>> Hi, everyone, I'm Kyle Dyer and welcome to "Colorado Inside Out."

I would argue this month is the best month in Colorado by introducing Patty Calhoun, the founder of "Westword."

Eric Sondermann.

Thank you all for joining us this week.

Let's start a discussion by talking about the governor.

We talked about his plan with the lag plan to get affordable housing built.

This week some things aren't going their way that he maybe wanted like the gun violence prevention law that was passed last session.

On Wednesday he reached out to the Biden administration and said please get involved with what the IRS is planning to do.

And so far no luck.

We're going to be taxed our our refunds.

They are causing so much headaches right now because we're also going into HH election season and people are coming out fast and furious against that ballot measure if is going to be a tough time but he is also talking about being at the state fair.

He is talking about electrified buses and he is really out there talking about his various platforms.

It matches the loophole, because they have not been able to buy pistols since '68.

Krista, good to see you this week.

>> Another missed target is the gun legislation that he pushed forward being in the process of being ruled unconstitutional.

Giving that we have a right to bear arms, does this fit in the history of our country?

And if you look at pistols and rifles and shotguns, long guns, they're very different.

Almost all of the crime committed with firearms is pistols, I think there is some justification for keeping those out of the hands of young people.

But long guns have a history in this country for hunting and competitive shooting.

Think about Annie Oakley.

She started hunting at eight.

She had to support her mom, widowed, and they were shooting squirrels and eating because of a long gun.

So we have a history of young people being involved in hunting, shooting sports, and saying they can't do that is unfair and I believe it is our governor and legislature feeling like it is unconstitutional to put that limitation.

>> The governor wrote just the other day about his relationship with rural Colorado.

>> Can Jared survival and thrive without rural Colorado?

He demonstrated he can, but they have so many challenges as is and for so long felt like a second-class citizen particularly as growth has just skyrocketed.

And Polis adds insult to injury if you will for how he treats rural Colorado.

I recommend that he not show up for a high school football game any time soon in any of the communities that are rural towns and communities around the state.

He is gone out of his way to alienate them and they deserve better.

>> You're right about the governor having a strange week.

You didn't mention the Gadston flag incident which was strange.

He was on TV talking about it.

A teacher or administrator told a school that he cannot have a Gadston flag on his backpack.

And the governor came to the student's defense and said this is a learning moment.

And you know, I fought him for it, I thought he was correct in that, but going to the HH thing and Taber in general, it is very weird right now.

Yesterday on twitter.

You have Michael Bennet stating that we need to ensure that people get the money they deserve.

And if you look at the democratic parties platform.

Number one on there under fiscal issues is repeal Tabour.

You can say it is a fuel refound, but it is clearly not a measure on the ballot.

There is a weird thing going on where everyone wants to jump on the band wagon, but at the same time secretly chipping away at it, it will come to a head and they will be clear and straightforward with voters saying it is time to do away with it and we'll see how it will be.

Interesting to see how it will be in the next few years.

>> I want to be sure that you're not endorsing 8-year-olds going out and shooting squirrels.

As much as I love Anne Oakley.

>> Squirrel is pretty good, on a barbecue?

Come on.

>> There goes that political career for Mrs. Kafer.

>> Okay, let's talk about state plucks.

What may be coming under the gold dome including with brand new representatives that are selected last weekend to fill a vacant seat.

>> Why would you pick a Marxist.

I mean, 100 million people died in the last century.

All of them attributable to the communist ideology.

It is a bad ideology.

Why would you embrace that?

Secondly there is a PR problem with democrats right now for people that are being linked to the far left of their party.

I know a lot of thoughtful moderate democrat that's have great ideas.

And I think when they do have situations like this, when they pick someone who is a valid MarxIST, they're leaning into the stereotype they're being panned by the right.

Well most democrats aren't.

But when you embrace someone like Hernandez who is a fire teacher and you're leaning into that stereotype, you're providing fauder.

