Speaker 1: So Michael, I was just doing it, just a little
Speaker 1: rough path here, and ninety three billion dollars they pushed
Speaker 1: out the door, right, So there's roughly one hundred and
Speaker 1: forty four million taxpayers.
Speaker 2: In the US.
Speaker 1: That comes up to about six hundred and forty five
Speaker 1: dollars per taxpayer just for that ninety three billion dollars.
Speaker 3: I'm pissed off. No, you're a selfish bastard. You went
Speaker 3: the six hundred and forty five dollars in your own pocket,
Speaker 3: so you can go waste it on something that's totally
Speaker 3: useless as opposed to whatever.
Speaker 2: Wonderful program they're going to put together.
Speaker 4: It totally useless, like eggs, Yeah, eggs.
Speaker 3: Or a diet coke or you sounded like he was driving.
Speaker 3: He's out there polluting the air right now, probably driving
Speaker 3: some damn you know, internal combustion engine and polluting the
Speaker 3: air ways and causing me to have my allergies this morning.
Speaker 2: Good grief.
Speaker 3: Sometimes you call in here thinking you're so damn smart,
Speaker 3: and you just irritate me. Denver right, headline, Now, where
Speaker 3: did it go?
Speaker 2: I'll get the wrong tab open headline.
Speaker 3: Denver's two hundred and fifty million dollar budget hole will
Speaker 3: force major cuts, furloughs, freezes, and likely layoffs. The Denver
Speaker 3: mayor broke the news to city workers yesterday morning. A
Speaker 3: fifty million dollar deficit for this year, a two hundred
Speaker 3: million dollar deficit for twenty twenty six.
Speaker 2: So they're going to slash spending.
Speaker 3: Slash that's that's their word, not mine, by more than
Speaker 3: twelve percent, more than during the pandemic when it was
Speaker 3: cut nearly ten percent. Now the employees are apparently pissed
Speaker 3: off because they're going to face furloughs this year, including layoffs,
Speaker 3: the reduction or elimination of programs, and the consolidation of departments.
Speaker 2: Now, listen, listen to that.
Speaker 3: Everything, everything, including layoffs, the reduction, elimination of programs, and
Speaker 3: the consolidation of departments, is on the table in twenty
Speaker 3: twenty six, he said.
Speaker 2: In fact, he says the.
Speaker 3: City will undergo a massive restructuring with emphasis on making
Speaker 3: government smaller, faster, and easier. The hiring freezes started today,
Speaker 3: meaning yesterday. Furloughs begin June one. But but now remember
Speaker 3: everything's on the table. Then you get down about five
Speaker 3: paragraphs later and you have this short little paragraph. Johnston says,
Speaker 3: he plans to continue spending on homelessness resolution, an investment
Speaker 3: in downtown and the city. And remember everything was on
Speaker 3: the table, and despite slashing government, Johnson plans to invest
Speaker 3: in catalytic projects, catalytic, converter projects, catalytic. Those big projects
Speaker 3: include downtown reinvestment, the expanse of downtown reinvestment. Oh my gosh,
Speaker 3: you mean like bus lanes of the middle of Cofax.
Speaker 3: You mean like bike lanes on Broadway. No, he's talking about, Well,
Speaker 3: maybe that is downtown reinvestment, the expansion of the National
Speaker 3: Western Center, and then contributing to a stadium for the
Speaker 3: National Women's Soccer League, and a debt package he helped
Speaker 3: voters support in November. So I thought I'd do a
Speaker 3: little digging. I like to dig, and let's just find out.
Speaker 3: For example, let's talk about homelessness first. The homeless population
Speaker 3: in Denver, based on the most recent data from twenty
Speaker 3: twenty four point in time, was nine thousand, nine hundred
Speaker 3: seventy seven. But that's across the entire seven county metro
Speaker 3: area that includes Adams, Rapo, Boulder, Broomfield, Denver, Douglas and
Speaker 3: Jefferson counties. Now nine hundred and seventy seven across that
Speaker 3: seven county metro area, but specifically in the city and
Speaker 3: County of Denver, the number is six thousand, five hundred
Speaker 3: and thirty nine. Now, we've had program after program after program,
Speaker 3: so I thought, I wonder what the change has been
Speaker 3: in homelessness over the past ten years. So in twenty fourteen,
Speaker 3: the point in time count recorded eight thousand and forty two,
Speaker 3: though that number was probably underreported because of bad weather
Speaker 3: and they had few volunteers. Now, remember the current number
Speaker 3: is nine thousand, nine hundred seventy seven. Because I'm doing
Speaker 3: apples to apples here, so I'm talking about the metro area.
