{"id":2078,"date":"2012-10-02T05:18:37","date_gmt":"2012-10-02T11:18:37","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.interculturalurbanism.com\/?p=2078"},"modified":"2012-10-03T09:42:21","modified_gmt":"2012-10-03T15:42:21","slug":"denvers-mayor-and-his-cabinet-come-to-community","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.interculturalurbanism.com\/?p=2078","title":{"rendered":"Denver’s Mayor and His Cabinet Come to Community"},"content":{"rendered":"

Last Saturday Denver Mayor Michael Hancock<\/a> held his third and final 2012\u00a0Cabinet in the Community<\/a> event at the Montclair Recreation Center in East Denver. \u00a0It featured presentations about the 2013 city budget by Chief Financial Officer Cary Kennedy, an update about the city’s economic plan by Economic Development Director Paul Washington, and a talk about the city’s health initiative by Environmental Health Director Doug Linkhart. \u00a0It also promised an eruption of organized opposition to the proposed Walmart store at 9th and Colorado<\/a>, an unfolding urban infill drama that we’ve been following on this blog (more on that below)<\/strong><\/em>.<\/p>\n

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Mayor Hancock, at Podium and with Cabinet, Addressing the Community Assembly (D. Saitta)<\/p><\/div>\n

This was a very nice meeting\u2014generously provisioned, well-organized, informative, and efficiently run. It addressed several of the concerns of this blog.\u00a0 \u201cAerotropolis<\/a>\u201d was one of them.\u00a0 Mr. Washington mentioned that we\u2019ve \u201conly scratched the surface\u201d of the economic potential of Denver International Airport (DIA), the 5th<\/sup> busiest in the nation and 10th<\/sup> busiest in the world. The city is actively looking for development opportunities to maximize this potential. \u00a0Mr. Washington described the proposed DIA aerotropolis as \u201cthe most profound economic opportunity that we will see in a lifetime.\u201d\u00a0 It also could have long-term unintended consequences that might be worth contemplating<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Mr. Linkhart addressed the relationship between built environment and health.\u00a0 Denver routinely ranks as one of the nation\u2019s fittest cities. It also ranks 6th<\/sup> in the country in terms of the number of people who bicycle to work, a ranking that has been helped by the success of the Denver B-cycle<\/a> program.\u00a0 However, one-half of the city\u2019s adults and one-third of its children are overweight or at risk thereof.\u00a0 In other words, Denver is getting fat along with the rest of the country. \u00a0Mr. Linkhart noted that Seattle does twice as well as Denver in numbers of people who bicycle to work, and Germany as a nation (with Berlin<\/a>\u00a0presumably leading the way) does five times as well. Mr. Linkhart is interested in hearing from citizens about what we can do with the built environment to help improve Denver\u2019s numbers.\u00a0 He mentioned creating more bike lanes.\u00a0 Another thing that could be done is to build more pedways and bikeways over dangerous streets, like we\u2019ve suggested here<\/a> as a way to improve urban connectivity for the development project at 9th<\/sup> and Colorado.\u00a0 But facilitating bicycle travel is one thing; equitably distributing the resources that encourage bicycle use is another. \u00a0In an interesting coincidence, last Sunday’s\u00a0Denver Post<\/em> reported<\/a> on some issues around the locating of Denver B-Cycle bike stations in the city.\u00a0 They\u2019re almost exclusively in white, middle-income areas.\u00a0 The story also identified some of the cultural factors that affect a minority community\u2019s willingness to participate in the program.\u00a0 The piece raises the interesting question of what other<\/em> incentives can be used to promote biking (and walking) by Denver residents if simply making bikes available makes no difference in some neighborhoods.<\/p>\n

This Cabinet in the Community event was also billed as one where opponents of the proposed Walmart store at 9th<\/sup> and Colorado could exert additional pressure to block public financing for this controversial project<\/a>. \u00a0We\u2019ve dubbed the opponents\u00a0Redshirts<\/a>.\u00a0 They\u2019ve been called \u201cWalmartyrs<\/a>\u201d <\/strong>by\u00a0<\/strong>Westword’s\u00a0<\/strong>Patricia Calhoun<\/a>, although I\u2019m not sure what these folks are risking by opting for obstructionism over constructive engagement. I\u2019ll assume that Ms. Calhoun is defining martyr as \u201csomeone who displays or exaggerates their discomfort or distress in order to obtain sympathy or admiration <\/em>[New Oxford American Dictionary].\u201d\u00a0 On the other hand, the folks working at Heidi’s Deli<\/a> across the street from the development site risk losing some business for their pro-Walmart opinions (see the 9News story here<\/a>) given some of the comments posted to the anti-Walmart Facebook page Do It Right at 9th<\/a>. \u00a0Tellingly, deli-seekers in the area are urged by Do It Righters to patronize Marczyk’s Fine Foods<\/a>\u00a0instead.\u00a0 Nope, no elitism and hypocrisy<\/a> to be found anywhere in this debate…<\/p>\n