There is an agency called anthem.

There is communication issues and I think it was quite a bad mistake.

>> Tim Hernandez is not the only option.

If there is any good news one of the candidates was a woman named Rachel Glendell.

I think the state can probably do without her service at this point.

I think this disappointment is a tale of our times.

Yes the remember party wandered into crazy townland, but the democratic party has polarized really hard.

Tim Hernandez is known to be a solitary voice for this philosophy at the legislature.

That would be one thing but he has plenty of company in the democratic party.

You don't have the dial the clock back that many years to where democrats would generally play on the left hand 40 yard line and republicans would play on the right-hand 40 yard line and 20 yards in between.

Now you have democrats playing as a left-hand end zone, republicans are in the right-hand or in the parking lot or where ever you can find them these days and the gap is just immense and that is why you have political dysfunction.

>> Sage?

>> One of the things that is interesting is the image problems, the crisis of the party that Colorado is having is overshadowed by the republican party problem which is more significant.

But as I was saying both parties are going to the fringe and becoming disconnected, and this is the perfect example of that.

Last night they aired the interview with Kyle Clark.

He was asked about political violence.

He said well, you know, I don't engage in political violence.

And Kyle pushed him on it.

And he, you know, he went on twitter, now X, which is never going to be normal to say, he went on and said that he was misquoted and he didn't think he was represented correctly.

So I want to quote exactly what he said.

He said I'm not here to police protests.

I think that folks that choose to relegate towards violence it's a personal political decision for themselves.

If any republican post January 6th asked what do you think of people beating up on lawmakers said that is a personal decision.

A lot are quiet about his words and it says a lot about where both parties are with their base.

>> It will be an interesting session ahead.

>> That gets into Polis again, unlike those that are not in power at the state house, democrats are and for POlis it is a challenge when you a very progressive MArxist far left wing and it is a channel to bring them to the center for policies that they really endorse.

So we're going to see wild times next year.

In the meantime we're going to replace dominant Murano who is going to Mike Johnston's administration and he has been a solid voice.

We'll see who replaces him.

>> Denver is approaching week 7 with a new mayor for the first time in a long time, and apparently they're split if they are there or not.

It is no ambiguity about what the number one issue is, homelessness and followed closely by housing affordability and that is followed closely by public safety.

To many people, myself included, I think those three issues together are sort of almost like spaghetti.

They're just woven together and you can't pull them apart.

Mike Johnston is clearly in charge at this point, but the city is still waiting for really much to happen outside of the homelessness realm.

I'm not diminishing the important of homelessness as the number one issue, it is clearly the case, but his appointments so far have all been in two categories.

One, his senior staff.

It is not that he is picking poor people, but who are the other appointments.

There has not been a cabinet member selected so far.

We're 12 weeks into the administration.

And it is time to see this team and it is time to see more than just the homeless issue.

>> Seven weeks, is there a grace period?

Is it, you know, two months?

What is it?

>> I think I would be willing to give him the grace period of at least seven weeks.

I mean for appointments, cabinet positions, maybe it is time to start getting into gear.

One thing that will be tough for the mayor is he is going to have to balance chatter online, chatter within those who are the political operative class that he is, you know, really the democratic party.

Not many republicans in this administration, and balancing that with what people in Denver are actually asking for.

There is a poll that was mentioned, 65% of people in that poll says they support homeless sweeps.

That doesn't mean that people are not compassionate to have programs to help these people.

Rehabilitation programs, shelters, whatever.

They want people to walk into their business and not see someone outside who is shooting up.

It is a terrible situation but it requires a voice of reason to say look, we can't have our city looking like this.

We need to clean up our streets but at the same time take care of our people.

I think that is going to be really tough.

The people that he is surrounded with will give him a lot of opinions.

It is up to him to say look, we're going to do it right, we're going to follow what the people of Denver want.

I'm giving him some grace.

I think seven weeks is too early, but I hope that he will be the leader that Denver needs.

