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The Lower Downtown Neighborhood Association strongly supports the efforts of the Revitalizing the Core Task Force to push for action to clean up blighted properties in the center of Denver.
As concerned citizens living in downtown, we urge the city to take action with owners of property that, year after year, refuse to improve the conditions of their buildings. Vacant storefronts and crumbling facades, undeveloped space, and poorly maintained alleys and sidewalks detract from the quality of downtown life.
Residents of LoDo embrace the vitality of downtown by supporting businesses, the Denver Center for the Performing Arts and the Denver Art Museum. Blight in the core is a lost opportunity for additional retail, restaurants and mixed-use properties. This delinquent core area acts as a wasteland separating LoDo from the rest of downtown.
Residents moving to LoDo include singles, young families and many retired couples. Residents look to the vitality of downtown and how it affects their lives. The impact of dilapidated buildings is a negative and ruins the image of Denver. It also gives a perception that downtown is unsafe not only for our residents but for the increasing numbers of downtown visitors.
LoDoNA urges action to improve downtown now.

Jack Tone, Denver
President,
Lower Downtown
Neighborhood Association

READER COMMENTS

Jack,

Why don't you start by gathering a group and going there to pick up some trash. All this call for government action drives me crazy. Take action, instead of just yapping about it.

Jack,

Why don't you start by gathering a group and going there to pick up some trash. All this call for government action drives me crazy. Take action, instead of just yapping about it.

In all honesty, I have to say I was thinking the exact thing as I was reading Mr. Tone's letter. I realize it would entail getting his own hands dirty and breaking out into a - gasp! - sweat, but think of the benefits of organizing such groups:

1) It would forge a stronger sense of community

2) If children were involved, it would teach them good lessons about keeping their neighborhoods clean, working with their neighbors to do so

3) IT WOULD CLEAN UP YOUR NEIGHBORHOODS, exactly what you're asking for!

Jack, and My Two Sense,

The original letter is not about litter nor trash. It is about property owners who allow prominent buildings downtown to sit vacant and dilapidated for almost two decades.

The owner of the Fontius building is harming his neighbors by driving down their property values. He is also harming the city as a whole by allowing his building to set a decrepit tone for half of the 16th Street Mall.

By refusing to sell, upgrade or lease his eyesore the owner of Fontius is essentially robbing his neighbors of the true value of their own properties.

Dave II

That's the whole idea of "totally free enterprise". I do what I want to with whatever is mine; and to blazes with anyone else. Just read all the postings from those who favor this form of . . . whatever it be they feel is NOT "socialism" instead.

Isn't the Fontius Building part of one of those everlasting estate quarrels? Where the shysters are the only ones who really make anything out of the whole mess; and therefore keep up the troubles as long as possible to that end.

Old Grouch,

As far as I know there is no ownership dispute. The owners simply and inexplicably do not care about the building.

A March 15 article in the Rocky addresses the issue.

http://www.rockymountainnews.com/drmn/other_business/article/0,2777,DRMN_23916_5418337,00.html

As for your shyster comment. I am not an attorney but I do get tired of people blaming all of the ills of society on lawyers. It is an easy way to shift blame and absolve responsibility. "Oh well. Nothing we can do it's all the lawyers fault."

Everyone hates lawyers, until they need one.

Yes, Dave II, I did somewhat miss the point ,albeit deliberately. The letter irked me. These LoDo people need to work together to get their precious "core" cleaned up. They've got the money, that's for sure, because only the well-heeled can afford to live there.

Mytwosense,

Forming a neighborhood association seems to be a step towards working together.

As for your "well-heeled" comment.

I am not against a little class-warfare, me being a leftist and all. You seem to be a bit more conservative in principle. Is it class warfare you are proposing or simply envy?

You seem to be a bit more conservative in principle. Is it class warfare you are proposing or simply envy?

Bite your tongue, sir! You obviously haven't seen my posts on other threads if you think I seem to be a conservative...

As for your question, I'm proposing neither, but suggesting the letter writer and his band of yuppies fund whatever it is they're yapping about out of their own pocket, instead of asking us to do it for them. Now, if they actually provided housing the average family could afford, I might be on board for some taxpayer assistance with their endeavor.

But they're just creating another off-limits-except-for-the-elite neighborhood in LoDo.

2sense,

I am a little confused. Are you familiar with downtown Denver? The 16th Street Mall does have a bit of blight. There are a number of blocks with either abandoned buildings, such as Fontius, or crappy tourist shops which make Estes Park look like the Ritz.

Improving the Mall and the downtown area would be a benefit to every Denverite not just those who live in LoDo.

I do not live in LoDo nor could I afford the rents. I don't, however, feel it is an off-limits except for the elite area. Falling Rock and Celtic Tavern are both fine and welcoming bars. The Tattered Cover is a great bookstore. Outfield seats at Coors Field are still affordable. Common Grounds has great coffee.

I really don't understand your beef with LoDo. If you have been in Denver for awhile you would remember when, while walking in the same neighborhood, you needed to step over the drunk in order to avoid the junkie. I would say the current situation is a definite improvement.

Oops, I forgot to "sign" the 12:10 pm post.

Dave II,

Thanks for the link to the article. I've lost track of a lot of Downtown Denver over the years; especially since Urban Renewal destroyed some of the best buildings in the area for the current skyline of vertical shoeboxes. (And the "cash register" at the East end, of course.)

Reading the article, however, I did see that the owner - or stated owner - called about the Fontius Building was named. And there was a store, and building, owning family by that same name who were somewhat prominent in Downtown for a good many years. The store had branches out in the suburbs as well.

Without going into details that really aren't any of my business, I do remember reading about some estate difficulties at the time the main store closed down, and older family members passed on. The Fontius Building as part of this stuck in my mind.

As to your response to my other comments, I might add: "And when you need one, you better have a fortune from which to pay for the services."

Why not start chain gangs using prisoners to clean our streets and do repairs and painting?If you use them they can get some time off their sentences and over crowding can be helped by making them work their way out.Let's stop giving them nothing to do and make them give back to the communities.Some of them can work off fines.Some can make some money to help them when they get out. It sure beats paying city employees for standing around doing nothing but eating lunch and getting a paycheck.

Let's put the non-violent offenders to work.

Grouch,

There may have been estate difficulties, many large estates have some. The estate problems do not explain why the building has been empty since 1988. It is a decision made by the owner.

Dave II

And sometimes it is something of a decision "made for" the owner by other considerations, with the "owner" just not chosing to make it all a part of a newspaper "special".

Some experience with "Businessmen's/Neighborhood/Community/Homeowner's/Betterment Associations" leaves me more or less unmoved by either - or any - "side" in the end.

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