Speaker 3: So the last twenty four point in time count was
Speaker 3: nine hundred and seventy seven. In twenty fourteen it was
Speaker 3: eight thousand and forty two. Eight thousand, forty two, I
Speaker 3: think is less than the current nine thousand, nine hundred
Speaker 3: almost ten thousand. Twenty fifteen, the data is less comprehensive,
Speaker 3: but it was estimated to be between sixty one hundred
Speaker 3: and ten thousand. Denver counted for nearly half of that.
Speaker 3: So again we're about ten thousand the same numbers today
Speaker 3: twenty fifteen. So in ten years of spending money, we
Speaker 3: have maintained the same amount of homelessness. Twenty sixteen, the
Speaker 3: point in time count about sixty one hundred. Wait a minute,
Speaker 3: that's the current number in Denver specifically today. So we've
Speaker 3: and that's just not changed at all. And in fact,
Speaker 3: the point in time count for twenty sixteen showed a
Speaker 3: fifty eight percent increase in homelessness since the year noted
Speaker 3: by twenty twenty three. Twenty seventeen, homelessness was at a
Speaker 3: ten year high with about fivey one hundred and sixteen.
Speaker 2: Now, wait a minute.
Speaker 3: In twenty seventeen, that was fivey one hundred and sixteen
Speaker 3: was a ten year high. But the point in time
Speaker 3: for twenty twenty four was ninety nine hundred, almost ten thousand,
Speaker 3: almost double. So I guess we've reached record numbers, but
Speaker 3: they don't want to call it record numbers. Twenty eighteen,
Speaker 3: I say, let's speed up here a little bit. Let's
Speaker 3: get to twenty twenty three. The count jumped to nine
Speaker 3: thousand and sixty five, the thirty one point seven increase
Speaker 3: from the year before. Twenty twenty two, but that does
Speaker 3: not count Venezuelan immigrants. Why not the federal report estimated
Speaker 3: ten thousand and fifty four, and that put Denver fifth
Speaker 3: nationally for homeless population size. So we have a fifty
Speaker 3: million dollar budget hole this year, a two hundred million
Speaker 3: dollar budget hole next year. Everything's on the table, but
Speaker 3: we're still going to spend money on homelessness. So not
Speaker 3: everything is on the table, and we keep spending more
Speaker 3: and more money on homelessness, and the numbers increase, they increase.
Speaker 3: The point twenty twenty four, the point in time count
Speaker 3: reached a record high of nine hundred and seventy seven.
Speaker 3: Can I just say ten thousand, which is up ten
Speaker 3: percent from last year? Overall growth, the homeless population in
Speaker 3: metro Denver has grown significantly. There's been a sixty three
Speaker 3: percent spike between twenty twenty and twenty twenty four. So
Speaker 3: I wanted to look at a decade now. It's fluctuated,
Speaker 3: but it shows a clear upward trend line, particularly post
Speaker 3: twenty twenty, and the trend line shows a forty four
Speaker 3: percent increase between twenty eighteen and twenty twenty three. So
Speaker 3: everything's on the table except homelessness. So the one thing
Speaker 3: that does not seem to have any impact on homelessness,
Speaker 3: that's off the table.
Speaker 2: He's still going to do that. Now. There is some
Speaker 2: good news in the homelessness.
Speaker 3: The number of veterans decreased by sixteen percent, but that's
Speaker 3: probably because they had a program called it was a
Speaker 3: targeted intervention program called Built for Zero. So for at
Speaker 3: least for our vets considering that Memorial Day is coming up,
Speaker 3: at least for our veterans who are still alive, we
Speaker 3: at least did something for them. So everything's on the
Speaker 3: table except that. Oh and immigration. Remember remember the story
Speaker 3: said Johnson says he plans to continue spending on homelessness
Speaker 3: resolution as an investment in downtown in the city. But
Speaker 3: it seems to me that the more you spend on homelessness, huh,
Speaker 3: the more homeless you get. So that's the investment you
Speaker 3: went for downtown Denver. Way to go, Mayor. I'm telling
Speaker 3: you what, you're one brilliant son of a bitch. I'll
Speaker 3: tell you what you've got the brains of just you
Speaker 3: know what. Wow, you know you should run for governor.
