Littleton Independent 081023

BEMIS WOMEN

Honoring strong family line P2

STORY ON PAGE 6

RULING: JUSTIFIED Officer cleared in fatal shooting P10

LITTLETON COUNCIL CANDIDATES

How to run in the election P17

VOICES: 16 | LIFE: 18 | CALENDAR: 21 LITTLETONINDEPENDENT.NET • A PUBLICATION OF COLORADO COMMUNITY MEDIA

CENTERS OF COMMUNITY

Public libraries have much more than books to check out.

Granddaughter of Edwin A. Bemis tells stories of the women in her family

BY NINA JOSS NJOSS@COLORADOCOMMUNITYMEDIA.COM

Edwin A. Bemis is a well-known historical gure in the Littleton community.

He is the namesake of Littleton’s public library and dedicated many of his years to the Littleton Independent, where he started as an apprentice at the age of 11 and later became its publisher. He helped create the Littleton Historical Society, the Littleton Museum and the Littleton planning commission, serving in many other leadership roles in the

city and state.

But he was not the only one in his family to accomplish greatness.

On Aug. 3, over 40 community members gathered in a meeting room at the Bemis Public Library to learn about the Bemis women — powerful ladies who made an impact on society, both in Littleton and beyond.

e event was hosted by Historic Littleton, Inc., a group dedicated to preserving the historical and architectural heritage of the greater Littleton area.

Maya Bemis DeBus, a granddaugh-

ter of Edwin A. Bemis, traveled from California to give the presentation. As a tour guide and historical society board member in her state, DeBus loves history and has spent years learning about her family’s stories.

“Every family has heroes. Every family has problems. Every family has shadows — and the Bemis family is no exception,” she said.

She walked the audience through generations of women, highlighting each stage with photographs, artifacts and stories.

The Bemis women

Elizabeth Granger Bemis, Edwin’s mother, rst moved to Colorado from Massachusetts in 1878, DeBus said. She was a musician, poet and a charter member of the Women’s Club.

After a few years in Littleton, her rst husband and her son both died. She returned to Massachusetts –which DeBus said was likely a brave journey for a woman in that era –married Fred Bemis, and convinced him to move to Littleton.

“If you’re the sixth of nine sons, you have to ght to nd your place in the world,” DeBus said of Fred. “I think that’s one of the reasons that they came here and that he really didn’t want to go back — besides the fact that Littleton is a wonderful, wonderful area.”

In Littleton, Elizabeth and Fred had Edwin, a son named Luther and a daughter named Ella. ey raised these children at the 1890 farmhouse that sits at the edge of Sterne Park. eir home is now owned by the City of Littleton, which leases it to Western Welcome Week to use as their business o ce.

Ella and Edwin opened a stationery and lm development shop on Main Street in Littleton in 1908. During this time, Ella hand painted ne china dishware, which was red in the shop and sold to customers.

After high school, Edwin married Katherine Prescott Bemis. She was widely known for her vocal talents and worked as the editor and manager of the Littleton Independent, a role in which the community recog-

nized her skill.

“ e Littleton Independent has always been a good newspaper,” DeBus read from a column written about the newspaper at the time of Edwin’s ownership. “It’s better now than ever since Katherine Prescott Bemis has taken charge as editor and manager.”

Debus’ mother was Elizabeth Bemis DeBus, the daughter of Katherine and Edwin. During her presentation, DeBus highlighted her mother’s successful career in radio news.

“ ey wanted her to do … children cooking and church (on the radio),” DeBus said. “And she said ‘No, no, no — I’m a news gal.’ And so that’s what she did.”

rough roles at several stations across the nation, she covered the 1940 Republican National Convention and had her own news analysis radio show.

DeBus then looked ahead at the current generations of Bemis women, who are carrying on the legacy of those who came before them. DeBus has relatives who are accomplished as a dance teacher, a travel agent, a physician assistant at the National Institute of Health and a PhD student in chemistry.

Learning history

One attendee at the event was Nina Ray, whose late husband, Garrett Ray, bought e Littleton Independent from publisher Houston Waring and editor Edwin A. Bemis in 1969.

“We knew (the Bemises) well,” Ray said, adding that they were like family, so learning the history was special.

Another attendee, Kathleen Fischer, said she found the presentation very interesting.

“It was fun to see those beautiful women,” she said about the photos. “Nice to see the great history they have.”

Deanna Kristopeit, who used to work at the Littleton Independent, said it was especially interesting to hear about Elizabeth Bemis DeBus’ work in the news business.

A woman examines a table of artifacts and documents about the history of the Bemis women at the Bemis Public Library on Aug. 3.

PHOTOS BY NINA JOSS

Maya DeBus emphasizes the important work of the women in the Bemis family, who have not gotten the same attention as the men over the years.

Nina Ray chats with other attendees after the presentation.

Library in search of local art for upcoming exhibits

BY ELISABETH SLAY ESLAY@COLORADOCOMMUNITYMEDIA.COM

e Englewood Public Library is accepting art in various mediums for an exhibit that will showcase community artists of all ages.

Bethany La erty, the library and cultural arts manager, said the theme

of the exhibit is “Community Art.” e show will run Aug. 10 to Oct. 5.

“ e exhibit bene ts the community by providing a free and open opportunity for artists to show their work and be celebrated for participating in a community event,” she said.

She said the exhibit will have “a simple theme that encompasses all

mediums, all subjects and an opportunity for artists of all ages to exhibit their work.”

She said there are two additional exhibits scheduled this year. e rst one will be from Oct. 12 – Dec. 7 and the theme is “Found Art.”

La erty said the artwork for that exhibit is “the creation of artistic

pieces using a variety of man-made objects to depict a unique and original object.”

e other exhibit, “Photography,” will be from Dec. 17, 2023, to Feb.8, 2024 and will include photographs of a variety of subjects.

The “Great Outdoors” art exhibit hung in the Englewood Public Library earlier this year. The library is accepting submissions for two exhibits entitled “Found Art” and “Photography.”

A work of art from the “Great Outdoors” art exhibit hangs in the Englewood Public Library. The library seeks to feature local artists of all ages.

PHOTOS COURTESY OF THE ENGLEWOOD PUBLIC LIBRARY

Residents sue city over referendum ruling

Plainti s are fighting plan for apartments at former Sam’s Automotive site

BY ELISABETH SLAY ESLAY@COLORADOCOMMUNITYMEDIA.COM

Englewood residents Davon Williams and Gary Kozacek led a civil suit in Arapahoe County District Court against the city and City Clerk Stephanie Carlile on Aug. 2.

Court documents state the two are asking the court for “judicial review of a hearing o cer order and issuance of an injunction on several grounds with regard to a referendum deemed successful on behalf of 1400+ registered voters” and themselves.

Williams and Kozacek are questioning the timeline of the initial signing and curing period of a referendum they presented to the city clerk that opposes an ordinance which approves a 395-unit residential complex.

e project was proposed by developer Embrey Partners and would sit on a lot, known as the former Sam’s Automotive site, at West Oxford Avenue and South Navajo Street.

Additionally, court documents said Williams and Kozacek are questioning the time frame of a petition protesting the referendum, the validity of notarized documents and the number of packets reviewed by the

hearing o cer.

e suit comes after the City Clerk’s o ce reviewed and determined only 40 out of a required 57 signatures were successfully cured on July 13. is was the nal determination that the referendum wouldn’t prevent the project from moving forward.

Williams and Kozacek are asking for an injunction on the city to halt the project as the suit goes through the legal process and for the court to retore the orginial certi ed signature count on the referendum so it can appear on the ballot in the November election.

“Unless a court issues an order to the contrary, ling of the lawsuit has no impact on the project nor does it otherwise revive the referendum,” said Christopher Harguth, the city’s communications director.

is determination followed a public hearing held June 23, which was called after resident David Lee Carroll led a protest petition to redetermine the validity of the referendum petition presented by Williams and Kozacek, which was initially approved by the city clerk.

In her ruling, hearing o cer Kristin Brown reevaluated the petition’s validity and stated only 1,409 of the 1,747 collected signatures are valid.

e petition needed 1,466 signatures for the City Clerk to deem it sucient, Brown’s ruling said.

Williams and Kozacek submitted a letter of intent to sue the city in an Englewood City Council meeting July 17.

be shared with their fellow community members,” she said.

Arapahoe County encourages everyone to join in this observance and to recognize the important roles that parents, employers and community members play in ensuring that all children have the financial support they need to thrive. Learn more at arapahoegov.com/humanservices.

Time to hit the trails!

Lace up your sneaks for a timed 5K trail run presented by Les Schwab Tires, beginning at Tagawa Gardens and running along the Cherry Creek Regional Trail. Funds support trail maintenance and Arapahoe County Open Spaces. Includes dinner, craft beer or sports drink, and live music at the finish line. Walkers and all ages welcome!

Thursday, Aug. 24, 2023 | 5:30–7:30 p.m.

Get details: arapahoecountyeventcenter.com

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FROM PAGE 4

La erty said the current exhibit is at capacity for pieces, but the other two exhibits are open for more submissions.

“It is an opportunity for community members to come together to view and discuss art, to have their artwork and passion for creation on display to

She also said the exhibit is a project of the library and was inspired by previous events that featured local artists.

“It is great fun to meet new people and get to know their stories that led them to creating art and their life experiences,” she said.

To submit art pieces visit Library Art Exhibit | City of Englewood, Colorado (englewoodco.gov).

No RSVP necessary. Childcare will be provided.

Wednesday, Sept. 27 6:30–8:30 p.m.

Second Chance Center 224 Potomac St., Aurora

Englewood resident Gary Kozacek, who helped initiate the referendum, testified during the June 23 public hearing in the Englewood Civic Center. Kozacek and Davon Williams recently filed a civil suit in Arapahoe County Court.

PHOTO BY TAYLER SHAW

EVEN WITH A HOUSING VOUCHER, METRO MAN FACES ENDLESS BARRIERS TO FIND DISABLED GRANDSON A HOME

BY NINA JOSS NJOSS@COLORADOCOMMUNITYMEDIA.COM

George Vonesh drives an hour round trip each day to visit his grandson, Justin.

Justin is a kind, caring, nonjudgmental young man, says his grandfather. He keeps up on the news and likes to discuss current events. In his free time, Justin enjoys music, concerts and paranormal television shows.

He also lives with intellectual disabilities, which have impacted him since childhood. Yet, at 32 years old, Justin lives on his own in an apartment in Lafayette.

As Justin’s primary companion and caregiver, Vonesh has spent much of his life memorizing the ins and outs of programs and services that many adults with disabilities rely on — from Medicaid to food assistance programs, to housing choice vouchers and more.

“It’s taken me years to learn all this stu ,” Vonesh said.

At age 79, he is starting to worry about how he can sustainably support his grandson. e distance from Arvada — where Vonesh lives — to Lafayette is feeling more and more challenging to travel as the years go by.

He wants to move Justin closer, but for months he’s faced hurdle after hurdle. Despite all his research, paperwork, phone calls, meetings and more paperwork, Vonesh hasn’t been able to nd an apartment that will work.

e problem comes down to what’s commonly called a housing choice voucher.

Justin received a voucher in 2018, about a year and a half after applying for the rent subsidization program. He was luckier than many, as some people wait on lists for years — sometimes more than a decade — before being selected for the program that’s part of the federal Department of Housing and Urban Development, or HUD.

e program, sometimes known as Section 8, aims “to help very low-income families, the elderly and the disabled a ord decent, safe and sanitary housing,” according to HUD.

Justin is both low-income and disabled in the eyes of

the government. His income was about $800 per month — less than 7% of the area median income in his county — when he applied for a voucher. is money came from a monthly stipend for people with disabilities, called Supplemental Security Income.

Since then, however, Vonesh has learned that a voucher is not a guaranteed ticket to housing.

“It’s not easy,” he said, gesturing at a pile of paperwork full of handwritten notes and math problems. “Even now, with all this homework that I have, I still am never quite sure about all the exact steps.”

rough his deep dive into the program and its many intricacies, Vonesh has uncovered a system with pitfalls at every turn. Sometimes, these challenges come from administrative complexities of the program. Other times, they are rooted in discrimination.

As Vonesh has worked tirelessly to nd a home for his grandson, housing advocates have taken steps to strengthen laws meant to protect people like Justin.

A new law on this front, which goes into e ect this month, has resulted in resistance from Colorado landlords. While they concede that people with housing vouchers can struggle to nd

a place, they say the problem should be addressed by making the program more economically attractive — not mandating how landlords interact with it.

Moving Justin closer Vonesh has been living in the same Arvada home for over 50 years. Since his wife passed away a few years ago, he divides his time between taking care of his dog, Jasper, and his grandson.

“Jasper in the morning, Justin in the afternoon,” he said.

Justin’s disabilities, which impact his social interactions, have made it challenging for him to make friends over the years. Vonesh said that causes Justin to be sad sometimes, making the daily visits even more important.

“If I don’t go up there, he’s just by himself,” he said.

As Vonesh gets older, the long drive is becoming more challenging.

“It’s hard on me,” he said. “I’m getting old and that tra c is dangerous … so I’d like to get him closer. Otherwise, I’m telling him, we’re just gonna have to gure out some days a week that I take o .”

But Vonesh has had little luck since he began searching for a closer apartment eight months ago. Because Justin has a voucher, moving is a complicated process that

involves a staggering number of considerations.

First, prospective apartments need to qualify under a payment standard set by HUD. at means the unit, plus utilities, has to be at or under a speci c price.

Once Vonesh nds an apartment at the correct rate in a desired area, there has to be a vacancy that lines up with the end of Justin’s current lease. He also has to add time for a federally mandated inspection of the unit.

If the new apartment is in a di erent county, Vonesh would need to transfer Justin’s rental subsidy across housing authority lines. e process is possible, but it

adds extra steps that take time. In a fast-paced rental market where landlords want tenants con rmed as quickly as possible, the timeline of these extra steps can complicate options.

Add those requirements to the personal desires any person may have for an apartment — like in-unit laundry or a place to sit outside — and Vonesh has a puzzle on his hands.

It is a puzzle that gets more challenging when some landlords, Vonesh says, won’t even take a glance at Justin’s application.

“I have lost count of the

‘Even now, with all this homework that I have, I still am never quite sure about all the exact steps.’

George Vonesh

George Vonesh sits with his dog, Jasper, outside of his home in Arvada.

PHOTOS BY NINA JOSS

From his desk in Arvada, George Vonesh searches for apartments for his grandson, Justin.

VOUCHERS

apartment managers who told (me) that they don’t accept (vouchers)”

since Justin got a voucher in 2018, Vonesh said. “ ey don’t want to deal with the bureaucracy and perceived problems with low-income renters.”

Discrimination over source of income

e apartment managers who told Vonesh they wouldn’t accept housing choice vouchers — if they said so after January 2021 — could have been breaking the law.

at’s when House Bill 20-1332 took e ect, outlawing housing discrimination based on a person’s source of income. e state law added this category to other protected classes including disability, race, color, creed, familial status and more.

In practice, this law means landlords in Colorado with more than three rental units must accept housing choice vouchers. ey cannot use Justin’s federal aid as a reason to turn him away.

Despite facing this issue, Vonesh never led a complaint with state o cials. e process seemed cumbersome and time-consuming, and it was more important to him to put his time and energy toward nding Justin a home, he said.

Vonesh isn’t the only one concerned that landlords discriminate in this way. Housing advocates across the metro area say they’ve seen evidence of housing discrimination based on source of income.

“Complaints about housing vouchers — and landlords refusing to accept them or refusing to count the value of the voucher — is the number three source of complaint that we received (in the past 18 months),” said John Paul Marosy, outreach and education coordinator at the Denver Metro Fair Housing Center.

e center is a private nonpro t or-

ganization that works to investigate matters related to housing discrimination across the metro region.

Although there may be some bad actors, Marosy noted that most discrimination against voucher holders comes from landlords who are unaware of the law.

“From our experience, the vast majority of landlords don’t intentionally discriminate in this way,” he said. “But it is incumbent on them to educate themselves.”

In a few cases, discrimination against voucher holders is outright. But more commonly, landlords create barriers for voucher holders without doing anything that appears to break the law, advocates say.

One of these barriers is the minimum income requirement. is is when a landlord requires a potential tenant to prove they make a certain ratio of income to rent.

Vonesh ran into this problem recently when he was checking out an apartment in Arvada for Justin. Right as he started to think it might work out, the apartment manager shattered his plan.

“ ey said, ‘Oh, you know, we can take a voucher, sure — but you still have to prove three times (the rent in) income,’” Vonesh said.

With Justin’s income — all from federal aid — this requirement was impossible to meet.

The income barrier

Aubrey Wilde, advocacy program director at Colorado Coalition for the Homeless, said income requirements are one of the biggest barriers for people with vouchers.

“We have folks with vouchers who technically should be able to use those vouchers, in most cases, being asked to prove that they earn three, four, ve — even eight — times the rent amount in income,” Wilde said, recounting numbers from her and other advocates’ work with people searching for housing.

BY NINA JOSS NJOSS@COLORADOCOMMUNITYMEDIA.COM

In Colorado, where discrimination based on source of income is illegal, some landlords are opposed to the mandate that they have to accept housing choice vouchers.

Drew Hamrick, a spokesperson for the Colorado Apartment Association, a leading state group of rental housing providers, said he thinks the vast majority of landlords follow the state law.

But across the nation, he said, many landlords resist participating in the voucher program. In some states, it is legal to reject a prospective tenant because they have a voucher. eir resistance is rooted in administrative costs.

“ ere’s so much red tape involved,” Hamrick said.

Although landlords do not care what the source of a person’s money is, Hamrick said, they care that they get paid. e voucher program is problematic because it adds the risk of additional expenses that landlords might not be compensated for, he said.

ese potential expenses include rent that can be lost while o cials inspect a unit to see if it meets federal standards. He also said there are other risks, like the chance that a tenant might not be able to a ord to pay for repairs needed for potential property damage.

Due to these concerns, Hamrick said the State of Colorado was unfair to mandate that landlords accept vouchers by approving House Bill 20-1332 in 2020.

“It was a bad legislative decision because, really, what you do when you (have) a problem like that is you x the program so that it’s more attractive to participate in, rather than saying, ‘Hey, we get the program doesn’t work that well, but you’ve got to play,’” he said.

A spokesperson from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, or HUD, acknowledged that there are areas of the voucher program that can use improvement, but highlighted that many of the rules landlords oppose are necessary. For example, he said inspections are crucial to ensure units for voucher holders meet basic health, safety and quality standards.

“All of these kinds of rules to

ensure that the funds are used e ectively, I mean, it comes with red tape — and to some extent, there’s no way around that,” the spokesperson said.

e HUD spokesperson said the program cares about landlord concerns and has made changes in response to what they have heard. One of these changes is o ering virtual options to streamline the inspection process.

HUD also recently gave public housing authorities the right to use some of their administrative funding to cover potential nancial losses for landlords to incentivize them to accept vouchers, the spokesperson said.

But with public housing authority budgets varying across the country, some have the ability to provide incentives like this, while others’ budgets are already stretched too thin.

How much source-of-income discrimination is reported?

Nonpro t groups that work directly with people impacted by source-of-income discrimination tend to see more instances of it than are o cially reported.

According to the Colorado Civil Rights Division, which processes housing discrimination complaints, fewer than 10 complaints have been led on the basis of source of income since House Bill 20-1332 went into e ect in 2021.

But the division’s data does not accurately re ect how much discrimination is truly happening, said Katie O’Donnell, a spokesperson for the division.

“It’s absolutely happening all over Colorado,” she said. “We hear about a very small portion of it.”

Many instances of housing discrimination go unreported due to fear of retaliation and a lack of understanding about the process of ling, she said.

George Vonesh, for example, is a grandfather seeking a home for his disabled grandson who is on a voucher. Despite several incidents that could be considered discriminatory, Vonesh has never led a complaint with state o cials. e process seemed cumbersome and time-consuming, he said, and it was more important to him to put his time and energy toward nding his grandson a home.

The long drives from Arvada to Lafayette are becoming challenging for George Vonesh, who is 79 years old, to make every day to visit his grandson.

PHOTO BY NINA JOSS

VOUCHERS

Jack Regenbogen, deputy executive director at the Colorado Poverty Law Project, said he and other advocates consider this behavior to be a form of discrimination.

“ ey’re not saying anymore, ‘We won’t accept Section 8,’ but they are discriminating based on the amount of income,” Regenbogen said.

Although many voucher holders can’t meet income requirements, Marosy from the Denver Metro Fair Housing Center said the voucher itself is a dependable sign that the tenant will be able to pay their rent each month.

