LETTER

FROM PAGE 10

Our local city council has been heavily in uenced by money from oil and gas and developers that are mainly concerned with corporate pro t and are not truly invested in the long-term stability of our city or the well being of working class

About Letters To The Editor

Colorado Community Media welcomes letters to the editor. Please note the following rules:

• Email your letter to letters@coloradocommunitymedia.com. Do not send via postal mail. Put the words “letter to the editor” in the email subject line.

• Submit your letter by 5 p.m. on Wednesday in order to have it considered for publication in the following week’s newspaper.

• Letters must be no longer than 400 words.

• Letters should be exclusively submitted to Colorado Community Media and should not submitted to other outlets or previously posted on websites or social media. Submitted letters become the property of CCM and should not be republished elsewhere.

• Letters advocating for a political candidate should focus on that candidate’s qualifications for o ce. We cannot publish letters that contain unverified negative information about a candidate’s opponent. Letters advocating for or against a political candidate or ballot issue will not be published within 12 days of an election.

Learn about the Hyland Hills Board candidates

It’s been somewhat disappointing about the small amount of information available about the three candidates for the two board of directors seats on the Hyland Hills Park and Recreation District. However, thanks to the Hyland Hills District and the Westminster Chamber of Commerce, you can still learn about candidates.

On the District’s web site, there are short bios on each of the three candidates You can access the video interviews with candidates Paul Page and Mike Hald on the chamber’s web site. Mail-in ballots have previously gone out to all registered voters. e election is May 2. If you have not yet mailed your ballot in, I would encourage voters to take their completed ballot to Hyland Hills o ces at 8801 Pecos Street, Federal Heights City Hall at 2380 W. 90th Avenue or Westminster City Hall at 4800 W. 92nd Avenue.

Northglenn residents take note of ebikes and e-scooters e Northglenn City Council recently revisited their laws on who and where OPOMD’s can be used. So, what is an OPOMD? It is an acronym for “other power driven mobile device” such as e-bikes, e-scooters and Segways. be working harder for you elsewhere. ornton residents.

Patricia Kummer has been a Certied Financial Planner professional and a duciary for over 35 years and is managing director for Mariner Wealth Advisors.

As a leader in our community I support the Land Use Bill HB23213 because I want to be sure our kids have the possibility to live in the town where they grew up. I also support this bill because we have to support smarter, more a ordable development.

Roberta Ayala, ornton

While they are currently allowed to some degree in the city, there have been limitations. A limited survey of citizens favored allowing children under 18 to be permitted to ride electric scooters in the city. Also, survey results showed clear support for allowing e-scooter and e-bikes on roadway/bike lanes, trails and parks. Riding them on sidewalks was not favored. By the way, we are not talking about rental OPOMD’s like in Denver. So, the city council will decide if these are safe changes to make with the increasing popularity of e-scooters and e-bikes.

e citizen’s feedback makes good sense to me especially not allowing either OPOMD on sidewalks. Us older folks aren’t able to dodge and weave as quickly as we use to do!

Adams County Regional Homeless Cooperative

Homelessness is not an isolated problem and it is not caused exclusively by a single factor.

Some current factors such as in ation and the high cost of housing in the Denver metro area are exacerbating the problem. Homelessness is a national problem best addressed on a regional scale.

Adams County, its municipalities and the City and County of Broomeld saw the need and the bene t to come together in a regional ap- proach to help mitigate this problem. A memorandum of understanding was approved in April, 2022. Since then, each of the governmental entities has been working on their assignments. Recently, a brie ng was held for o cials to learn of 2021-2022 accomplishments. I thought sharing a few of these results would be helpful for the public to be made aware. I think too often government fails to widen their reach in sharing facts and gures especially on issues which have a negative connotation.

So, here we go--collectively there were 4,537 unique and active clients identi ed. A total of 725 unique clients took advantage of the Lyft ride program using 1,406 rides.

Here is a positive statistic- 1,380 exits from homelessness to housing. In 2022, there was a 72% reduction in veterans being homeless. A total of 73 people were sheltered via the Winter Housing Program. Using tenant-landlord mediation in partnership with Brother Redevelopment, 20% of landlords agreed to forego eviction.