Speaker 3: That's what you should do. As long as we're going
Speaker 3: down in the crap hole, I think you could. You
Speaker 3: could probably flush the toy pretty damn well. Now the
Speaker 3: other thing that now, remember, everything's on the table except homelessness.
Speaker 3: And everything's on the table except oh, immigration, the immigration crisis,
Speaker 3: as the Denverright calls it. Now they say, in twenty
Speaker 3: twenty three, the city spent seventy three million dollars on
Speaker 3: both homelessness and immigration. Then the following year, according to
Speaker 3: Denver Right, Denver spent eighty six point six million, and
Speaker 3: in the following year seventy six point two million. Now
Speaker 3: again they say that's on both. So I thought, you know, Michael,
Speaker 3: why don't you go do some DIGGI let's see what
Speaker 3: we can find out about homelessness. Now Denver I says
Speaker 3: it's like seventy one million dollars. Based on available data,
Speaker 3: the total taxpayer money spent on services for illegal aliens
Speaker 3: in Denver since December of twenty twenty two, three years ago,
Speaker 3: is estimated at three hundred and fifty six million dollars. Now,
Speaker 3: if you take an average of seventy million per year,
Speaker 3: that only gets you to two hundred and ten million.
Speaker 3: And the data that I find shows it's estimated at
Speaker 3: three hundred and fifty six million dollars. Now, a significant
Speaker 3: portion of that is attributed to last year. Now that
Speaker 3: includes spending by the city, schools and the healthcare systems,
Speaker 3: which of course are all you know, it's the Denver
Speaker 3: Public schools, it's Denver General Health, it's the city and
Speaker 3: county and Denver All that's reported by the Common Sense Institute. Now,
Speaker 3: precise costs for twenty twenty four a loan are not
Speaker 3: fully isolated in their sources. But here's what I found out.
Speaker 3: When you do total cumulative spending. Cumulative spending again between
Speaker 3: December of twenty two and November twenty four, three hundred
Speaker 3: and fifty six million dollars. That's about seven nine hundred
Speaker 3: dollars per illegal alien for the estimated forty five thousand
Speaker 3: who have arrived in Denver since twenty twenty two. That's
Speaker 3: eight percent of your budget, roughly eight percent. So I
Speaker 3: don't know, it seems to me. I bet you, I'm
Speaker 3: just a dummy. If you wanted to start cutting your
Speaker 3: budget deficit, you wanted to reduce it, you might go
Speaker 3: to the one thing that you shouldn't be paid for anyway,
Speaker 3: which are illegal aliens, which represents a three hundred and
Speaker 3: fifty six million.
Speaker 2: Dollars dollar amount and cut it out now.
Speaker 3: In January of last year, Johnson projected the cost could
Speaker 3: reach one hundred and eighty million dollars for the year
Speaker 3: of twenty twenty four if the pace of arrivals continued,
Speaker 3: though actual spending may have been lower because of reduced
Speaker 3: arrivals down to less than a dozen per day by
Speaker 3: November of last year. But the city itself has spent
Speaker 3: between seventy one and one hundred million dollars directly on
Speaker 3: illegal alien support programs through mid twenty twenty four. Then,
Speaker 3: and I found this phrase interesting. The additional costs were
Speaker 3: borne by the schools and the healthcare systems. Well, wait
Speaker 3: a minute, in Denver, the city county. I know you
Speaker 3: have a Denver school where, but it's the Denver publics,
Speaker 3: the Denver School System, and Denver General Health the healthcare systems. Again,
Speaker 3: the taxpayers and Denver end up paying for it. So
Speaker 3: you had education, health care, shelter and housing, case management, work, transportation,
Speaker 3: other costs like food, childcare, administrative costs, and then you
Speaker 3: had some one time capital costs. So what do you
Speaker 3: think those were? Now, Remember we're trying to fill a
Speaker 3: budget hole. Education between ninety eight to two hundred and
Speaker 3: twenty two million dollars.
Speaker 2: Here are the details.