“If you look at it from the landlord’s point of view, this is a guaranteed source of income,” he said. “ ey know for a fact that this individual has this voucher and that money will be there for months and months to come.”

But House Bill 20-1332 sets no limit to the income level a landlord can require. And for people with vouchers, there’s no clarity about whether a minimum income requirement applies to the whole rent, or just the portion of rent a voucher holder is paying out of pocket.

is legal blurriness has created a situation where landlords can reject a voucher holder for not making three or more times the full rent amount in income.

A new law

rough months of lobbying and testifying, the Colorado Coalition for the

Homeless and the Colorado Poverty Law Project worked with legislators on a new law this year, Senate Bill 23-184, that addresses income requirement barrier for voucher holders. It will go into e ect in August.

“It caps the minimum income requirement at two times the cost of rent,” Wilde said.

e Colorado Apartment Association, a leading state group for landlords, was a vocal opponent of the bill. Spokesperson Drew Hamrick said the income requirement cap — which will allow people to spend 50% of their income on rent — will set tenants up for failure.

“Anyone signing a contract that they’re promising to pay that much of their income in rent is going to default under it,” he said. “No one can afford to do that.”

Hamrick said landlords do not care about the source of a tenant’s money — but they care that they get paid.

In landlords’ eyes, he said, the housing voucher program adds the risk of additional expenses they might not be compensated for. ese potential expenses include rent lost while o -

George Vonesh shows handwritten math problems calculating payment standards, income levels and his grandson’s voucher subsidy — complex calculations required to find his grandson a home.

cials inspect a unit to see if it meets federal standards. He added there are other risks, like the chance that a tenant might not be able to pay for repairing property damage. Instead of mandating that landlords accept vouchers, Hamrick said, legislators should work to make the program more nancially attractive for landlords.

He said the new cap is not a sustainable decision for rental housing providers, who will have to accept tenants more likely to default on rent. He added that more defaults would likely make rents rise across the market over time.

“ e Colorado legislature has substituted their own business judgment for the judgment of the entire market and made a bad business decision here,” he said.

Regenbogen, however, said he thinks people paying half their income on rent will still be able to make ends meet. Low-income people, he said, have always had to be resourceful — and housing is a necessity they deserve the opportunity to have.

“(Paying half of one’s income on rent is) not ideal, but what’s worse was the

previous status quo where if people weren’t earning an arbitrary multiplier of what rent is, then they could very possibly nd themselves either in the homeless shelter or on the street,” he said.

He added that the new number re ects a reality in Colorado — where more than half of households are rent-burdened, meaning they are paying more than the recommended 30% of their income on rent, according to recent U.S. Census Bureau data.

For people with vouchers, the new law also clari es that minimum income requirements must only apply to the portion of rent the tenant pays out of their own pocket.

In addition, it prohibits landlords from considering the credit score of an applicant who is on a voucher. Wilde said credit, like the minimum income requirement, has historically been a barrier for voucher holders in nding housing.

Hope for Justin

Vonesh said the new law is good for people at low income levels like Justin.

Since voucher holders generally pay 30% to 40% of their income on rent, the vast majority will now always qualify in terms of income.

“I think (the law) will have a fairly signi cant positive impact,” Vonesh said, re ecting on the times Justin has been turned down on the grounds of income. “ at new provision, I think, takes that o the table.”

Vonesh said the more he knows and understands the laws, the more he is feeling prepared and empowered going into conversations

with apartment managers.

“I was just waiting for them to say ‘We don’t accept vouchers,’” he said, describing one recent meeting. “I was ready to pull out my printed-out copies of the statutes that are all highlighted.”

But people who don’t know their rights don’t have that opportunity to stick up for themselves, he said.

To help educate more tenants and landlords on the rights and rules related to housing discrimination, the Denver Metro Fair Housing Center launched a campaign in April about source-ofincome discrimination.

“Most prejudice is rooted in the lack of knowledge,” Marosy said. “We’re optimistic that as we get more knowledge out about the voucher program, we’ll see a decrease in the discrimination that we’ve been seeing against voucher holders.”

As months have gone by, laws have been passed and Vonesh has gotten help, he has maintained hope for Justin — but it hasn’t been easy.

With the number of apartments that have not worked out for his grandson, Vonesh was hesitant to say one law would x the whole process.

“I think some of these folks can be pretty creative if they really don’t want to accept vouchers,” he said.

But the new law is a step forward, he said.

Armed with his stack of papers and knowledge of his rights, Vonesh is dedicated to continue trying — for the sake of himself, for the sake of Justin and for the sake of other Coloradans who have struggled to put a roof over their heads.

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Arapahoe County identifies its first human case of West Nile virus

BY TAYLER SHAW TSHAW@COLORADOCOMMUNITYMEDIA.COM

Arapahoe County has identied its rst case of a person being infected with West Nile virus for the 2023 season, the county announced Aug. 3.

West Nile virus is the leading cause of mosquito-borne disease in the continental United States, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. e virus is commonly spread to people by the bite of an infected mosquito.

Most people infected with West Nile virus do not have symptoms, according to the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment. However, some infected people can develop a serious and potentially deadly illness.

Given that there are no vaccines to prevent — or medications to treat — West Nile virus in people, health o cials are urging residents to take precautions at all outdoor locations to prevent mosquito bites.

Arapahoe County recommended the following steps to limit exposure to the virus:

Wear an insect repellent that is

approved by the Environmental Protection Agency, such as one that includes the ingredient “DEET.”

Arapahoe County said these repellents are proven safe and e ective for all people ages 2 months and up, including those who are pregnant and breastfeeding.  Stay indoors at dawn and dusk, as this is when mosquitoes are the most active.  Avoid recreating around standing water sources such as lakes and ponds. If you are camping, use mosquito netting.  Wear clothes to protect against mosquitoes, such as long-sleeved shirts and pants. Drain standing water sources including puddles, gutters, owerpots, tires, pool covers, boats and tarps.  Prevent mosquitoes from getting indoors by using an air conditioner or fans rather than open windows. If you do have any windows or doors with openings, put a screen on them.  If you live on a property with a septic system, take steps to prevent mosquitoes by ensuring your tank is in good repair and any vents or openings are covered or sealed.

Arapahoe County has identified mosquitoes carrying West Nile virus near the Arapahoe County Fairgrounds. SHUTTERSTOCK IMAGE

SEE WEST NILE, P34

Littleton o cer Michael Lopez cleared in fatal shooting

BY THELMA GRIMES TGRIMES@COLORADOCOMMUNITYMEDIA.COM

Littleton Police O cer Michael Lopez was cleared by the 18th Judicial District for any wrongdoing in the shooting that resulted in the death of Stephen Poolson Jr. on Feb. 2.

In the report, Chief Deputy District Attorney Clinton McKinzie said after reviewing the evidence provided by the Critical Response Team and applying the law to the facts of the incident, “I conclude that O cer Lopez was legally justi ed in using lethal force against Mr. Poolson. e police o cer’s use of force was reasonable, necessary, and appropriate to defend himself from the threat posed by Mr. Poolson.”

According to the report’s summary of facts, on Feb. 2 around 1:05 a.m., Lopez was on patrol in a fully marked police car near 5600 S. Bannock St. in Littleton. As he turned onto Powell Avenue he observed a man straddling a parked motorcycle outside an apartment building. e man was later identi ed as Poolson, 41.

Lopez took note that the motorcycle was on the sidewalk with no license plate. Lopez pulled the patrol car alongside Poolson. Rolling down his window, Lopez asked Poolson what he was doing. Poolson responded that he was waiting for friends.

According to the report, Lopez then asked where the motorcycle’s license plates were. Poolson did not respond. Lopez then asked if the bike had been stolen. Allegedly, Poolson said, “not yet.”

At this time, a masked male and female subject emerged from a nearby apartment building behind Poolson. When they saw Lopez talking to Poolson, they ran back inside.

Lopez drove his car forward to block the motorcycle’s path. Poolson then turned on the engine and began to push the motorcycle forward, Lopez collided with the bike, pushing it into a low wall.

Poolson fell o and ran toward the nearby apartments.

Lopez exited his patrol car to chase Poolson, drawing his handgun and calling on the radio to report he was in pursuit of the suspect on foot.

In the apartment complex’s courtyard, Lopez found Poolson trying to climb over a fence that led to a parking area behind the building. With his gun drawn, Lopez ran up to Poolson while reporting over the radio that he

was tracking a white male wearing a black hoodie.

At that point, Poolson who was trying to climb the fence turned and pointed a handgun at Lopez. According to the investigation, at this point, the two men were standing 12 feet apart. Poolson told Lopez to “get back,” with the o cer responding, “don’t shoot.”

Repeating his order for Lopez to “get back,” Poolson kept the gun pointed at the o cer. Stepping behind the partial cover of a tree, Lopez red his weapon six times, striking Poolson who immediately fell to the ground.

Lopez immediately reported that he had shot Poolson, asking for a trauma kit. Another o cer soon showed up with a trauma kit, followed by South Metro Fire and Rescue, which responded within minutes to provide Poolson medical care.

Poolson was soon pronounced dead, being struck by ve of the six bullets red.

According to the coroner’s report, the cause of death resulted in a gunshot wound directly to the chest.

At the scene, the investigation revealed that a Glock handgun loaded with 14 rounds of live ammunition was found next to Poolson.

McKinzie said investigators also learned that the motorcycle that started the entire stop had been reported stolen in Denver six months earlier.

According to the investigation, while Lopez did not activate his body-worn camera, it still captured video without audio due to a feature that allows the camera to save the previous 30 seconds of video before being activated to record both audio and video.

McKenzie said in his report that the video is consistent with statement’s provided by Lopez after the shooting.

When asked why he did not activate the body-camera, Lopez told investigators that he wasn’t even planning on investigating a crime, admitting that he was only curious why the motorcycle did not have a license plate, noting that the situation developed quickly.

A surveillance camera located in the courtyard of the apartment complex captured both audio and visual footage of the shooting and is consistent with Lopez’s account of the incident.

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O cials at the scene where a police o cer shot a man who had allegedly been on a stolen motorcycle.

PHOTO COURTESY OF LITTLETON POLICE DEPARTMENT

Valles-Dominguez found guilty of shooting Littleton o cer

BY NINA JOSS NJOSS@COLORADOCOMMUNITYMEDIA.COM

A jury found Rigoberto VallesDominguez, 35, guilty after he shot and injured a Littleton police o cer in 2021.

During the July trial, Valles-Dominguez was found guilty on 13 counts, including attempted rst-degree murder after deliberation, aggravated robbery, prohibited use of a weapon, assault with a deadly weapon causing serious bodily injury and rst degree assault on

a peace o cer.

On Sept. 20, 2021, Littleton Police

Cpl. Je Farmer and O cer David Snook responded to a call of shots red, according to the police department.

A suspect, later identi ed as VallesDominguez, started running towards an apartment building, a press release from the 18th Judicial District Attorney’s O ce said. Farmer and Snook pursued the suspect on foot.

Valles-Dominguez red multiple rounds from a handgun, hitting Snook

CLEAR VISION

in the torso, arm and leg, the release states. Both o cers returned re, and Valles-Dominguez escaped.

Farmer, who was aware of the severity of Snook’s injuries, dragged Snook to safety and transported him to the hospital, according to the police department.

A subsequent investigation showed that Valles-Dominguez hid for several hours in the apartment complex and then carjacked a motorist and left the scene, according to the news release.

He was captured a few days later at

an RV home in Brighton.

“ e defendant’s actions showed no regard for human life,” Chief Deputy District Attorney Jason Siers said in the press release. “While O cer Snook suffered serious injuries, it’s a miracle no one was killed.”

In May, President Joe Biden awarded Farmer a Medal of Valor, the highest national award for valor by a public safety o cer, for helping save Snook’s life during the incident.

Sentencing for Valles-Dominguez is scheduled for Sept. 25.

Man facing explosive device possession charge fails to appear in court

BY ELISABETH SLAY ELSAY@COLORADOCOMMUNITYMEDIA.COM

Brian Gessing, a man allegedly involved in a bomb making operation at a south Englewood home at 4945 S. Delaware St., failed to appear in court July 31.

Gessing, 51, is facing a possession of an explosive device charge and a drug paraphernalia possession charge, for which he was arrested June 29. He was charged on July 6 by the 18th Judicial District Attorney’s O ce.

Eric Ross, spokesperson for the DA’s o ce said a judge set a $5,000 cash or surety bond for Gessing on June 29, then changed it to $1,000 on July 3 before changing it to a $5,000 personal recognizance bond on July 6.

“Brian Gessing failed to appear. e [personal recognizance bond] is revoked,” Ross said. “When a party fails to appear, a warrant gets issued.”

He said a warrant for Gessing failing to appear in court will be issued shortly, and that Gessing has an existing warrant for another case involving an alleged motor vehicle theft on April 28.

e owner of 4945 S. Delaware St., Michael Steven Lubotsky, 50, was also charged for allegedly making explosives on the property. Ross said his Lubotsky’s bond was set at $5,000 and a continuance was granted for his case on July 31. He is out on bond and his next court appearance is scheduled for Aug. 28.

e two were arrested just one day after the city issued a condemnation notice because Lubotsky’s property was deemed “un t for human occupancy,” documents state.

Englewood Police Division Chief Tracy Jones said EPD and other agencies found apparent bomb-making materials, cut PVC pipe, and explosive ingredients including potassium

nitrate at the house.

e city has taken on the cost of cleaning up the property, which remains fenced o and under abatement, meaning no unauthorized people can enter the property including Lubotsky.  Attempts to recover the city’s costs from the homeowners will come later.

is incident was one of many that have taken place at this property in the last several years, which Englewood residents have expressed

concern about.

In a meeting July 20, members of the neighborhood surrounding Lubotsky’s property gathered to speak with representatives from the city and law enforcement about the property and next steps.

At the meeting, Jones said various materials taken from the home are being analyzed and he said EPD is hoping the Drug Enforcement Administration, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives or the FBI will take over the case.

If another agency takes over the case, Jones said the house could be seized and then sold. He said this is one of the ways the city could recover taxpayer funds used to clean up the house, which the city is doing after issuing the emergency abatement order on July 7.

Shawn Lewis, city manager, said to ensure the city is reimbursed for the clean-up e orts, it will add up all the costs plus an administrative fee and put a lien on the property, which stays with it and is led with the county.

“When the county assessor sends the tax bill in 2024, [Lubotsky] will have to pay that or [he] will be delinquent in taxes and until [he] gets that paid, [he’s] in danger of having the city foreclose on [the] lien,” Shawn Lewis said.

He said the Arapahoe County Health Department is involved with aspects of the property including suspected meth contamination and potential issues with vermin, which residents mentioned were becoming

a problem.

“Now that we have preliminary positive meth reports, that goes to Arapahoe County Public Health to basically determine the abatement and mitigation plan for that,” Lewis said.

During the meeting, Code Enforcement Division Manager Dave Lewis Jr. said Lubotsky must comply with the Arapahoe County Health Department and the city before he will be granted access to his house.

However, Shawn Lewis said if Lubotsky does comply with all entities and he pays o the lien, then he can return to the property.

Many residents at the July 13 meeting asked whether the city could prevent Lubostky from returning to the residence, describing the property as a problem for many years.

EPD call logs from the last ve years show o cers have responded to various complaints at or near the property. e records show the calls included welfare checks, verbal disturbances, domestic violence complaints, noise complaints, assaults and more.

Shawn Lewis said despite the history, the city can’t simply take away Lubotsky’s property as he has rights as a homeowner that are out of the city’s control.

e city encourages residents to remain engaged by reporting any activity around the property to the EPD non-emergency number, 303-7617410, calling their councilmembers with any issues and registering for the EngleFix app to le complaints.

City o cials and the Englewood Police Department addressing residents in a neighborhood safety meeting July 20. Brian Gessing, one of the men involved in a potential bomb making operation, missed his court date July 31.

PHOTO BY ELISABETH SLAY

Toxic algae detected in Cherry Creek Reservoir

BY TAYLER SHAW TSHAW@COLORADOCOMMUNITYMEDIA.COM

After discovering toxic algae in the Cherry Creek Reservoir, o cials are not permitting some recreational activities like swimming and paddleboarding in parts of the reservoir.

Colorado Parks and Wildlife, which announced the recreational closure in a July 30 news release, advises that people and their pets avoid contact with the water at the reservoir because a toxic, bluegreen algae bloom was found on the shoreline.

Toxic algae can a ect the liver, skin, or neurological systems of people and pets, according to the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment.

Colorado Parks and Wildlife said swimming, paddleboarding and wading will not be allowed near the marina and the “west shades” area of the reservoir. ere are warning signs at the recreational closure areas.

“All skin-to-water contact should be avoided for humans and pets,”

Cherry Creek Operations Manager Larry Butter eld said in the release. “Contact with the water could cause minor skin rashes and make pets ill. Dogs need to be on-leash to keep them from drinking or playing in the (algae) bloom.”

health department advises that boats avoid areas with toxic algae and to clean sh well and discard sh guts appropriately.

e reservoir’s recreational closures came after water samples tested by the state health department showed a high, “red level” of microcystin, an algal toxin. Microcystin is a potent liver toxin and possible human carcinogen, according to the Environmental Protection Agency. It is a type of cyanobacteria, which is also referred to as blue-green algae.  ese organisms naturally occur in Colorado but can become prob-

lematic when they multiply rapidly, resulting in a dense concentration of cyanobacteria, also referred to as a “bloom,” according to the state health department.

e blooms become harmful when the cyanobacteria produce toxins, the state health department said.

e state health department’s threshold for water recreational closure is 8 micrograms per liter of microcystin and above, which is considered a “red level,” according

to the news release. e samples at Cherry Creek State Park showed concentrations of 10 micrograms per liter.

Colorado Parks and Wildlife said water samples will continue to be collected and tested, and the closures will remain in place until the level of microcystin decreases.

Updates on the recreational closure will be shared online at cpw. state.co.us/placestogo/parks/CherryCreek.

Image of Cherry Creek State Park swim beach being underwater.

PHOTO COURTESY OF COLORADO PARKS AND WILDLIFE

Littleton’s Timothy White researches cognitive deficits he lives with

sional — along the way, one of which

where he is pursuing a degree at the University of Colorado Denver, Timothy White spent the summer at the University of Cincinnati in Ohio researching chemotherapy-induced cognitive de cits.

In addition to his passion for neuroscience, he brings a unique personal experience to the lab: almost a decade ago at the age of 18, he was diagnosed with the type of cancer — acute lymphoblastic leukemia — he is researching, and he continues to live with cognitive de cits associated with several years of chemotherapy.

“Chemotherapy-induced cognitive impairment, or the mechanisms of cognitive de cits associated with any cancer, it’s very under researched,” White said.

ies in mice: executive function and memory.

White has been a student of science for several years now, having earned an associate’s degree in psychology from ACC before starting at CU Denver, where he is now working toward a bachelor’s of psychology. It wasn’t until about a year ago when he decided “on a whim” to pursue neuroscience studies at a convention in San Diego.

“I noticed there was a presentation being done on an ALL leukemia mice model, and I was like ‘oh, that’s super cool,’” White said.  Although he had to catch a ight back home before the presentation,

induced cognitive de cits in graduate school, and he started looking into applications. He stumbled upon a webpage for the University of Cincinnati’s Rise Up program for neuroscience, headed by Reyes. With only hours before the application window closed, White gathered last-minute letters of recommendation and applied.

Now, at the close of his summer research position, he feels the lab has made real progress, not only in their internal studies, but in the eld at large. By taking previous research methods a step further and inducing both sexes of mice with leukemia before treating with chemotherapy, White said the lab in Cincinnati is providing a more accurate and practical look at chemotherapy-induced cognitive de cits.

“ ey’re already trying out new diets to try and create a preventative bu er,” White said. “ is isn’t just ‘yes, we want to understand what’s happening in the brain.’ ey are already using this model to try and nd preventative measures and create some kind of extra leg-up on preventing cognitive de cits following treatment.”

White’s struggle with memory continues to be a barrier in his education, but he said that his research cohort has shown support.

“If I’m feeling stressed or anxious or I’m having trouble doing something, everyone in the lab has been more than happy to jump in and help me in whatever ways that I need, and I think that is the environment they would have even if I wasn’t there,” White said. “Everybody there wants to help each other and collaborate.

White has stumbled upon a few

don’t like it when I go too far out of Cincinnati, but Cincinnati is great,” White said.

He also found that he was “freaking out for nothing” as he mentally prepared for the research position.

“I feel like every time you start a new job, you have to, like, mentally fortify yourself and get to a point where you feel like you belong,” he said.

