I think [most people] would like to call me a preservationist or traditionalist,” Crockett says. “It’s very important for me on this album to show that no no, y’all got that wrong. I’m not just a preservationist. I’m going to bring tradition upfront and I’m going to do it in a way that you’ve never seen before, because it’s less about what I’m saying. It’s how I’m doing it. And I just think so often the folks that shake stuff up are [building on] the tradition that people have forgotten about.”

Welcome to Hard Times is Crockett’s eighth studio album since 2015, a few released as his honky-tonk alter ego Lil G.L. Some might call Crockett prolific, but that’s nothing compared to some of his heroes in country, blues and soul — folks who recorded more than 50 records in their career, he says. (For more on Crockett’s musical influences, see Heavy Rotation.)

The album was born out of a desire to make “a haunting, Gothic, dark, ’60s country record,” with producer Mark Neill, and created with a sense of urgency, he says, even more so after undergoing open heart surgery in early 2019 BOULDER COUNTY’S INDEPENDENT VOICE

to fix a congenital heart condition called Wolf Parkinson’s White. Written last fall and recorded in February, it turns out the album is rather prescient for the current moment.

Releasing it in the middle of a global pandemic wasn’t even a question.

“It’s like, parting the Red Sea, running through there, and then looking behind ya and it’s gone. And that’s how I felt. I couldn’t imagine sitting back and doing nothing and hoping for better days to put the record out,” he says. “Traveling entertainers and artists like myself, we tend to see society for what it is if we’re not completely blind. And so a lot of the things that I’m writing about that might be connected with people this year, they were happening last year, too.”

Not one to shut out viewpoints that don’t match his own, Crockett’s music crosses genres, as well as socioeconomic and racial boundaries, he says. It’s born out of an independent worldview nurtured by playing the hand he was dealt.

“For better or worse, I’ve dealt with a lot of negative circumstances in my life that I was able to cultivate into experience and wisdom,” he says. “In my own life, forces greater than myself led me down certain rivers, and I like the idea of swimming upstream, but you can’t swim up some currents and you gotta go where the river takes you.”

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JULY 30, 2020

Adam Sloat Broker/Owner

Your Boulder Real Estate Expert and Music Guy

Q&A SELLER ADVICE FROM A LOCAL HOME INSPECTOR, MY GO-TO GUY CHUCK Question: Chuck, what advice would you give sellers before listing their home to ensure buyer inspections are boring and without any red flags?

Answer: There is probably something in your home that you know isn’t operating perfectly.

Whatever the item is in your home that you have to fuss with, get a qualified professional to service it or repair it and leave those service reports out for the inspection. I.e. a glass company for your windows or a HVAC professional to service your systems. – Chuck Bohall, A-Pro Home Inspections

720-466-8212 adam@adamsloat.com www.westwaterrealty.com I

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What to do when there’s ‘nothing’ to do...

VIRTUAL EVENTS

n LONGMONT MUSEUM VIRTUAL SUMMER CONCERT: QUEMONDO.

7:30 p.m. Thursday, July 30 via Facebook, longmontmuseum.org.

Enjoy free, live tunes in the comfort of your own home, backyard or wherever you have access to Facebook. The Longmont Museum is livestreaming concerts from Stewart Auditorium direct to your phone or computer. Known as one of Colorado’s hottest salsa bands, Quemonda brings infectious live energy to each show, playing music by traditional and contemporary artists, including Celia Cruz, Marc Anthony and Gloria Estefan. This 10-piece combines the style of salsa music with the classic pop of legends like Frank Sinatra and The Beatles.

Visit the museum’s Facebook page at 7:30 p.m. on the night of the concerts and click on “videos” to join.

n CHRISTINE BUCKLEY IN CONVERSATION WITH BRIGITTE MARS

COURTESY OF THE ARTIST

BY BOULDER WEEKLY STAFF

If your organization is planning an event of any kind, please email Caitlin at crockett@boulderweekly.com.

5 p.m. Thursday, July 30 via Zoom, boulderbookstore.net.

Community herbalist Christine Buckley, author of Plant Magic: Herbalism in Real Life, will join her former neighbor and Boulder herbalist, Brigitte Mars, on Thursday, July 30 for a conversation about the easily accessible, common plants found in our public parks, yards and between the cracks in the sidewalk — many of them weeds. Common medicinal plants are the secret ingredient in crafting simple and delicious botanical therapies at home to care for ourselves and our communities. Tickets for this event are $5 (plus a small convenience fee) and are available on Eventbrite.

COURTESY FIREHOUSE ART CENTER

n ARTWALK LONGMONT.

Saturdays through Sept. 12, firehouseart.org/artwalk-longmont.