Speaker 3: Those costs cover education for about sixteen thousand illegal alien
Speaker 3: students enrolled in seventeen Denver Metro school districts since December
Speaker 3: twenty two. Now the range reflects uncertain the obviously reporting
Speaker 3: costs across the districts because I don't know that there's
Speaker 3: an equal reporting system. But that equates equates to almost
Speaker 3: two percent of Colorado's K through twelve education budget for
Speaker 3: the year twenty twenty five. Almost half of all the
Speaker 3: illegal aliens in the school system in the metro area
Speaker 3: are from Venezuela, Colombia, Guatemala, El Salvador, and Honduras. Now,
Speaker 3: the Common Sense Institute, again a source for a lot
Speaker 3: of this information, reports that two hundred and fifty six
Speaker 3: million of the three hundred and fifty six million total
Speaker 3: spent was on education. So the one thing that we
Speaker 3: should be focused on spending for our citizens, it's a
Speaker 3: damn lot of money going to illegal aliens.
Speaker 2: Do I remember everything's on the table?
Speaker 3: Don't forget Denveright and the mayor say everything's on the table.
Speaker 3: What about healthcare? There's between fifty and one hundred and
Speaker 3: twenty million dollars in uncompensated care. That's emergency departments. They
Speaker 3: provided about forty eight million dollars in encompassated care, which
Speaker 3: averaged to about almost three thousand dollars per illegal alien.
Speaker 3: The higher estimate of about one hundred and twenty million
Speaker 3: dollars includes broader health care cross costs across the metro
Speaker 3: hospitals because well, obviously illegal aliens probably don't have insurance.
Speaker 3: Denver Health, the taxpayer funded safety net system, has reported
Speaker 3: significant strains from unpaid medical visits. Now under under federal law,
Speaker 3: you can't turn them away, legal or illegal. Somebody shows
Speaker 3: up in a hospital with a GSW, you're not going
Speaker 3: to ask, you know, you're going to treat the gunshot
Speaker 3: wound first. You're not going to ask, you know, even
Speaker 3: at that point, you don't even ask about insurance, let
Speaker 3: alone your citizenship. You're just going to treat it. But
Speaker 3: if you give you some context, the forty nine million
Speaker 3: dollar figure that cited about from emergency departments has part
Speaker 3: of the total three hundred and fifty plus million total
Speaker 3: indicates that are ongoing healthcare costs in twenty twenty four.
Speaker 3: But I can't find any specific number for twenty twenty four.
Speaker 3: So that's the healthcare cost. What about shelter and housing costs?
Speaker 3: Between forty two and seventy one million dollars, that's cumulative
Speaker 3: through mid of last year. Now, had Denver spent a
Speaker 3: lot of money on temporary housing, the hotels, the shelters.
Speaker 2: Rent assistance.
Speaker 3: By December of twenty three, Denver had spent thirty eight
Speaker 3: million dollars. By midpoint last year, it was estimated to
Speaker 3: be seventy one million dollars HM for for estimates for
Speaker 3: midpoint last year were seventy one million. And we have
Speaker 3: a fifty million dollar hole this year, which fifty million
Speaker 3: is less than seventy one million dollars. Had you not
Speaker 3: been spending that on homeless, you would have had oh
Speaker 3: you could have covered your budget deficit.
Speaker 2: They spent.
Speaker 3: Just doing casework almost ten million dollars. Let's see, I
Speaker 3: had a note here about where is it about work authorization?
Speaker 5: Oh?
Speaker 3: Here it is. By midpoint last year, Denver had helped
Speaker 3: sixteen hundred illegal aliens with work authorization. They had a
Speaker 3: ninety seven success rate. And Denver also helps them support
Speaker 3: their asylum claims. So taxpayers are also funding that now
Speaker 3: I know it's only you know, what was it almost
Speaker 3: ten million dollars, But when you're trying to fill a
Speaker 3: fifty million dollar hole for this year and a two
Speaker 3: hundred million dollar hole for next year, ten million dollars
Speaker 3: goes quite away in doing that. Transportation six million dollars,
Speaker 3: that's what's allocated in twenty twenty four. That's for like
Speaker 3: free bus tickets, not just to move around Denver, but
Speaker 3: even to relocate to other places.
Speaker 2: Food costs.
