Denver s often divided electronic-music scene has finally found a reason to come together: to shut down underground raves and house parties that risk becoming COVID-19 superspreader events.
Promoters, venue staffers and musicians in the city s underground scene, which isn t exactly known for abiding by the law, say that public health is more important than partying right now, and as much they want to get back to throwing raves and parties, the events aren t worth it if they re going to make people sick. And some of these scene stalwarts are willing to blacklist artists and promoters who go forward with raves and other shows.
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Colorado Governor Jared Polis, right, trails the cart bearing the state s first shipment of COVID-19 vaccine to a freezer with Patrick Belou, logisitics specialist at the laboratory for the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment, early Monday, Dec. 14, 2020, in Denver. (AP Photo/David Zalubowski)
David Zalubowski
Homeless people in a park in downtown Denver. (Courthouse News photo / Chris Marshall)
(CN) Denver health officials explained in federal court on Wednesday why they shirked Covid-19 guidelines from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and cleared homeless encampments without notice a move a class of Denverites experiencing homelessness say violates a settlement agreement.
According to the lawsuit filed Oct. 5, Denver cleared at least 11 homeless camps between April and August, displacing more than 1,000 unhoused citizens. Covid-19 guidelines from the CDC advise against clearing encampments unless adequate housing is available.
“We always consider CDC guidance, but we don’t always follow it,” Bill Burman, Denver’s public health director, told the court. “These are guidelines, they are not mandates.”
During two days in federal court this week, Denver officials and a group of homeless individuals who ve sued the city painted vastly different pictures of homeless encampment sweeps during the COVID-19 pandemic. I think the presence of encampments is a complex and very difficult issue. I don’t think there’s a clear right and wrong answer in how we handle this complex problem, Bill Burman, director of Denver Public Health, testified.
The evidentiary hearing stemmed from a lawsuit filed in October by Andy McNulty of Killmer, Lane & Newman LLC on behalf of Denver Homeless Out Loud and ten homeless plaintiffs against the City of Denver, the State of Colorado and a contractor that works with the city on homeless encampment sweeps. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention advises municipalities not to sweep encampments during the pandemic, to avoid furthering the spread of COVID-19; the plaintiffs want Denver to stop the sweeps for the duration of the pandemic.
There wasn t so much an elephant in the room during Mayor Michael Hancock s December 17 press conference about the Mile High s continuing response to COVID-19 as there was a turkey.
For the past few weeks, Hancock has maintained a profile nearly as low as the Unknown Soldier s since being caught traveling out of state to spend Thanksgiving with his family after telling city employees not to do so, and he clearly didn t want to answer questions about the situation during this particular session. Prior to taking questions from journalists, he implied that anyone who quizzed him on the subject was disrespecting every front-line worker fighting the novel coronavirus, and when a reporter mentioned it anyway, the typically verbose official went positively monosyllabic.