ArtWalk is back and ready to give you and your family something fun and socially distant to do on Saturdays through Sept. 12 (in person... nothing virtual about it). With a unanimous blessing from City Council, Downtown Longmont was able to enlarge outdoor areas and pedestrian spaces on Main Street to grow outdoor dining and shopping areas for more safety during ArtWalk.

Firehouse Art Center will offer creative activities (for kids and adults), both as entertainment and as art-making opportunities, during scheduled times on the weekend. Enjoy outdoor music and artist booths on the upcoming ArtWalk on Aug. 1, from 5-8 p.m.

Please follow safety regulations, wear masks and practice social distancing throughout the event.

see EVENTS Page 18

BOULDER COUNTY’S INDEPENDENT VOICE

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n SHOES & BREWS, SKECHERS PERFORMANCE, AND OSKAR BLUES BREWING PRESENT: THE SIXTH EDITION OF THE COLLABEERATION 5K & BREW FEST

Virtual Edition, Aug. 1-2, facebook.com/events/shoesbrews/6th-edition-collabeeration-5kvirtual-edition/956359808136227.

The sixth annual CollaBEERation 5K and Brew Fest is a little different this year. The race course has been set-up and marked for mileage by the Shoes & Brews crew for you to hit whenever it works for you, or blaze your own 5K on your favorite trail or right out your front door. There’ll be prizes for Sweatiest Selfie, Most Epic Run Course, Best DIY Finish Line, Best After-Race at Home Party, Earliest Riser and more. Packet pickup at Shoes & Brews is open through Aug. 1, and your race entry includes a race-customized run hat, race bib, race patch, and a swag bag filled with goodies from S&B and other partners. You’ll also receive special discounts during the weekend at Shoes & Brews, including sales and full priced items.

n BOULDER VIRTUAL ARTIST CRITIQUE.

11 a.m. Saturday, Aug. 1 via Zoom, bit.ly/3jvHlKq. Broadcasting live from R Gallery in Boulder, Rick Dallago and Ed Narvaez host a virtual artist critique each Saturday at 11 a.m. The works of five local artists are chosen for critique by fellow artists via Zoom. All are welcome to submit work, participate and converse with each artist about process, technique, sources, inspiration, marketing, etc. Critiques will be positive, respectful and constructive. All forms of expression are welcome: painting, photography, dance, music, sculpture, quilting, acting and storytelling. After registering, you will receive a confirmation email with information on how to join the meeting and how to submit work for critique.

ART

EVENTS from Page 17

NAROPA UNIVERSITY ART GALLERIES VIRTUAL EXHIBITION: ‘THE MORE THINGS CHANGE, THE MORE THEY STAY THE SAME,’ BY MICHAEL DIXON. Through Aug. 6, bit.ly/2WMwMJ1.

MICHAEL DIXON’S Michael Dixon is an artist working primarily with oil paint.

PAINTING ‘I’M A Born in San Diego, California, Dixon received his MFA BLACK MAN IN A from the University of Colorado Boulder in painting, and a WHITE WORLD.’ PHOTO BY ANDREW BFA from Arizona State University in painting and drawing.

WILLOUGHBY. Dixon is currently a professor of art at Albion College. In a statement about the Naropa exhibit, Dixon writes: “As a biracial American, I have often felt out of place, excluded, and alone in majority white spaces. In black spaces, I have also felt different. What I have experienced is that I do not neatly fit into white culture or black culture but rather rest in the middle. I have conceptualized this unique ‘in between’ space based upon my experiences and the conversations I have had with other biracial people over the years. Exploring this ‘in between’ space has been the major focus of my creative work.” You can virtually meet the artist on Aug. 28 at 6 p.m.: naropa.zoom.us/j/94076148020

n FUNDRAISER FOR NAACP BOULDER COUNTY.

Sunday, Aug. 2-Monday, Aug. 3, bit. ly/32OnBvN. Starting Aug. 2, CU-Boulder students Joshua Harmon and Bradley Hansen will walk from the Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Memorial in City Park, Denver, to Fort Carson, Colorado Springs, for a total distance of 84.6 miles to represent the 8 minutes 46 seconds George Floyd spent pinned down before he succumbed. Join Harmon and Hansen in their mission to raise racial awareness, honor the countless victims of racism and demand justice for the wrong-doings against the black community through the Step Forward Strive Forward fundraiser event. Your donation will directly benefit the Boulder County Branch of the NAACP (National Association for the Advancement of Colored People). For more information, contact Joshua Harmon: 720-357-4344 or jharmon2019@gmail.com.