Speaker 3: I can't quite quantify that, but it peers around seventy
Speaker 3: one million dollars on other support programs, which I think
Speaker 3: would include probably food.
Speaker 2: For illegal aliens.
Speaker 4: It seems like in the short.
Speaker 2: Segment, I've almost filled your budget hole.
Speaker 5: The Common Sense Institute reported that Mayor Johnston spent three
Speaker 5: hundred and fifty six million dollars on immigrants. Maybe the
Speaker 5: mayor's name should be changed to Mayor dim Wick.
Speaker 2: Mayor no common sense? How about that?
Speaker 3: Now this isn't exactly having things to do with Denver,
Speaker 3: but nonetheless I just find it superfluous and stupid. Where'd
Speaker 3: you get this?
Speaker 2: Dragon? Where'd this come from? About the walkway?
Speaker 4: There would be a nine news one thing I believe.
Speaker 2: This is nine news.
Speaker 3: The headline is Governor Polus Veil's design for Colorado's His
Speaker 3: History Pedestrian Walkway. He's unveiled the renderings for the Colorado
Speaker 3: one fifty Pedestrian Walkway as a way to celebrate Colorado's
Speaker 3: one hundred and fiftieth anniversary. A It will connect people
Speaker 3: to Lincoln Veterans Park and commemorates Colorado's art, culture, and
Speaker 3: history for the states one hundred and fiftieth anniversary. The
Speaker 3: eleven thousand square foot walkway will enhance connectivity you mean,
Speaker 3: I get a better signal on my cell phone. Yeah,
Speaker 3: of course, Okay, all right, and improve accessibility among downtown
Speaker 3: Denver's public spaces and monuments. The project that's expected to
Speaker 3: be completed in the summer of twenty twenty six. Now, well,
Speaker 3: let me tell you about the design first, because this
Speaker 3: is really important for what I believe this is going
Speaker 3: to turn into, you know, it's going to turn into
Speaker 3: I think it's gonna turn into. The design will be
Speaker 3: reflective of Colorado's diverse topography, meaning you're gonna it's gonna
Speaker 3: be what hilly or it's gonna like, you know, have
Speaker 3: a you know, a forty five foot in forty five
Speaker 3: degree incline.
Speaker 4: Potholes, potholes.
Speaker 6: That's what's gonna a.
Speaker 2: Touche, mister Redbeard. Potholes.
Speaker 3: And of course, when I tell you what I think
Speaker 3: it's going to turn into, it'll be like driving on
Speaker 3: the twenty five or the seventy during rush hour when
Speaker 3: there's been a wreck, or somebody has pulled over and
Speaker 3: has their flashers on, or a cop stops somebody you know,
Speaker 3: is investigating a wreck, and so everybody's trying to pull
Speaker 3: over and slow down. So it's gonna go nowhere. And
Speaker 3: this is what this walkway is going to turn into.
Speaker 3: It will pay tribute to Colorado's geology by featuring regional
Speaker 3: material like sandstone, marble granite. It will naturally wine from
Speaker 3: the Colorado State Capitals of Lincoln Veterans Park and will
Speaker 3: include features like a viewing platform or platforms, sculptural monuments,
Speaker 3: commissioned artwork you know like lucifer uh play elements, and
Speaker 3: different learning and storytelling opportunities for everybody.
Speaker 2: I know you're you're.
Speaker 7: I'm in awe back here. Oh I thought you were orgasmic.
Speaker 7: I thought you were getting close to you know, I
Speaker 7: was like, you know, the walkway was designed by Studio
Speaker 7: Gang Studio, Studio Studio Trope, Mundus, Bishop Olin and Thornton Thomassetti.
Speaker 3: There's a rendering of it. And then let's see is
Speaker 3: this statement from Polis.
Speaker 2: Of course it is. I'm thrilled. He has a thrill
Speaker 2: up his leg.
Speaker 3: That Coloradins can now visualize this walkway and it's amazing
Speaker 3: positive impact on our community. Now when Coloradines of all
Speaker 3: ages come to visit our state capital, they can more
Speaker 3: easily access and enjoy Lincoln Veterans Park while enjoying and
Speaker 3: learning from art from local artists.
Speaker 6: Are curious, is that a thing to people go, hey,
Speaker 6: I need to go tourists out of state people, maybe
Speaker 6: even you know, from from up north to down south?
