DIAGNOSIS

training” on his forearm because he believes there’s value in going through something di cult. at’s Mace’s attitude toward Alzheimer’s disease.

e disease’s toll can be seen in the races that father and son have undertaken as time goes by. ey ran the Leadville 50-mile race in 2021, the Leadville Marathon in 2022, and they are planning to do the Leadville 10K this year.

“I have realized that winning doesn’t matter; I just want to run with my dad,” Travis explained.

e family knows that Mace’s health continues to deteriorate, so they are planning for the future while still trying to be present in the here and now.

Mace wants people to know that people with Alzheimer’s disease are like everyone else, and they go on with life, though a little di erently.

“Just love the person (with Alzheimer’s),” Pam said. “ ey are the same person.

As things change, we will have to change. It’s not going to get easier.”

Pam, already patient with an optimistic outlook, said she’s learned that it’s OK to ask for help.

Helping others

Pam said it was important for them to reach out to others on the Alzheimer’s disease journey to share information and to connect for support.

“Why stay home and hide?” she asked.

Travis said connecting with others on the same path has become a new mission, and a big goal of the book is to make a di erence and help people. Secondarily, it gave father and son something to do together.

“We are not Alzheimer’s experts,” Travis said, “but we are sharing our story.”

Mace continues to nd happiness in his life, and Travis attributes that “to my mom being incredibly supportive and energetic.”

“What is important to know,” Mace said, “is you will still be OK even after the diagnosis. I’m still an athlete and as good as I ever was. I’m perfectly happy. I have a great family.”

Mark “Mace” Macy and his son Travis Macy with the book they co-wrote with Patrick Regan called “A Mile at a Time: A father and son’s inspiring Alzheimer’s journey of love, adventure and hope,” which chronicle’s the family’s journey with the disease.

WANT TO GO TO THE CONFERENCE?

• The Alzheimer’s Foundation of America is hosting a free Alzheimer’s & Caregiving Educational Conference as part of its 2023 national Educating America Tour. It will be from 10 a.m.-1 p.m. Wednesday, May 17, at the University of Denver’s Fritz Knoebel Events Center, 2044 E. Evans Ave., Denver. Travis and Mark Macy are speaking at the conference about Navigating Alzheimer’s a Mile at a Time. To register, visit www. alzfdn.org/tour.

• Mark and Travis Macy will be at the Evergreen Taphouse at 6:30 p.m. Wednesday, May 17, for a book signing.

BY NINA JOSS AND MCKENNA HARFORD COLORADO COMMUNITY MEDIA

Several hours before the restaurant opened one Wednesday in April, Maggiano’s Little Italy was already bustling with people sipping co ee and lling their plates with wa es and eggs.

It was the monthly gathering of the Arapahoe County Republican Breakfast Club. At the Denver Tech Center restaurant, leaders and neighbors build community and discuss issues important to the GOP in the metro area and across Colorado.

At this meeting, talk turned to the Republican Party’s identity crisis.

“It’s very clear that, even in this room of good friends, we are still very deeply divided,” Arapahoe County GOP Chair Anne Rowland said to the group. “In spite of that, if we want to win, we need to keep having conversations in a positive way and not to tear one another down.” ere seems to be consensus within the Republican Party that unity is needed to start winning. Republicans appear to agree they need an identity, a clear message. e disagreement, however, is exactly what messages to push.

Rowland’s statement highlighted an idea that, despite not being on any ofcial agenda for the meeting, was on everyone’s minds: What do Republicans need to do to win elections?

In 2022, Democrats edged out Republicans in most key elections. Along with wins in all four statewide elected o ces, including governor, and a U.S. Senate seat, Democrats gained a supermajority in the state House and a majority in the state Senate.

Some want the party to shift focus away from abortion, gun control, the results of the 2020 presidential election and Donald Trump in hopes of appealing to more una liated voters. Others say these topics are exactly what Republicans need to double down on to win.

At the April breakfast, some of those themes played out. Republi- cans in the room disagreed on how much the party should focus on abortion. While many Republicans share a desire for more restrictions on abortion in Colorado, the question is how much these beliefs should be a part of mainstream messaging.

“It reminds me of an old saying: ‘If you can’t beat them, join them,’” said Bob Andrews, who lost the Arapahoe County assessor race in 2022.

As a “devout Catholic” with “strong opinions about abortion,” Andrews said Republicans need to stop focusing on it.

“We have this abortion albatross around our neck,” he said. “As an assessor candidate, I had to answer questions about abortion. at’s not in my purview. But until we give that up, we’re going to keep losing.”

Others argued the exact opposite is needed, saying the key to winning is to push harder on the controversial social issues that became a focal point of the 2022 elections.

“As a Republican, we’ll never walk away from protecting the unborn, period,” said Randy Corporon, Republican national committeeman and political radio talk show host. “We don’t need to moderate our position. We need to point out how radical the Democrat position is … It’s a wonderful opportunity to stand up for what we believe and convince people why we’re right.” e passion of these comments — and the divisions they brought to the surface — extend far beyond Maggiano’s.