NORMAN ROCKWELL: IMAGINING FREEDOM. Denver Art Museum, 100 W. 14th Ave. Parkway, Denver, Hamilton Level 2, through Sept. 7.

In the 1940s, Franklin D. Roosevelt’s administration developed the Four Freedoms — Freedom of Speech, Freedom of Worship, Freedom from Want and Freedom from Fear — to persuade Americans to support the war effort. Norman Rockwell, a renowned illustrator, was among the artists who took on the challenge to communicate visually the notions of freedom in support of the war efforts. The results were Rockwell’s popular Four Freedoms illustrations that depicted everyday community and domestic life that helped Americans rally for the defense of public freedom.

NORMAN ROCKWELL (1894-1978), ‘THE PROBLEM WE ALL LIVE WITH,’ 1963.

OIL ON CANVAS, 36” X 58”. ILLUSTRATION FOR LOOK, JANUARY 14, 1964.

COLLECTION OF NORMAN ROCKWELL MUSEUM.

see EVENTS Page 20

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BOULDER COUNTY’S INDEPENDENT VOICE

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JULY 30, 2020

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EVENTS from Page 18

HOME VIEWING Olivia de Havilland

by Michael J. Casey

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JULY 30, 2020

Walking through life with you, ma’am, has been a very gracious thing.

—They Died With Their Boots On

L

ike all great Hollywood stars, her story starts nowhere near the City of Angels. She was born Olivia Mary de Havilland on July 1, 1916, in Tokyo, Japan, to English parents: professor Walter de Havilland and actress Lilian Fontaine. One year later, sister Joan Fontaine followed. Years later, the two would feud publicly, but not until both had made their way to Hollywood, stole the hearts of the moviegoing public and won Oscars. Fontaine won one (for Suspicion, making her the only actor directed by Alfred Hitchcock to win the award), and de Havilland won two. But Fontaine won hers first. Fontaine also got married first, divorced first and died first. Such is the stuff of Hollywood rivalry.

Now de Havilland joins her sister once more: On July 25, 2020, de Havilland died in her Paris home from natural causes. She was 104.

Unlike sister Fontaine, de Havilland didn’t play her sexuality as slight. She was gorgeous, yes, but her defining characteristic was her “strong jawline,” as Roland Culver tells her in To Each His Own. It wasn’t just her jawline that was strong; it was the whole package. Jack Warner found that out first-hand when he tried to string her contract along. She sued him, sacrificing two viable years of work in the process, and won — setting a massive precedent in the endless struggle between actor and studio. Years later, Bette Davis remarked, “Every actor in the business owes a debt of gratitude to Olivia de Havilland for taking us out of bondage.”

From her first days on the stage at the age of 17 to her retirement five decades later, de Havilland was never far from the spotlight. She will always be remembered as Melanie Hamilton in 1939’s Gone With the Wind, perfectly poised and decidedly tough: Hollywood’s romantic notion of the antebellum belle.

The shadow of Wind looms large, but de Havilland is much more than Melanie Hamilton. She made eight pictures with Errol Flynn, the best of the bunch being the Technicolor-coated swashbuckler, The Adventures of Robin Hood. Few movies are this playful, and when de Havilland’s Maid Marian and Flynn’s Hood first meet, the frame crackles with electricity. She is radiant; he is dashing. It’s like a dream, only better.

In 1946 she starred in the wartime melodrama To Each His Own and won her first Oscar. The script, penned by Charles Brackett and Jacques Théry, is as twisty as a noir-soaked murder mystery, and de Havilland navigates every curve and contour with grace, command and heartbreaking poise. It’s spectacular, but somehow it’s been forgotten. A pity; movies this good deserve a legacy.

You can stream To Each His Own on NBC/Universal’s new service, Peacock.

The Adventures of Robin Hood and Gone With the Wind you’ll find on HBO Max. And all three will be screened on August 23, on TCM, when the channel pays tribute to the star with a slate of 11 films, including her turn as the homely — or as homely as de Havilland could get — spinster, Catherine Sloper, navigating a harsh world full of harsh men in 1949’s The Heiress. It’s a stunning performance, maybe her best, and it netted her a second Oscar.

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BOULDER COUNTY’S INDEPENDENT VOICE

of your life story so that you can be fully open to new possibilities that could become available.

BY ROB BREZSNY ARIES

MARCH 21-APRIL 19: Aries poet Lawrence

Ferlinghetti is renowned for his buoyancy. In one of his famous lines, he wrote, “I am awaiting, perpetually and forever, a renaissance of wonder.” Here’s what I have to say in response to that thought: Your assignment, as an Aries, is not to sit there and wait, perpetually and forever, for a renaissance of wonder. Rather, it’s your job to embody and actualize and express, perpetually and forever, a renaissance of wonder. The coming weeks will be an especially favorable time for you to rise to new heights in fulfilling this aspect of your life-long assignment.