Speaker 5: Does it?
Speaker 4: They say, hey, I need to visit the capitol.
Speaker 3: Yes, they think to themselves. I want to go to
Speaker 3: the sixteenth Street. I want to I want to go
Speaker 3: to Union Station. I want to see if I can
Speaker 3: dodge some muggings. I want to see if I can
Speaker 3: get stuck on Colefax, you know, behind a bus somewhere.
Speaker 3: I want to see if I can get killed crossing
Speaker 3: the street Colefax and then I want to go downtown
Speaker 3: and just visit the homeless, you know, pick up a few.
Speaker 2: You know, maybe you do.
Speaker 3: Insulin injections, or like me, you do testosterone injections, so
Speaker 3: I need see needles.
Speaker 4: But mostly serious here to do.
Speaker 6: People come to other states and go I need to
Speaker 6: visit the capitolilty.
Speaker 4: I mean, I get it.
Speaker 6: Maybe possibly because it's the gold Dome, not Trump's gold Dome,
Speaker 6: but Denver's Golden Dome.
Speaker 3: If I'm if I'm in a capital city, uh huh.
Speaker 3: And I've done this year's because I've been to all
Speaker 3: of them. But if I'm in a capital city for
Speaker 3: business or work, or or I'm just driving through, I
Speaker 3: might drive by and look at it.
Speaker 2: I mean, because it's I don't necessarily get out and
Speaker 2: go in.
Speaker 6: You know, my dad's in Salt Lake City and they've
Speaker 6: got the Copper Dome, which is green, so it's it's
Speaker 6: kind of interesting to drive by and see that and go, oh,
Speaker 6: look at that.
Speaker 4: But I don't know, did you.
Speaker 2: Ever go look at the tabernacle? Yes? Okay, yeah, so yo.
Speaker 3: But I don't think people first think when they let's
Speaker 3: take a vacation to Colorado and the kids.
Speaker 2: Go yeah, can we go to the state Capitol.
Speaker 4: Is that other thing?
Speaker 2: I don't think that's the thing dragging all right. I
Speaker 2: don't think it is.
Speaker 5: Uh.
Speaker 2: It's an interactive, active experience.
Speaker 3: It will showcase Colorado's history and look to our even
Speaker 3: stronger future. I want to thanks Studio Gang for their
Speaker 3: work on this design, as well as all the local artists.
Speaker 2: Blah blah blah. Now.
Speaker 3: According to the to the press release, it will serve
Speaker 3: as a new gateway to downtown Denver and is a
Speaker 3: major part of the ongoing initiatives to revitalize the Civic
Speaker 3: Center area. The initiatives include renovations to the Library, Denver
Speaker 3: Art Museum, upgrades the recently open Populous Hotel, the Future
Speaker 3: fifty two to eighty Trail, the Mcnichol's Building Museum, and
Speaker 3: improvements to the Greek Theater in the Central Promenade in
Speaker 3: Civic Central Park.
Speaker 6: I have a theory about this dragon. Do you want
Speaker 6: to guess? I don't want it's going to be a magnet.
Speaker 6: I don't want to venture into what the heck is
Speaker 6: in your mind.
Speaker 3: Is, Oh, it's it's going to be a magnet, all right,
Speaker 3: and it's going to be an attraction it's gonna damn ye,
Speaker 3: damn straight. It's going to be a magnet and attraction
Speaker 3: for criminals and homeless.
Speaker 4: No, that's no, no, not a thing.
Speaker 3: Talk about a great campground. You know you're homeless. You
Speaker 3: can see the mountains you'd like, you'd prefer to be
Speaker 3: up there, and you can't. But according to the press release,
Speaker 3: it's going to represent Colorado's topography. So just take your
Speaker 3: tent and pitch it on a fourteen or on the
Speaker 3: new historic pedestrian The Colorado won fifty pedestrian walkway.
Speaker 6: And you can see that. To the renderings of that.
Speaker 6: Michael says, go here dot com.
Speaker 3: Normally I want people to go, well, actually I do
Speaker 3: want you to go. I want you to go look
Speaker 3: at this, yeah abomination. Then I want you to think
Speaker 3: about the costs. What do you think it costs? Guess
Speaker 3: what I could not find out. I can find out
Speaker 3: everything about how much we spent on homelessness, everything about
Speaker 3: it and the breakdown and for illegal aliens, on education hospital.