>> He has been surprisingly aggressive on the homelessness issue, I think, including sweeps just as we came over to film today there was another sweep under way and it was not with a seven-days notice that is under the federal guideline agreed to in 2016.

He can do it for public health reasons in a shorter period of time and I think that is what we'll see here.

He has been surprisingly active on that and willing to take criticism.

We have to remember that he had 28 transition committees all chargeded with 100 day plans.

So coming up, priorities for 100 days and we're halfway there.

I think he is moving along with that.

I applaud a lot of his recent appointees.

Molly Arbina, she could run this city and maybe she will.

She a great person to bring in.

We missed having her in city government.

Sue powers, that is a great move, too.

Let's give them a little more time, a little, but the transition committee, I think, did a pretty good job.

There is also a number on this pole, 400 people may be quizzed, over three quarters of them love DIA.

They're positive about DIA, so I would like to know exactly who was quizzed.

By the end of the weekend I'm guessing you won't hear 75% positive.

I think it is easy to think about the negative.

We have amazing art institutions here.

A great Denver arts and sciences, botanical garden, it is beautiful but the crime and homelessness is an issue and I hope the mayor, who is a thoughtful map, hears that people want to see the sweep and the fact that you can be driving downtown and see somebody with no pants on.

I think a pants on city is a very good idea.

And so I think the sweeps need to keep up and there needs to be a balance between the compassion and the harm reduction and also the person responsibilities of insisting that people make changes that they get sober.

And I have some concern that's some -- concerns that some of it will get jettisoned.

>> 40% of people like the idea that Denver ballots could incorporate rank choice voting where you rate candidates in horder of preference with the lowest voted are eliminated.

We learned that the day before we vote here in Colorado in the presidential primary the trial will commence in the federal indication against former President Donald Trump for which he is charged with trying to overthrow 2020 election.

Just the timing of that is something, right?

Right before super Tuesday.

>> It certainly is.

Whether it is a coincidence or not, the trial has to happen at some point and any date picked second-degree a bad one.

There will always be something going on.

You're always going to have something on the calendar.

You know, one thing is I'm someone that is vocally not a fan of Donald Trump.

I'm a conservative, a republican, I didn't vote for him either time, but we have to be cautious with the judicial proceedings against Donald Trump.

There is a huge lack of confidence in our institutions right now.

It is not completely unjustified.

If you read the Durham report there is good reason to believe that a lot of things that happened were part of collusion.

They were done outside of the normal procedure.

When you those kind of circumstances, regardless of whether or not Donald Trump did what he did or did not do.

You have to make sure that you're very careful with these prosecutions.

Obviously I think the one in Georgia had a lot of merit and the one in Florida had a lot of merit as well but the one in Manhattan is one of the stupidest I have seen.

It was the first to come out and it set the stage to make them all seem politically motivated.

We have to be careful.

If we lose trust in our institutions, that will be very hard to rebuild.

All I'm saying is be cautious, tread carefully, and understand that a lot of Americans have a lot of doubts.

I think this is on our prosecutors to do what they can to restore the justice.

>> Adam, a genius to get into the race in district three two years ago because he is now really doing well against Lauren Goldberg.

And I'm not sure this coffee cup would not be doing well at this point just because of her behavior in Congress.

But Adam is really in position and others are jumping into the race and it will be really hard to overcome the lead that he has and the amount of money that he has raised so far.

But you would not think that in that district a liberal would be able to take it.

>> I think ranked choice voting is a big mistake.

I think it will reduce the trust that people have in elections.

It's confusing with number one.

You could end up in results where nobody got their first two choices.

So you could end up with everybody's third choice and I think it lacks the clarity.

That, you know, the system that we have more is now black and white, more clear, and it has some flaws like anything else they do.

People get more confused, less interested in voting, and when you look at where it is being done, you end up with more people unhappy than happy with the results.

>> I think it is at least worst an experiment.