“For me personally it’s like OK, I have this memory disorder, I’m an undergrad, I do have research experience but I haven’t worked with genes. ere are all of these things and then when I got here and started working, it was like ‘okay, this is doable.’”

In a research capacity, he unexpectedly found gender-speci c neurological di erences in the mice resulting from the chemotherapy. He said the lab is still unsure about what these ndings mean, but that it’s “really interesting and very strange.”

He now prepares to return to CU Denver for the start of classes, where he will continue working in a neuroscience lab studying alcohol and social bu ering. He looks forward to bringing some new gene-related research skills back to Denver.

As he prepares to nish his bachelor’s degree — hopefully this coming spring, he said — he is looking to grad school, and the University of Cincinnati is at the top of his list. He is also looking at some schools in his home state.

Less than a year after a spontaneous trip to San Diego for a neuroscience conference, White has found a place in a deeply personal eld of research, and is only at the beginning of his journey into cognitive science.

Timothy White, at left, with lab advisers Dr. Matia Solomon and Dr. Teresa Reyes.

PHOTO BY ANDREW HIGLEY

didn’t necessarily expect to,” said Denver’s Darren Albert, winner of a men’s category four race.

“ e Littleton Criterium is great. It’s awesome. It’s probably the best race on the Colorado calendar, so this is fantastic,” he said.

Albert was racing with Lena Cycling Club, which he named after his daughter.

e event brought some extra business to the shops on Main Street, with what Playa Bowls manager Lauren DeGeus described as “a constant stream of people” coming through.

Cyclists came from across the state to compete, including Avery Cavner from the Groove Subaru Excel Sports team. Cavner, now 15, has been racing since she was six years old, and came with her family from Colorado Springs for the race. ed,” said her mom, Lindsay Cavner, as she watched Avery race.

Avery recently nished a training program in Italy, and intends to go pro.

Following tradition, the event saw some rain, but cyclists and spectators pushed through until the sky opened back up. e races concluded around 10 p.m., as planned.

As for the national professional races, the Denver Disruptors had two women and one man place in the top ten of their respective events. Valentina Scandolara placed second in the women’s professional race, and Leah Kirchmann placed seventh. In the men’s race, Riley Sheehan placed 10th.

Amelia Durst, Sylvia Espinoza and Haydn Hludinski accept first, second and third place, respectively, on the women’s category three podium.

PHOTOS BY SHEA VANCE

Cyclists race in the men’s category four events, the second race of the day

Not Trump — please

Iremember the year I turned 18 and the thought of registering to vote was so awesome. I couldn’t wait to vote for president.

I was proud to register as a Republican. Over the years — I have drifted more to the middle. In Arizona, when I covered more and more politics — it was more logical for me to become an independent. In this space, on more than one occasion, I have said I still lean right on a lot of issues.

However, I have to say, I do not get the Trump loyalty. I cannot gure out how he is still pulling so much support nationwide. He is being indicted for a lot. Whether you agree with the indictments or not — the reality is he’s still got a lot of legal troubles on his plate.

Yet — he still ies around the country touting his “amazing” leadership abilities, asking for money, which appears to be paying legal bills, and claiming he will still make a great president.

However, here is the reality — to those Republicans saying they are going to vote for Trump in the primaries — I ask, have you thought about the end game?

A man whom I’ve stayed friends with and whose family I knew growing up recently posted a plea to his Republican friends on Facebook. He begged his Republican friends to realize that Trump cannot win the whole thing and it’s time to go with another candidate. He speci cally brought up Ron DeSantis.

He speci cally said in ation and the economy are big reasons to look beyond Trump.

I have been a bit surprised that DeSantis has not gained more ground among Repub-

licans. Even with his recent stumbles I am surprised he has not gained more ground with the party.

In my friend’s plea, he stressed that Trump absolutely will not win the general election. I agree with him.

While Trump may carry the Republican vote — he will not carry the una liated and independent voters. He will not gain anything among Democratic voters.

To win the whole thing — a candidate has to get some votes beyond their own party. Trump cannot do it.

To those still wanting him to be president — it will not happen.

Nikki Haley, Mike Pence and Ron DeSantis have a better chance of getting the una liated voter over Trump.

To those sticking with Trump — do you want to win the entire thing and get Biden out of o ce — or do you want to stand by Trump and lose?

I’m not saying the Republican candidates have my vote as of right now, but I will say Nikki Haley and Ron DeSantis have a better shot of getting me to vote Republican than Trump does.

I can’t say I’m over the top with the job the Biden/Harris ticket has done to date. A good, strong leader may get me to consider the other side.

I believe Trump has divided this country too much. I believe he has helped in creating the hateful country we are dealing with on both sides of the aisle. Is he solely to blame? No. But, he carries a lot of it.

We need a di erent leader. We need di erent people to represent the conservative party.

I hope the Trump-for-life supporters start questioning whether loyalty to him is more important than having new leadership in the White House in 2025.

elma Grimes is the south metro editor for Colorado Community Media.

LINDA SHAPLEY Publisher lshapley@coloradocommunitymedia.com

Reading to learn, grow, imagine, escape

As part of our company’s onboarding process, we are invited to connect with new hires at every level of the organization and wherever they may live. Technology of course makes scheduling these calls and having these calls very easy when we are connecting with new remote team members.

e other day I had a wonderful call with our newest team member, Adam. What we found that we had in common was a love for reading. And it was a great reminder for me that each year around this time, I publish my reading list and recommendations.

e summertime is always a great way to reacquaint ourselves with reading if we have not been as diligent in our e orts. Vacations and staycations o er us that time to unwind and relax with a good book. For me, depending on what I am reading, a great book transports me to di erent places, in di erent times, inspires creativity, and helps me to learn and grow personally and professionally.

I love this quote by S.I. Hayawaka, “It is not true that we only have only one life to live; if we can read, we can live as many more lives and as many kinds of

ERIN ADDENBROOKE Marketing Consultant eaddenbrooke@coloradocommunitymedia.com

life as we wish.” So spot on. We all have our di erent genres of the types of books we enjoy reading. For me, I go through a cycle of ve di erent types of books and then repeat the cycle. I start with a faith-based book, then a history book or biography, then move to a business book, add in a personal development book, and then go to a ctional book. I have found that the diversity in my reading keeps me wellrounded and a ords me the opportunity to engage in conversations with people regardless of their own reading preferences. Reading so many di erent types of books also inspires tremendous creativity.

So here is my current reading list, hopefully one or two may be of interest to you.

Faith-based books: “Mission Possible” by Tim Tebow, “All ings New” by John Eldridge, “If You Want to Walk on Water, You’ve Got to Get Out of the Boat” by John Ortberg, “Let the Journey Begin” by Max Lucado, “ e Carpenter” by Jon Gordon

History or biography books: “ e Forgotten 500” by Gregory A. Freeman, “ e Last Stand” by Nathaniel Philbrick, “George Washington’s Secret Six” by Brian Kilmead and Don Yaeger, “ e Nine” by Gwen Strauss

Business books: “How to Sell to the Modern Buyer” by David Mattson, “10

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Email letters to letters@coloradocommunitymedia.com

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Littleton Independent (ISSN 1058-7837)(USPS 315-780)

A legal newspaper of general circulation in Littleton, Colorado, the Littleton Independent is published weekly on Thursday by Colorado Community Media, 750 W. Hampden Ave., Suite 225, Englewood, CO 80110

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Thelma Grimes

Election in Littleton — How to run for city council

BY NINA JOSS NJOSS@COLORADOCOMMUNITYMEDIA.COM

Littleton citizens interested in running for city council will be able to start collecting signatures on Aug. 8, when the city clerk’s o ce will make nomination petitions available.

ree Littleton city council seats are up for election on Nov. 7. Voters will elect representatives for District 2, District 4 and one at-large seat. e seats are each four-year terms.

e November election will be the rst to use Littleton’s new district boundaries, which were adopted as part of the city’s redistricting process that happens every 10 years.

Littleton’s council is the leading authority in the city, making all ofcial political decisions. Elections for city council positions happen in odd-numbered years and are nonpartisan in nature, the city said.

Who is running so far?

Pam Grove, who currently sits in the at-large seat, and District 4 councilmember Kelly Milliman have both submitted candidate a davit forms declaring their intent to run for their respective seats.

District 2 councilmember Jerry Valdes is term-limited as he reaches the end of his 12th year on council.

Prior to his role in District 2, he also served as Mayor Pro Tem and Mayor. One competitor for the District 2 seat will be Robert Reichardt, who has served on the Littleton Public Schools Board of Education since 2015, including a recent period as president.

Andrea Vukovich Peters, who works as a real estate agent in Littleton, will be running for the District 4 seat.

How to run

Candidates must be a citizen of the United States, at least 21 years old and a registered voter in Littleton for at least 12 consecutive months prior to the election. Per the city’s charter, candidates must also live in the district they are running to represent, City Clerk Colleen Norton said.

Elected city o cials may not be a paid employee of any municipality or hold other elected public o ce, the city said.

All citizens interested in serving on city council must submit a candidate a davit form to the city clerk’s ofce. ese forms are available on the city’s website at https://webforms. littletongov.org/Forms/CandidateA davit.

en, they must obtain and complete a nomination petition for candidacy. Petitions will be available starting Aug. 8 at the city clerk’s o ce and must be submitted with signatures from at least 50 quali ed registered voters by Aug. 28 by 5 p.m. Signatures must come from registered electors in the district a candidate is running for, Norton said. For example, a person running to represent District 2 must gather signatures from voters in District 2. Citizens running for the at-large seat can gather signatures from registered electors anywhere within the city boundaries.

People interested in running may le for candidacy at any time, as long as they meet the deadline to return completed nomination petitions.

Council meets regularly on the rst and third Tuesday of the month at 6:30 p.m. and generally holds study sessions on the second and fourth

Tuesdays as well.

e mayor position pays $1,500 per month, the mayor pro tem role pays $1,225 per month and other city council members make $1,100

per month.

ose interested in running may contact the clerk’s o ce at 303-7953780 or COLCityClerk@littletongov. org for more information.

FROM

Leadership Virtues for Disruptive Times” by Tom Ziglar, “Smart Brevity” by Jim VandeHei, Mike Allen, Roy Schwartz, “Traction” by Gino Wickman

Personal development books: “ e Power of Who” by Bob Beaudine, “ e Power of Community” by Howard Partridge, “Becoming a Master Communicator” by Renee Marino, “What Drives You” by Kevin Miller, “Growth with Goals” by Jill Hellwig

Fiction books: “Dark Vector” by Clive Cussler, “Wild Fire” by Nelson DeMille, “ e Lion” by Nelson DeMille, “American Assassin” by Vince Flynn, “Transfer of Power” by Vince Flynn

Again, those are just my recent favorites and if you are looking for a good book in a speci c genre, hopefully this list helps or inspires you to look at similar titles.

And remember what Mary Schmich says about reading,

“Reading is a discount ticket to everywhere.” It is so true, we can let whatever it is we read to lead us into a new paradigm and bring us into a new place mentally, emotionally and spiritually. Reading broadens our knowledge and leads us to new horizons. And the only thing that we are bound by is our own time and willingness to commit to making the e ort to read and read more often.

How about you? What are you reading these days? I always love getting fantastic book recommendations from our community and sharing what we both get out of the reading. I would love to see your list at gotonorton@gmail.com, and when we can read to learn, grow, imagine and escape it really will be a better than good life.

Michael Norton is an author, a personal and professional coach, consultant, trainer, encourager and motivator of individuals and businesses, working with organizations and associations across multiple industries.

Littleton voters will elect three city councilmembers on Nov. 7.

BY CORINNE WESTEMAN CWESTEMAN@COLORADOCOMMUNITYMEDIA.COM

For those who haven’t stopped by their local library in recent years, it’s not just a place to pick up and drop o books anymore.

In the post-pandemic era, libraries have become meeting places, remote work spaces, play areas and more. Rather than the repositories of books and other print media they once were, libraries are taking on more of a community center role, sta members at Denverarea library districts explained.

“ ey’ve always had that role,” said Holly Grant of the Clear Creek County Library District. “But now, it’s about … not just seeing (a library) as a storehouse of knowledge and scholarship.”

To that end, libraries have diversi ed the items and programs they o er to address community needs. Depending on the district, patrons can check out everything from camping equipment to virtual reality headsets. Additionally, patrons can access video- and audiobook-streaming services for free with their library cards.

Plus, along with children’s storytime and book clubs, library events and programs can range from puppy yoga to snowshoe hikes.

“It’s a very di erent library than what many of us grew up with,” Holly Whelan of Arapahoe Libraries said. “ … We have everything, everything, everything.”

Items and resources aplenty

Whelan’s words aren’t an exaggeration, as sta members from multiple districts said their libraries o er so much it’s hard for them to remember everything. So, before buying, renting or downloading something, check the library rst.

Along with books, movies and comics, districts have nontraditional items for check-out. Many o er laptops, iPads, Kindles, mobile WiFi hotspots, passes to local museums, cookware, GoPro cameras and science kits.

Mark Fink, executive director of Anythink Libraries — which has branches from ornton to Bennett — said his district’s TryIts collection includes musical instruments for various experience levels; lawn games; outdoor gear like snowshoes and backpacks; 3-D printers; sewing machines and crafting kits; and microscopes.

People have borrowed them for weekend barbecues, camping trips, one-o projects, or to see whether they’d want to buy their own. Fink said the TryIts collection has been so popular, Anythink Libraries has “expanded the level of items we provide.”

O ering items like these saves patrons money and helps the environment too, Grant pointed out, as people aren’t buying things they might only use once.

Along with physical items, districts have several online resources patrons can access with their library cards. rough these apps and online services, patrons can download e-books and audiobooks, stream movies and TV shows, and access tutoring services and online classes — all for free.

Lizzie Gall of Je erson County Public Library said patrons who used to spend money on Audible and Net ix

have saved money by nding their items through the library instead.

In-person services are also crucial, whether it’s answering technological questions or notarizing documents. Grant said Clear Creek patrons have asked for help setting up their Kindles and reviewing their emails, and tourists often stop into the Idaho Springs and Georgetown branches to ask questions about local sites and museums.

As Whelan summarized it: “If you think the library isn’t for you, or we don’t have anything to o er, think again. … We have something for everybody.”

Unique programs, events

Beyond summer reading and book clubs, libraries have expanded the type of events and programs they o er — ranging from outdoor and out-of-library adventures, to arts

and culture, to physical and mental health. Almost all are free and open to everyone, including out-of-district attendees. Some may require preregistration and/or tickets to cover event costs.

Clear Creek has hosted everything from snowshoe hikes to American Sign Language classes. It also has free present-wrapping stations in December, which are immensely popular, Grant said.

Both Je erson County and Arapahoe libraries have hosted after-hours laser tag for teens, which are well-attended and sometimes have fun themes like “Star Wars.” Gall highlighted other teen events, like this August’s Teen Iron Chef and the ongoing Coding Camp, which has expanded to include preteens.

Summertime outdoor concert series are

Local libraries o er nontraditional items and programs, preserve important ‘third place’

Eli Monreal plays Life-Size Clue during a March 31 teen event at Je erson County Public Library’s Golden branch.

FILE PHOTO BY CORINNE WESTEMAN

EVERYBODY

popular at Anythink and Arapahoe library districts, with each concert drawing hundreds of attendees.

Fink noted how Anythink Libraries also has an artists-in-residence program through a partnership with the Boulder Museum of Contemporary Art. e district’s also partnering with the City of ornton to build a 35,000-square foot nature library so people can engage with nature in an accessible way, he commented.

For Arapahoe Libraries, Whelan highlighted the Library For All program, which is for adults with disabilities and their caregivers. It also has a Memory Café for adults with memory loss, their caregivers and families.

Events like these have become crucial ways for participants to connect and interact with those in similar situations, Whelan described.

At Douglas County Public Libraries, the popular brew tour is return-

ing this year, which encourages patrons to support local breweries and co ee shops. Kerri Morgan, special events manager, said the district also hosts several literary trivia nights, library-wide scavenger hunts and similar events throughout the year.

Its thrice-a-year Storybook Holiday events are especially delightful, she added. ese themed nights at the library bring classic stories to life at springtime, Halloween and the winter holidays. is fall’s will be “ e Legend of Sleepy Hollow”themed, complete with interactive trick-or-treating.

“When you walk into the library, it’s almost like walking into a living expression of that piece of literature,” Morgan said of the Storybook Holiday events. “ … It’s all about making positive, lifelong memories inside the library.”

During the pandemic, virtual events became incredibly popular, and districts continue to o er hybrid options. Whelan said, for Arapahoe Libraries, it’s about engaging people no matter where they’re at — in the world, or in life.

“When we talk about getting people into the libraries, that doesn’t physically have to be walking through the doors,” she continued.

Preserving the ‘third place’

With libraries evolving as technology and community needs do, sta members emphasized how libraries are increasingly important meeting places. So, the buildings must re ect that.

More libraries now feature built-in cafes for people to relax, meet and/ or work. Fink said Anythink Libraries wanted its branches to feel like “high-end bookstores,” and help patrons “create special moments of joy or delight” through their library experiences.

Fink described how, in sociological terms, libraries fall into the “third place.” e premise is that a person’s “ rst place” is their home and their “second place” is work. us, “third places” like parks, churches, co ee shops and gyms are crucial for civic engagement and social interaction.

Libraries as “third places” are increasingly important for young

parents looking to get their children out of the house and meet other local families, Morgan described. eir popularity’s also growing among work-from-home folks who’ve lost their “second place” and want to work a free, o ce-type environment.

Morgan emphasized how, unlike some “third places,” libraries are completely free and open to everyone.

“It’s a place where, if you want, you can be entertained or educated,” she said. “It’s almost like a choose-your-own adventure.”

Gall, Grant and others emphasized how should re ect the people they serve, and adapt to their needs and interests. us, their districts are very responsive to patrons’ feedback for new items, events and programs.

“( e library)’s something that everybody can enjoy without feeling like there’s a price tag attached,”

Grant continued. “ … If the library wasn’t there to o er all those elements of service, where would (people) get them from?”

Douglas County Libraries hosts a Halloween-themed Storybook Holiday event. The district hosts these events three times a year — in the spring, around Halloween, and in early December.

Brooks Bowland, 6, crosses the bridge during the Clear Creek County Library District’s snowshoe hike in February

FILE PHOTO BY SARA HERTWIG

Colorado funk band SuperMagick performs at Anythink Libraries’ Backyard Concert Series in 2016. COURTESY OF KENT MEIREIS AND ANYTHINK LIBRARIES

Arapahoe Libraries hosts a seed library at one of its locations. Seed libraries have become a popular program among local library districts. COURTESY PHOTO

Tours set at water gardens

SONYA’S SAMPLER

The Colorado Water Garden Society will host the annual Water Blossom Celebration from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. on Aug. 12 at Denver Botanic Gardens, 1007 York St., with tours of the water gardens and free aquatic plants, while they last. ere is a ne collection of water lilies, some carnivorous plants and information on how to grow them.

DBG members free, others pay an admission fee. See colowatergardensociety.org.

Newman Center

e Newman Center at the University of Denver begins its 2023-2024 season with “Dogman: e Musical” at 6 p.m. Sept. 8 and 11 a.m. and 2 p.m. Sept. 9, followed Sept. 22-23 with the Martha Graham Dance Company at 7:30 p.m. Tickets: 303871-7720. For the season program, go to denvercenter.org/ticketsevents for a rich program of music, dance and lectures through the season in the Gates Auditorium.

Black Cube

Black Cube, a nonpro t nomadic art museum, located in Englewood, o ers tours of Marguerite Humeau’s 160-acre earthwork, “Orisons,” located in Hooper, Colorado, in the San Luis Valley. It transforms an unfarmable piece of land into “a place

of reverence,” we are told. A series of 84 kinetic and interactive sculptures “invoke the land’s histories” and a vast network of interrelations. ere

are 77 kinetic, wind-activated sculptural works which lay on the seven

Wonderbound season begins Oct. 19

with The Widow’s Bane, a band which is described as “a convergence of Creole and Cajun folklore.” (Ammons features live music.)

BY SONYA ELLINGBOE SELLINGBOE@COLORADOCOMMUNITYMEDIA.COM

Wonderbound’s Artistic Director Garrett Ammon and Clay Rose created “Wicked Bayou,” which will open the contemporary ballet’s 10th season Oct. 19-29 in its new permanent home in Park Hill, at 3842 Dahlia St., Denver, according to a recent announcement.

The company has appeared at various venues in the metro area since its founding and moved into the new facility in May.

October performances will be

This will be a final chance to see this band perform, as it will be saying farewell after this production, according to information we received.

