Few at city hall use the word cronyism. It sounds so dated. Even the concept is foreign and anachronistic, reminiscent of fat cigars, mint juleps and Boss. There's no preferred substitute term, either -- no word to delineate it from business as usual.
Obviously, I'm still driving on fumes from yesterday's post, in which I charted the interrelationship of a prominent labor lobbyist/election lawyer and several Denver elected officials. A reader sent me a note saying that Clerk and Recorder Stephanie O'Malley did not pay the lawyer in question. Rather, she accepted the legal services as a gift.
Noted. Doesn't make it OK, as far as I'm concerned, especially since she was in a position to make official decisions related to another of the lawyer's clients, now-Councilman Paul Lopez.
Then again, I'm an antique person with quaint quibbles about election integrity.
Westword has run a few cherce city hallish articles lately. Last week's takedown of Beauvallon "developer" Craig Nassi raised questions of whether the city under former Mayor Wellington Webb gave Nassi special breaks and favors (which, in a bygone era, might've been referred to as cronyism.)
A letter in response blames Denver City Council: "I ask you, how is it possible that a building of this prominence — or any building, for that matter — that is clad with f*$#ing Styrofoam could be approved and get permits?"
I share the dismay, but city council does not dictate style (or issue permits, fyi.)
Joel Warner interviewed developer Buzz Geller, who explains why he finds the city's planning department so infuriating:
"You've got these city planners and public works personnel and fire department staff and traffic engineers, all these people coming at you from a non-business standpoint. They could care less about development. They just want to make sure everything they have to do doesn't get more difficult."
Uh, as it should be. (See: Beauvallon.) Can't blame the city for trying to protect public interests. That doesn't always coincide with making life easy for developers.
Michael Roberts wrote that the Denver Police Department "looks clueless" in Deborah Sherman's scary- amazing series on identity theft: "Thus far, Channel 9 has done most of the heavy lifting for the police in this case -- and the press's resources are stretched thin enough without having to add law enforcement to its to-do list." Yup.
Alan Prendergast was rightly puzzled that Philip Van Cise did not make the cut for naming the new Denver Justice Center. (Prendergast's feature on Van Cise is a must-read.) Prendergast commented that Van Cise "was instrumental in getting Ben Lindsey disbarred."
As a Lindsey fan, I don't think that's entirely to Van Cise's credit. I wrote to Prendergast, who placated me by adding a note that Lindsey was eventually reinstated to the Colorado bar in 1935. True. Also, the California Bar Association reviewed the Colorado Supreme Court's disbarment decision and concluded that Lindsey had done nothing wrong. They allowed him to practice law in California, where Lindsey moved in 1931 to get away from his many vindictive enemies here. Just sayin'.
In other news, experts say Denver police brutality isn't really a problem. The same can't be said for the hundreds of thousands of dollars paid by the city to settle recent brutality claims.
Also: Child protection might suffer as a result of budget and staffing deficits at the Denver Department of Human Services:
"Councilwoman Carol Boigon said she would prefer to see the number of child-abuse caseworkers reduced before the city made any further cuts to providing child-care aid for working parents."
A terrible choice to have to make. Nothing funny or snide to say about it.
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