TAURUS

APRIL 20-MAY 20: I live in Northern California on

land that once belonged to the indigenous Coast Miwok people. They were animists who believed that soul and sentience animate all animals and plants as well as rocks, rivers, mountains — everything, really.

Their food came from hunting and gathering, and they lived in small bands without centralized political authority. According to one of their creation stories, Coyote and Silver Fox made the world by singing and dancing it into existence. Now I invite you to do what I just illustrated: Find out about and celebrate the history of the people and the place where you live. From an astrological perspective, it’s a favorable time to get in touch with roots and foundations.

GEMINI

MAY 21-JUNE 20: “When I look down, I miss all

the good stuff, and when I look up, I just trip over things,” says singer-songwriter Ani DiFranco. I wonder if she has tried an alternate approach: looking straight ahead. That’s what I advise for you in the coming weeks, Gemini. In other words, adopt a perspective that will enable you to detect regular glimpses of what’s above you and what’s below you — as well as what’s in front of you. In fact, I suggest you avoid all extremes that might distract you from the big picture.

The truth will be most available to you if you occupy the middle ground.

CANCER

JUNE 21-JULY 22: The Italian word nottivago

refers to “night roamers”: people who wander around after dark. Why do they do it? What do they want to accomplish? Maybe their ramblings have the effect of dissolving stuck thoughts that have been plaguing them. Maybe it’s a healing relief to indulge in the luxury of having nowhere in particular to go and nothing in particular to do: to declare their independence from the obsessive drive to get things done.

Meandering after sundown may stir up a sense of wild freedom that inspires them to outflank or outgrow their problems. I bring these possibilities to your attention, Cancerian, because the coming days will be an excellent time to try them out.

LEO

JULY 23-AUG. 22: “Notice what no one else notices

and you’ll know what no one else knows,” says actor Tim Robbins. That’s perfect counsel for you right now, Leo. According to my analysis of the astrological omens, your perceptiveness will be at a peak in the coming weeks. You’ll have an ability to discern half-hidden truths that are invisible to everyone else.

You’ll be aggressive in scoping out what most people don’t even want to become aware of. Take advantage of your temporary superpower! Use it to get a lucid grasp of the big picture — and cultivate a more intelligent approach than those who are focused on the small picture and the comfortable delusions.

VIRGO

AUG. 23-SEPT. 22: “Look on every exit as being

an entrance somewhere else,” wrote playwright Tom Stoppard. That’s ripe advice for you to meditate on during the coming weeks. You’re in a phase of your astrological cycle when every exit can indeed be an entrance somewhere else — but only if you believe in that possibility and are alert for it. So please dissolve your current assumptions about the current chapter

BOULDER COUNTY’S INDEPENDENT VOICE

LIBRA

SEPT. 23-OCT. 22: “One must think with

the body and the soul or not think at all,” wrote Libran author and historian Hannah Arendt. She implied that thinking only with the head may spawn monsters and demons. Mere conceptualization is arid and sterile if not interwoven with the wisdom of the soul and the body’s earthy intuitions. Ideas that are untempered by feelings and physical awareness can produce poor maps of reality. In accordance with astrological omens, I ask you to meditate on these empowering suggestions. Make sure that as you seek to understand what’s going on, you draw on all your different kinds of intelligence.

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SCORPIO

OCT. 23-NOV. 21: “I always wanted to be commander-in-

chief of my one-woman army,” says singer-songwriter Ani DiFranco. I think that goal is within sight for you, Scorpio. Your power over yourself has been increasing lately. Your ability to manage your own moods and create your own sweet spots and define your own fate is as robust as I have seen it in a while. What do you plan to do with your enhanced dominion? What special feats might you attempt? Are there any previously impossible accomplishments that may now be possible?

SAGITTARIUS

NOV. 22-DEC. 21: Your meditation for the coming weeks

comes to you courtesy of author and naturalist Henry David Thoreau. “We can never have enough of nature,” he wrote. “We must be refreshed by the sight of inexhaustible vigor, vast and titanic features, the sea-coast with its wrecks, the wilderness with its living and its decaying trees, the thunder cloud, and the rain which lasts three weeks and produces freshets. We need to witness our own limits transgressed, and some life pasturing freely where we never wander.” Oh, how I hope you will heed Thoreau’s counsel, Sagittarius.

You would really benefit from an extended healing session amidst natural wonders. Give yourself the deep pleasure of exploring what wildness means to you.