Wonderbound now has a 260seat auditorium and will welcome its audience to performances on a large stage, where the company will rehearse and perform. The new facility also has administrative offices. (We are told that there is parking at the new location and on the nearby street.) The organization is proud to have weathered the pandemic without furloughs or layoffs or salary cuts ...

The “Wicked Bayou” ballet was

5.00% APY * 6 OR 9 MONTH CD.

created by Ammons and Rose, frontman for the Boulder-based band Gasoline Lollipops. The new work is a dark adventure, which includes a depraved puppet master, an insatiable alligator and two young lovers who must fight for their lives ...

December will feature a new holiday production, “Icy Haught,” choreographed by Ammons and company dancer Sarah Tallman, on Dec. 7-17. We are assured that this is not standard holiday fare. Ammon and Rose will also pair up for the season finale, a world premiere of “Samson and Delilah,” which will be set in Palestine, Texas in 1977, at the height of the ERA movement. All-new music in the psychedelic country genre will tell of Delilah, a beautician, and Sam, the local sheriff, star-crossed

lovers, who do not always see eye to eye.” Rose and his band will accompany on May 2-12, 2024. Also included in the season will be “Awakening Beauty,” with Tom Hagerman and his band on Feb. 22 to March 3.

The dance company is described: “Lives at the convergence of tradition and innovation, vulnerability and courage and intimacy and openness. Under the leadership of husband-and-wife team Garett Amon and Dawn Fay, Wonderbound is committed to the development and sharing of the collaborative artistic experiences ... creations erase boundaries between mediums and engage artists and audiences in candid explorations of the human experience.” See wonderbound.com for subscription information.

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The water gardens at Denver Botanic Gardens will be the subject of tours by the Colorado Water Garden Society on Aug. 12. PHOTO COURTESY OF DENVER BOTANIC GARDENS

‘Wicked Bayou’ will be performed with live music from The Widow’s Bane

Thu 8/17

Denver Broncos

@ 9am Centura Health Training Center, 13655 E. Broncos Pkwy., Englewood

The Newarkansans live at The Inverness HIlton Denver @ 4pm Hilton Denver Inverness, 200 Inverness Dr W, Englewood

TEN - Colorado Tribute to Pearl

Jam: TEN - A Tribute to Pearl Jam at Tailgate Tavern @ 6pm Tailgate Tavern & Grill, 19552 Mainstreet, Parker

Sat 8/19

Crazy Dave, Bass Guitarist: Resonance Debuts | Tailgate Tavern @ 5pm Tailgate Tavern & Grill, 19552 Mainstreet, Parker

Fri 8/18

Cory Michael @ 1pm Wide Open Saloon, 5607 US-85, Sedalia

Electric Whiskey Experiment @ 5pm Sunroom Brewing, 3242 S Acoma St, Englewood

powered by

Tom Mcelvain Music @ 6pm private House concert - Castle Rock, CO, Castle Rock

George Porter Jr.: Conscious Alliance All Star Bene�t @ 6pm Cherry Hills Village Community Develop‐ment, 2450 E Quincy Ave, Englewood

Kristopher James: Earth Angel Festival 2023 @ 6pm null, 7231 S Quintero St, Fo��eld

6 Million Dollar Band @ 6pm Pindustry, 7939 E Arapahoe Rd, Centen‐nial

Resist & Bite @ 6pm Wild Goose Saloon, Parker

Jude Brothers @ 7pm Swallow Hill Music, 71 E Yale Ave, Denver

Resist @ 7pm Wild Goose Saloon, 11160 S. Pikes Peak Drive, Parker

Sun 8/20

Read Southall Band @ 6pm Gothic Theatre, 3263 S Broadway, Engle‐wood

Crazy Dave, Bass Guitarist: Fleatwood Mac Tribute | Tailgate Tavern & Grill @ 6pm

Tailgate Tavern & Grill, 19552 Mainstreet, Parker

Thu 8/24

Neil Z: Brightenstar @ Black Bear

@ 4:30pm

Black Bear Golf Club, 11400 Can‐terberry Pkwy,, Parker

Fleming Mansion Walkthrough (about 45 days before event)

@ 6pm Fleming Mansion, 1510 S. Grant St., Den‐ver. 720-913-0654

Steve Everett: Earth Angel Fest @ 4pm Earth Angel Barn, Fo��eld

Grayson Little Music: Grayson Little & The Sunday Drivers at Concert Under The Lights @ 6pm Festival Park, 300 2nd St, Castle Rock

Rotating Tap Comedy @ Coal Mine Ave Brewing @ 6pm Coal Mine Ave Brewing Company, 9719 W Coal Mine Ave unit a, Lit‐tleton

The Barlow Band takes to Arvada Center

Ask any performer and they’ll tell you there’s something di erent about performing on a “home stage” — the stages they’ve seen heroes and peers perform on countless times in their

e Bar-

the Arvada Center’s outdoor amphitheater is one of those stages. So, getting the chance to open for alt-rocker Lucero at 7:30 p.m. on Friday, Aug. 11 is a big deal for the band.

e Barlow — Shea Boynton on vocals, guitar and banjo, Troy Scoope on bass, Ben Richter on drums and Brad Johnson on guitar and vocals — have been a group since 2017 and draw inspiration from classic and contemporary country artists like Steel Woods, Cody Jinks, the Randy Rogers Band and Waylon Jennings and Willie Nelson.

We chatted with Boynton about the group’s history, performing at the Arvada Center and more:  Interview edited for brevity and clarity.

Tell me about the background of e Barlow.

Most of us have known each other since high school (Arvada Senior High) and played in di erent bands together at one point in time or another. We started e Barlow as a

casual thing — we were all itching to play and needed a creative outlet.

e band came together naturally as we were already buddies. e rst couple years were us getting our foothold musically and playing around Denver/Colorado. Touring escalated after we released “Horseshoe Lounge” in Feb. of 2021 and we’ve been full steam since.

What’s it like being part of the Denver music scene?

Denver and Colorado are small, tight knit scenes. It’s always reasonable to assume we’ll run in to folks we know within production, promotion or other artists when we’re playing inside state lines.

We proudly wave the #coloradocountry ag and always tell folks we’re from Arvada. is is where we were raised, where we’re raising our children, and have built our lives here. We couldn’t be prouder to play country music from a place that’s less conventional than others.

What does it mean to be playing at the Arvada Center and opening for Lucero?

We’ve all driven by the Arvada Center a million times, so when the opportunity came up to play there we were elated. It’s home. Any chance to play among our friends and family always feel like a celebration. I’ve been listening to Lucero for more than 20 years, getting to share a stage with them is a huge privilege.

We pride ourselves on touching every genre within our lane that we can. As musicians, we make memo-

ries for folks and we aim to do our job each night.

Find more information at www. thebarlowband.com/ and get tickets at https://arvadacenter.org/events/ lucero.

Mountains of fun at 4th ConiferFest

What better way is there to appreciate late summer in Colorado than by getting a little elevation and attending the Rotary Club of Conifer’s  4 th annual ConiferFest ?

Held from 11 a.m. until about 7:30 p.m. on Saturday, Aug. 12, at  the open space adjacent to Our Lady of the Pines Church , 9444 EagleCli Drive in Conifer, the fundraiser features live music from Who’s omas, Captain Quirk, Magoo the Band and Sam Gyllenhall Band. Attendees will be able to enjoy various beverage options (including margaritas), food trucks and more.

All you need to know can be found at https://coniferfest.com/.

Celebrate 15 years of CinemaQ Film Festival

Sharing the stories of the LGBTQIA+ community has rarely been as crucial as it is right now, with the community’s rights under constant assault. is makes the annual  Denver Film CinemaQ Film Festival  not just important, but worth celebrating.

It’s the festival’s 15 th year and it is bigger than ever, with some truly incredible lms getting screened over its run at the  Sie

SAMPLER

large-scale net sculptures, inspired by sandhill cranes, which migrate through the valley in spring and fall. Open to the public by advance reservation only, but admission is free sunrise to sunset daily. Self-guided tour includes a two-hour walk in sandy soil. Visitors with accessibility issues can contact the Black Cube sta at hello@blackcube.art for more information before reserving a visit. See blackcube.art.

Author honored

Highlands Ranch author Claudia Cangilla McAdam was recently honored by the Colorado Authors League with a 2023 Writing Excellence Award for her children’s book, “Louie’s Lent.” It won third place in the Association of Catholic Publishers’ Children’s Book/Picture Book category. She has several other books in production as well.

Depot Art Gallery exhibit

“Best of Colorado,” the next Depot Art Gallery exhibit, coinciding with Littleton’s Western Welcome Week,

FilmCenter , 2510 E. Colfax Ave. in Denver, from ursday, Aug. 10 through Sunday, Aug. 13. Some of the highlights include “Chasing Chasing Amy,” “Bottoms,” “Our Son” and “Problemista.”

As is always the case with Denver Film, there will be great panels with lmmakers and other creatives. Get tickets, passes and all the details at www.denver lm.org.

Clarke’s Concert of the Week — The Strokes at Red Rocks

e Strokes  are one of the most important bands of this century, and their debut album, “Is is It” radically reshaped the direction of indie and alternative rock. I’ve pretty much loved all the group’s albums in their own way, and even if they don’t have the critical success they used to, they’re still legends that demand attention.  e group doesn’t tour often and so the fact that they’re playing  Red Rocks , 18300 W. Alameda Parkway in Morrison, at 6:30 p.m. on Monday, Aug. 14, is a massive deal. Despite the fact they’ve been around for 20 years, they’ve never played the mythical venue before, so this is going to be a special evening. ey’ll be joined by alt-rock vocalist Weyes Blood as the opener.  Purchase tickets at www.ticketmaster.com.

Clarke Reader’s column on culture appears on a weekly basis. He can be reached at Clarke.Reader@hotmail.com.

is juried by artist Christian Dore. He chose 60 works from 400 entries. Show runs Aug.8-Sept. 10. A reception will be from 5:30-7:30 p.m. on Aug. 18 at the Littleton Fine Art Guild’s Town Hall Arts Center gallery, where “Home on the Range” will run through Sept. 10. Admission is free on both galleries. Town Hall hours: 10-5 MondayFriday, 2450 Main St., Littleton.

Bega Park

e Littleton Fine Arts Guild members will ll Bega Park in Downtown Littleton with tents and art on Aug. 12. Visitors encouraged ...

Jazz

Dazzle Jazz is collaborating with an El Chapultepec Legacy project to give space in its new location at the Denver Center for Performing Arts to a series of paintings and to piano jazz called “the late set,” from 11 p.m. to 1 a.m. on ursday, Friday, Saturday, starting in the fall. ePecLegacy.com is raising funds for the project. (Reach out to Anna@thepeclegacy.com for information on becoming a donor.) Dazzle will have moved this past week to 1080 14th St. in the DPAC with ongoing concerts. Tickets will cost $15 to $45 via dazzledenver.com.

Clarke Reader

Get excited about heirloom tomatoes

The essence of summer for me is a freshly picked tomato, and if you are a Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) member or visit farmer’s markets, I am sure you love the rainbow of colors that come from heirloom tomatoes. At the Denver Botanic Gardens Chat eld Farms’ CSA, we get super excited about new nds, old classics and interesting adapted heirlooms that we can add to our o erings. Of course, tomato season starts well before the summer — deep in the winter, when the snow is falling, tomato growers pursue seed catalogues with all sorts of tomato varieties. Now, with midsummer approaching, we enthusiastically wait for the rst fruits of the vine.

I would like to share three varieties we are most excited about for this season. ese varieties are heirloom or more accurately, ‘open pollinated’ tomatoes, which means a saved seed from the fruit will have very similar characteristics as the original plant.

Carbon

ese black heirloom tomatoes are heavy feeders and have a high tolerance for drought and hot growing conditions. Carbon

tomatoes are open pollinated, which means they use natural pollinators such as bumblebees, bees, birds and, sometimes, the wind — all natual elements of the garden.

e carbon tomato is a large, rm, meaty tomato. Its esh is deep red with light to dark purple shoulders. It has a vibrant, sweet, smokey avor with the texture of a beefsteak. ese fruits are marketed as crack resistant, but according to several growers, they tend to split if watering is not regular.

Cherokee green is tomato is a true green when ripe which can cause confusion. We see many people pick up green tomatoes, then set them down because they think they are not ready. However, if you know what to look for in ripeness, then you are blessed with the sweetest avor (in my opinion) of all the tomatoes. Ripeness is indicated by a slight yelloworange hue on the blossom side of the fruit. is wonderful heirloom has an excellent, complex avor with a gorgeous color, which makes it one of our most anticipated tomatoes for this season based on being a favorite from last year. Each tomato can be between six ounces and one pound. Cherokee green is a large, beautiful beefsteak selected by Craig LeHoul-

lie who has trialed more than 1,200 tomato varieties and has several helpful books on home gardening. is tomato comes from the same gene selections at the Cherokee purple, which is known for bold, acidic avors.

Moskovich

A true classic in every tomato garden, this early, small, red tomato makes for a great slicer. ese perfect little red globes are cold-tolerant, which means they will be one of the rst to start to ripen. Moskovich

can put on growth while the early May conditions are still too cold for many big fruit tomatoes. It will be one of the last to keep producing because of its hardiness, making it a true work-horse winner for production. e avor is very balanced — not too acidic and not too sweet, so it also works for canning, if that’s your thing.

Happy growing (and eating)!

Josie Hart is the associate director of farm program for the Denver Botanic Gardens.

Heirloom tomatoes.

PHOTO BY SCOTT DRESSEL-MARTIN

Residents pursue litigation to address Centennial Airport concerns

BY TAYLER SHAW TSHAW@COLORADOCOMMUNITYMEDIA.COM

Following months of residents raising concerns about aircraft noise, tra c and lead emissions coming from Centennial Airport, a group has taken it a step further and created an organization called Safe Skies Colorado, Inc. to pursue legal action.

“We’re preparing to move forward with litigation,” said Nathan Winger, the president of Safe Skies Colorado.  e organization has retained a law rm that is helping examine different legal avenues it could pursue, Winger said.

Safe Skies Colorado has directed its attorneys to prepare a complaint, but it is still “up in the air” about who to bring the complaint against, he said.

“We are looking toward - how are we going to approach this situation? Does it mean pursuing legal action against the airport authority board, the county commissioners, individual ight schools?” Winger said.  e organization is looking at all angles, intent on pursuing whoever the residents believe they can get relief from, he said.

“We want to make sure that we’ve done our due diligence and that we’re bringing claims that we believe we can prevail on,” Winger said.

Winger says aircraft over homes ‘has increased significantly’

Centennial Airport, located in Arapahoe County near Dove Valley Regional Park, is one of the 25 busiest airports in the nation, averaging 1,000 takeo s and landings per day, according to the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA).

It is home to “numerous ight schools” and has “signi cant business jet and helicopter tra c,” according to the FAA’s website.

For months, residents have been attending meetings to raise concerns about increased air tra c, noise and lead pollution impacting the community, speci cally those living north of Arapahoe Road. Some formed a group, Quiet Skies Over Arapahoe County, to advocate for changes to be made to address safety and noise concerns at Centennial Airport.

Winger, who moved to Greenwood Village about a year-and-a-half ago, believes something changed at the airport, saying there are more planes ying near residential homes now than there were one year ago.

“We knew we live by an airport, and so we understood that there would be some tra c, you know, in and around our home and in and around our neighborhood — and that was ne,” Winger said. “Over the last year or so, it has increased signi cantly to the point where being in our backyard can sometimes be di cult.”

His two young children are routinely disturbed by aircraft while playing in the backyard, covering their ears from the noise, he said. Everyone in the neighborhood seems to talk about the planes, he added.

“We really do feel the impacts, and we know that our neighbors do as well,” he said.

Winger and his wife began attending the airport’s community noise roundtable meetings, typically held the rst Wednesday of each month.

e roundtable is made up of local elected o cials from Arapahoe and Douglas counties, appointed community representatives, airport sta , and others, according to Centennial Airport’s website.

Its purpose is to work with the airport to nd ways to reduce and mitigate the impact of aircraft noise on surrounding communities, per the website.

“We’ve been going for quite a while and we, and others, have become very frustrated with what we perceive as the lack of progress in trying to achieve any of these goals … of just trying to nd some common ground to be able to live and enjoy our home,” Winger said.

“ at’s all we want.”

Centennial Airport’s e orts to address community concerns e reason why more aircraft are ying over nearby neighborhoods remains unclear.

During the February noise roundtable meeting, the FAA explained its analysis found that the primary factor was increased aircraft volume in the tra c pattern, causing the tra c pattern to elongate.

Centennial Airport Executive Director and CEO Mike Fronapfel said the airport disagrees with that initial analysis. e airport thinks that after a 2021 mid-air collision occurred, the FAA local control tower changed the way it managed the aircraft in the pattern, resulting in the pattern getting extended more frequently over the community.

“Obviously, the FAA and the airport have disagreements about how we got here and why we’re having a problem,” Fronapfel said at the June noise roundtable meeting. “But at the end of the day … we both acknowledge that the tra c has increased over the community.”

“Instead of focusing on what’s happened and how it happened, let’s focus on the solution and then move forward,” Fronapfel added.

One of the steps Centennial Airport leaders have taken to address community concerns is hiring e Normandy Group, a lobbying and advocacy rm based in Washington D.C.

Louis Dupart, founding partner of the Normandy Group, spoke during

the June noise roundtable meeting.

He said he has been working with the airport, Centennial, Greenwood Village and Arapahoe County to get the FAA to join a sub-roundtable technical working group to address noise at the airport.

“Our goal is to have something happen quickly,” Dupart said.

Regarding concerns about lead pollution, airport and community leaders celebrated in early May when Centennial Airport became the rst in Colorado to o er unleaded aviation gas.

Aviation gasoline is the only transportation fuel in the U.S. to contain lead and is the fuel most commonly used in piston-engine aircraft, a ccording to the FAA’s website.

It was a step several o cials credited, in part, to residents who raised concerns.

For example, Arapahoe County Commissioner Jessica CampbellSwanson said Centennial Airport would not be the rst airport in the state to make unleaded aviation fuel available without the community raising its voice.

Residents generating their own solution

Winger said he thinks it is great that the airport has taken steps such as o ering unleaded fuel and getting a lobbyist.

“Not to totally detract from the airport’s e orts — it’s just not enough, and it’s not fast enough,” he said.

Safe Skies Colorado provides an opportunity for residents to generate their own solution, in a sense, Winger said.

“If this works, or it’s a combination of other things which work to give us some relief and help us achieve our goal of coming to some resolution … that’s what we want,” he said.

SEE AIRPORT, P25

Highlands Ranch resident Yvette Gunther celebrates 101st birthday

BY HALEY LENA HLENA@COLORADOCOMMUNITYMEDIA.COM

Some say she’s amazing, others say she’s a wonder woman, but one thing for certain is Yvette Gunther is an energetic and caring mother, grandmother and friend.

To celebrate her 101st birthday, many of her closest friends came together at Northridge Park in Highlands Ranch.

“She means a lot to us,” said close friend Sue Jude. “She always has the sweetest, warmest greeting.”

ere was a lot of food to go around at the celebration as Gunther had a large birthday cake and guests brought other treats for a large potluck.

Wearing a purple happy birthday tiara, Gunther was joined by two of her daughters, Barbara and Susan, and her friends from her aerobics class.

Gunther goes to aerobics class three times a week where the other participants say they have to keep up with her.

“She’s very energetic,” said Barbara.

Since she can remember, Gunther has always been physically active.

While attending an all girls board-

AIRPORT

“ at doesn’t mean one thing is better than the other,” he added. “ is is just something else to help move this process along.”

e idea to create Safe Skies Colorado came about after many conversations with people who were frustrated with what was happening at the airport, Winger said.

school, she also played soccer.

One of her fondest childhood memories is the First of July events in Vancouver where there were fun activities all day long. Some of her favorites were running in races and swimming.

“I’ve always been athletic,” said Gunther. “Since I’m older now, I still

“We started with the idea of, you know, hiring attorneys and that was kind of the stated goal, was to look for … attorneys to represent us and other people to be able to advise us,” he said.

e purpose of Safe Skies Colorado, in part, is to be able to serve as a representative for residents who are a ected by issues arising from the airport, he said.

“ e mission, though, is really to represent the community’s interest and make sure that our voices are heard,” he said.

mountains, followed by 59 years of marriage before Carl passed.

When they rst moved to Highlands Ranch, there were only a few houses on their street with an open view to watch the sunset every night.

Every year, the couple would go on an international trip, going all around the globe to places like Japan

e organization has garnered a lot of interest from the community, Winger said. It has hosted several community meetings and is raising donations to fund its legal e orts.