Bill Christopher is a former Westminster city manager and RTD board member. His opinions are not necessarily those of Colorado Community Media. You can contact him at bcjayhawk68@gmail.com.

Gloria Jean (Baca) Basquez April 3, 1940 - April 18, 2023

Gloria Jean Basquez, of Northglenn, passed away April 18, 2023. Born in Trinidad to the pioneer Baca family, she was a homemaker, and accomplished hairstylist and loved painting and carpentry. Survivors: sons Edward and Joseph Alan Basquez and daughters Donna Heit and

Anna Basquez, six grandchildren and 13 great-grandchildren, many nieces and nephews, other family. Husband Joseph N. Basquez preceded her in death. Funeral Mass will be 11 a.m. May 3 at Immaculate Heart of Mary in Northglenn. Donations: IHM and/or St. Mark’s Westy.

• Publication of any given letter is at our discretion. Letters are published as space is available.

• We will edit letters for clarity, grammar, punctuation and length and write headlines (titles) for letters at our discretion.

• Please don’t send us more than one letter per month. First priority for publication will be given to writers who have not submitted letters to us recently.

• Submit your letter in a Word document or in the body of an email. No PDFs or Google Docs, please.

• Include your full name, address and phone number. We will publish only your name and city or town of residence, but all of the information requested is needed for us to verify you are who you say you are.

• Letters will be considered only from people living in Colorado Community Media’s circulation area in Adams, Arapahoe, Clear Creek, Denver, Douglas, Elbert, Je erson and Weld counties.

• Do not use all caps, italics or bold text.

• Keep it polite: No name calling or “mudslinging.”

Local foragers teach students to cook with wild foods

ere some see weeds, Erica Davis sees ingredients for delicious soups and salads.

“In urban areas, there are a lot of plants that we call weeds that spring up everywhere, that are widely available to people, that are edible and good,” she said.

Foraging is the act of gathering wild plants from nature, generally to be used for food, and sometimes to make other products. For Davis and other foragers, spring means plants are starting to grow –which means kitchens will soon be full of wild foods ready to be prepared in creative

Across the Front Range and in the mountains, several foragers share their knowledge through cooking classes based on

Why cook with wild food?

Davis, who runs a blog called Wild Food Girl, has upcoming classes in Ramah and Fairplay. Her Arvada class this spring has

“I think one of the biggest challenges with edible wild plants is that people don’t always know how to prepare them,” she said. “We all know how to cook spinach, we all know how to make broccoli — but we don’t all know how to cook tumble mustard so that it tastes good. So in my classes, I like to give students that experience of preparing an edible wild plant — or three — in a way that I think they are going to Davis’ classes begin with an hourlong plant walk where students learn the names of plants and safety and sustainability guidelines for foraging. Afterward, she teaches them how to prepare several of the plants they have for-

In the spring, dandelions and wild mustard greens are common staples in her

“People sometimes picture foraging as going out into the forest and picking plants

— and that’s part of it — but I would really encourage people to learn the weeds and make use of them,” she said. “A lot of them are non-native species, so there really aren’t as many ecological considerations with picking them.”

Davis teaches her students to make dandelion green soup from a recipe passed down by an Italian relative. Musk mustard is great in salads, and tumble mustard and field pennycress are fun to ferment, she said.

Beyond the creative and flavorful uses of foraged foods, research from 2019 suggests that wild edible greens harvested in urban areas can be abundant and highly nutritious. The study dubbed wild edible plants “open-source food.”

“This idea that open-source food is out there for anybody to eat and make use of — and then furthermore, it’s organic, it’s free, it’s fresh — I just think that’s a great concept,” Davis said.

Safety precautions

Despite their affordability and freshness, wild plants are not all safe to eat. Crystal Baldwin, who teaches wild plant-based classes at her Golden business, Earth Sweet Boutique, said it’s always important to triple-check plants before you eat them.

“I don’t like to frighten people away from… foraged foods because there’s a lot of very safe ones,” Baldwin said. “But I like them to be aware that there are dangerous, poisonous ones that will kill you, and so it’s important to kind of have an idea of what those might be and what to look out for.”

Baldwin encourages those interested in foraging to start by taking classes, working with local experts and reading about which plants are safe to eat.

She also said it’s important to check if plants are near old buildings that could be contributing lead to soil or if plants have been sprayed with pesticides.