So it turns out that people know about Vibrant Englewood, and they are excited about connecting with this group and helping us grow and achieve the kind of impact we want to see.
How do I know this? Two things:
- This morning was Vibrant Englewood’s second ever Community Coffee meeting. We DOUBLED our attendance from the first one. Now the first one was on a cold rainy day and this morning was definitely better. But it’s not like this was an outdoor event. I asked everyone last time to try to recruit one more person, and we exceeded those expectations.
- This evening, I attended the City of Englewood Conversations with Council event. I had a chance to talk with multiple city staff and council members, and they had already heard of Vibrant Englewood. I’m not trying to keep us a secret or anything, but I haven’t done any direct outreach to city staff or council yet. So this was all organic reach through the Englewood grapevine. And not only had they heard of us, but there was real excitement to connect with Vibrant Englewood, support what we’re doing, and collaborate on building a stronger Englewood for the future.
Englewood Election Results
We all know what happened on the top line last Tuesday, so let’s do our best to forget about that and focus on what happened locally. Englewood had three ballot issues this year and here’s how they turned out:
- Ballot Issue 2C – Parks Bond – Passed, but just barely. The margin was around 1.5%, or less than 300 votes. It’s a bond, so it comes with the TABOR required language about new taxes, and the snafu with the yard signs didn’t help anything. But in the end, Englewood’s parks get this critical funding, so thank you, Englewood!
- Ballot Question 301 – Direct Election of the Mayor – Passed in a landslide. I’m not sure what to think about this one. I voted against it, mostly because I didn’t think a ballot question was the right way to make a change like this. But in the end, without much of a campaign either way, this question passed with over 80% of the vote. So obviously this is something people liked, and now we get to see what it actually looks like in practice. Vibrant Englewood will be keeping an eye on the implementation.
- Ballot Question 302 – Supermajority to Fill Council Vacancies – Passed overwhelmingly. This one I know exactly what I think about it. This is a bad policy for Englewood. The ballot question language was misleading, and had Vibrant Englewood existed before this election, we would have been out against it. Hopefully city council vacancies are rare and this doesn’t have negative impact. But the bottom line is that the council won’t be able to fill a vacancy in the future so we will have to deal with empty seats and extra costs for special elections.
Some other results of note for Englewood:
- Chris Gutschenritter defeated Barbara McManus for the RTD Board seat. I thought they were both solid, but I am excited to see what Chris and the new wave of RTD board members can do. I look forward to engaging with him and hopefully he will engage with Vibrant Englewood.
- Carrie Warren-Gully won re-election as the Arapahoe County Commissioner for District 1. Carrie, I know you’re on our email list, so if you’re reading this, come out and join us at an event some time. I doubt many people know much about what a county commissioner does, and I for one would love to hear about it directly from you!
- Arapahoe County is “de-Bruced” meaning that we are now exempt from the TABOR revenue cap and the county is able to keep additional tax revenue instead of refunding it. RTD is also de-Bruced, but this one was technically an extension of a prior de-Brucing and not something totally new.
- Statewide, Proposition 131, establishing all-candidate primaries and ranked-choice voting in general elections was defeated. While I am generally a supporter of ranked-choice voting, I didn’t like all the things this one was doing. RCV makes the most sense as a replacement for primaries, not in addition to jungle primaries.
Community Coffee Recap
- This was in the last newsletter, but was discussed more this morning. The application for Englewood Board and Commissions is now open, and there are a lot of vacancies. I love that the folks who have already attended our coffee meetings represent a lot of boards and commissions, but I would of course love to see more. If you are thinking about applying but you’re not sure, or you know someone who should apply but is reluctant, please let us know so we can help connect you with people who have served with this groups and can help make sure we get the best people in all of these roles. The list of vacancies and the application is here: City of Englewood – Board Application
- There was a particular focus on the 2 vacancies for the Englewood Transportation Advisory Commission (ETAC). We know that there are some good people rotating off of that commission and we are hoping that we can help identify strong candidates to replace them.
- We also talked about the direct election of the mayor, as well as the new RTD Board member, which I already covered above.
Alright, I have already had two Vibrant Englewood/city events today, and writing this has been my third major block of time contributed to this group. Thank you to everyone who has helped us grow our reach so far, and I look forward to all that we can continue to accomplish together.
Boards and Commissions City Council coffee Grow + Gather RTD
Last modified: November 14, 2024