CAPRICORN

DEC. 22-JAN. 19: Author and activist bell hooks (who

doesn’t capitalize her name) has taught classes at numerous American universities. She sometimes writes about her experiences there, as in the following passage. “My students tell me, ‘we don’t want to love! We’re tired of being loving!’ And I say to them, if you’re tired of being loving, then you haven’t really been loving, because when you are loving you have more strength.” I wanted you to know her thoughts, Capricorn, because I think you’re in a favorable position to demonstrate how correct she is: to dramatically boost your own strength through the invigorating power of your love.

AQUARIUS

JAN. 20-FEB. 18: Aquarian author Langston Hughes

(1902-1967) was a pioneering and prolific African American author and activist who wrote in four different genres and was influential in boosting other black writers. One of his big breaks as a young man came when he was working as a waiter at a banquet featuring the famous poet Vachel Lindsay. Hughes managed to leave three of his poems on Lindsay’s table.

The great poet loved them and later lent his clout to boosting Hughes’ career. I suspect you might have an opening like that sometime soon, Aquarius — even if it won’t be quite as literal and hands-on. Be ready to take advantage. Cultivate every connection that may become available.

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PISCES

FEB. 19-MARCH 20: Author Faith Baldwin has renounced

the “forgive and forget” policy. She writes, “I think one should forgive and remember. If you forgive and forget, you’re just driving what you remember into the subconscious; it stays there and festers. But to look upon what you remember and know you’ve forgiven is achievement.” That’s the approach I recommend for you right now, Pisces. Get the relief you need, yes: Forgive those who have trespassed against you. But also: Hold fast to the lessons you learned through those people so you won’t repeat them again later.

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Keep calm and carry cake Wartime with Alice in ‘Summerland’

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rank (Lucas Bond) has come to Summerland. Sort ON THE BILL: ‘Summerland,’ of: Under normal conditions, he’d be living in available on video London, but it’s World War II, and the blitz is on. His demand July 31. father is an RAF pilot, and his mother works for the ministry. Bomb sirens sound throughout the night, and the city is no place for a child. So, he’s shipped off to live with Alice (Gemma Arterton), a reclusive spinster living in a cluttered cottage near the white cliffs of Dover. Not a bad place to wait out a war, if only Alice were a bit more welcoming. We must all do our part, a neighbor assures her. If looks could kill, Alice would have considerably fewer neighbors.

Alice isn’t interested in her part. She’s interested in her cottage, her work and maybe, if the mood strikes her, inflicting a little displeasure on those around her — like taking chocolate from a child.

That scene — the indulgent smile on Alice’s face as she takes a long, satisfying drag of her cigarette while a young girl cries off-camera — tells you everything you need to know about Alice. Mary Poppins, she is not.

She’s a writer, one who specializes in Celtic myths. And not just to recount them — that’s a bunch of hokum, she tells Frank — but to find their origins in the real world. As Alice recounts, people must have seen something to inspire the myth: “Stories have to come from somewhere.”

Frank has stories. And he has curiosity, enough to find himself enchanted by the brusque Alice. When the two go looking for a Fata Morgana, a mirage, Frank sees “Dover castle! A turret with a green flag!” Dover castle doesn’t fly flags, Alice snaps, abandoning her grade school companion on the grassy knoll. But on the drive home, she spies a castle flying a green flag from its turret. Stories have to come from somewhere.

Written and directed by Jessica Swale, Summerland has a touch of wonder with a tinge of loss. It’s a breezy affair, runs a little over 90 minutes but feels nothing like it.

That’s all due to Arterton, an actress who seems right at home in period films. Bond is good too but displays limitations when the story asks too much of him. Frankly, it’s surprising Swale doesn’t ask more of him, but one of the movie’s tricks is how it sidesteps ancillary scenes for flashbacks with Alice’s romantic relationship with Vera (Gugu Mbatha-Raw). Once those threads intertwine, it becomes apparent how enjoyable Summerland truly is.

Summerland is light, airy and sweet. It’s the angel food cake of cinema: You may not crave it, but you always enjoy it when it’s on the table. And though the movie’s framing device injects saccharine sentimentality in the last three minutes, it’s not enough to distract from the rest: An easygoing hour and a half in an enchanting cottage near the white cliffs of Dover.

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BOULDER COUNTY’S INDEPENDENT VOICE

Authentic NYC BAGELS in Colorado

BY DAN SAVAGE Dear Dan: I’m a 20-something more-orless lesbian in an East Coast city. I’m primarily into women, and I’m only interested in relationships with women, but I’m sometimes attracted to men and have enjoyed sex with men in the past. For various reasons, I decided a few years ago not to pursue physical stuff with men anymore and I publicly identify as a lesbian. This worked great pre-pandemic, but now, with a tiny social bubble and no dating prospects, I find myself feeling very attracted to a male friend/coworker. He’s 30-something, single, straight, and we’ve hung out a few times since COVID (only outside, and while socially distanced). As far as work goes, neither of us has a management role, we’re in different departments, and we rarely interact professionally. So, hypothetically, the coworker part wouldn’t be an ethical issue if we were to get involved.

