Colorado Is Not Full: News Miner 62

The progressive YIMBY fight, housing policy, sex ed, Woodland Park schools, antisemitism, the drug war, animosity in the legislature, and more.

Colorado Is Not Full

Colorado progressives are embroiled in debate regarding housing policy.

Joe Salazar said:

1) Colorado and our environment CANNOT handle more people. 2) Colorado was built on local control FOR A REASON. You want better housing policy, elect better city council members. Not difficult concepts.

On the other hand, Deep Singh Badhesha said:

Denver is not full. Colorado is not full. America is not full. Everyone who lives here should be able to stay. Everyone who moves here should be welcomed. If you disagree with this, please discard your “Progressive” tag at the door.

I agree with Badhesha, obviously. Problems with housing are problems with government policy. Badhesha and I would disagree somewhat on which policies; I want to look squarely at those that restrict the development and use of residential properties.

Regarding Salazar’s remarks, I would point out:

1. People have got to live somewhere. You’re not reducing the overall environmental impact by forcing them to live outside of Colorado.

2. Anyway, once we move to carbon-free energy (presumably through some combination of nuclear and solar and wind with batteries), more people will not impact the environment even if you’re very-worried about global warming.

3. Colorado can handle a practically unlimited number of new people, especially if they live in relatively dense housing. We’ve got tons of space here. If you doubt this, just pick a direction and drive that way for several hours while looking around.

4. Salazar is saying it’s possible to elect “better city council members” but implying they shouldn’t allow the construction of new housing because Colorado is full.

5. City councils tend to represent the interests of people there who already own homes (and who tend to be more politically active), not the interests of renters or of people who would otherwise like to live their too. Forcibly excluding people from your neighborhood is not a “progressive” value by any plausible meaning of the term.

Notes on Housing

In no particular order . . .

Democratic Rep. Steven Woodrow said something that I very much agree with (I think he was quoting another document related to YIMBY efforts in Montana): “Your property rights trump your neighbor’s ability to tell you what you can or cannot build in your own backyard.”

Unfortunately, Coloradans generally are friendly to statist policies when it comes to housing, including rent control and “affordability” mandates, Magellan reports.

The problem in housing is statism! Here’s another example, from Westword: “Denver’s Landmark Preservation Commission has turned down a Capitol Hill church’s plan to develop a parking lot into a twelve-story apartment building with affordable housing, which would exceed the minimum height standards mandated by the city.” What bullshit!

Apparently Boulder does allow housing coops, but Eric Budd says:

Unfortunately, housing co-ops in Boulder are not fine. 1. City charges $1,000 every two years for a license 2. 70 page application [are required]. 3. [As are] architectural drawings. We now have fewer housing co-ops in Boulder than when legalized in 2017. It’s a failed policy by the City of Boulder.

What’s really going to help with the housing supply is governments hassling owners of rental properties: “Denver issued its first fines Wednesday to [36] apartment complexes operating without a license,” Axios reports.

Here is a perfect example of how local elected officials serve established interests to exclude others from neighborhoods, from Denverite:

Many residents of Montclair and a portion of the Mayfair area are uninterested in neighborhood rezoning for accessory dwelling units, or ADUs.

Councilmember Amanda Sawyer announced in her May 5 newsletter that the proposed move to rezone the neighborhood to allow for ADUs would not be moving forward due to the community’s response.

Sex Ed

The proposed sex education curriculum in Roaring Fork is, predictably, controversial. Offhand it seems pretty reasonable to me. It seeks to enable students to do the following, according to the Post Independent:

Ask any questions they have about issues such as puberty, sex, reproduction and relationships.

Receive complete, age-appropriate and medically-accurate information about sexuality.

Explore issues that interest them related to their sexual development.

Develop the skills necessary to form healthy friendships and, later, healthy romantic partnerships.

Have support from caring adults who respect, affirm and celebrate them for who they are.

The Woodland Park School Board

Here is what a Woodland Park school board member wrote to another member, according to NBC in a very-long story:

This is the flood the zone tactic, and the idea is if you advance on many fronts at the same time, then the enemy cannot fortify, defend, effectively counter-attack at any one front. Divide, scatter, conquer. Trump was great at this in his first 100 days.

That is . . . not an appropriate way to run a school board.

