Justice
Youth ‘reimagine’ policing and public safety during town hall
Nearly 40 Colorado youth convened on Tuesday night over Zoom in a public forum to “reimagine” policing and public safety in Denver. During the virtual community-led town hall, which was livestreamed on Facebook, students discussed a need for reallocating police funding, more community mental health services and police training around implicit bias and cultural competence. […]
‘Cold day in hell’ before he’d tolerate ‘uninvited’ federal agents, former DHS boss Ridge says
HARRISBURG, Penn. — The nation’s first secretary of the Department of Homeland Security had sharp words for his former agency Tuesday, condemning the Trump administration’s decision to send federal officers into the streets of Portland, Ore., to quell protests, saying it was “counterproductive,” and that it was not the agency’s mission to act as domestic […]
Students share stories of discrimination, assault through Instagram account
A few weeks ago, two Colorado teenagers created a platform for students at Jefferson County Public Schools to share painful stories. “I’d just been thinking a lot about kind of the racist or anti-Semitic incidents that have occurred to me, and that they must have happened to so many other people,” said Elyza Berry, 18, […]
Court orders Trump administration to accept new DACA applications
Almost one month after the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that President Donald Trump’s administration didn’t properly end a program that protects undocumented immigrants who were brought to the country as children, the Department of Homeland Security still had not reopened the program to new applicants. The Trump administration has long tried to end the Barack […]
Groundbreaking law opened police internal affairs investigations records. But more transparency is needed.
By Jeffrey A. Roberts Fourteen months before Colorado lawmakers passed the sweeping law enforcement accountability and transparency bill recently signed into law by Gov. Jared Polis, they approved a measure to shine a light on how police departments police themselves. House Bill 19-1119 was groundbreaking, introducing a statewide standard for the disclosure of records on completed internal affairs investigations. Before […]
Colorado ranked 9th in U.S. for gap between renters’ income and housing cost
Workers earning minimum wage in Colorado — many of whom have served as essential workers during the coronavirus pandemic — need to work a total of 71 hours per week to afford a fair market, one-bedroom rental home, according to a national study published on Tuesday by the National Low Income Housing Coalition, a research […]
Battle with Trump over renaming military facilities that honor Confederates expected
WASHINGTON — Key U.S. senators are preparing for battle with the White House over renaming military facilities that honor Confederates — and they’re expecting to win. Sen. Tim Kaine, a Virginia Democrat who backs the effort, said he believes the GOP-controlled Senate would override a possible presidential veto of a defense policy bill that, with […]
We have historic opportunity to reallocate resources, not defund, and make policing more just
By Bruce Brown In his 2002 book “The Tipping Point: How Little Things Can Make a Big Difference,” Malcolm Gladwell noted that ideas, trends and behaviors spread like wildfire after reaching a critical threshold of acceptance. It is clear that our nation has reached a positive tipping point on police reform since the brutal murder […]
Turn ‘tough on crime’ into ‘effective on crime’
In the wake of George Floyd’s murder, the Colorado state Legislature passed sweeping bipartisan police reform. It took a mere 16 days to pass, yet it’s only the beginning. Today’s criminal justice system is not only steeped in racial and gender bias, it’s at odds with emerging science. A growing number of long-held practices are […]
Did protests play role in record-breaking voter turnout?
Last month, Colorado shattered the previous state record for voter turnout in a nonpresidential primary election. As of 11:30 p.m. June 30, more than 1.57 million ballots had been returned to county election officials, according to the secretary of state’s office. Colorado Secretary of State Jena Griswold took the opportunity to praise the state’s secure […]
What did Frederick Douglass think of the Fourth of July?
Editor’s note: Following are excerpts from a speech, as it appeared in published form, on the meaning of the Fourth of July delivered by the formerly enslaved American abolitionist Frederick Douglass in Rochester, New York, July 5, 1852. Fellow-citizens, pardon me, allow me to ask, why am I called upon to speak here to-day? What […]
Police spending accounts for about a third of budget in Colorado’s biggest cities
When Vanessa Wilson, interim chief of the Aurora Police Department, addressed a special meeting of the Aurora City Council convened on June 30 to discuss her department’s response to recent protests, she began by making a comment that surely echoed the thoughts of many residents in the sprawling suburb of 379,000. “I never thought it […]