I have a feeling he’d be down for a casual pandemic thing… although it’s possible I could be projecting. But I have no idea how to broach this subject. He’s a respectful person and we work for a very progressive organization, so he’s not going to flirt with me since I identify as gay. I don’t know how to bring up in casual conversation that I sometimes like sleeping with men, Dan, and my usual approach to flirting involves a lot of casual physical contact, which obviously isn’t possible right now. What should I do? Should I just let this go? Even though we don’t work closely together, there’s obviously the potential for professional issues if feelings got hurt, and celibacy is obviously a responsible option during this pandemic. But COVID-19 lockdowns and restrictions are going to continue and he and I seem well enough suited to keep each other company. I was single and celibate for a while before the pandemic and am feeling desperate to touch another human being. If it’s not a terrible idea, how do I flirt with him without endangering public health, messing up our friendship, or making our work situation incredibly awkward in the event that he’s not into me?

—Craving Organic Viable Earthly Touching

Dear COVET: There’s no way to ensure that a sexual and/or romantic relationship with a coworker (or anyone else) won’t end badly — and a little awkwardness would be the least of your worries if this proposed arrangement ended badly. But if your relationships and breakups are generally dramafree, COVET, and if you’ve been friends with this guy long enough to know that his relationships and breakups have been mostly drama-free, I think you should tell him how BOULDER COUNTY’S INDEPENDENT VOICE

you’ve been feeling. Ask him if he’s interested in finding a COVID-19 sex buddy, as the Dutch call them, and if he is, tell him you would like to apply for the position.

While most couples meet online these days, COVET, roughly 10% of opposite-sex couples — which is what you two would be — still meet through work. And while you’re not interested in anything romantic or longterm, couples that meet through work remain the most likely to marry. Which means work relationships don’t always end in tears and/or pink slips and/or lawsuits.

(Although they do sometimes end in divorce.) People who find themselves attracted to coworkers need to be thoughtful about power dynamics, of course, and cognizant of company policies where workplace romance is concerned. And it sounds like you are being thoughtful and it doesn’t sound like either of you have power over each other and are unlikely to ever be in positions of power over each other.

And life is short and this pandemic is going to be long. So the next time you get together for some socially distanced socializing, COVET, open your mouth and tell this guy what you’ve been thinking. If he’s as liberal and progressive as you make him out to be, he’s no doubt aware that human sexuality is complicated and that while many of us can find a perfect fit among the most commonly understood set of labels, many of us pick a label that doesn’t fit perfectly because it comes closest to capturing some combo of our sexual and/or romantic interest and desires. Don’t think of this ask — don’t think of this disclosure — as walking anything back, COVET, but of expanding and complicating what he already knows about you. You remain homoromantic — you’re only interested in other women romantically — but you are sexually attracted to both men and women sexually. In other words, COVET, your heart is lesbian but your pussy is bi.

If he’s up for being your COVID-19 sex buddy, swear to each other that you’ll handle the inevitable end with grace and compassion. For while awkwardness can’t be avoided, COVET, stupid and unnecessary drama certainly can. And it’s been my experience that promising in advance to act like grownups ups the chances of everyone acting like grownups. Similarly, simply saying, “Well, this might get awkward,” in advance of awkwardness or, “This is awkward,” if things should get awkward reduces the strength and duration of awkwardness by at least half.

Send questions to mail@savagelove. net, follow Dan on Twitter @fakedansavage and visit ITMFA.org.

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BOULDER WEEKLY

BLACK CAT

SUPPORT THE SKOKANS

E

ric and Jill Skokan’s Black Cat team was preparing a dinner for guests on their farm and dining space north of Boulder on July 24 when life for the beloved local family changed forever.

Two of Eric and Jill’s sons had just pulled out of the property in their car when a dump truck crashed into them, and then into the family’s house. Their 17-year-old son, Kelsey, was killed; his brother suffered serious injuries.

Their home was wrecked.

It’s hard to reason why bad things happen to good people — and the Skokans are good people. Really good people. They have fed us, welcomed us into their dining spaces and on their farm. They’ve pushed the conversation on sustainable agriculture forward. And they’ve been exceptional ambassadors of not only the local food scene but of our Boulder County community.

