Tag: Denver

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local leaders too much government

Brave New Budgets

Denver, migrants, police

“Stay here and you will suffer.” 

That’s the message Denver’s Newcomer Communications Liaison Andres Carrera delivered to migrants last month, according to the city’s NBC 9 News.

“You don’t have to walk anywhere, we can buy you a free ticket,” Carrera offered. “You can go to any city,” he said, mentioning New York and Chicago, specifically. 

“We can take you up to the Canadian border, wherever!”

Denver is now preparing to spend $90 million on migrant programs this year. 

In the last fiscal year, New York City spent $1.5 billion “for asylum seeker shelter and services,” and those expenses are going up. Chicago’s “City Council is set to vote on spending another $70 million in city funds for migrant services,” Block Club Chicago reported last week, “just five months after Mayor Brandon Johnson’s 2024 budget allocated $150 million for new arrivals this year.”

We hear about the costs of the border crisis; these whopping numbers certainly clarify that matter. 

Still, something else caught my attention. 

Denver is making a 2.5 percent cut to most city agencies, while reducing the police department budget 1.9 percent, an $8.4 million dollar decrease for cops. Some charge that’s de-​funding the police.

“The City of Denver’s adjustment to the Denver Police Department’s budget was carefully crafted with safety leaders and Mayor [Mike] Johnston,” a spokesperson explained, “to ensure there would be no impact to the department’s public services,” 

Crafted with care. And having precisely zero impact.

Imagine had you or I suggested to politicians and government officials that we slice millions of dollars from their budgets. We’d be accused of gutting education and undermining public safety … if not starving the children.

Who knew it could be so easy and painless for them?

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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Illustration created with PicFinder and Firefly

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Accountability folly free trade & free markets local leaders moral hazard nannyism porkbarrel politics responsibility too much government

Small Target, Big Subsidy

Denver, incentive, California, development, rent, graft, corruption

Something has gone wrong when, to get a tenant to move into an empty space in your prime-​location building, you need a $4 million subsidy.

And when I say “prime location,” I’m not engaging in Trumpian over-​statement. The downtown Denver, Colorado, property location sees over 35,000 pedestrians per day … and that’s with the primo slot empty.

But to get that slot filled, the owners have negotiated with the city government to nab a $2 million “incentive” to fix the place up for Target, which is thinking of leasing the location to put up a smaller-​than-​usual “flexible-​format” store. Oh, and another $2 million for “operational” costs, which seems to be some kind of a loan to be paid back from taxes to be collected — and shared by the city for 20 years with the owners.

In other words, it’s the darnedest business deal you’ll ever see (and never get): up-​front money not from a bank or investors, but from Denver’s city government “BIF” — Business Investment Fund — which is obviously part of a convoluted scheme fed by taxes and devised by … people I wouldn’t trust with my money.

Structuring deals like this is how modern cronies — er, cities — operate, I know. Am I alone in judging it corrupt on the surface and corrupting in the details?

If prime commercial property has gone unused for about a decade — as this three-​storied mall space has — I’d think that maybe the owners have set the rents too high or the city has been a bit too greedy with taxes.

Or both.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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Common Sense folly free trade & free markets general freedom too much government

Despotic Denver?

Chicken Politburo, politics, photomontage, Paul Jacob, James Gill, collage

In what sort of place does the government get to determine whether you can open a restaurant at an airport, according to whether your political beliefs line up with the politicians in power?

Iran? North Korea? Egypt? China? Cuba? The old Soviet Union? Russia today?

Actually, over far too much of our beautiful globe the marketplace is not anywhere close to free. Instead, it’s maniacally manipulated of, by and for those wielding political power.

Including in Denver, Colorado.

“Chick-fil‑A’s reputation as an opponent of same-​sex marriage has imperiled the fast-​food chain’s potential return to Denver International Airport,” reports The Denver Post, “with several City Council members this week passionately questioning a proposed concession agreement.”

The article notes that the “normally routine process of approving an airport concession deal has taken a rare political turn. The Business Development Committee … stalled the seven-​year deal with a new franchisee of the popular chain for two weeks.”

Popular?

Yes, extremely popular … with customers. A senior airport concessions executive said the restaurant was “the second-​most sought-​after quick service brand at the airport” in a 2013 survey.

Not popular among politicians, however, who claim concern about DIA’s “reputation.”

That’s about it, really. The company itself isn’t accused of any form of illegal or politically incorrect discrimination. It is merely that the company’s ownership and management have expressed disreputable (to some) opinions. And might donate a portion of its profits to political causes that politicians on the Denver City Council don’t approve of.

In a foreign country, with an unfamiliar cause, almost no one would hesitate to call this what it is: despotic.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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Chicken Politburo, politics, photomontage, Paul Jacob, James Gill, collage

 

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Common Sense general freedom government transparency initiative, referendum, and recall tax policy term limits

Conflicts Perplexing Prominent Politicians

In Disguise

When does the same old song-​and-​dance, performed by yet another self-​selected committee of the political elite, become “a unique process” that “Nobody’s ever done …”?

When the much-​liberal Denver Post reports the “much-​respected” Daniel Ritchie saying so.

Every election cycle for a decade, it seems, a cabal of big-​spending politicians and big-​receiving special interests form a “prominent” and “bipartisan” group to propose making citizen initiatives more difficult, weakening term limits, and circumventing the state’s Taxpayer Bill of Rights (or TABOR, which limits spending and requires voter approval for tax increases).

This cycle’s iteration is “Building a Better Colorado,” now being formed for a September launch by Ritchie, the former Denver University chancellor.

Sunday’s Post provided the group of “prominent civic and business leaders [not to mention politicians]” ample coverage: “The project — developed behind the scenes for months and detailed in exclusive interviews and documents obtained by The Denver Post — is perhaps the most concerted effort in recent memory to address what organizers see as inherent conflicts in how the state is governed.”

Conflicts?

“Those conflicts, they say, are impeding Colorado’s ability to build new roads, put more money in classrooms, engage an increasingly disenchanted electorate and prepare for the future.”

“I’ve seen this game played too often in Colorado,” remarked the Independence Institute’s Jon Caldara. “It’s like a Kumbaya committee. We are going to get all these people who are marginally diverse and at the end of this long process … the conclusion is to raise taxes.”

While the “new” group isn’t “advocating any specific policy outcome” and plans to engage the public at town hall meetings, the meetings’ agenda has been pre-​set … by “experts.”

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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In Disguise

 

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initiative, referendum, and recall video

Video: The Straightest Line Between Here and Freedom

One of the things I do is promote the initiative and referendum process. Have you noticed? Well, that means traveling around the country and speaking before groups of people interested in making the world a freer, better place. Recently I spoke at “Liberty On the Rocks” in Denver:

Ari Armstrong asked some great questions — questions I think that would come to most thoughtful people’s minds, when contemplating direct action via the ballot.