At the same time, the article paints the conservative board as uniquely ideological, as though when left-wingers control school boards they are not ideological.

Is the board otherwise doing a good job?

The NBC article notes that the board approved Merit Academy charter school, which the Independence Institute’s Ross Izard quite likes.

One thing the board did was adopt American Birthright materials for social studies. Here is NBC:

American Birthright materials emphasize patriotism, argue that the federal government should have no authority over public schools and say teachers should not encourage civic engagement, such as registering to vote or petitioning local lawmakers on issues students care about. . . .

The Colorado State Board of Education rejected American Birthright in October. The National Council for the Social Studies, a professional trade group for educators, issued a rare warning against using it.

There’s much more in the NBC article. For more specifically on the American Birthright materials, see also Chalkbeat, CPR, and Newsline. Offhand, these materials seem like a slightly right-of-center take on American history, as opposed to the far-left-of-center take many in the education establishment want. But I’d have to thoroughly review the materials to reach a firmer evaluation (which I’m probably not going to do).

It’s as I always say, “It’s so weird how government-run schools become so political.”

See also Jimmy Sengenberger’s take on Woodland Park. He also discusses Denver and the Colorado Education Association’s anti-capitalist resolution (which I’ve also discussed at length).

Quick Takes

Antisemitism: “Swastikas etched on the bathroom walls, students doing Hitler salutes, pennies being thrown near Jewish students, and students telling Jewish people to ‘go back to the gas chambers.’ These are some of the antisemitic experiences that students, parents and teachers shared during the May 8 Cherry Creek School District Board of Education meeting.” Disgusting. This from Colorado Community Media.

Statism: Rep. Javier Mabrey notes, “We passed HB 23-1002, which will cap the price of EpiPens for Colorado consumers. We passed HB 23-1229, which will protect Coloradans from predatory lending practices.” The first bill, among other things, imposes mandates both on manufacturers and on pharmacists. The second bill “protects” people from getting certain loans completely.

Death by Drug War: Elise Schmelzer reports: “Oscar Canas died on April 18, 2021, in the Garfield County jail while serving a one-year sentence for misdemeanor drug possession. He left behind a 2-year-old daughter and an 11-month-old son, according to the lawsuit filed last month against the county.” He died “after taking a “fatal drug cocktail prescribed to him by medical staff . . . according to a federal lawsuit filed in his death.” Via Elisabeth Epps.

Drug War II: Kansas state troopers are going out of their way to search Coloradans’ cars, and likely breaking the law in doing so.

Hyperbole: Rep. Stephanie Vigil said of her Republican colleagues in the legislature: “You’re dealing with very, very, very bad men. Bad men—violent men—people who want to kill a lot of us. They do. I know that they do.” See the Axios report. Vigil’s remarks are ridiculous and the polar opposite of charitable. House Speaker Julie McCluskie was more measured, saying some of the GOP “rhetoric has been hostile.” I agree with that; for example, I’ve harshly criticized Scott Bottoms’s remarks about transgender people. The GOP in turn responded like a bunch of toddlers.

Titone: The Washington Post has a nice profile of Brianna Titone (and also discusses Bottoms)

Business: Ed Sealover has a good run-down of what (many) business leaders thought of the legislative session.

Legislature: Mark Hillman has some good advice for Democratic leaders regarding how to keep things on schedule. Here’s something I’d recommend: Reduce from five to three the number of bills that each member normally can run, and make it harder to introduce more.

Criminal Justice: Good job 9News for reporting about the bullshit medical diagnosis “excited delirium,” which often has been invoked to excuse police abuses. Now a national association of coroners has renounced the term.

Mothers: An Osprey in Boulder County faced pelting hail to protect her eggs.

Migrants: Migrants, many from Venezuela, have faced a chaotic scene in Denver. The U.S. has a strong interest in bringing in people disaffected with their troubled home countries, but we don’t seem to have the will to do that.

Fish: Someone caught a 73 pound trout in Colorado. I didn’t know they came that big!

For Gods’ Sake: Apparently someone keeps chiseling the “s” out of the sign for Garden of the Gods. I’m sure if there were one (and only one) God he’d be thrilled about people committing acts of vandalism for His sake.

Birds: Here’s a recent photo of some nesting birds at Standley Lake.