On a personal note, Eric and Jill have been great friends to Boulder Weekly, always opening up their spaces for our writers and photographers, generously sharing their knowledge and time with us, even as they worked tirelessly to build their business into the local institution it is today.

Of course, many people feel that way about the Skokans — that their connection with them is personal. Which is why the community is rally-

THE SKOKAN FAMILY; Kelsey at far left.

ing to support this family.

A fundraiser (gofundme.com/f/black-catsupport-and-memorial-fund) has already eclipsed $220,000 in donations (as of July 29) to help the family rebuild their home and meet other financial needs. The Colorado Chautauqua has donated the use of a large cottage to house the extended Skokan family so they can grieve together. Local chefs have cooked meals for the family. Community mem-

bers have been calling and emailing with offers to pick crops, foster lambs that need to be bottle-fed, mend fence lines and work shifts at the farm stand and the Farmers Market.

You can help, too. Donate at the link above, visit the farm stand on Jay Road, stop by their booth at the Farmers Market, and just keep these good folks, and Kelsey, in your thoughts for a while.

2

1 n Drink this: Wibby Brewing’s Home Team Pilsner

n Eat this: Waterloo’s Hot Chicken Sandwich

Sporting the red, white and blue, Wibby Brewing’s Home Town Pilsner certainly drank deliciously over the Fourth of July. But just because the month’s coming to a close doesn’t mean you need to abandon the classic-leaning German pilsner loaded with Crystal hops and sweet, grainy malt. The nose is floral, kind of like fresh-cut grass with a hint of citrus. The flavor is predominantly cereal grains with a touch of nutmeg on the back. It’ll go great with a bag of peanuts and your sport of choice, but, for enhanced refreshment, crack one by the pool.

Here’s a really well done chicken sandwich.

The folks at Louisville’s Waterloo take a fat chicken breast, hand-bread it, fry it and coat it in vinegar-forward hot sauce. Placed on a toasted bun and topped with pickles, mayo and lettuce, it’s a no-frills, comfort-food gem.

The chicken is juicy, the spice is just right, the pickles perk up each bite and the mayo and lettuce cool it all down. Enjoy to-go or eat it there — downtown Louisville has done a fantastic job closing down Main Street and designing an outdoor dining space that you actually want to hang out in.

BOULDER WEEKLY

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JULY 30, 2020

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JULY 30, 2020

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BOULDER COUNTY’S INDEPENDENT VOICE

Keeping everyone happy

“We have a group of about 20 employees that work with us doing the mixed boxes,” Atkins says. “We’re a family business.”

Atkins started doing mixing packs for Breckenridge Brewery 15 years ago. His competitor at the time, Tim Roberts, was playing in the same sandbox — Roberts’ emphasis was cardboard — and they often found themselves calling on the same customers.

“We struck up a good relationship,” Atkins says with a chuckle. “I was buying from Tim at one point. He was buying with me. We, eventually, came together.”

Located at 11333 E. 55th Ave. in Denver, Atkins and Roberts formed 5280PKG in 2015, back when almost everyone 5280PKG was packaging in glass bottles.

Then, two years ago, the industry changed overnight.

“Across the whole country, everyone hit the switch and went from bottles to cans,” Atkins says. “That created, as you can imagine, a major headache for the can manufacturers, because they couldn’t produce fast enough. So there were some people who were left out of getting cans, and there’s still some people that are finding it very difficult to get cans.”

Especially since breweries that never before considered packaging beer have had little choice in hopes of supplementing the loss from on-premise sales — the increase in demand has exceeded aluminum can manufacture supplies, causing companies like Ball to explore new avenues in search of more raw materials.

In the meantime: “Our crews have been going strong, following all the guidelines, and just doing what we have to do to take care of our customers,” Atkins says. He loves working with the brewing industry — “It’s hard to meet an unhappy brewer.”

And if Atkins can keep the brewery owners happy, then the beer drinker will stay happy too.

Profiles in brew: Keith Atkins of 5280PKG

by Michael J. Casey

W

e take on everybody,” Keith Atkins, operations and logistics manager of 5280PKG says. “If a customer needs us to mix 50 cases ... no problem. We’ll bring ’em in and get ’em out.”

Atkins doesn’t brew beer or package it, but if you’ve ever picked up a mixed pack of beer from Upslope Brewing Company, Wibby Brewing, Finkel & Garf Brewing Co., or plenty more, then you’ve enjoyed his handiwork. His company is the one that takes the packaged beer from each brewery, breaks it down, parcels it out into the sampler packs, and sends it out for distribution to grocery and liquor stores. And 5280PKG does it fast. As Atkins puts it: “It comes in cold, goes back out cold.”