Speaker 3: Somebody asked me about incarceration. I can't find any figures
Speaker 3: on incarceration costs, primarily because well they never asked. Do
Speaker 3: you think that the Denver do you do you you know,
Speaker 3: with all due respect to the goober that asked me
Speaker 3: that question, do you honestly believe that a Denver cop,
Speaker 3: upon arresting somebody is going to say, hey, maybe see
Speaker 3: your papers please. Of course they're not, because they probably
Speaker 3: get fired for doing it. So we don't have any
Speaker 3: numbers about that. So I started digging around seeing if
Speaker 3: I could find something. Now it's here's what I found.
Speaker 3: It's described as this eleven thousand square foot public private
Speaker 3: partnership and there is the key eleven thousand square feet.
Speaker 3: So as I say it's going to be a magnet,
Speaker 3: it's going to be in a traction. It involves the
Speaker 3: Governor's office, the P three office at the Colorado Department
Speaker 3: of Personality, Administration and History Colorado. Completion data is expected
Speaker 3: by summer of twenty twenty six, and then no specific
Speaker 3: cost figures for the walkway itself are provided because it's
Speaker 3: part of a broader state initiative that includes significant transportation
Speaker 3: and infrastructure funding. So here's a little context. Sea DOT
Speaker 3: has allocated billions for infrastructure.
Speaker 5: To do.
Speaker 3: What what are you gonna do with that bill? With
Speaker 3: those billions of dollars that the Sea Dot allocation includes
Speaker 3: forty two million dollars in grants for thirty seven transportation
Speaker 3: projects for.
Speaker 2: Twenty twenty three.
Speaker 3: Now I'm confused because this is Check's calendar twenty twenty five. Now,
Speaker 3: I know there's a lot of construction going around, but
Speaker 3: it doesn't seem to be the kind of construction that
Speaker 3: we ought to be doing, you know, like widening, fixing, potholes, fixing,
Speaker 3: you know, the conversions from concrete asphalt.
Speaker 2: You know where you have those anyway.
Speaker 3: But there is no direct allocation that I can find
Speaker 3: anywhere for the Colorado one to fifty walkway, So there's
Speaker 3: no explicit cost data. Now, I think it's reasonable to
Speaker 3: infer that, even though this is a public private partnership,
Speaker 3: that taxpayers are going to bear a portion of the
Speaker 3: expense through state budgets or a grant. You know, maybe
Speaker 3: they'll try to not do anything directly through the state,
Speaker 3: so they'll give a grant to some of these people
Speaker 3: they are going to be doing the construction, doing the
Speaker 3: design work and all of that. They'll get a grant.
Speaker 3: So they goes, oh, well, you know what, No, taxpayers
Speaker 3: didn't pay for it. Oh, yes, they did the gigs,
Speaker 3: the cost to taxpayers for the Colorado one fifty pedestrian
Speaker 3: walkway is not publicly specified in any available source that
Speaker 3: I could.
Speaker 6: Find, And you really got to go to Michael says,
Speaker 6: go here dot com and check out these renderings because
Speaker 6: it the walkway path snakes through the park up and
Speaker 6: over to Lincoln to the Capitol Building. So in order
Speaker 6: for you to go from the park to the Capitol Building,
Speaker 6: you've got to snake through the park on this walkway
Speaker 6: up and over Lincoln to the Capitol Building rather than
Speaker 6: just you know, cross the street.
Speaker 3: And if you're describing that, Redbeard is using hand gestures,
Speaker 3: he's making the little curvy motions, and then he's kind
Speaker 3: of doing up and down motions like a roller coaster. Yeah,
Speaker 3: and I'm thinking every single one of those is a
Speaker 3: not in but it's a it's a divergence, or it's
Speaker 3: a it's a point by which if you're homeless or
Speaker 3: you're a criminal and you're looking for you know, subjects
Speaker 3: for your criminality. Uh, that seems to be a perfect
Speaker 3: place to do.
Speaker 6: There are four or more switchbacks on this on this
Speaker 6: walkway path, and it is elevated, so underneath sure you're
Speaker 6: protected from the leble.
Speaker 2: I didn't even think about the underneath par of course.