When asked what he would like for community members to know, Winger said, “It doesn’t have to be this way.”

“We believe that it’s possible to live … in unity or with an agreement with the airport and also be able to enjoy our communities and our neighborhoods,” he said. “ ere can be a way

to see Mount Fujiyama as well as Portugal and England.

Gunther said the only places she hasn’t gone are Russia, India and South America.

With beautiful clear blue water, Gunther said the South Paci c was her favorite destination. She and her husband went there on their 50th anniversary.

While in China, she fell in love with the art of traditional Chinese ribbon and fan dancing.

“ at’s where I saw this Chinese dancing,” said Gunther. “I saw those fans and those beautiful ribbons.” Gunther knew she had to learn that style of dance.

She performed the style of dance for the talent portion of beauty pageants - where she tied for for Ms. Senior Colorado one year- and performed at her 100th birthday party. Gunther’s life so far has been lled with loving people and amazing memories from around the world and she does not want to stop.

No matter what it is, Gunther encourages others to never stop moving.

“I o er everybody the choice to do something all the time,” said Gunther. “Don’t just sit around, look at TV, you want to live life.”

to live in harmony with an airport next to you.”

Winger said members of Safe Skies Colorado are open to having a dialogue with airport o cials.

“We now have this common problem,” he said. “It’s our hope that we can kind of work together to … get some kind of relief here.”

ose interested in learning more about Safe Skies Colorado and how to donate can visit www.safeskiesco.org or contact the organization by emailing info@safeskiesco.org.

Highlands Ranch resident Yvette Gunther celebrates her 101st birthday with friends and family at Northridge Park. Always full of energy, Gunther wears her purple happy birthday tiara as she enjoys the potluck.

PHOTO BY HALEY LENA

Donating gently used household goods

BY TAMARA CHUANG THE COLORADO SUN

Until about two-and-a-half years ago, Bobby Dainko was living in his car, addicted to meth.

Today, he’s clean and works full time at Spring Back Colorado Mattress Recycling, a nonpro t in Commerce City that recycles used mattresses that would otherwise end up in land lls. e nonpro t deliberately employs folks like Dainko — graduates of a nearby addiction treatment program.

“Yeah, I was living in my car right down the street here,” said Dainko, pointing out the window from an airconditioned o ce where he answers calls and schedules mattress pickups. “I just got sick and tired of what it takes to live homeless. I used to think, ‘Oh, you’re homeless. You don’t have to do anything.’ But no, it’s a daily battle. Hour by hour even. Where am I going? What am I doing? I did that for almost a year and got so sick of it. I called Wellness Court and they welcomed me back at 2 in the morning.”

Dainko had previously worked at Spring Back after graduating from the nearby Stout Street Foundation substance abuse recovery program in 2017. But he relapsed a year later, after his mother passed away. He just wasn’t done with drugs, he says now. But he believes he’s nally kicked his addiction for good. And Spring Back gave him his job back.  “ e owner (Christopher Conway), he said, ‘Bobby, you’ve never lied to me, you’ve never stolen from me. ose are the two things I don’t tolerate. Yes, I’ll give you another chance.’ And he did,” said Dainko, who now has bene ts like health insurance. “And because of that, I got a second chance here.”

Uno cial and o cial workforce programs have been a source of labor for Colorado employers long before the pandemic and the ensuing labor shortage struck. But there’s another breed of workforce programs that help the planet, help consumers get rid of old stu and help people who have di culty nding

work get a job. From diverting old computers and unwanted couches from land lls to refurbishing or upcycling materials for another life, the social enterprises often hover below the public radar. But some have caught the attention of the Colorado Department of Public Health & Environment, which awarded grants to many programs aimed at diverting waste from the land lls.

“We applaud companies working on recycling solutions, particularly when they accomplish that by developing socially responsible business models that help some of Colorado’s disadvantaged workers learn new skills,” Kendra Appelman-Eastvedt, the recycling grants program manager, wrote in an email.

Here’s a few of them, but please share others in your local community and we’ll compile a list for a future story.

Spring Back gets a shoutout from the city of Denver’s bulky-item disposal page. e company also partners with ve land lls around the state by providing a trailer to collect mattresses for recycling at $30 each. Otherwise land ll custom-

ers often pay more to dispose of a mattress — it costs $74 at the Waste Management-operated Denver Arapahoe Disposal Site in Aurora. And yes, the mattress goes into the land ll, said a Waste Management employee who answered a pricing call. She suggested Spring Back for recycling mattresses at a lower price.  Spring Back works with mattress stores to collect unwanted mattresses, and it has partnerships with a handful of land lls, including in Mesa and Larimer Counties, and several cities, including Pueblo, Loveland and Denver. In the Denver area, there’s mattress pick up. On an average week, Spring Back workers tear down between 1,500 to 2,000 unwanted mattresses; strip them for steel, foam, wood and other recyclable parts; and send very little to the land ll.

“ e environmental impact is huge. Long-term sustainability is really important. Working with cities and municipalities is great. But this whole thing was started out of the desire to help folks and really help them get their life turned around,” said Peter Conway, vice president

of business development and the founder’s son. “ at’s the rewarding part, for me at least.”

Eric Gallegos, who completed the Stout Street program and graduates in February, plans to stay at Spring Back “for the long haul.”

Gallegos, who had the choice of prison or Stout Street, said that Stout Street showed him the path out of a life of drugs. Spring Back helps him stay on it.

“I’m comfortable here. I like to have a good, productive work day that challenges me. And this is labor intensive,” said Gallegos, who is from Trinidad. “When you make it through the day, you feel accomplished.”

Getting a job has long been part of Stout Street’s program, said Bradley Lucero, its executive director. e organization has worked with Spring Back for about a decade and also works with organizations like Food Bank of e Rockies and construction companies. It’s always looking for new partners willing to employ those at Stout Street, most who are there because their only other option was prison.

“ ey’re not used to getting up and going to work. ey’re not used to what minimum wage looks like, or living on $20 an hour because selling drugs, obviously they could make thousands of dollars in an afternoon,” Lucero said. “Having an idea of what a future looks like sober is huge.”

And for those who are tired of their old way of life and ready for more stability, the partnership with employers helps graduates get a second chance to reboot their work life.

“Some of them will take advantage of it, some of them will squander it,” Lucero said. “But for the most part, it’s folks that understand they have a criminal history and the longer they can keep a solid resume or build a solid resume, they understand that’ll help their odds down the road to apply and hopefully retain other positions.”

powerful is the light of unity that it can illuminate the whole earth.”

At Spring Back Mattress’ Commerce City warehouse, Eric Gallegos pitches in wherever he can to help the company strip down and recycle all the parts of unwanted mattresses. Gallegos, a former drug addict and dealer, faced prison or a local rehab. He chose rehab, which put him in touch with Spring Back for a job. He’s been clean for more than two years.

PHOTO BY ANDY COLWELL, SPECIAL TO THE COLORADO SUN

DONATIONS

Seeking developmentally disabled workers

Just west of downtown Denver, Blue Star Recyclers charges a fee to take an old PC, monitor or other household electronics o your hands. e fees help pay a team that dismantles computers and household electronics. Parts are recycled for pro t or upcycled into working computers for sale. e tasks are repetitive but employees are eager to get to work.

e majority have been diagnosed with some sort of developmental disability, like autism.

“It’s like they’re waiting by the clock a minute before (the work day starts) to make sure they clock in right on time,” said Sam Morris, Blue Star’s CEO. His dad, Bill, started the company in 2009 in Colorado Springs. “We’ve had folks who’ve been with us in Colorado Springs for 13 to 15 years and they are still exceeding their goals every week. And they’re doing the exact same thing every day.”

e company has diverted 34 million pounds of electronics from land lls and continues to do so.

e pandemic strained its growth and caused Blue Star to close newer operations in Chicago and Boulder. But something it did months before the pandemic changed its trajectory. After sharing their workforce results with a team of electronics recyclers in 2019, Blue Star doubled down on its original mission: nding job opportunities for people with developmental disabilities. Blue Star’s employees are rarely absent, very focused on their daily tasks and have a good attitude, according to a case study on the company’s workforce.

“It was just the real simple stu : zero absenteeism and lost-time accidents, 98% on-task engagement, all the measurables that everyone is so focused on, it became pretty clear that they were going ‘Omigosh, how do we get in on this?’” Morris said. “What we’ve found over the years is that, especially for folks on the autistic spectrum, they are just unbelievably good at that systematic step-by-step task. Whether it’s putting something together or taking it apart, if it’s the same everyday and they know what to expect, that’s their comfort zone.”

Blue Star began a national training program for the organization behind the e-Stewards certi cation, an e-waste recycling standard that bans exporting toxic e-waste to developing nations.

Before it launched the Advanced Plus program, Blue Star had employed roughly 60 individuals with a diagnosed developmental disability. After setting up the training program in 2019, “we’re almost at 200,” Morris said. “It became clear pretty quickly that this was the best approach.”

When city budgets got slashed during the pandemic, Denver’s Department of Parks and Recreation felt the pain and was unable to hire the usual

crew of seasonal workers. at’s when the nonpro t Civic Center Conservancy, which exists to support Civic Center park, began strategizing.  e Conservancy teamed up with Bayaud Enterprises to hire unhoused residents to pick up trash and assist city workers with landscaping in a program called Civic Center Works, which launched in April 2022.

“ e narrative around Civic Center in some way, shape or form was that the homeless were a drain on Civic Center and it was something that was bringing it down. But we knew the unhoused community were some of the park’s biggest advocates. And we had seen from before (the pandemic) that the people nding community in our park, Civic Center park, were the ones who were walking around picking up trash and taking care of it,” said Eric Lazzari, the Conservancy’s executive director.

Last year, 24 people were hired to work six hours a day, three days a week for the season. Ten moved on to permanent jobs with the parks department or used the program as a stepping stone in their career path. is season, there’s about ve people on the job daily with about a dozen in the program, he said.

“ ese are folks making the steps to transition out of homelessness and were looking for jobs,” Lazzari said.

“What started out as a parks problem solved the parks problem but also impacted and changed the lives of others.”

What started as a side project for Nick Reichert and friend Lance Harding to make a few extra bucks in 2016 is now a couch refurbishing and upcycling business helping those in need.

“One of our rst couches actually went to someone who was just getting o the streets,” said Reichert, who was a y shing guide in the Vail Valley when he noticed free couches on Craigslist that were often in decent condition. “I’ve always had a heart, especially for the homeless. He was just so excited to get this really nice couch that had been xed up and cleaned up (and) delivered to his house.”

e Good Couch in Lakewood today receives about 50 couches a week

(it also o ers pickup). After cleaning and xing them, the couches are sold online. at helps sustain the company, which is pro table. It donates some of the proceeds to the Colorado Coalition for the Homeless but also provides couches to folks who are getting a home after living on the streets. Harding is a founder but no longer part of the business.

But some couches are in such bad shape or, well, just outdated, ugly and unsellable. ose ones are stripped for parts and recycled to avoid the land ll or upcycled into something new.

“Being a y shing guide, I have a heart for sustainability. I want to see

as little waste go into the land ll as possible,” he said. “In couches, there’s just all this wood and metal, upholstery foam. None of that’s good in a land ll.”

Wood and metal has been used for shelving and the company’s storage shed. Extra frames, hardware and legs are used to x up other couches. Reichert also estimates that e Good Couch has saved 1,000 pounds of leather from land lls. ey recently began working with American Made Apparel Manufacturing in Aurora to do something with those leather scraps. Now it has a line of handbags, wallets and card holders — all made in Denver with leather from unwanted couches.

“I’d say that at least 95% of what we take is at least partially or fully disassembled and reused,” he said. “ e most ful lling part is de nitely being able to get furniture to the people who (the Coalition) is able to place in semi-permanent housing. And there’s a lot of other ministries and organizations now, too, that know about us and are able to recommend us so we do get to give away a fair amount of couches every month to folks in need.”

is story is from e Colorado Sun, a journalist-owned news outlet based in Denver and covering the state. For more, and to support e Colorado Sun, visit coloradosun.com. e Colorado Sun is a partner in the Colorado News Conservancy, owner of Colorado Community Media.

Kian Phair, senior recycling tech at Blue Star Recyclers, has been with the company since 2015. Blue Star accepts e-waste like old computers and has techs that dismantle the machines for parts that can be recycled. The company likes to hire people with developmental disabilities, who can thrive on repetitive tasks. PHOTO PROVIDED BY BLUE STAR RECYCLERS

Families sue Douglas County schools over bias response

Legal filing alleges discrimination, inaction

BY MCKENNA HARFORD MHARFORD@COLORADOCOMMUNITYMEDIA.COM

ree families are suing the Douglas County School District over its response to a pattern of what is being described as racial abuse at Castle Rock Middle School and Douglas County High School.

Filed Aug. 2 in the U.S. District Court for Colorado, the complaint alleges numerous students and staff at the schools targeted four Black or biracial students with harassment, racial slurs and threats, depriving them of equal access to education.

Parents of the students led the complaint. e complaint describes experiences of the children of Lacey Ganzy, Jon and Misty Martin, and Nadarian and Alexis Clark. It lists Douglas County School District, the school board and Castle Rock Middle School Principal John Viet as

defendants.

e children are not named in the lawsuit to protect their privacy.

e complaint argues that the racial harassment of the students is a consequence of a district culture that doesn’t value educational equity, speci cally alleging School Board President Mike Peterson and board members Kaylee Winegar, Becky Myers and Christy Williams contributed to that culture.

e complaint says the district violated the Civil Rights Act and the 14th Amendment by denying equal educational opportunities to the students involved.

Instead of a speci ed amount in the lawsuit, the families are requesting a jury trial to determine damages owed.

“Indeed, in a glaring act of callousness, the School District and Board of Education have yet to take formal action in their entity capacities, and many individual Board Members have yet to condemn these well-documented injustices,” the complaint says. “ e indi erence of School District leaders explains how

such levels of hate and racism were permitted to fester.”

In April, Ganzy and her son reported a group chat of more than 100 Castle Rock Middle School students where some allegedly used the n-word, threatened to shoot Black people, shared racist memes and spoke about bringing back the Holocaust.

Ganzy’s daughter, who was attending Douglas County High School, also shared during an April school board meeting that she was called racial slurs regularly and was asked by a teacher to debate in favor of Jim Crow Laws during a class activity.

Superintendent Erin Kane made a statement at a May 23 meeting addressing the Ganzy family.

“Racism in any form is unacceptable at DCSD and a direct policy violation,” Kane said.

e complaint sheds further light on the racism the Ganzys experienced, as well as two other students of Castle Rock Middle School.

e complaint alleges all four students were frequently called the n-word and “cotton pickers.” e three middle school students also were compared to monkeys by their classmates numerous times. One student allegedly had a photo taken of them using the bathroom that was posted to the internet.

“Peers and teachers subjected Plainti s to abuse and harassment that was so severe, pervasive, and objectively o ensive that it deprived Plainti s of access to educational opportunities or bene ts provided by the School District,” the complaint says.

According to the o cial complaint, each student reported what they were experiencing to teachers or administrators, alleging district sta either didn’t respond at all or didn’t take the reports seriously.

e students’ reports were not shared with their parents and the schools did not communicate to the parents what was happening.

e harassment reached a point where one student switched schools and two others moved to online classes.

e complaint says only one stu-

dent involved in the group chat was disciplined and sta did not follow through on creating safety plans for the minority students to return to in-person learning. It also notes that the district hasn’t implemented antidiscrimination training for sta or students.

Citing the contention around the district’s equity policy and rhetoric used in the 2021 campaign, the complaint alleges Peterson, Winegar, Myers and Williams oppose educational equity for minority students and “foment hate,” which emboldened students to harass minorities.

“To this day, Majority Board Members employ rhetoric harmful to minority students, and DCSD has failed to implement antidiscrimination trainings,” the complaint says. “Black and biracial students and parents, and discussions about racism against historically marginalized communities, continue to be portrayed as a problem and dismissed, resulting in an environment ripe for racial harassment and abuse of students.”

In an interview with Colorado Community Media, Ganzy said the district’s response has been unacceptable and she hopes the complaint prompts them to take action, like de ning the di erence between bullying and a hate crime in district policies.

“I’m disappointed we couldn’t reach any sort of resolution before making it to the state that we’re in today,” she said. “I never received any kind of conversation with (Superintendent) Kane or anyone from the school district who said they would reach out.”

Ganzy’s family has since moved out of Castle Rock and switched school districts, but she said she wants to prevent what happened to her children from happening to others.

“I’m hoping that by getting at the one thing that makes Douglas County move at all, which is money, that maybe we’ll get some resolution for the kids behind my son, because they de nitely failed him,” she said.

Around 50 students, parents and community members gathered outside the Douglas County School District building on May 23 to protest the district’s response to reports of discrimination.

PHOTOS BY MCKENNA HARFORD

Jeramiah Ganzy, a former student at Castle Rock Middle School who experienced racial harassment, including slurs and threats that caused him to leave school, protests outside the Douglas County School District building on May 23 over the district’s response to his reports of discrimination.

Colorado GOP goes all in on trying to block una liated voters

BY SANDRA FISH AND JESSE PAUL THE COLORADO SUN

e Colorado GOP led a federal lawsuit July 31 doubling down on its attempt to block una liated voters from casting ballots in the party’s 2024 primaries as part of a controversial strategy to help Republicans exit obscurity after three straight election cycles of defeat.

e legal action came as the party’s leaders were set to gather Aug. 6 to consider a bylaws amendment backed by Colorado GOP Chair Dave Williams that would make it easier for Republicans to opt out of Colorado’s primaries next year altogether.

e amendment failed

e Republican Party is represented in the lawsuit by John Eastman, the attorney who helped Donald Trump try to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election and who appeared to be an unindicted coconspirator in an indictment against Trump that was released recently.

Randy Corporon, a conservative talk radio host and a member of the Republican National Committee, is also representing the GOP in the case. e defendant is Colorado Secretary of State Jena Griswold, a Democrat and the state’s top elections o cial.

“We welcome all una liated

to have a say in selecting our nominees but we will not stand idly by as radical left-wing organizations use an unconstitutional law to further harm our election e orts,” Williams wrote in an email to Colorado GOP members Tuesday announcing the legal action. e email also asked for donations to support the lawsuit.

A federal judge rejected a similar lawsuit led by a group of Republicans in 2020 seeking to ban unafliated voters from the primary that year. e judge said the plainti s didn’t have standing to sue because the legal action wasn’t brought by the state party itself. Eastman and Corporon were also the attorneys in that suit.

Eastman was a conservative scholar at the University of Colorado and he may soon be disbarred by the state of California for his spread of

Arapahoe County GOP Chair Anne Rowland addressed the group at Maggiano’s Little Italy.

2020 election conspiracies.

e latest lawsuit seeks to exempt the Colorado GOP from a 2016 ballot measure that lets una liated voters cast ballots in partisan primaries.

e complaint alleges that the 2022 GOP primary outcomes in the U.S. Senate, gubernatorial and secretary of state contests may have been di erent if some 246,000 una liated voters had not joined 423,000 Republicans in casting ballots in the parties’ primaries. e margins of victory in those contests ranged from nearly 49,000 votes to nearly 89,000 votes.

“Una liated voters have had an outcome-determinative impact on at least some prior Republican primary elections,” the lawsuit said.

e lawsuit included a copy of a Colorado Sun story from last year highlighting how more una liated voters cast ballots last year in the GOP’s primaries than they ever before. However, there were no statewide contested Democratic primaries in 2022.

Una liated voters make up the largest share of Colorado’s electorate, at nearly 50%.

“ e court dismissed the prior lawsuit and we continue to believe the new lawsuit has no merit,” Griswold said in a statement. “As Secretary of State, I will always stand up for voters to ensure that their constitutional right to cast a ballot is protected.”

Meanwhile, Williams, who was elected party chair in March, announced last week that he supports an amendment to the state party’s bylaws that would make it easier for Republicans to opt out of Colorado’s 2024 primaries.

e amendment, drafted by conservative commentator Chuck Bonniwell, will be considered Saturday at the Colorado GOP’s central committee meeting in Castle Rock. It requires two-thirds support to pass, a threshold that Bonniwell admitted he may not be able to meet.

“If the Bonniwell amendment fails to pass, then there will be no realistic chance to even preserve the right to opt-out of the open primary,” Williams wrote in an email to Republican Party Members.

e amendment would make a nonvote by a member of the central committee an automatic “yes” vote on any action that requires the approval of at least 70% of the committee’s support to pass. Under Propo-

sition 108, the 2016 ballot measure letting una liated voters cast ballots in partisan primaries, the Colorado Democratic and Republican parties can opt out of the change if 75% of their respective central committees agree to do so.

