All the News About Denver’s Best Residential Community Since 1961 Volume 53, Issue No. 1
A Greater Park Hill Community Hill, Inc. Publication
January 2014
MLK in Park Hill: 50 Years This Month Witnesses recall unwavering eloquence of civil rights leader’s 1964 message during Denver visit By Cara DeGette
Standing on the steps of Montview Boulevard Presbyterian Church on Jan. 26, 1964. Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr. stepped outside to speak to the overflow crowd outside before addressing the congregation inside. Photo by Mel Schlieltz, Rocky Mountain News collection/Denver Public Library
not change attitudes that condone discrimination. When Martin Luther King, Jr. came to “Legislation can’t make a man love me, Park Hill 50 years ago this month, he mesbut it can stop a man from lynching me,” merized and energized thousands of ColoKing told an audience of 600 on a Friday radans working toward integration and night at the University of Denver. waging a battle for King’s visit was sponracial equality. sored by the Denver King’s three-day Commission on Human historic visit included Relations. The organiseveral speaking en- “And I want to say, what a great zation’s chairman, Dick gagements in Denver pleasure it is to be in the state Young, escorted the civil and Littleton. The of Colorado once more, and in rights leader to his many Sunday before he flew speaking engagements this total community.” home to Atlanta, he and meetings with other delivered a Sunday local leaders in Denver Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr., sermon at Macedonia and Littleton. Baptist Church and arriving in Denver in January, 1964 “I was just awestruck then spoke at Montat how he spoke, using view Boulevard Presno notes,” said Young, byterian Church. The who has lived in Park crowd, in the thousands, spilled onto the Hill with his wife Lorie for 53 years. “He street outside. was just such an effective speaker.” Everywhere, King spoke of the battle for Park Hill’s relevance racial equality, and for the Civil Rights Act Park Hill was particularly relevant to of 1964, which passed later that year. Also King’s visit because the neighborhood was that year, he was awarded the Nobel Peace ground zero in the fight for fair housing and Prize in Oslo, Norway. public school integration during the time. According to an account in the Jan. 25, Park Hill was the first neighborhood in 1964 Rocky Mountain News, King hinted Denver -- and was a model for the nation at a national boycott of industries that re-- to resist the blockbusting that occurred fuse to abandon employment policies that allow racial discrimination. He rejected continued on page 11 suggestions that enacting new laws would
‘Making a Democratic Process More Democratic’ Tracing the roots of the neighborhood movement As Denver’s Inter-Neighborhood Cooperation (INC) prepares for its annual dinner on Jan. 30, a former City Council member and a community development expert recall the leadership of the Park Hill community in the “neighborhood movement” of the early 1970s. Former Councilwoman Cathy Donohue and INC’s first Chair and community consultant Bernie Jones say Park Hill was uniquely positioned to be part of INC’s development because the neighborhood already had an essential cohesion. “Forming INC was part of the continuing process of making a democratic process more democratic,” says Jones, a retired community development and planning specialist now living in British Columbia. According to Jones, “neighborhood groups were popping up all over the place” in the 1970s. Recognition of Registered Neighborhood Organizations (RNOs) later became part of the “Neighborhood Notification Ordinance of 1979.” Donohue says that in her view, groups developed in response to widespread dissatisfaction over the administration of then-Mayor Bill McNichols, who served from 1968 to 1983.
“The mayor’s friends got what they requested, while everyone else suffered,” Donohue said. “The mayor had total control over the budget, and there was absolutely no communication between the mayor and council except those members who were ‘in his pocket.’”
Setting the pattern Longtime INC representative Michael Henry of Capitol Hill says neighborhoods were increasingly concerned about what he terms was McNichols’ “usual failure to inDave Felice form or consult with residents or neighborhood associations about issues and changes that would affect the neighborhoods.” Jones cites the work of Jules Mondschein of Park Hill in the 1960s, when the neighborhood struggled against segregation and some real estate agents encouraged white residents to move out of the area. As historian Phil Goodstein describes in his book Park Hill Promise (New Social Publications, 2012), Mondschein became the first chairman of Greater Park Hill Community when GPHC developed in 1970 from the Park Hill Action Committee. Donohue, who served on council for seven years beginning in 1975, termed Park
City Matters
“At first, the law was small and simple, focusing primarily on zoning matters which would affect neighborhoods. It has become much more sophisticated now. “
six organizations. Eight promptly joined. Henry, Jones, and Donohue say INC began working with “sympathetic” members of Council. “We had to have nine votes to sustain a mayoral veto, and that was almost impossible,” Donohue said. She credits staff aides Jennifer Macy and Judy Gold for working closely with thenCouncilmembers Sal Carpio, Sam Sandos, Bill Roberts, Paul Hentzell, and Cathy Reynolds to develop the “Neighborhood Registration and Notification Ordinance.” “At first, the law was small and simple, focusing primarily on zoning matters which would affect neighborhoods,” said Jones. “It has become much more sophisticated now. “
Two ways to view the ordinance The ordinance requires organizations to register annually with Community Planning and Development after meeting certain organizational criteria. It also requires city departments to send written notification to the RNOs on matters such as zoning, liquor licensing, requests to vacate streets and alleys, and, more recently, marijuana store licenses. “There are two fundamental ways to view the ordinance,” Jones said. “One is for city officials to make a decision and encourage
- Bernie Jones
City Loop project on hold; critics cautiously optimistic
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Annual MLK Jr. Marade to kick off at 9 a.m. on Jan. 20
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Inside This Issue
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January 2014
Hill a well-respected neighborhood, and one that set a pattern for others. The year after Park Hill Action Committee formed, residents to the east organized what became known as Capitol Hill United Neighborhoods (CHUN). Others smaller groups started coming together in the Washington Park neighborhood of south Denver and in the northern and western parts of the city. By 1975, Jones says, leaders who had “met in various ways” (this was before the Internet and e-mail), and started to talk about establishing a neighborhood coalition. “We were fellow strugglers against a city administration that didn’t care (about neighborhood residents),” said Jones. “Our first meeting consisted of 12 people in my (Capitol Hill) living room.” Jones says the group wrote a constitution that required an initial membership of
The Sunshine Food Project brings fresh veggies to Park Hill
continued on page 6
Next GPHC Meeting Thursday, Jan. 9 at 6:30 p.m. 2823 Fairfax St., Denver
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