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Colorado Probes Claims of Cash Incentives Linked to Medicaid Services for Homeless Residents
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Colorado Politics, Approved, Local

Colorado Probes Claims of Cash Incentives Linked to Medicaid Services for Homeless Residents

By: David Migoya | Colorado Politics Editor’s Note: This story is part of a series. Read about how home health in Colorado is a complex setupand about the group On Going HHC. They call it “the program.” For the past four years, dozens of homeless people in the Denver metro area have been recruited to live rent-free in suburban houses sprinkled across Aurora — not the stereotypical homeless shelter-type housing one might think, but rather neat homes in middle-class communities with mortgages. But living there comes with a hitch: a requirement that participants be on Medicaid and have at least one prescribed medication — all must first visit the same doctor to get a cursory exam and a prescription — administered by a home health company for which the doctor ...
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Transparency in Colorado media: Who gets scrutinized and who doesn’t?
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Colorado Accountability Project, Approved, Commentary, State

Transparency in Colorado media: Who gets scrutinized and who doesn’t?

By Cory Gaines | Commentary, Colorado Accountability Project Colorado Times Recorder (CTR), Hutchins, the Gazette, and Glass Houses There was an interesting bit in Journalism Professor Corey Hutchins' media newsletter recently. That newsletter is linked first below and the quote I reference is attached as screenshot 1. Because pictures don't have working links, I put the CTR article Hutchins links to second below for convenience's sake. Both the CTR piece and Hutchins blurb are pretty chatty, as much about the insider ball of producing news as anything, but a quote from the CTR piece helps point to another dynamic I think is at play here. It's subtle, stay with me.Copied here with link intact:"Criticizing the Gazette newspapers isn’t something loc...
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Jeffco Schools Warns Staff of Major Job Cuts as Budget Strain Deepens
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The Denver Gazette, Approved, Local

Jeffco Schools Warns Staff of Major Job Cuts as Budget Strain Deepens

By Sage Kelley | The Denver Gazette Jeffco Public Schools employees received a voicemail from Superintendent Tracy Dorland Monday morning warning them of potential job cuts in the next year. “My holiday message this year is a more somber and serious one,” Dorland said in a voicemail obtained by The Denver Gazette. “Some of our colleagues in central services will receive notifications this week about changes to their positions at the end of the 2025-2026 school year.” The district expects to eliminate between 150 and 160 full-time positions as part of its new Budget Reduction Blueprint — or overall plan to whittle $60 million from the district’s budget in the 2026-2027 school year, according to a Nov. 13 presentation to the district’s board of education by Chi...
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Audit Raises Questions Over DPS Debt Practices As Taxpayers Foot the Bill
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The Denver Gazette, Approved, Local

Audit Raises Questions Over DPS Debt Practices As Taxpayers Foot the Bill

By Nico Brambila | The Denver Gazette Denver Public Schools is operating with a negative net position — owing more in long-term obligations than it holds in assets — a rare and troubling financial posture for a major Colorado school district, according to an audit. Presented on Thursday, the audit for fiscal year 2024–25, which ended June 30, showed the district is carrying $4.07 billion in long-term liabilities. (For context, the district budget last fiscal year was about $1.5 billion.) Total assets remained lower, even after the district added nearly $1 billion in unspent 2024 bond proceeds to its books — cash voters approved a year ago that had not yet been put to use. As those bond dollars are spent, the cash asset will disappear, while the long-term debt remains,...
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Why Colorado’s Elections No Longer Belong to Its Voters
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The Denver Gazette, Approved, Commentary, State

Why Colorado’s Elections No Longer Belong to Its Voters

By: Vince Bzdek | Commentary, The Denver Gazette Why is Michael Bloomberg, the former presidential candidate, three-term New York mayor and founder of the financial info firm that bears his name, spending millions on Colorado elections? The short answer: because he can. The liberal New Yorker has donated $2.7 million to support Denver’s flavored tobacco ban, Referendum 301, to be decided on Tuesday. Two of his donations to that campaign were the largest individual contributions in Denver history, according to an Axios analysis. Bloomberg is also the largest donor in the 2026 governor’s race, giving $500,000 to a super-PAC supporting U.S. Sen. Michael Bennet’s campaign. “This is a very large donation for a statewide race,” Seth Masket, professor of political sc...
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Aurora Pushes Back on Polis’ Power Play Over Local Housing
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The Denver Gazette, Approved, Commentary, Local

Aurora Pushes Back on Polis’ Power Play Over Local Housing

By: Michael A. Hancock | Commentary, The Denver Gazette Aurora has experienced rapid growth in recent decades. With new neighborhoods, transit corridors and shifting demographics come tough land-use choices: where to build housing, protect open space, manage traffic, and preserve neighborhood character. We understand our communities better than distant state bureaucrats ever could. That’s what home rule is meant to guarantee. But today, Gov. Jared Polis and the Colorado legislature are challenging that guarantee – not with persuasion, but with edicts and threats of financial punishment. Aurora can’t stand silent. Colorado’s Constitution enshrines home rule in Article XX, Section 6, which grants municipalities the right to govern “matters of local concern,” including planning, zoni...
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A ‘Trail of Broken Lives’ Tells the Real Story of Colorado’s Legalized Marijuana
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The Denver Gazette, Approved, Commentary, State

A ‘Trail of Broken Lives’ Tells the Real Story of Colorado’s Legalized Marijuana

By: Gazette Editorial Board | Commentary, The Denver Gazette Society once vilified marijuana. Later generations of hipsters laughed off the stigma.  Now, mounting evidence has brought things full circle — vindicating the psychoactive drug’s original critics after all.  Today’s high-potency pot — legalized for recreational use in Colorado in 2012 and in over two dozen other states since then — is leaving a trail of destruction. Whether it’s marijuana’s devastating impact on the mental health of our youth, or on the safety of our highways, it’s drawing overdue scrutiny that is justified by hard data. Pot’s toll in traffic fatalities in particular is back in the news. A new study by Wright State University in Dayton, Ohio, looked at driver autopsy results from car crashe...
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Government shutdown strains DIA operations and staffing
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The Denver Gazette, Approved, State

Government shutdown strains DIA operations and staffing

By  Deborah Grigsby | The Denver Gazette The shutdown of the federal government has begun to palpably affect the country’s airports, including at Denver International Airport, which is seeing staffing shortages, according to officials. By Monday evening, the Federal Aviation Administration was reporting that staffing shortages were creating delays at DIA, as well as airports in California and New Jersey. Denver International Airport officials anticipate that more than 938,000 passengers will travel through airport checkpoints between Oct. 9 and Oct. 20, a 5.5% increase over the same time period in 2024. Lawmakers, meanwhile, continue to disagree on funding the federal government, forcing air traffic controllers and other essential federal employees to work without pay. More ...
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Colorado’s Housing Crunch Shows Signs of Easing but Costs Still Bite
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The Denver Gazette, Approved, Commentary, State

Colorado’s Housing Crunch Shows Signs of Easing but Costs Still Bite

By The Gazette Editorial Board | Commentary, The Denver Gazette The cost of housing has soared in our state in recent years, outpacing income growth and making it especially challenging for lower-wage earners and younger, entry-level workers to afford rent. Buying a place of their own is an even taller task for many. It all has led to much public debate and, inevitably, hyperventilation by politicians pledging to solve what they have dubbed an affordable-housing “crisis.” The panic also has led to a lot of misfires by policymakers.  Among those are proposals that would put the squeeze on providers of rental housing, presuming them to have bottomless pockets. Rent control is an example. There also have been various policy prescriptions making it harder to evict tenants. Some o...
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