“ is public pronouncement isn’t being taken lightly,” Williams wrote. “Both proponents and opponents of this amendment should have faith that the process is free and fair from any undue in uence, especially from someone who is charged with administering the debate.”

Williams said in a letter to the central committee that he will hand over his gavel Saturday to the chairman pro tem at the Colorado GOP’s central committee meeting “to absolutely ensure that faith is maintained in the process.”

But not all Republicans think the amendment is a good idea.

e GOP branches in Weld, Morgan and Arapahoe counties have written letters opposing the Bonniwell amendment.

“To strip any citizen of the right to vote or not vote under both the Colorado and United States Constitution is simply wrong no matter how you look at it,” Hunter Rivera, acting chairman of the Weld County Republican Party, said in a written statement. “Automatically making a nonvote a ‘yes’ vote ies in the face of the principles this country was built on.”

Arapahoe County GOP Chair Anne Rowland wrote in a letter that the amendment is “unfair.” She said it “negates the voice of duly elected members of the central committee and their constituents — the workhorses of our party who are also entitled to a voice through their elected representative.”

“To avoid the disenfranchisement of grassroots Republicans, no vote should ever be cast or counted — either in the a rmative or the negative — unless the CRC member who is guaranteed that right to vote casts that themselves or grants another individual the right to cast that vote in their absence by proxy,” the letter said.

e Morgan County GOP said in its letter that it is “strongly” opposed to the Bonniwell amendment and called it “morally and ethically wrong.”

“ e Morgan County Republican Party believes (the Bonniwell amendment) has been brought forth only because current Republican State Party leadership does not believe it has the … majority needed” to opt out of the primary, the letter said.

is story is from e Colorado Sun, a journalist-owned news outlet based in Denver and covering the state. For more, and to support e Colorado Sun, visit coloradosun.com.

e Colorado Sun is a partner in the Colorado News Conservancy, owner of Colorado Community Media.

PHOTO BY NINA JOSS

Fishing now allowed for first time at Rueter-Hess Reservoir

BY ELLIS ARNOLD EARNOLD@COLORADOCOMMUNITYMEDIA.COM

Local residents looking for a place for recreational shing now have Rueter-Hess Reservoir — near Parker and Castle Pines — as an option for the rst-ever time, Douglas County says.

Catch-and-release shing at the reservoir will be open from 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. Fridays, Saturdays, Sundays, and Mondays, starting Aug. 4 and running through October.

“To maintain the vitality of the sh, a limited number of shing opportunities will be available each day the reservoir is open,” the county said in a news release.

Reservations are required and were to open online at 9 a.m. Aug. 2.

Each day that shing is open, 25 adult anglers with valid state shing licenses will be allowed to sh. ose younger than 16, who are not required by the state to have a license, are not required to register but may still sh, the news release says.

You can sh from the

shore or a paddleboard, kayak or canoe.

ere is no cost to sh at the reservoir, but the county asks that you reserve your spot ahead of time. ose planning to drive into the reservoir need a daytime parking pass, which costs $10 per vehicle.

You can register for shing and a parking pass at the same time at douglas.co.us/ rueter-hess-recreation/ reservations-rueter-hess.

e reservoir has been stocked with walleye, yellow perch, largemouth bass, wiper (striped hybrid bass), channel cat sh, black crappie and blue gill. Only arti cial lures and ies,

and barbless single hooks, are allowed, and bait is not allowed. Tackle boxes and licenses will be checked, the news release says.

ere is “no discussion at this time” on whether non-catch-and-release shing will be o ered at the reservoir in the future, said Wendy Holmes, county spokesperson.

Other water activities

e reservoir remains open for non-motorized water activities including paddleboarding, canoeing and kayaking from 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. Fridays, Saturdays, Sundays and Mondays into late October. Motorized or

belly boats are not allowed.

(Swimming is also not allowed, Holmes said, noting that the reservoir is primarily a drinking-water source.)

Access to the reservoir is free. Again, those who want to drive and park at the reservoir need a one-day parking pass for $10 per vehicle.

New oversight of recreation

Douglas County’s elected leaders recently approved an agreement to take charge of recreation at Rueter-Hess Reservoir, in a move that the county said would allow for more access.

e change means more time for paddleboarding, canoeing and kayaking starting with this year’s water recreation season at the reservoir, now already underway.

Opportunities to enjoy the reservoir area were to expand based on the agreement by the county and the municipalities that sit near the water, providing more sta and a streamlined nancial structure for overseeing recreation.

e reservoir is a drinkingwater storage facility owned

and operated by the Parker Water and Sanitation District, the entity that provides drinking water to much of Parker and some nearby areas.

e county website describes the reservoir as a place for “history bu s, day hikers, dog walkers, watersport enthusiasts, and local anthropologists alike.”

Getting there

e reservoir area sits o Hess Road just west of Heirloom Parkway, generally between the City of Castle Pines and the Town of Parker.

It’s accessible about 4 miles east of the interchange of Interstate 25 and Castle Pines Parkway, which becomes Hess Road, or about 4 miles west of the intersection of Parker Road and Hess Road.

Construction to add a new pipeline near the reservoir is ongoing, so you may see construction tra c at the entrance, the news release says.

For more, see the county’s website at tinyurl.com/ BeforeYouGoRueterHess.

A man on a stand-up paddleboard cruises the waters of Rueter-Hess Reservoir.

PHOTO FROM DOUGLAS COUNTY OUTDOORS FACEBOOK PAGE

Insects in dramatic decline in Colorado, study finds

Numbers plummet over course of 35 years

BY WILLIAM ALLSTETTER THE COLORADO SUN

Dramatic insect declines previously reported around the world are also occurring in Colorado. Researchers with the Rocky Mountain Biological Laboratory, or RMBL, report that ying insects in the mountains outside of Crested Butte have declined more than 60% since 1986.  e current research, published in the scienti c journal Ecosphere, is noteworthy for the length of time covered and the relatively undisturbed mountain environment where it was conducted. e declines correlated with drier and warmer weather, suggesting an impact of climate change.

“Increasingly we are seeing insect declines in places that are more pristine, which is much more alarming,” said Julian Resasco, assistant professor of ecology and evolutionary biology at the University of Colorado.

While historically seen as agricultural pests and personal nuisances, insects and other invertebrates (no backbone) are increasingly recognized for the vital services they provide in nature: pollination, pest control, nutrient cycling and sustenance for birds and other animals higher on the food chain. e continued decline of insect populations could have profound consequences for the environment, humans and other animals.

“We rely on insects for ecosystem services. We need them to be abundant and diverse,” Resasco said.

Concern about declining insect populations surged in 2017 after researchers reported that ying

and the causes of insect decline are ongoing debates among entomologists.

For their study, the RMBL researchers set up a tentlike trap in the middle of a 27-acre meadow at the Rocky Mountain Biological Laboratory, 9,500 feet above sea level near the abandoned mining town of Gothic. Surrounded by the peaks and meadows of the Elk Mountains, the setting is stunning — and far removed from intensive agriculture, urban growth, pesticide use and other human activities that have been blamed for insect declines.

“We thought that it was important for us to look at a site that is free from all those in uences,” said David Inouye, co-author on the research paper, and a professor emeritus at the University of Maryland.

Two days a week, the researchers capture ying insects — mostly bees, wasps and ies. ey count and dry the insects, weigh them and divide them into several broad groupings. Since 1984, researchers have captured and recorded data about the

insects every week of every subalpine summer for 40 years.

“If you want to see a long-term trend, you need decades of data,” Inouye said. Insect populations can uctuate several fold from year to year. Data collected over a longer period helps identify less dramatic long-term trends. e current study is the longest controlled study of insects in Colorado and one of the longest in the United States.

e project has lasted so long that it has relied on three generations of scientists. Authors on the paper include the now-deceased originator of the work, Michael Soulé; David Inouye, who is spending his 53rd season at the laboratory this summer; and David’s son, Brian Inouye, and daughter-in-law, Nora Underwood, both professors of ecology and evolution at Florida State University.

e paper analyzes 35 years of data, from 1986 through the summer of 2020. e researchers documented a 62% decline in the number of insects captured and a 49% decline in their total weight over the period.

e insect decline was correlated with less winter snowfall, less summer rain and warmer temperatures.

Average annual snowfall at the laboratory fell sharply during the study period, to 344 inches per year from 463 inches. Abundant winter snow cover provides protective insulation to overwintering insects. Average summer rainfall did not change signi cantly during the study’s 35 years, but years of low summer rainfall had fewer insects. Summer rainfall promotes plant growth that feeds many insects. Average temperature rose about 2 degrees Fahrenheit during the study period and was correlated with the insect decline, although less so than precipitation.

“Changes in precipitation and warmer temperatures are expected to continue under climate change,” the researchers wrote in their report. “ us, continued insect declines might be expected even in relatively undisturbed habitats.”

“We should be concerned,” Underwood said. “ ere are a lot of cascading e ects of insects.”

Fewer insects can mean less food for other animals, fewer owers pollinated and fewer nutrients recycled through the environment. Underwood does have faith

in the resilience of nature and is not predicting an imminent insect apocalypse or deserts in the mountains. But she notes that the study documents big changes occurring to important players in the environment with likely, but unknown, impacts occurring as climate change continues.

Underwood invokes the rivet hypothesis by famed biologist Paul Ehrlich, for whom both she and Brian worked during summers when he came to RMBL. An airplane has thousands of rivets holding it together. You can remove one rivet without causing any trouble. But if you keep removing rivets — or insects — eventually the plane will fall apart and crash. No one knows which is the crucial rivet, and maybe it is best to keep as many as possible.

David Inouye believes the insect declines in Colorado and around the nation may have already rippled through the environment. In 2019, researchers reported an alarming 29% decline in North American birds, a net loss of 3 billion birds, since 1970. Birds that feed on insects were a prominent portion of those losses. Around the Rocky Mountain Biological Laboratory, researchers have likewise documented a striking decline in white-crowned sparrows, an insect-eating bird whose distinctive call is heard less often than in past years.

Insects and white-crowned sparrows are just one of several changes that David Inouye has observed in his decades at the laboratory. Moose and fox now live there year-round, and a Wyoming ground squirrel has moved up from lower-elevation Almont, to Crested Butte and now the laboratory. Ticks and mosquitoes that can carry West Nile virus have also appeared around the laboratory in recent years. Wild owers are blooming earlier.

“I think in the long term, most people are going to nd those changes undesirable,” he said.

is story is from e Colorado Sun, a journalist-owned news outlet based in Denver and covering the state. For more, and to support e Colorado Sun, visit coloradosun.com.

e Colorado Sun is a partner in the Colorado News Conservancy, owner of Colorado Community Media.

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Symptoms of West Nile virus

Symptoms of West Nile virus generally appear about two to 14 days after exposure, the county said. One in five people develop a fever, body aches, headache, and occasionally, skin rashes and swollen lymph nodes.

The county said mild symptoms of a West Nile virus infection usually pass on their own.

Less than 1% of people infected with West Nile virus will develop severe symptoms that affect the nervous system, Arapahoe County said.

People who are older than 60 are at a higher risk, as well as people with medical conditions like cancer, diabetes and hypertension.

Severe symptoms of West Nile virus include tremors, high fever, coma, neck stiffness, paralysis, muscle weakness, confusion and disorientation.

The state health department said residents who develop severe headaches or confusion should contact their health care provider.

12 confirmed human cases in Colorado, 1 death

The first human case of West Nile virus in Colorado for 2023 was confirmed in late July in La Plata County, according to the state health department.

As of Aug. 4, 12 people have been affected by West Nile virus in Colorado in 2023, according to data from the state health department.

The Weld County Department of Public Health and Environment confirmed on Aug. 4 the first death of someone due to West Nile virus in Colorado in

2023. In a news release, Weld County said a 53-year-old resident died from neuroinvasive West Nile virus.

The state health department said mosquito populations are at “historic levels” in some parts of Colorado due to the high rainfall this year.

“This unusually high mosquito activity along with known presence of the virus has caused an elevated risk of West Nile virus transmission to humans,” the department said in a news release.

7 Colorado counties have infected mosquitoes

Arapahoe County is among seven counties in Colorado that have confirmed West Nile viruspositive mosquitoes, the county said.

In July, environmental health experts detected West Nile virus in mosquitoes near the Arapahoe County Fairgrounds, marking the first known presence of the virus in the county this year. The county said efforts to treat the surrounding area with insecticide were effective. Environmental health specialists conducted a follow-up test to the same pool where the infected mosquitoes were found, and the samples reportedly came back negative.

However, in early August, it was announced that mosquitoes near Heritage High School in Littleton had tested positive for the virus.

“The season for high mosquito activity typically runs through September, so public health experts caution that our community has a while to go before West Nile (virus) risk peaks and declines,” the county said in its news release.

Those interested in learning more about West Nile virus can visit cdc.gov/westnile.

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System Manager

CommonSpirit Health seeks System Manager, Payment Transformation in Englewood, CO to lead the accounting and performance analysis activities for value-based agreements (VBA) and initiatives. From $127,005/yr. Requires BS in Business Admin, Accounting, Finance, Healthcare or related or related and 3 years leadership exp, 5 yrs exp in Data Analysis in a Health Care setting. Position is remotemay live anywhere in US. Apply to kelly.enyart@commonspirit.org

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Public Notices

Legals

Public Trustees

COMBINED NOTICE - PUBLICATION

CRS §38-38-103

FORECLOSURE SALE NO. 0224-2023

To Whom It May Concern: This Notice is given with regard to the following described Deed of Trust:

On May 16, 2023, the undersigned Public Trustee caused the Notice of Election and Demand relating to the Deed of Trust described below to be recorded in the County of Arapahoe records.

Original Grantor(s)

Brian C Reseigh

Original Beneficiary(ies)

Mortgage Electronic Registration Systems, Inc. as beneficiary, as nominee for Paramount Residential Mortgage Group, Inc.

Current Holder of Evidence of Debt

PennyMac Loan Services, LLC

Date of Deed of Trust

December 11, 2020

County of Recording

Arapahoe

Recording Date of Deed of Trust

December 15, 2020

Recording Information (Reception No. and/or Book/Page No.)

E0175481

Original Principal Amount

$259,000.00

Outstanding Principal Balance

$251,159.26

Pursuant to CRS §38-38-101(4)(i), you are hereby notified that the covenants of the deed of trust have been violated as follows: Failure to pay principal and interest when due together with all other payments provided for in the evidence of debt secured by the deed of trust and other violations thereof.

THE LIEN FORECLOSED MAY NOT BE A FIRST LIEN.

See Attached Legal Description

Also known by street and number as: 9079 E. Panorama Circle #217, Englewood, CO 80112.

THE PROPERTY DESCRIBED HEREIN IS ALL OF THE PROPERTY CURRENTLY ENCUMBERED BY THE LIEN OF THE DEED OF TRUST.

NOTICE OF SALE

The current holder of the Evidence of Debt secured by the Deed of Trust, described herein, has filed Notice of Election and Demand for sale as provided by law and in said Deed of Trust.

THEREFORE, Notice Is Hereby Given that I will at public auction, at 10:00 A.M. on Wednesday, 09/13/2023, at The East Hearing Room, County Administration Building, 5334 South Prince Street, Littleton, Colorado, 80120, sell to the highest and best bidder for cash, the said real property and all interest of the said Grantor(s), Grantor(s)' heirs and assigns therein, for the purpose of paying the indebtedness provided in said Evidence of Debt secured by the Deed of Trust, plus attorneys' fees, the expenses of sale and other items allowed by law, and will issue to the purchaser a Certificate of Purchase, all as provided by law.

First Publication: 7/20/2023

Last Publication: 8/17/2023

Name of Publication: Littleton Independent

IF THE SALE DATE IS CONTINUED TO A LATER DATE, THE DEADLINE TO FILE A NOTICE OF INTENT TO CURE BY THOSE PARTIES ENTITLED TO CURE MAY ALSO BE EXTENDED;

DATE: 05/16/2023

Michael Westerberg, Public Trustee in and for the County of Arapahoe, State of Colorado

By: Michael Westerberg, Public Trustee

The name, address, business telephone number and bar registration number of the attorney(s) representing the legal holder of the indebtedness is:

Alexis R. Abercrombie #56722

Scott D. Toebben #19011

Aricyn J. Dall #51467

David W Drake #43315

Randall S. Miller & Associates PC 216 16th Street, Suite 1210, Denver, CO 80202 (720) 259-6710

Attorney File # 23CO00112-1

The Attorney above is acting as a debt collector and is attempting to collect a debt. Any information provided may be used for that purpose.

©Public Trustees' Association of Colorado Revised 1/2015

Legal Description 0224-2023

The land referred to herein is situated in the state of Colorado, County of Arapahoe described as follows:

Building A, Condominium Unit 217, Dry Creek Crossing Condominiums, according to the Condominium Map for Dry Creek Crossing Condominiums and as described in the Declaration

of Condominium and of Easements, Covenants, Conditions and Restrictions of Dry Creek Crossing, recorded on September 1, 2006, in the office of the Clerk & Recorder of Arapahoe County, State of Colorado, at Reception No. B6126819 and Condominium Map for Dry Creek Crossing Condominiums recorded September 1, 2006 at Reception No. B6126818, County of Arapahoe, State of Colorado.

Building A, Garage Unit 51, Dry Creek Crossing Condominiums, according to the Condominium Map for Dry Creek Crossing Condominiums and as described in the Declaration of Condominium and of Easements, Covenants, Conditions and Restrictions of Dry Creek Crossing, recorded on September 1, 2006, in the office of the Clerk & Recorder of Arapahoe County, State of Colorado, at Reception No. B6126819 and Condominium Map for Dry Creek Crossing Condominiums recorded September 1, 2006 at Reception No. B6126818, County of Arapahoe, State of Colorado.

Legal Notice NO. 0224-2023

First Publication: 7/20/2023

Last Publication: 8/17/2023

Name of Publication: Littleton Independent

COMBINED NOTICE - PUBLICATION

CRS §38-38-103

FORECLOSURE SALE NO. 0208-2023

To Whom It May Concern: This Notice is given with regard to the following described Deed of Trust: On May 9, 2023, the undersigned Public Trustee caused the Notice of Election and Demand relating to the Deed of Trust described below to be recorded in the County of Arapahoe records.

Original Grantor(s)

Miguel Casillas Guevara

Original Beneficiary(ies)

MORTGAGE ELECTRONIC REGISTRATION SYSTEMS, INC. AS NOMINEE FOR CITYWIDE HOME LOANS, LLC, ITS SUCCESSORS AND ASSIGNS

Current Holder of Evidence of Debt COLORADO HOUSING AND FINANCE AUTHORITY

Date of Deed of Trust

July 16, 2020 County of Recording Arapahoe Recording Date of Deed of Trust July 23, 2020

notified that the covenants of the deed of trust have been violated as follows: Failure to pay principal and interest when due together with all other payments provided for in the evidence of debt secured by the deed of trust and other violations thereof.

THE LIEN FORECLOSED MAY NOT BE A FIRST LIEN.

LOTS 12 AND 13, BLOCK 15, TOWN OF SHERIDAN, TOGETHER WITH THAT PORTION OF VACATED PARK PLACE, AS A RESULT OF VACATION, COUNTY OF ARAPAHOE, STATE OF COLORADO.

Also known by street and number as: 3332 S Clay Street, Englewood, CO 80110.

THE PROPERTY DESCRIBED HEREIN IS ALL OF THE PROPERTY CURRENTLY ENCUMBERED BY THE LIEN OF THE DEED OF TRUST.

NOTICE OF SALE

The current holder of the Evidence of Debt secured by the Deed of Trust, described herein, has filed Notice of Election and Demand for sale as provided by law and in said Deed of Trust.

THEREFORE, Notice Is Hereby Given that I will at public auction, at 10:00 A.M. on Wednesday, 09/06/2023, at The East Hearing Room, County Administration Building, 5334 South Prince Street, Littleton, Colorado, 80120, sell to the highest and best bidder for cash, the said real property and all interest of the said Grantor(s), Grantor(s)' heirs and assigns therein, for the purpose of paying the indebtedness provided in said Evidence of Debt secured by the Deed of Trust, plus attorneys' fees, the expenses of sale and other items allowed by law, and will issue to the purchaser a Certificate of Purchase, all as provided by law.

