LETTERS

actively encouraging educators to pick and choose which students to favor academically based solely on immutable characteristics. It actively seeks to prove Ibram X Kendi’s assertion that “the only remedy to past discrimination is present discrimination and the only remedy to present discrimination is future discrimination.”

When educators are forced to embrace this philosophy through board directive, racism becomes a moral imperative. It should be self evident that this blind push for equity is stumbling into a truly gruesome place.

I am deeply saddened by the stories some students have told me over the last several months. I wish I could o er my 50 years of wisdom to help them understand that the rise in racial issues isn’t because people are more racist, but because a spotlight has been forced upon immutable differences for the last two years under the DCSD equity policy. Continuing to divide us by those di erences as required by equity is the problem, not the solution. It is time for that policy

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• Letters should be exclusively submitted to Colorado Community Media and should not submitted to other outlets or previously posted on websites or social media. Submit- e Valle Seco Exchange follows a long-standing pattern. “Exchange facilitators,” people familiar with the land-acquisition wish lists of agencies, help private landowners buy lands the agencies want. e landowners then threaten to manage and develop those lands in ways that undermine their integrity. to die and to allow the content of our character to return to the core principles of human decency in DCSD.

880 acres of prime game-wintering habitat. But the trade mostly bene ts the landowners pushing the exchange.

Public lands for trade in the Valle Seco Exchange include river access, corridors considered for Wild and Scenic River designation, wetlands, sensitive species habitat, and signicant cultural sites.

Alarmingly, the Valle Seco exchange also includes more than 175 acres of a Colorado Roadless Area, a designation meant to block development of high-quality land. e exchange would allow a neighboring landowner to consolidate those 380 acres with his 3,000-plus acre ranch, opening the door to development.

Allyson Rydwell Parker

School board’s bad look

As Douglas County homeowners experience an increase in auto insurance, homeowner insurance, and now property tax increase, what impact to their insurance will Douglas County School District have after their settlement (through insurance) of the former superintendent? Is the political position of the school board worth the possible increase? Where does the money come from to pay for this insurance, Taxpayers!

I recognize that there is a need for an increase in funds to retain teachers and provide for a good education of our youth but is it good timing in light of already increases taxpayers are feeling. I would hate to see asking for an increase in MLO funds or capital money to fail again but do these political bias gures feel this is the right time. I realize politicians don’t use common sense and feel they are always right in making decisions for us but is asking for tax increase in November realistic?

Dave Usechek, Parker

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e Valle Seco proponents did this by closing formerly open gates and threatening to fence the 880 acres for a domestic elk farm and hunting lodge.

is is blackmail on the range.

While catering to these private interests, the agencies suppress public scrutiny by refusing to share land appraisals and other documents with the public until afterthe public process has closed — or too late in the process to make it meaningful.

e proponents and their consultants have ready access to these documents, yet the public, which owns the land, does not. In Valle Seco, appraisals were completed in August 2020, but they weren’t released to the public until December 2021, just a few weeks before the scheduled decision date for the exchange. Advocates managed to pry the appraisals out of the agency only after submitting multiple Freedom of Information Act requests and taking legal action.

In another deal, the Blue Valley Exchange, the BLM also withheld drafts of the management agreements until just before releasing the nal decision. is is hardly an open and fair public process. e federal government presents what are, in e ect, done deals. Development plans and appraisals are undisclosed and comment periods hindered. By prioritizing the proponents’ desires over public interests and process, the land management agencies abdicate their responsibilities. e result is that too many land trades are nothing less than a betrayal of the public trust as the public loses access to its land as well as the land itself.

Erica Rosenberg is a contributor to Writers on the Range, writersontherange.org, an independent nonpro t that works to spur lively conversation about Western issues. She is on the board of Colorado Wild Public Lands, a nonpro t in the town of Basalt that monitors land exchanges around the state.

BY ELLIS ARNOLD EARNOLD@COLORADOCOMMUNITYMEDIA.COM

At e Alley in downtown Littleton, you might nd a musician who’s so into the music, they’ll get up and dance on the bar.

When a local band surprises the crowd with a stellar performance that no one saw coming, “it just knocks people’s socks o ,” said Mary Riecks, e Alley’s bar manager and a Littleton-area native. e watering hole on Main Street doubles as a music venue that nds and helps grow local talent — and the shows are free. It’s one of the bars in the metro Denver suburbs that o ers a window into up-and-coming homegrown performers amid a music scene that one longtime bar owner says is growing.

“Twenty years ago when I opened up the bar, there were a few bars around that had live music,” said Doug Jacobsen, owner of Jake’s Roadhouse in Arvada.

Since then, he’s noticed that “all of these di erent bars” now o er space for shows, said Jacobsen, who has friends who perform at spots around metro Denver.

“ ere’s a lot of great musicians here,” Jacobsen said.

Here’s a look at places o the beaten path where you can catch some lesser known — and sometimes famous — music artists in person.

‘Something for everyone’ Wild Goose Saloon in Parker o ers a bit of a di erent environment: It’s a bar but also a large event venue. ey’re both longtime musicians themselves — they perform in a band called Lola Black, garnered play on the radio and toured around the country — and have played Fiddler’s Green Amphitheatre several times, Dellinger said. ey take their knowledge of the industry to running the Wild Goose, which was built around the concept of serving as a music venue and has a bigger stage, sound and lighting setup than most bars do, Dellinger said.

It aims to be “Colorado’s version of the Knitting Factory” — a unique, independent venue that hosts local and national artists, said Chris Dellinger, who serves as co-owner of Wild Goose Saloon with his wife.

It’s “kind of like every musician’s dream to own their own venue at some place and time, and we just ended up being able to pull it o ,” said Dellinger, who lives in Aurora.

After opening in July 2021, Wild Goose has hosted some large country artists and “some `80s artists that are still big,” Dellinger said. National pop-rock act American Authors is set to play there in late April.

“My motto always is, ‘If you don’t like the music one night, that’s OK — it’ll be completely di erent the next night or the next week,’” Dellinger said. “So we really try to have something for everyone here.”

His venue tries to get exposure for local talent by letting them open for national touring acts. For the audience, the typical admission cost for a national artist’s show at Wild Goose sits around $25 to $30, but local artists’ ticketed shows can cost as low as $10, and most of the local artists’ shows are free.

Dellinger and his wife have

“snuck in” a performance or two at Wild Goose, he said — they were set to play there in late April with the Texas Hippie Coalition, an American heavy metal band. Keeping classics alive

You might also see Jacobsen, a guitarist himself, playing with a band at Jake’s Roadhouse in the north metro area every now and then.

His bar started o ering live music “right away” after opening near the end of 2003. Sitting in east Arvada close to Denver and Westminster, the venue o ers mostly cover bands and blues, and on Wednesday nights, bluegrass is on tap. Sometimes, artists play original songs, but it’s rare, Jacobsen said.

“Our people come in to hang out, and most original bands don’t have four hours’ worth of original music,” Jacobsen said.

But playing covers at Jake’s Roadhouse is one way to get a new artist’s foot in the door in the local music scene.

“We have bands that come to us all the time that can’t get these other bars to give them a chance to play because they haven’t played anywhere before,” Jacobsen said. He added: “We’re not like that. I know a lot of musicians around town, and we will give a band a chance to play just on the word of a friend.”

He feels that live music is im-