Atkins’ business is bumping. While the coronavirus pandemic has effectively cut onpremise consumption at bars and breweries off at the knees, it’s made an entire industry pivot overnight to packaging and distribution. That’s put 5280PKG in a unique position as it sells aluminum cans, glass bottles, boxes, trays and carriers (six- and four-packs) for breweries, soda and kombucha companies.

And though the pandemic’s reach has affected just about everyone and everything, beer has been hit in a particularly vulnerable spot. One of the brewing industry’s hallmarks revolves around brewers brewing myriad beers in hopes of engaging drinkers of all types. That’s where the sampler comes in, a bridge between at-home consumption and the brewery experience of trying four different beers. According to Atkins, 90% of every sampler box you see at the store is mixed by hand.

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On pot, the Dems can’t get past Joe Biden

By Paul Danish

P

olls routinely show that Democrats overwhelmingly favor legalizing marijuana, so you would think that the Dems would include a plank in their national platform calling for the legalization of pot at the federal level.

In your dreams.

On Monday, July 27, the Democratic Party’s platform committee rejected an amendment supporting legalization. The vote was 50 to 106, with three abstentions.

The decision was unsurprising. American political parties don’t like to embarrass their presidential candidates by putting stuff in their platforms that contradicts the candidate’s position on issues, or repudiates his most notable political achievements.

And the Democratic Party’s presidential candidate this year is Joe Biden, whose most lasting legislative achievement as a U.S. senator was sponsoring the crime bills, including the infamous 1994 crime bill that made the war on drugs the law of the land — and turned it into a war on black and Latino Americans.

And to this day he clings to his opposition to legalizing marijuana like a deplorable clings to her rifle and Bible.

So when it comes to the party platform, what Uncle Joe wants Uncle Joe gets. Here’s the plank on pot that the platform committee adopted after rejecting the amendment that would have put them on record supporting federal marijuana legalization: “Democrats will decriminalize marijuana use and reschedule it through executive action on the federal level. We will support legalization of medical marijuana, and believe states should be able to make their own decisions about recreational use. The Justice Department should not launch federal prosecutions of conduct that is legal at the state level. All past criminal convictions for cannabis use should be automatically expunged.

“Substance use disorders are diseases, not crimes,” the draft platform states. “Democrats believe no one

should be in prison solely because they use drugs. And rather than involving the criminal justice system, Democrats support increased use of drug courts, harm reduction interventions, and treatment diversion programs for those struggling with substance use disorders.”

The phrase, “Democrats believe no one should be in prison solely because they use drugs,” comes straight out of the talking points. And it’s pretty rich considering

The New Jersey measure to legalize recreational pot was put on the ballot by the state’s legislators after those worthies proved too chicken to pass it themselves. A poll taken in April by Monmouth University found 61% support. A survey done by DKC Analytics earlier this month found 68% support.

Mississippi voters will consider two medical marijuana legalization ballot questions. After an initiative to legalize medical marijuana for 20 specific conditions GAGE SKIDMORE was petitioned onto the state ballot, the legislature put a more restrictive competing measure of its own on the ballot, which would limit access to terminally ill patients.

South Dakota activists successfully petitioned separate recreational and medical legalization proposals onto the state’s ballot. South Dakotans will vote on both.

On July 1, Arizona activists submitted more than 420,000 signatures on a recreational marijuana legalization initiative petition. They needed 237,645 valid signatures to get on the ballot. As of this writing the signatures were still being checked. A poll taken in early June showed more than 65% support.

Supporters of a Montana recreational marijuana legalization initiative submitted over 52,000 sigthat millions of black and Latino Americans went to prison natures in support of a statutory initiative that would for drug crimes thanks to Biden. legalize recreational marijuana in Montana, and over • • • • 80,000 signatures in support of a constitutional initiative With Election Day fewer than 100 days away, here’s that would set the legal minimum age for purchasing, the state of play with marijuana ballot questions, accordconsuming or possessing marijuana at 21. They needed ing to a tour d’horizon by Sean Williams at The Motley 25,468 and 50,936, respectively.

Fool.

Nebraska supporters of a medical marijuana initiative Recreational and/or medical marijuana legalization submitted 182,000 signatures on July 2. They needed ballot questions will appear on the ballots in New Jersey, 121,669. A McLaughlin and Associates poll found 76% South Dakota and Mississippi. support.

Signatures on initiative petitions are being checked in And in Washington, D.C., where voters legalized Arizona, Montana and Nebraska, and all three are likely recreational pot possession but not sales in 2014, it to make it onto their state ballots as well. appears activists collected enough valid signatures to There’s an outside chance that Oklahomans will vote put a psychedelics decriminalization measure on the on some form of marijuana reform too.

November ballot.

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