First Publication: 7/13/2023

Last Publication: 8/10/2023

Name of Publication: Littleton Independent

IF THE SALE DATE IS CONTINUED TO A LATER

DATE, THE DEADLINE TO FILE A NOTICE OF INTENT TO CURE BY THOSE PARTIES ENTITLED TO CURE MAY ALSO BE EXTENDED;

DATE: 05/09/2023

Michael Westerberg, Public Trustee in and for the County of Arapahoe, State of Colorado

By: Michael Westerberg, Public Trustee

The name, address, business telephone number and bar registration number of the attorney(s) representing the legal holder of the indebtedness is:

Alison L Berry #34531

N. April Winecki #34861

David R. Doughty #40042

Nicholas H. Santarelli #46592

Lynn M. Janeway #15592

Janeway Law Firm, P.C. 9540 Maroon Circle, Suite 320, Englewood, CO 80112 (303) 706-9990

Attorney File # 22-026877

The Attorney above is acting as a debt collector and is attempting to collect a debt. Any information provided may be used for that purpose.

©Public Trustees' Association of Colorado Revised 1/2015

Legal Notice NO. 0208-2023

First Publication: 7/13/2023

Last Publication: 8/10/2023

Name of Publication: Littleton Independent COMBINED NOTICE - PUBLICATION CRS §38-38-103 FORECLOSURE SALE NO. 0199-2023

To Whom It May Concern: This Notice is given with regard to the following described Deed of Trust: On May 5, 2023, the undersigned Public Trustee caused the Notice of Election and Demand relating to the Deed of Trust described below to be recorded in the County of Arapahoe records.

Original Grantor(s)

Pursuant to CRS §38-38-101(4)(i), you are hereby

Arapahoe County Warrants

Pursuant to CRS §38-38-101(4)(i), you are hereby notified that the covenants of the deed of trust have been violated as follows: Failure to pay principal and interest when due together with all other payments provided for in the evidence of debt secured by the deed of trust and other violations thereof.

LOT 44, HOMESTEAD IN THE WILLOWS FILING NO. 3, COUNTY OF ARAPAHOE, STATE OF COLORADO.

APN #: 207529204027

Also known by street and number as: 6703 South Locust Court, Centennial, CO 80112.

THE PROPERTY DESCRIBED HEREIN IS ALL OF THE PROPERTY CURRENTLY ENCUMBERED BY THE LIEN OF THE DEED OF TRUST.

NOTICE OF SALE

The current holder of the Evidence of Debt secured by the Deed of Trust, described herein, has filed Notice of Election and Demand for sale as provided by law and in said Deed of Trust.

THEREFORE, Notice Is Hereby Given that I will at public auction, at 10:00 A.M. on Wednesday, 09/06/2023, at The East Hearing Room, County Administration Building, 5334 South Prince Street, Littleton, Colorado, 80120, sell to the highest and best bidder for cash, the said real property and all interest of the said Grantor(s), Grantor(s)' heirs and assigns therein, for the purpose of paying the indebtedness provided in said Evidence of Debt secured by the Deed of Trust, plus attorneys' fees, the expenses of sale and other items allowed by law, and will issue to the purchaser a Certificate of Purchase, all as provided by law.

First Publication 7/13/2023

Last Publication 8/10/2023

Name of Publication Littleton Independent

IF THE SALE DATE IS CONTINUED TO A LATER DATE, THE DEADLINE TO FILE A NOTICE OF INTENT TO CURE BY THOSE PARTIES ENTITLED TO CURE MAY ALSO BE EXTENDED;

DATE: 05/05/2023

Michael Westerberg, Public Trustee in and for the County of Arapahoe, State of Colorado

By: Michael Westerberg, Public Trustee

The name, address, business telephone number and bar registration number of the attorney(s) representing the legal holder of the indebtedness is:

Alison L Berry #34531

N. April Winecki #34861

David R. Doughty #40042

Nicholas H. Santarelli #46592

Lynn M. Janeway #15592

Janeway Law Firm, P.C. 9540 Maroon Circle, Suite 320, Englewood, CO 80112 (303) 706-9990

Attorney File # 23-029786

The Attorney above is acting as a debt collector and is attempting to collect a debt. Any information provided may be used for that purpose.

Legal Notice No. 0199-2023

First Publication: July 13, 2023

Last Publication: August 10, 2023

Publisher: Littleton Independent COMBINED NOTICE - PUBLICATION CRS §38-38-103

FORECLOSURE SALE NO. 0222-2023

To Whom It May Concern: This Notice is given with regard to the following described Deed of Trust:

On May 16, 2023, the undersigned Public Trustee caused the Notice of Election and Demand relating to the Deed of Trust described below to be recorded in the County of Arapahoe records.

Original Grantor(s)

Brenda Stokes

Original Beneficiary(ies)

Mortgage Electronic Registration Systems, Inc., as Beneficiary, as nominee for Nations Lending Corporation, it successors and assigns

Current Holder of Evidence of Debt

Nations Lending Corporation

Date of Deed of Trust

April 16, 2021

County of Recording

Arapahoe

Recording Date of Deed of Trust

April 22, 2021

Recording Information (Reception No. and/or Book/Page No.)

E1066103

Original Principal Amount

$480,260.00

Outstanding Principal Balance

$468,991.12

Pursuant to CRS §38-38-101(4)(i), you are hereby notified that the covenants of the deed of trust have been violated as follows: Failure to pay principal and interest when due together with all other payments provided for in the evidence of debt secured by the Deed of Trust and other violations thereof.

THE LIEN FORECLOSED MAY NOT BE A FIRST LIEN.

LOTS 36 AND 37, BLOCK 5, RESUBDIVISION OF BLOCK 1, 2, 3, 4, 13, 14, 15 AND 16 OF WINDERMERE GALLUP'S SUBURBAN HOME, SUBDIVISION, COUNTY OF ARAPAHOE, STATE OF COLORADO.

Also known by street and number as: 5949 S Bemis St, Littleton, CO 80120.

THE PROPERTY DESCRIBED HEREIN IS ALL OF THE PROPERTY CURRENTLY ENCUMBERED BY THE LIEN OF THE DEED OF TRUST. NOTICE OF SALE

The current holder of the Evidence of Debt secured by the Deed of Trust, described herein, has filed Notice of Election and Demand for sale as provided by law and in said Deed of Trust.

THEREFORE, Notice Is Hereby Given that I will at public auction, at 10:00 A.M. on Wednesday, 09/13/2023, at The East Hearing Room, County Administration Building, 5334 South Prince Street, Littleton, Colorado, 80120, sell to the highest and best bidder for cash, the said real property and all interest of the said Grantor(s), Grantor(s)' heirs and assigns therein, for the purpose of paying the indebtedness provided in said Evidence of Debt secured by the Deed of Trust, plus attorneys' fees, the expenses of sale and other items allowed by law, and will issue to the purchaser a Certificate of Purchase, all as provided by law.

First Publication: 7/20/2023

Last Publication: 8/17/2023

Name of Publication: Littleton Independent

IF THE SALE DATE IS CONTINUED TO A LATER DATE, THE DEADLINE TO FILE A NOTICE OF INTENT TO CURE BY THOSE PARTIES ENTITLED TO CURE MAY ALSO BE EXTENDED;

DATE: 05/16/2023

Michael Westerberg, Public Trustee in and for the County of Arapahoe, State of Colorado

By: Michael Westerberg,

Public Trustee

The name, address, business telephone number and bar registration number of the attorney(s) representing the legal holder of the indebtedness is:

Amanda Ferguson #44893

Heather Deere #28597

Toni M. Owan #30580

Halliday, Watkins & Mann, PC 355 Union Blvd., Ste. 250, Lakewood, CO 80228 (303) 274-0155

Attorney File # CO21434

The Attorney above is acting as a debt collector and is attempting to collect a debt. Any information provided may be used for that purpose.

©Public Trustees' Association of Colorado Revised 1/2015

Legal Notice NO. 0222-2023

First Publication: 7/20/2023

Last Publication: 8/17/2023

Name of Publication: Littleton Independent COMBINED NOTICE - PUBLICATION CRS §38-38-103 FORECLOSURE SALE NO. 0239-2023

To Whom It May Concern: This Notice is given with regard to the following described Deed of Trust:

On May 26, 2023, the undersigned Public Trustee caused the Notice of Election and Demand relating to the Deed of Trust described below to be recorded in the County of Arapahoe records.

Original Grantor(s)

Gina L Iacolino

Original Beneficiary(ies)

MORTGAGE ELECTRONIC REGISTRATION SYSTEMS, INC. AS NOMINEE FOR UNIVERSAL LENDING CORPORATION, ITS SUCCESSORS AND ASSIGNS

Current Holder of Evidence of Debt

Allied First Bank, SB dba Servbank

Date of Deed of Trust

February 16, 2018

County of Recording

Arapahoe Recording Date of Deed of Trust

February 20, 2018

Recording Information (Reception No. and/or Book/Page No.)

D8016194

Original Principal Amount $240,580.00

Outstanding Principal Balance $244,946.02

Pursuant to CRS §38-38-101(4)(i), you are hereby notified that the covenants of the deed of trust have been violated as follows: Failure to pay principal and interest when due together with all other payments provided for in the evidence of debt secured by the deed of trust and other violations thereof.

THE LIEN FORECLOSED MAY NOT BE A FIRST LIEN.

SEE ATTACHED LEGAL DESCRIPTION

APN #: 2075-29-2-29-067

Also known by street and number as:

6775 S IVY STREET UNIT A7, CENTENNIAL, CO 80112.

THE PROPERTY DESCRIBED HEREIN IS ALL OF THE PROPERTY CURRENTLY ENCUMBERED BY THE LIEN OF THE DEED OF TRUST.

NOTICE OF SALE

The current holder of the Evidence of Debt secured by the Deed of Trust, described herein, has filed Notice of Election and Demand for sale as provided by law and in said Deed of Trust.

THEREFORE, Notice Is Hereby Given that I will at public auction, at 10:00 A.M. on Wednesday, 09/27/2023, at The East Hearing Room, County Administration Building, 5334 South Prince Street, Littleton, Colorado, 80120, sell to the highest and best bidder for cash, the said real property and all interest of the said Grantor(s), Grantor(s)' heirs

and assigns therein, for the purpose of paying the indebtedness provided in said Evidence of Debt secured by the Deed of Trust, plus attorneys' fees, the expenses of sale and other items allowed by law, and will issue to the purchaser a Certificate of Purchase, all as provided by law.

First Publication: 8/3/2023

Last Publication: 8/31/2023

Name of Publication: Littleton Independent

IF THE SALE DATE IS CONTINUED TO A LATER

DATE, THE DEADLINE TO FILE A NOTICE OF INTENT TO CURE BY THOSE PARTIES ENTITLED TO CURE MAY ALSO BE EXTENDED;

DATE: 05/26/2023

Michael Westerberg, Public Trustee in and for the County of Arapahoe, State of Colorado

By: Michael Westerberg,

Public Trustee

The name, address, business telephone number and bar registration number of the attorney(s) representing the legal holder of the indebtedness is:

Alison L Berry #34531

N. April Winecki #34861

David R. Doughty #40042

Nicholas H. Santarelli #46592

Lynn M. Janeway #15592

Janeway Law Firm, P.C. 9540 Maroon Circle, Suite 320, Englewood, CO 80112 (303) 706-9990

Attorney File # 22-027666

The Attorney above is acting as a debt collector and is attempting to collect a debt. Any information provided may be used for that purpose.

©Public Trustees' Association of Colorado Revised 1/2015

LEGAL DESCRIPTION 0239-2023

CONDOMINIUM UNIT A-7, IN CONDOMINIUM BUILDING 17, OLDE MILL CONDOMINIUMS PHASE III, ACCORDING TO THE CONDOMINIUM MAP ENTITLED OLDE MILL CONDOMINIUMS PHASE III,AS RECORDED ON OCTOBER 22, 1985 IN BOOK 86 AT PAGES 13 TO 18 IN THE RECORDS OF THE ARAPAHOE COUNTY CLERK AND RECORDER'S OFFICE, AND ACCORDING TO THE DEFINITIONS, TERMS AND PROVISIONS IN THE CONDOMINIUM DECLARATION FOR OLDE MILL CONDOMINIUMS RECORDED OCTOBER 23, 1984 IN BOOK 4290 AT PAGE 150, AS MODIFIED AND SUPPLEMENTED BY THE AMENDMENT AND SECOND ANNEXATION OF ADDITIONAL LAND TO OLDE MILL CONDOMINIUMS RECORDED OCTOBER 28, 1985 IN BOOK 4583 AT PAGE 499, AND THE FOURTH ANNEXATION OF ADDITIONAL LAND TO OLDE MILL CONDOMINIUMS RECORDED OCTOBER 16, 1986 IN BOOK 4921 AT PAGE 525, AND ALL PREVIOUS ANNEXATIONS OF RECORD AS REFERRED TO AND DESCRIBED THEREIN, TOGETHER WITH THE EXCLUSIVE RIGHT TO USE THE FOLLOWING COMMON ELEMENTS: COVERED PARKING SPACE #39 AND GARAGE #87, COUNTY OF ARAPAHOE, STATE OF COLORADO.

Legal Notice NO. 0239-2023

First Publication: 8/3/2023

Last Publication: 8/31/2023

Name of Publication: Littleton Independent COMBINED NOTICE - PUBLICATION CRS §38-38-103 FORECLOSURE SALE NO. 0202-2023

To Whom It May Concern: This Notice is given with regard to the following described Deed of Trust:

On May 9, 2023, the undersigned Public Trustee caused the Notice of Election and Demand relating to the Deed of Trust described below to be recorded in the County of Arapahoe records.

Original Grantor(s)

Choice Property Investments LLC, a Colorado Limited Liability Company

Original Beneficiary(ies)

Merchants Mortgage & Trust Corporation

Current Holder of Evidence of Debt

Toorak Capital Partners, LLC

Date of Deed of Trust

March 21, 2022

County of Recording

Arapahoe

Recording Date of Deed of Trust

April 08, 2022

Recording Information (Reception No. and/or Book/Page No.)

E2039861

Original Principal Amount

$450,000.00

Outstanding Principal Balance

$450,000.00

Pursuant to CRS §38-38-101(4)(i), you are hereby notified that the covenants of the deed of trust have been violated as follows: Failure to make timely payments required under said Deed of Trust and the Evidence of Debt secured thereby

THE LIEN FORECLOSED MAY NOT BE A FIRST LIEN.

LOT 17 AND 18, BLOCK 20, JACKSON'S BROADWAY HEIGHTS, COUNTY OF ARAPAHOE, STATE OF COLORADO

Also known by street and number as:

4166 South Delaware Street, Englewood, CO 80110.

THE PROPERTY DESCRIBED HEREIN IS ALL OF THE PROPERTY CURRENTLY

NOTICE OF SALE

The current holder of the Evidence of Debt secured by the Deed of Trust, described herein, has filed Notice of Election and Demand for sale as provided by law and in said Deed of Trust.

THEREFORE, Notice Is Hereby Given that I will at public auction, at 10:00 A.M. on Wednesday, 09/06/2023, at The East Hearing Room, County Administration Building, 5334 South Prince Street, Littleton, Colorado, 80120, sell to the highest and best bidder for cash, the said real property and all interest of the said Grantor(s), Grantor(s)' heirs and assigns therein, for the purpose of paying the indebtedness provided in said Evidence of Debt secured by the Deed of Trust, plus attorneys' fees, the expenses of sale and other items allowed by law, and will issue to the purchaser a Certificate of Purchase, all as provided by law.

First Publication: 7/13/2023

Last Publication: 8/10/2023

Name of Publication: Littleton Independent

IF THE SALE DATE IS CONTINUED TO A LATER

DATE, THE DEADLINE TO FILE A NOTICE OF INTENT TO CURE BY THOSE PARTIES ENTITLED TO CURE MAY ALSO BE EXTENDED;

DATE: 05/09/2023

Michael Westerberg, Public Trustee in and for the County of Arapahoe, State of Colorado

By: Michael Westerberg, Public Trustee

The name, address, business telephone number and bar registration number of the attorney(s) representing the legal holder of the indebtedness is:

Erin Croke #46557

Steven Bellanti #48306

Holly Shilliday #24423

Ilene Dell'Acqua #31755

McCarthy & Holthus LLP

7700 E Arapahoe Road, Suite 230, Centennial, CO 80112 (877) 369-6122

Attorney File # CO-23-955469-LL

The Attorney above is acting as a debt collector and is attempting to collect a debt. Any information provided may be used for that purpose.

©Public Trustees' Association of Colorado Revised 1/2015

Legal Notice NO. 0202-2023

First Publication: 7/13/2023

Last Publication: 8/10/2023

Name of Publication: Littleton Independent COMBINED NOTICE - PUBLICATION CRS §38-38-103

FORECLOSURE SALE NO. 0237-2023

To Whom It May Concern: This Notice is given with regard to the following described Deed of Trust:

On May 23, 2023, the undersigned Public Trustee caused the Notice of Election and Demand relating to the Deed of Trust described below to be recorded in the County of Arapahoe records.

Original Grantor(s)

REGINA BALAGUL

Original Beneficiary(ies)

MORTGAGE ELECTRONIC REGISTRATION

SYSTEMS, INC. ACTING SOLELY AS NOMINEE FOR NORTHPOINTE BANK

Current Holder of Evidence of Debt LAKEVIEW LOAN SERVICING, LLC

Date of Deed of Trust

December 11, 2020 County of Recording

Arapahoe Recording Date of Deed of Trust

December 11, 2020

Recording Information (Reception No. and/or Book/Page No.)

E1074447 Original Principal Amount

$240,000.00

Outstanding Principal Balance

$232,270.47

Pursuant to CRS §38-38-101(4)(i), you are hereby notified that the covenants of the deed of trust have been violated as follows: Failure to pay principal and interest when due together with all other payments provided for in the Evidence of Debt secured by the Deed of Trust and other violations of the terms thereof

THE LIEN FORECLOSED MAY NOT BE A FIRST LIEN.

LOT 5, BLOCK 5, SOUTHWIND SUBDIVISION FILING NO. 1, COUNTY OF ARAPAHOE, STATE OF COLORADO.

Also known by street and number as: 7232 S SHERMAN ST, CENTENNIAL, CO 80122-1158.

THE PROPERTY DESCRIBED HEREIN IS ALL OF THE PROPERTY CURRENTLY ENCUMBERED BY THE LIEN OF THE DEED OF TRUST.

NOTICE OF SALE

The current holder of the Evidence of Debt secured by the Deed of Trust, described herein, has filed Notice of Election and Demand for sale as provided by law and in said Deed of Trust.

THEREFORE, Notice Is Hereby Given that I will at public auction, at 10:00 A.M. on Wednesday, 09/20/2023, at The East Hearing Room, County Administration Building, 5334 South Prince Street,

Littleton, Colorado, 80120, sell to the highest and best bidder for cash, the said real property and all interest of the said Grantor(s), Grantor(s)' heirs and assigns therein, for the purpose of paying the indebtedness provided in said Evidence of Debt secured by the Deed of Trust, plus attorneys' fees, the expenses of sale and other items allowed by law, and will issue to the purchaser a Certificate of Purchase, all as provided by law.

First Publication: 7/27/2023

Last Publication: 8/24/2023

Name of Publication: Littleton Independent

IF THE SALE DATE IS CONTINUED TO A LATER DATE, THE DEADLINE TO FILE A NOTICE OF INTENT TO CURE BY THOSE PARTIES ENTITLED TO CURE MAY ALSO BE EXTENDED;

DATE: 05/23/2023

Michael Westerberg, Public Trustee in and for the County of Arapahoe, State of Colorado

By:

Michael Westerberg,

Public Trustee

The name, address, business telephone number and bar registration number of the attorney(s) representing the legal holder of the indebtedness is:

Anna Johnston #51978

Randall M. Chin #31149

David W. Drake #43315

Ryan Bourgeois #51088

Joseph D. DeGiorgio #45557

Barrett, Frappier & Weisserman, LLP 1391 Speer Boulevard, Suite 700, Denver, CO 80204 (303) 350-3711

Attorney File # 00000009804766

The Attorney above is acting as a debt collector and is attempting to collect a debt. Any information provided may be used for that purpose.

©Public Trustees' Association of Colorado Revised 1/2015

Legal Notice NO. 0237-2023

First Publication: 7/27/2023

Last Publication: 8/24/2023

Name of Publication: Littleton Independent COMBINED NOTICE - PUBLICATION CRS §38-38-103 FORECLOSURE SALE NO. 0259-2023

To Whom It May Concern: This Notice is given with regard to the following described Deed of Trust:

On June 2, 2023, the undersigned Public Trustee caused the Notice of Election and Demand relating to the Deed of Trust described below to be recorded in the County of Arapahoe records.