From Arapahoe County, which has a Democratic majority, to rightleaning Douglas County — Republicans nd themselves debating and questioning whether they can come to a consensus on how to present a one-party front to voters.

A numbers game

Last year in Douglas County, a Democrat won a legislative race in the Republican stronghold for the rst time since 1966. e numbers di erentiate Douglas County from neighboring Arapahoe County, where 21% of active registered voters are Republicans, 31% are Democrats and 46% are una liated.

Still, Douglas County elected mostly Republicans to the statehouse, re ecting its voter spectrum. Republicans account for 34% of active registered voters in the county, while 19% are Democrats and 46% are una liated. (Voters not included in these numbers are registered with minor parties.)

Kevin Edling, who ran for Arapahoe County sheri against incumbent Democrat Tyler Brown in 2022, said these numbers played a role in his loss.

“I knew before I ran for o ce for the Arapahoe County sheri that we’re behind the eight ball because there’s … more registered Democrats in Arapahoe County than there are Republicans,” he said.

If Edling could have run without choosing a party, he said he would have. Some races feel like they’re already decided down party lines before the candidates even start campaigning, he said.

“ at’s not what it’s supposed to be about,” he said. “It’s supposed to be about ideas and candidates and service.”

In the eyes of many Republicans, party registration numbers played a large role in the GOP’s cache of losses in 2022.

“I campaigned for several of the (November 2022) candidates,” said Arapahoe County Commissioner Je Baker, the lone Republican on the ve-member board. “None of my picks won. But you know … I don’t think they could have done anything better. It’s a mathematics game.”

Party registration numbers in Arapahoe County are similar to those statewide. Just under a quarter of active voters in Colorado are registered Republican and 27% are Democrat. ere are multiple theories as to why registering as una liated is becoming more common among voters.

It is signi cantly more popular, however, to not be registered with any party at all – 46% of voters in the state are una liated, and that percentage has increased over time.

On Nov. 4, 2008, the day Barack Obama was rst elected, Democratic, Republican and una liated voters in Colorado were evenly split, with about 33% of voters registered in each category. Since then, both major party registration percentages have decreased while una liated voters have increased.

For some, the shift away from party a liation highlights the declining loyalty to both major political parties and frustration with the two-party political system.

Suzanne Taheri, who was known for much of her political career as Suzanne Staiert, thinks the shift to una liated could also have a systemic cause.

In the past, o cials at the Department of Motor Vehicles would ask residents if they wanted to register to vote and would allow them to select a party.

“Now, they don’t ask you the question anymore,” Taheri said. “You’re just automatically registered as unafliated.”

A new process, implemented in 2020, automatically registers new voters as una liated when they get a driver’s license.

To register with a speci c party, voters have to change their a liation online or by responding to a mailed notice from the state.

“Your motivation to then go into the system and change your a liation to something else is much lower,” said Taheri, the former chair of the Arapahoe County GOP. “Like why? What is the bene t? Now we have open primaries, and if you don’t register as a Republican, then you can vote in either. If you register as a Republican or a Democrat, you only get to pick one. So I don’t know that we will ever see (party registration) really increasing in Colorado.”

In March, during a Republican town hall event in Castle Rock, one Douglas County resident said if voters were forced to pick a party, more would choose the right and Republicans would fare better in elections and registration numbers.

With the growing number of unafliated voters in the state, many Republicans say the key to winning elections is getting these voters on their side.

“We need to make sure they know that not all Republicans look like me, are old white guys,” Baker said. “ at we have folks that are BIPOC, that they are LGBTQ+. We need to make sure that we’re addressing the issues that they nd important.”

But in Taheri’s eyes, not all una liated voters are “up for grabs.”

“We’re not necessarily appealing to una liated (voters) — they’re unafliated by default, not necessarily by choice,” she said. “I think there’s a big di erence between someone who comes here who’s a Democrat, gets registered as una liated and doesn’t switch, versus somebody who made the switch from a party to una liated … If they were truly up for grabs, I would say, you know, you have to sell your issues to them.”

According to the secretary of state’s o ce, una liated voters can choose a party preference, meaning they can choose to receive a ballot for only the Democratic or Republican primary leading up to an election. Of the una liated voters who have chosen a party preference since the June 2022 primary, 59% chose Democratic and

33% chose Republican.

Voter preference numbers for other recent primaries also show more Democratic preferences than Republican.

Despite these blue-leaning tendencies, many una liated voters, with the ability to vote for either party in the primaries, choose to vote on the Republican ballot.

In the 2022 primaries, 1.2 million total votes were cast, according to numbers from the secretary of state’s o ce. According to the o ce’s data, 248,192 una liated voters returned Republican ballots and 170,631 cast their ballots in Democratic primaries.

With una liated voters impacting primary races, some Republicans support closing primary elections to only registered GOP voters. ey say this would compel people who want to participate to register with the party.

“As members of our community who have knocked countless doors and engaged untold numbers of residents, we know una liated voters are more aligned with conservative values than not,” Douglas County GOP Chair Steve Peck said in a statement. “We hope to prove the value of Republicanism to them over time and have them join our family to take

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