Speaker 3: Yeah, so what we'll do is we'll just take more
Speaker 3: cops and well, it's just another crime infested.
Speaker 2: It's just it's.
Speaker 3: Somebody had mentioned in the text messages about bird feeders
Speaker 3: and how you know you feed up. You know, it
Speaker 3: attracts more birds and more birds, and it attracts squirrels and squirrels.
Speaker 3: This is what I mean by an attraction. The Governor's Walkway.
Speaker 3: Can't you imagine the Colorado one to fifty walkway? Mommy, daddy,
Speaker 3: Can we go to Denver so we can get a
Speaker 3: walk way so we can see the homeless people in
Speaker 3: the crime Can we go?
Speaker 2: Can we go pick up needles? Can we Yeah? Kids,
Speaker 2: let's go.
Speaker 4: Oh all those new areas perfect for graffiti.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 3: Now, the top the walkway itself above has railings on it.
Speaker 3: But again you can still put graffiti on the railings too.
Speaker 3: But the more I looked at the aerial view, the
Speaker 3: more I'm ap to mark my words, it's an attraction
Speaker 3: for homeless people and criminals. And then I thought to
Speaker 3: myself as I looked at the aerial view, oh, I
Speaker 3: just parked. I've got a meeting at the Capitol. I
Speaker 3: got to be there in five minutes. Do I want
Speaker 3: to walk down, say, from you know, Broadway on cole
Speaker 3: Fax over to Lincoln on along Coal Fax, you know,
Speaker 3: make a straight line and then walk into the Capitol.
Speaker 3: Or do I want to wake you know, meandering around
Speaker 3: all over the place trying to dodge the homeless. Or
Speaker 3: let's say it really did turn into a tourist attraction,
Speaker 3: and I want to get from point A to point B.
Speaker 3: It's like when you go when you go to Washington,
Speaker 3: d C. And all the tourists are there for the
Speaker 3: cherry blossoms, and they're all on the escalators. Maybe nobody knows,
Speaker 3: you know, to stand right and walk left. Nobody nobody does.
Speaker 3: Drives me nuts. Drives me nuts. It gonna be the
Speaker 3: same thing. The penny is going away and Dragon and
Speaker 3: I had a man We had a knockdown, drag out
Speaker 3: argument about this yesterday.
Speaker 4: We were trying to figure out he screamed.
Speaker 2: At me, he was rude to me.
Speaker 4: He was just all through punches. Yeah, good thing. We
Speaker 4: don't have an.
Speaker 2: HR, I know.
Speaker 3: Really, so the pennies going away stop being minded next year.
Speaker 3: According to a directee, from the president. But it doesn't
Speaker 3: mean that the pennies are going to disappear from circulation.
Speaker 3: There's no current mandate that I can find requiring the
Speaker 3: banks to remove pennies from circulation if they receive a
Speaker 3: penny during.
Speaker 2: A transaction, so they'll still give them out. So they'll
Speaker 2: still give them out. Now.
Speaker 3: In countries like Canada, they eliminated the penny in twenty
Speaker 3: twenty thirteen, pennies remained legal tender, but then were gradually
Speaker 3: withdrawn because businesses and banks returned them to the mint
Speaker 3: for recycling. And that might be what they do here.
Speaker 3: But how long would it take to remove all pennies
Speaker 3: from circulation. They're about one hundred and fourteen billion pennies
Speaker 3: in circulation, about one point one point one four million dollars.
Speaker 3: It would depend on how aggressively the government makes you
Speaker 3: withdraw it. If pennies were to remain legal tender, they
Speaker 3: will only gradually disappear as they get hoarded, lost, or
Speaker 3: return to the banks, and then if the banks are
Speaker 3: required to return them to the mint to be melted down.
Speaker 3: So one economist that I found that talked about at
Speaker 3: Aja Patel, says that could be decades into the future
Speaker 3: because of the slow reabsorption into the banking system. Canada's
Speaker 3: experience indicated that even a decade after halting penny production,
Speaker 3: pennies were still being used, although.
Speaker 2: Their availability started to be diminished.
Speaker 4: So who knows.
Speaker 3: Any other little factoids, but there's a bunch more. But
Speaker 3: I think you'd rather have touched by every these shots now.
Speaker 3: I don't know, maybe it wouldn't pennies or bullets