<\/em>Mayor Hancock saw this kind of outrage (and, perhaps, pettiness) coming and fired a preemptive strike in his welcoming remarks. \u00a0He noted that 9th<\/sup> and Colorado is critical to the economic development of the city.\u00a0 He said that he\u2019s heard the community (or, alternatively, perhaps just a segment<\/a> of the community?) \u201cloud and clear.\u201d \u00a0He said he wants a development that\u2019s wanted by the neighbors and in which everyone can take pride.\u00a0 He reminded the group that city government takes no position on retailers and doesn\u2019t look to favor one over another.\u00a0 He noted that Walmarts are being planned all over the city. Some neighborhoods want one, others don\u2019t.<\/p>\n

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Redshirted Anti-Walmarteers at Cabinet in the Community (D. Saitta)<\/p><\/div>\n

The mayor also sought to dispel two myths that have been circulating about the 9th<\/sup>\u00a0and Colorado project. One is the widespread myth that public financing for the project goes directly to Walmart. \u00a0It doesn\u2019t. However, to the extent that the myth\u00a0exploits citizen ignorance about how “tax increment financing<\/a>” (TIF) works it has proven tactically useful for redshirted anti-Walmarteers to perpetuate it. \u00a0The\u00a0other myth is that Mayor Hancock has been counting City Council votes in an effort to move the project forward. He hasn’t (or so he says). \u00a0However, it\u2019s clear that council vote-counting has been taking place. \u00a0As\u00a0reported last week in the Denver<\/em>\u00a0Post<\/em><\/a>, City Councilwomen Susman and Robb admitted speaking to other council members and determined that \u201cthere probably were not enough votes for TIF to pass.\u201d \u00a0There can be \u00a0little doubt that such vote-counting by the councilwomen was prompted by the very vocal outrage of the Redshirts<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Vote-counting is politics as usual, and that’s fine. \u00a0The point here\u2014as well as here<\/a> and here<\/a>\u2014is that instead of counting (or not) City Council votes our civic leaders should have been promoting better discussions of the many<\/em> issues that converge at re-development sites like 9th<\/sup>and Colorado. \u00a0One commentator in Westword<\/em><\/a>\u00a0frames just a few of the other issues in a particularly pithy way:<\/p>\n

People are batshit because it is a Walmart. How about being upset that 100K square feet is not a “neighborhood market?” How about being upset that the original number of proposed dwelling units has plummeted from 1400 to 400? Is zero next? How about being upset that this proposal is in no way “Main Street Zoning” in appearance?<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Or, how about being upset that there’s no plan to preserve additional historical structures or architectural features<\/a> that would enrich the re-developed site’s identity as a distinctive place<\/em><\/a>? \u00a0Public meeting attendees and social media contributors have<\/em> raised some of these issues, but they’ve been overwhelmed by the single-minded focus on Walmart. Opportunities to discuss these issues have always been there, at least at the public meetings that I’ve attended. \u00a0When things get back on track discussion of these issues, and others, should be comprehensive, sensitive to urban context, and data-driven rather than ideology-based. \u00a0The discussions should be framed by the essential question of What does a politically, economically, and culturally-inclusive city look like<\/em>?<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0 This question should be front-and-center whether we\u2019re talking about the quality of transportation infrastructure, the character of \u201cmixed use\u201d development, the nature of historic preservation, or any other variable that affects the livability of an urban place and the willingness of citizens to identify with it.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Last Saturday Denver Mayor Michael Hancock held his third and final 2012\u00a0Cabinet in the Community event at the Montclair Recreation Center in East Denver. \u00a0It featured presentations about the 2013 city budget by Chief Financial Officer Cary Kennedy, an update […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"spay_email":"","footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2078","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-9th-and-colorado"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p1H2bI-xw","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.interculturalurbanism.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2078","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.interculturalurbanism.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.interculturalurbanism.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.interculturalurbanism.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.interculturalurbanism.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2078"}],"version-history":[{"count":25,"href":"http:\/\/www.interculturalurbanism.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2078\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2113,"href":"http:\/\/www.interculturalurbanism.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2078\/revisions\/2113"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.interculturalurbanism.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2078"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.interculturalurbanism.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2078"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.interculturalurbanism.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2078"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}