It is now this very protracted progress, let's see how that goats, but it should at least be on the table.

More importantly in some respects this is another way that Donald Trump demeaned our politics and his diminishing of the politics.

We have a candidate who is a former President of the United States who will spend a very large chunk of the year in a dock in a series of criminal trials.

>> Now we're we're at the point where we talk about highs and lows of the week.

Patty, let's start with something that bothered you this week.

>> Of all of the Turkeys that will get to keep their legs, the celebration "taste of Colorado" will not be happening over this weekend.

They divided it up.

I think it was a mistake, but every Turkey is happy.

>> Oh, I guess so.

No Turkey, maybe we should try squirrel.

>> There grow.

>> I want to give my shame of the week, maybe shame of the year so the committee that voted out this proposed recommendation that Denver adopt so called "safe injection sites."

Places people can do illegal activities in a sanctions way.

It is, you know, ask anyone with a business or home, would you like to have a spot where people can shoot up legally?

I'm guessing they're going to say no.

It is a very partisan way.

They will tee it up to the legislature next year.

I'm hoping the legislature knows better.

>> I will agree with Krista on her point with the safe injection sights.

This is probably a little late, but the start of the school year, we're going into labor day weekend.

Kids should be starting next Tuesday or Wednesday after labor day and particularly with the heat, so many communities, Denver being center to it, have experienced 43 schools without air-conditioning.

The temperature on day one the temperature was 99 degrees.

You tell me how much learning is going on in those classrooms under those conditions.

Let families and kids have their August, start the school year after labor day.

>> Interestingly mine dove tails with yours.

Seeing where Americans stand on public education.

They found it is the low nest 23 years, only 36% of Americans are satisfied with public education.

I think it only goes up to 41% for parents.

These are rock bottom numbers.

This is as low as we have been in a long time.

And obviously we have seen this huge amount of school choice efforts across the country.

I think they're part of that.

You know, I think that something needs to change.

Public education is in dire straights whether it is not having air-conditioning, failing test scores, the safety of our students in the classroom, there is not much to be excited about when it comes to public education in this country and that is a sad state of affairs.

>> Let's talk about something good and positive.

No taste of Colorado, but there are great events around Denver this week.

Krista was talking about the art scene, first Friday is packed with really exciting activities all over town.

>> And Phillip Bailey is playing Tuesday night.

>> Of course, the CU football game, but just let me know.

>> That is exciting, too.

>> I'm going to give my hats off to the board of county trustees.

There is an effort to remove some books from the library.

These are LBGTQ books.

A group wanted those taken out and the trustees overruled that and said we're not going to do that.

It is the subject of my column.

Libraries are to offer a diverse amount of materials and no one gets to come in and say you can't have that.

Let's have a lot of books and let the readers decide.

>> On my column, my say something nice is for the governors of Idaho and Wyoming.

If you're a rural citizen in western Colorado, the governors of Wyoming and Idaho have been more responsive to your interesting than your own governor has been.

>> The best thing that I heard this week just happened a few minutes ago and patty says they won't be for awhile nap is better than the forever that I'm used to, but I actually discovered this really neat Facebook page I want today share.

People submit photos and VIN numbers of muscle cars they or their parents owned and basically you have 75,000 people that start searchs and tagging and they have found like, you know, Camaros and things that were owned by people 20 and 30 years ago and I think that is a very cool thing.

I think it is cool that people are connecting with their -- >> What's the name?

>> Lost muscle cars.

>> On Facebook, all right, thank you so much.

My something positive is just a well wish for a nice long labor day weekend and I hope everyone takes time to take a break from a busy work schedule.

From the e-mails and all of the other demands that keeps us all so busy while we're on the job.

Enjoy taking as much of a breather as you can this weekend.

That goes for our fabulous possible as well.

Have a great break this weekend and thank you all for watching at home or listening to our pod cast on Spotify.

We'll see you next week here on PBS 12.

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