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Opinion

  •
    Living up to our commitments

    A recent story on National Public Radio suggested that people who find themselves with mortgage balances that are more than their homes are worth would be smart to stop making payments, have their homes foreclosed upon and then go buy another house in the same neighborhood based on the newly diminished housing values. They even found a contracts lawyer to say the reason there are default provisions in contracts is because defaulting on contracts is a rational option that is available to anyone who enters into any contract.

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    Wish new president luck with world...

    Writing before the election results are final, I have no idea of the outcome of the presidential race. So from behind a veil of ignorance, this column is an expression of support and good wishes to the newly elected president — whoever he is.

  • Campaign ‘reforms&...

    The U.S. Supreme Court’s recent decision allowing more corporate spending on elections has generated a great deal of attention. 

    In Congress, politicians (who fill their own coffers with corporate dollars) feign indignation: They are shocked — shocked! — that tainted money is influencing elections. To fix it, they propose a set of “reforms” to clean up campaign spending once and for all.

  • Helping a furry friend in need

    Oliver needed a friend.

    The 9-year-old chihuahua mix was sick, missing about half his teeth and hadn’t had a place to call home for more than a year. He was a hefty14 pounds — a bit much for a pooch his size, likely due to months of inactivity and a poor diet.

    Things weren’t looking good for him in general.

    He was scheduled to die on Jan. 19 at a metro-area animal shelter.

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    Solution for PERA spreads the pain...

    When I first met former Colorado attorney general Duane Woodard in 1981, he was a member of the Public Utilities Commission. He and the other two commissioners were charged with evaluating requests from utilities to raise their rates. A variety of businesses, governments and residential consumers that needed utility services would routinely challenge the rate hikes. The PUC needed to determine that utilities received a fair rate of return while ensuring that consumers got fair rates.

  • Lifelong learning proves the...

    Jefferson County Schools is the largest Colorado district not to recently win voter approval for a mill-levy increase. The weight of cutting $32 million now falls on our county’s educational system. Coupled with the recent change in the school board, one wonders about the direction in which education is headed.

  • Community newspapers not extinct

    Few industries have gone from boom to bust as quickly as newspapers.

    In 1989, I was working for the Rocky Mountain News, and times were good. Really good. Our circulation was soaring, and ad sales were humming along.

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    Rooting for an American city as it...

    In 1999, the New Orleans Saints traded all of their draft picks — and their first- and third-round draft picks the next year — to the Washington Redskins for the first pick in the NFL draft. With it, they selected University of Texas running back Ricky Williams. The Saints went 3-13 that year, and within three years Williams would be playing for the Miami Dolphins.

  •
    School board avoided tough decisions

    When members of Congress and Pentagon leaders realized we needed to close military bases around the country and find ways to use others better, they knew they would face impossible political dilemmas. Communities around the country would fight to keep their bases and missions. What politician with an ounce of self-preservation instinct would vote to close a base in his or her own district?

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    Sweet and bittersweet journeys

    “And he carries the reminders

    “Of every glove that laid him down

    “Or cut him till he cried out

    “In his anger and his shame

    “I am leaving, I am leaving

    “But the fighter still remains.”

    — Paul Simon

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    Gov. Ritter’s decision an...

    When Gov. Bill Ritter announced he was leaving office to spend more time with his family, some greeted the news with skepticism and doubt. After so many scandals involving public figures, it’s easy to assume ulterior motives.

    But I’m giving the governor the benefit of the doubt. I do believe that sometimes elected officials leave office for the sake of their families, because I did it myself.

  •
    Ritter’s compass showed...

    Shortly after I started as the founding director of Denver’s Mayor’s Office of Regulatory Reform in 1991, Elbra Wedgeworth, the office’s deputy director, told me she wanted us to have breakfast with one of her Leadership Denver classmates from the district attorney’s office. Shortly thereafter, she and I met with Bill Ritter. From that day, the three of us went on to bigger and better things. Elbra became president of the City Council and brought the Democratic National Convention to Denver.

  •
    Will a third-party movement emerge?

    As I write this column, I’m looking at an online Denver Post story announcing that my friend and former colleague in the state House, Kathleen Curry, has renounced her affiliation with the Democratic Party and is now officially “independent.” It comes as a surprise only insofar as sitting elected officials rarely leave their parties. That said, Curry, who hails from Gunnison, has always had an independent streak.

  • A bold (and cold) plunge into the...

    There is nothing quite like starting the new year standing chest deep in 33-degree water. Regardless of what happens in 2010, everything else should seem like a walk on the beach.

    After years of covering the annual Evergreen Lake plunge, I finally had the guts to participate. I made the decision to jump several weeks ago, but it wasn’t until I was standing on the edge of a hole cut through 20 inches of ice that I was fully committed. With a giant step forward, I leapt into the icy water.

  •
    Leverage always a player in politics

    It’s disappointing on every level that health care reform, like the stimulus plan before it, will be enacted without bipartisan cooperation. While Democrats have charged Republicans with being obstructionists and Republicans have called Democrats arrogant, the simple fact is that President Obama’s major initiatives will be enacted without Republican support.

  • State budget: Here come the cuts

    Last week, the Denver Post reported that “Colorado’s budget shortfall has grown another $40 million, reaching a projected $600.6 million for the fiscal year that ends in June.” This is due in large part to declining tax revenues as a result of bad economic conditions.

    To make matters worse, in the upcoming fiscal year — which ends in July — the budget shortfall is expected to be $1.5 billion. 

    To put those numbers into perspective, the stateís operating budget for fiscal 2009-10 is just about $19 billion.

  •
    Tough assignment for school board

    You have to wonder if the two new members of the Jefferson County Board of Education go to bed each night thinking, “Be careful what you wish for …”

  •
    Scandal-obsessed media sell us short

    Another season, another scandal. This time, a minor car accident in Florida gave rise to a story that culminated in Tiger Woods issuing a public statement confessing to “transgressions.”

    In what appears to be a semi-annual ritual, the press is having a field day with the foibles of another celebrity. Talk shows talk. Experts offer opinions. Eyebrows are raised. Heads move gravely from side to side.

    Are we the better for it?

  • Library service continues to grow

    With recent news of libraries closing, hours being cut and services being reduced around the Denver area and the nation, it’s important not to lose sight of the growing need for library services in the community.

  • Suddenly, our state is going to pot

    When Colorado voters passed Amendment 20 in 2000 to legalize the use of medical marijuana, it would have been hard to predict that the program would explode to such an extent in 2009 that Atlantic Monthly would use the term “ganjaprenuership” to explain what is going on here in its Aug. 26 issue.