Original Grantor(s)

Larry J Idol

Original Beneficiary(ies)

MORTGAGE ELECTRONIC REGISTRATION SYSTEMS, INC. AS NOMINEE FOR FINANCE OF AMERICA REVERSE LLC, ITS SUCCESSORS AND ASSIGNS

Current Holder of Evidence of Debt FINANCE OF AMERICA REVERSE LLC

Date of Deed of Trust

December 23, 2016

County of Recording Arapahoe

Recording Date of Deed of Trust

December 30, 2016

Recording Information (Reception No. and/or Book/Page No.) D6152681

Original Principal Amount $531,000.00

Outstanding Principal Balance $196,697.88

Pursuant to CRS §38-38-101(4)(i), you are hereby notified that the covenants of the deed of trust have been violated as follows: Failure to pay principal and interest when due together with all other payments provided for in the evidence of debt secured by the deed of trust and other violations thereof.

THE LIEN FORECLOSED MAY NOT BE A FIRST LIEN.

LOT 29, BLOCK 2, WILLOW CREEK TOWNHOUSES, COUNTY OF ARAPAHOE, STATE OF COLORADO.

Also known by street and number as: 8035 E Phillips Avenue, Centennial, CO 80112.

THE PROPERTY DESCRIBED HEREIN IS ALL OF THE PROPERTY CURRENTLY ENCUMBERED BY THE LIEN OF THE DEED OF TRUST.

NOTICE OF SALE

The current holder of the Evidence of Debt secured by the Deed of Trust, described herein, has filed Notice of Election and Demand for sale as provided by law and in said Deed of Trust.

THEREFORE, Notice Is Hereby Given that I will at public auction, at 10:00 A.M. on Wednesday, 10/04/2023, at The East Hearing Room, County Administration Building, 5334 South Prince Street, Littleton, Colorado, 80120, sell to the highest and best bidder for cash, the said real property and all interest of the said Grantor(s), Grantor(s)' heirs and assigns therein, for the purpose of paying the indebtedness provided in said Evidence of Debt secured by the Deed of Trust, plus attorneys' fees, the expenses of sale and other items allowed by law, and will issue to the purchaser a Certificate of Purchase, all as provided by law.

First Publication: 8/10/2023

Last Publication: 9/7/2023

Name of Publication: Littleton Independent

IF THE SALE DATE IS CONTINUED TO A LATER DATE, THE DEADLINE TO FILE A NOTICE OF INTENT TO CURE BY THOSE PARTIES ENTITLED TO CURE MAY ALSO BE EXTENDED; DATE: 06/02/2023

Michael Westerberg, Public Trustee in and for the County of Arapahoe, State of Colorado

By: Michael Westerberg, Public Trustee

The name, address, business telephone number and bar registration number of the attorney(s) representing the legal holder of the indebtedness is:

Alison L Berry #34531

N. April Winecki #34861

David R. Doughty #40042

Nicholas H. Santarelli #46592

Lynn M. Janeway #15592

Janeway Law Firm, P.C. 9540 Maroon Circle, Suite 320, Englewood, CO 80112 (303) 706-9990

Attorney File # 23-030066

The Attorney above is acting as a debt collector and is attempting to collect a debt. Any information provided may be used for that purpose.

©Public Trustees' Association of Colorado Revised 1/2015

Legal Notice NO. 0259-2023

First Publication: 8/10/2023

Last Publication: 9/7/2023

Name of Publication: Littleton Independent

COMBINED NOTICE - PUBLICATION CRS §38-38-103

FORECLOSURE SALE NO. 0263-2023

To Whom It May Concern: This Notice is given with regard to the following described Deed of Trust:

On June 6, 2023, the undersigned Public Trustee caused the Notice of Election and Demand relating to the Deed of Trust described below to be recorded in the County of Arapahoe records.

Original Grantor(s)

NOLAN W STAUFFER

Original Beneficiary(ies)

MORTGAGE ELECTRONIC REGISTRATION SYSTEMS, INC. ACTING SOLELY AS NOMINEE FOR CHANGE LENDING, LLC

Current Holder of Evidence of Debt CHANGE LENDING, LLC

DBA CHANGE HOME MORTGAGE

Date of Deed of Trust

September 24, 2022

County of Recording

Arapahoe

Recording Date of Deed of Trust

October 06, 2022

Recording Information (Reception No. and/or Book/Page No.)

E2100823

Original Principal Amount

$320,512.00

Outstanding Principal Balance

$319,757.80

Pursuant to CRS §38-38-101(4)(i), you are hereby notified that the covenants of the deed of trust have been violated as follows: Failure to pay principal and interest when due together with all other payments provided for in the Evidence of Debt secured by the Deed of Trust and other violations of the terms thereof

THE LIEN FORECLOSED MAY NOT BE A FIRST LIEN.

LOT 11, BLOCK 6, SOUTHGLENN - FIRST FILING, COUNTY OF ARAPAHOE, STATE OF COLORADO.

Also known by street and number as:

6550 S HIGH ST, CENTENNIAL, CO 80121.

THE PROPERTY DESCRIBED HEREIN IS ALL OF THE PROPERTY CURRENTLY ENCUMBERED BY THE LIEN OF THE DEED OF TRUST.

NOTICE OF SALE

The current holder of the Evidence of Debt secured by the Deed of Trust, described herein, has filed Notice of Election and Demand for sale as provided by law and in said Deed of Trust.

THEREFORE, Notice Is Hereby Given that I will at public auction, at 10:00 A.M. on Wednesday, 10/04/2023, at The East Hearing Room, County Administration Building, 5334 South Prince Street, Littleton, Colorado, 80120, sell to the highest and best bidder for cash, the said real property and all interest of the said Grantor(s), Grantor(s)' heirs and assigns therein, for the purpose of paying the indebtedness provided in said Evidence of Debt secured by the Deed of Trust, plus attorneys' fees, the expenses of sale and other items allowed by law, and will issue to the purchaser a Certificate of Purchase, all as provided by law.

First Publication: 8/10/2023

Last Publication: 9/7/2023

Name of Publication: Littleton Independent

IF THE SALE DATE IS CONTINUED TO A LATER DATE, THE DEADLINE TO FILE A NOTICE OF INTENT TO CURE BY THOSE PARTIES ENTITLED TO CURE MAY ALSO BE EXTENDED;

DATE: 06/06/2023

Michael Westerberg, Public Trustee in and for the County of Arapahoe, State of Colorado

By: Michael Westerberg, Public Trustee

The name, address, business telephone number and bar registration number of the attorney(s) representing the legal holder of the indebtedness is:

Anna Johnston #51978

Randall M. Chin #31149

David W. Drake #43315

Ryan Bourgeois #51088

Joseph D. DeGiorgio #45557

Barrett, Frappier & Weisserman, LLP 1391 Speer Boulevard, Suite 700, Denver, CO 80204 (303) 350-3711

Attorney File # 00000009815366

The Attorney above is acting as a debt collector and is attempting to collect a debt. Any information provided may be used for that purpose.

©Public Trustees' Association of Colorado Revised 1/2015

Legal Notice NO. 0263-2023

First Publication: 8/10/2023

Last Publication: 9/7/2023

Name of Publication: Littleton Independent City and County

Public Notice CITY OF ENGLEWOOD NOTICE OF PUBLIC HEARING

Notice is hereby given that a public hearing before the Englewood City Council will be held on August 21, 2023 at the hour of 7:00 p.m. in the Englewood Council Chambers, 1000 Englewood Parkway, Englewood, CO 80110.

Case #2020-009: Unified Development Code. The issue to be heard before City Council is to repeal and replace Title 16 of the Englewood Municipal Code.

A copy of the proposed amendments may be reviewed in the Community Development Department. Anyone interested in this matter may be heard at the Public Hearing by calling 303.762.2430 or by emailing CityClerk@englewoodco.gov 24 hours prior to the public hearing for directions on providing public testimony virtually or in person.

By

Order of the Englewood City Council

Stephanie Carlile,

City Clerk

Legal Notice No. 531885

First Publication: August 10, 2023

Last Publication: August 10, 2023

Publisher: Englewood Herald

Public Notice

ARAPAHOE COUNTY NOTICE OF FINAL SETTLEMENT

To whom it may concern: This notice is given with regard to items in the custody of the Arapahoe County Sheriff’s Office that have been released for public auction. The Sheriff’s Office will release numerous items including but not limited to, bicycles, jewelry, audio/ visual equipment, automotive parts, tools, sports equipment (such as camping, rafting, skiing gear, etc.), household goods and other items of personal property to a private auction company identified as Roller Auction. These items will be released for on-line bidding on the last Tuesday of each month. This Auction is open public.

If any citizen believes they have property in the possession of the Arapahoe County Sheriff’s Office that can be identified, and for which they can show proof of ownership associated with a written report that has been filed with the Sheriff’s Office prior to this announcement, can contact the evidence section of the Sheriff’s Office.

Joan Lopez, Clerk to the Board

Legal Notice No. Arap 1224

First Publication: August 10, 2023

Last Publication: August 10, 2023

Publisher: Englewood Herald Littleton Independent and the Centennial Citizen Public Notice

Call For Nominations For School Directors

Littleton Public Schools (Arapahoe County School District Number Six) Arapahoe County, Colorado

The Board of Education of Littleton Public Schools in the County of Arapahoe, State of Colorado, calls for nomination of candidates for school directors to be placed on the ballot for the regular biennial school election to be held on Tuesday, November 7, 2023.

At this election two directors will be elected for one 4-year term each. To be qualified, a candidate must have been a registered elector and a resident of the school district for at least twelve consecutive months before the election. A person is ineligible to run for school director if he or she has been convicted of committing a sexual offense against a child.

A person who desires to be a candidate for school director shall file with the school district a written notice of intention to be a candidate and a nomination petition in accordance with law.

Nomination petitions may be obtained at the Littleton Public Schools’ Finance Office, 5776

South Crocker Street, Littleton, CO. Office hours are 7:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Completed petitions should be submitted with 50 eligible signatures to the Littleton Public Schools’ Finance Office by 4:30 p.m. on September 1, 2023.

IN WITNESS WHEREOF, the Board of Education designated election official, Jonathan Levesque of Littleton Public School District 6, in the County of Arapahoe and the State of Colorado, has caused this call for nominations to be given this August 9, 2023.

Legal Notice No. 531640

First Publication: August 10, 2023

Last Publication: August 24, 2023

Publisher: Littleton Independent

Public Notice

ARAPAHOE COUNTY NOTICE OF PUBLIC HEARING CASE NO LE23-001, SKY RANCH NO 6 TRACT N [NEIGHBORHOOD D LIFT STATION] / LOCATION AND EXTENT

PROPOSAL: Pure Cycle on behalf of Rangeview Metropolitan District is proposing to construct a sanitary sewage lift station to serve future development of the Sky Ranch Subdivision. This project will be located in Sky Ranch Filing No. 6, southeast of the intersection of Monaghan Road and East 6th Avenue (Parcel ID 1977-00-0-00-545).

NOTICE IS HEREBY GIVEN that on September

5, 2023 the Arapahoe County Planning Commission will hold a Public Hearing at 6:30 P.M., or as soon as possible thereafter at 6954 S Lima St., Arapahoe Room, Centennial, CO 80112; at which, all interested persons will be given an opportunity to be heard concerning the above-described Case Number LE23-001, Sky Ranch No 6 Tract N [Neighborhood D Lift Station] / Location and Extent. The agenda will typically be posted by the Friday afternoon preceding the hearing and can be viewed on our website at https://arapahoe. legistar.com/Calendar. You can also listen to, or speak at, the meeting by calling 1-855-436-3656. To join the speaking queue, press *3 on the telephone keypad.

More information about this proposal is available at the offices of the Arapahoe County Public Works and Development Department, Planning Division, 6924 S Lima St., Centennial CO 80112 (please call ahead to schedule an appointment if you plan to walk-in), by calling 720-874-6650, or by emailing planning@arapahoegov.com during regular business hours (8:00 a.m. to 4:30 p.m., Monday through Friday).

Joan Lopez, Clerk to the Board

Legal Notice No. Arap 1226

First Publication: August 10, 2023

Last Publication: August 10, 2023

Publisher: Englewood Herald Littleton Independent and the Centennial Citizen Public Notice

Call for Nominations for School Directors Englewood School District Arapahoe County, Colorado

The Englewood School District in the County of Arapahoe, State of Colorado, calls for nomination of candidates for school directors to be placed on the ballot for the regular biennial school election to be held on Tuesday, November 7, 2023.

At this election two (2) directors will be elected for a term of office of four years. To be qualified, a candidate must have been a registered elector of the school district for at least 12 consecutive months before the election. A person is ineligible to run for school director if he or she has been convicted of committing a sexual offense against a child.

A person who desires to be a candidate for school director shall file a written notice of intention to be a candidate and a nomination petition signed by at least 50 eligible electors who are registered to vote in the regular biennial school election.

Nomination petitions may be obtained from Michelle Haider, DEO, at the Roscoe Davidson Administration Office at 4101 S. Bannock St., Englewood, CO 80110. Office hours are 8:00 a.m.-4:00 p.m.

Completed petitions shall be submitted to Michelle Haider, DEO, at the Roscoe Davidson Administration Office at 4101 S. Bannock St., Englewood, CO 80110, no later than 4:00 p.m. on September 1, 2023.

Legal Notice No. 531662

First Publication: August 10, 2023

Last Publication: August 10, 2023

Publisher: Englewood Herald

the hours of 7:00 a.m. and 7:00 p.m. At that time, three (3) directors will be elected to serve 4-year terms in Director Districts A, B and C for Cherry Creek School District No. 5. Eligible electors of Cherry Creek School District No. 5 who have resided in each District respectively for at least 12 months preceding the election and who are interested in serving on the school board may obtain a Board Candidate Packet for the Director District in which they reside, including a Nomination Petition from the District Designated Election Official (DEO) from August 9 through September 1:

Sonja S. McKenzie (Designated Election Official) 4700 S. Yosemite Street, Greenwood Village, CO 80111 720-554-4373

The Office of the DEO is open on the following days: Monday through Friday from 9:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m.

State law requires 50 signatures from eligible electors on a Nomination Petition. The deadline to submit a School Board Candidate Petition is 4:00 p.m. on Friday, September 1, 2023 (not less than 67 days before the election). Earlier submittal is strongly encouraged. Affidavit of Intent to be a Write-In-Candidate forms must be submitted to the office of the designated election official by 4:00 p.m. on Friday, September 1, 2023.

Cherry Creek School District No. 5

District Name

/s/ Sonja S. McKenzie

Designated Election Official Signature

Legal Notice No. 531664

First Publication: August 10, 2023

Last Publication: August 10, 2023

Publisher: Littleton Independent and the Centennial Citizen

Bids and Settlements

Public Notice NOTICE OF FINAL SETTLEMENT

NOTICE IS HEREBY GIVEN pursuant to § 3826-107, C.R.S., that on August 25th, 2023, final settlement with Diamond Contracting Corp will be made by Southwest Metropolitan Water & Sanitation District for the “2022 DCIP S. Kipling Parkway Water Main Replacement Project” subject to satisfactory final inspection and acceptance of said facilities by the District. Any person, co-partnership, association of persons, company or corporation that has furnished labor, materials, team hire, sustenance, provisions, provender, or other supplies used or consumed by such contractor or his or her subcontractor in or about the performance of the work contracted to be done or that supplies, laborers, rental machinery, tools, or equipment to the extent used in the prosecution of the work whose claim therefore has not been paid by the contractor or subcontractor, at any time up to and including the time of final settlement for the work contracted to be done, may file a verified statement of the amount due and unpaid on such claim with Southwest Metropolitan Water & Sanitation District, c/o, Mr. Timothy Flynn, Attorney, Collins, Cole, Flynn, Winn & Ulmer, 165 S. Union Boulevard, Suite 785, Lakewood, CO 80228-1556. Failure to file such verified statement or claim prior to final settlement will release the District and its employees and agents from any and all liability for such claim and for making final payment to said contractor.

s/s General Manager, Cynthia A. Lane, P.E.

Southwest Metropolitan Water & Sanitation District

Legal Notice No. 531679

First Publication: August 10, 2023

Last Publication: August 17, 2023

Publisher: Littleton Independent Public Notice

ARAPAHOE COUNTY REQUEST FOR PROPOSAL

RFP-23-48 CR 38 Bridge Repairs

Notice is hereby given that the Arapahoe County Purchasing Division will be accepting Arapahoe County is seeking Construction Services for repairs for repairs to CR 38 bridge due to rainfall and flooding on July 4th, 2023.

The Request for Proposal RFP-23-40, CR 38 Bridge Repairs document can be obtained on www.bidnetdirect.com/colorado. Questions and electronic submissions will be accepted online via Rocky Mountain E-Purchasing System at www. bidnetdirect.com/colorado.

Submittals must be received electronically no later than 10:00 a.m. local time on August 31, 2023.

The County reserves the right to waive any or all informalities or irregularities and to reject any or all submittals.

Joan Lopez, Clerk to the Board

Legal Notice No. Arap 1225

First Publication: August 10, 2023

Last Publication: August 10, 2023

Publisher: Englewood Herald Littleton Independent and the Centennial Citizen

Misc. Private Legals

Public Notice

TO: SHARISMA SIMONE THOMAS:

You are notified that you have 10 days after publication for this notice of levy to file your claim of exemption with the District Court of Arapahoe County, 7325 South Potomac St., Centennial, CO 80112 in Case 2020CV031458 entitled: ALABAMA ONE CREDIT UNION v. SHARISMA SIMONE THOMAS, a/k/a SHARISMA S. THOMAS, a/k/a SHARISMA THOMAS $1, 507.90 garnished at Bank of America, 1801 16th St., Denver CO 80202.

Legal Notice No. 531608

First Publication: July 20, 2023

Last Publication: August 17, 2023

Publisher: Littleton Independent Public Notice

TO: MYRA ZEITLIN:

You are notified that you have 10 days after publication for this notice of levy to file your claim of exemption with the District Court of Arapahoe County, 7325 South Potomac St., Centennial, CO 80112 in Case 2020CV030915 entitled: CAMDEN DEVELOPMENT, INC. v. MYRA ZEITLIN, a/k/a MYRA ELIZABETH ZEITLIN, a/k/a MYRA E. ZEITLIN, a/k/a MYRA TALBOYS, a/k/a MYRA ELIZABETH TALBOYS, a/k/a MYRA E. TALBOYS $1.742.51 garnished at Credit Union of Colorado, 1390 Logan St., Denver, CO 80203

Legal Notice No. 531592

First Publication: July 13, 2023

Last Publication: August 10, 2023

Publisher: Littleton Independent

Notice to Creditors

Public Notice

NOTICE TO CREDITORS

Estate of ROSE MARIE KELLY, aka ROSE M. KELLY, aka ROSE KELLY, Deceased Case Number: 2023PR030883

All persons having claims against the abovenamed estate are required to present them to the Personal Representative or to the Arapahoe County District Court on or before December 12, 2023 or the claims may be forever barred.

Chris Kelly, Personal Representative 4970 S. Emporia Greenwood Village, CO 80111

Legal Notice No.531681

First Publication: August 10, 2023

Last Publication: August 24, 2023

Publisher: Littleton Independent Public Notice

NOTICE TO CREDITORS

Estate of FLORENCE MIRIAM KENT, aka FLORENCE M. KENT, aka FLORENCE KENT, Deceased Case Number: 2023PR030845

All persons having claims against the abovenamed estate are required to present them to the personal representative or to the District Court of Arapahoe County, Colorado on or before December 11, 2023, or the claims may be forever barred. W. Douglas Hoak, Reg. # 43148

Attorney to the Personal Representative 8055 E. Tufts Ave., Suite 1350 Denver, Colorado 80237

Legal Notice No. 531887

First Publication: August 10, 2023

Last Publication: August 24, 2023

Publisher: Littleton Independent Public Notice

NOTICE TO CREDITORS

Estate of Mattie Louise Edwards, Deceased

Case Number: 2023PR30384

All persons having claims against the abovenamed estate are required to present them to the personal representative or to the District Court of Arapahoe County, Colorado on or before December 4, 2023, or the claims may be forever barred.

Donna Gary, Personal Representative c/o Klein Law Firm, PC 7535 E. Hampden Ave., Suite 400 Denver, CO 80231

Legal Notice No. 531657

First Publication: August 3, 2023

Last Publication: August 17, 2023

Publisher: Littleton Independent Public Notice

NOTICE TO CREDITORS

Estate of FRANCES JEANETTE LYONS, AKA FRANCES JEANETTE KELLY, AKA JEANETTE KELLY, A/K/A JEANETTE LYONS, Deceased

Case Number: 2023PR30843

All persons having claims against the abovenamed estate are required to present them to the personal representative or to the District Court of Arapahoe County, Colorado on or before December 10, 2023, or the claims may be forever barred.

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