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Letters: Grieving parents fight to protect other students from shootings

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 18:00:37 GMT

Castillo parents fighting for safety of studentsRe: “Parents seeking records, not cash,” March 14 news storyInstead of taking the money and running, the Castillos are choosing to honor their son, Kendrick, by getting and sharing information that may save other students. Good for them!Peggy Caughlan, Fort CollinsAssault rifle lapel pins disrespectfulRe: “GOP’s filibuster sought to stall gun, safe-drug-use bills,” March 11 news story and “GOP digs in against gun bills,” March 7 news storyIn light of the near-daily shootings and killings of Americans at our own hands, often with assault-type weapons, doesn’t it seem insulting to the dead and wounded, both present day and past, that any elected representative of any party would wear an assault rifle insignia on their lapel?It is a disrespectful affront to any survivor to vaunt the instrument of destruction that deprived them of loved ones. Parents and school children fear attending what should b...

Scorpion tamales, larvae tacos and worm tostadas are on the menu at Denver’s La Diabla this week

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 18:00:37 GMT

Growing up in Mexico City, it was common for Jose Avila to snack on the edible bugs at the markets around town with his grandma and mom after school.So, the James Beard-nominated chef didn’t think it would be odd to ship 22 pounds of dried crickets, Chicatana ants, escamoles, scorpions, stink bugs and maguey worms in thermic boxes with iced gel packs from his hometown to Denver, where he’d planned to host a Festival de Bichos (Bug Festival) at his downtown restaurant, La Diabla Pozolería y Mezcalería, earlier this month.But U.S. Customs and Border Protection had other plans.“The bugs ended up getting stuck in Customs for three days,” Avila said. “All I was told was that they were sent to the lab, but I think they just wanted to make sure the bugs were actually bugs and not something else.”Chef Jose Avila cooks insects at La Diabla on Monday, March 13, 2023. (Photo by AAron Ontiveroz/The Denver Post)Luckily, for all the adventurous foodies or history lovers who want to eat like...

Coloradans may see the Northern Lights more often in the coming months

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 18:00:37 GMT

The sighting of the Northern Lights in northern Colorado two weeks ago may be a mere glimpse of what’s in store in the coming months, judging by “space weather” predictions generated in Boulder that anticipate increasing solar storm activity through 2024.The magnetic field of the sun reverses polarity every 11 years, meaning its magnetic north and south poles flip. Sun spots, solar flares, and the Coronal Mass Ejections (CMEs) that cause the Northern Lights reach peak levels midway through the cycle, which is predicted to occur in late 2024 or early 2025.Fort Collins resident Michael Charnick took this photo of the Northern Lights on Feb. 26, a few miles north of town, using a long exposure on an iPhone. (Provided by Michael Charnick, @charnick_wx)That means the likelihood of more opportunities to see the Northern Lights, also known as the aurora borealis, is strong. They occur when the charged particles ejected by the sun are deflected to earth’s north and s...

Editorial: With Dave Williams, Colorado’s GOP can quit the charade

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 18:00:37 GMT

The GOP staffers at the party’s state headquarters in Greenwood Village should go ahead and take down the American and Colorado flags and run up the Trump and Q flags that they hid in the closet for 2022.The party is done pretending in this state to reject the extremists’ lies that fueled an attack on the U.S. Capitol and caused a constitutional crisis. It’s a shocking decision following an election where even their most anti-Trump candidates got trounced at the polls.Last week Dave Williams, an election conspiracy theorist who maintains without evidence that the 2020 election was stolen, was regretfully nominated the head of the Colorado Republican Party.Williams certainly hasn’t come a long way since his college days when he used his position as student body president to discriminate against an LGBT student group at the University of Colorado at Colorado Springs.Since being ousted from student council in 2007, Williams has served as the chair of the El Paso County Repu...

Thefts of Kias, Hyundais in Colorado chase away auto insurance companies

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 18:00:37 GMT

With car thefts spiking in Colorado the past few years, three auto insurance carriers are now declining to cover certain vehicles, leaving at-risk owners with fewer options.Allstate, State Farm and Progressive are passing over new owners of some Kia and Hyundai vehicles, as thieves steal those cars at higher rates. In 2021, Colorado held the No. 1 spot in the nation for motor vehicle thefts – and those rates continued to skyrocket in the first half of last year, according to the Rocky Mountain Insurance Association.In 2022, the top 10 U.S. cities for car thefts included Denver, Aurora, Westminster and Pueblo, according to the nonprofit.From July through September of last year, the majority of the state’s most-stolen vehicles were either Kia models – Sportage, Optima, Sorento and Soul – or Hyundai – Tuscan, Sonata and Elantra. Truck owners were also targeted, with Chevy Silverados, Ford F-250s and GMC Sierras making the list.Some of these thefts are blamed on a social media tre...

Pierogies and pickle soup may not be pretty as a picture, but they’ll have you coming back to Cracovia

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 18:00:37 GMT

Editor’s note: This is part of our new series, Hidden Gems, in which we take a look at those restaurants you should know about but may not. They are either tucked away in strip malls or otherwise off the beaten path. Try them out; if you like what you eat, pass the word.  WESTMINSTER, CO – MARCH 10: A dish of kielbasa at Cracovia in Westminster, Colorado on Friday, March 10, 2023. Cracovia is a polish-american restaurant that opened in 2008. (Photo by Rebecca Slezak/Special to The Denver Post)There aren’t a lot of Polish restaurants in Colorado. Compared to the photogenicity of, say, dripping birria tacos or cheese pull-rific slices of pizza, white pork sausage and stuffed cabbage rolls pale in Instagram- and Tik Tok-worthiness. But there’s a beauty in perfectly pleated pierogi; an allure to a creamy soup swirled with bright olive oil and dotted with parsley.Maybe our current food trends aren’t overly conducive to Polish food, but Cracovia doesn’t really care about trends anyw...

Wash Park French eatery making way for something “a little more fun”

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 18:00:37 GMT

A French restaurant in West Wash Park has closed its doors, but its ownership plans to debut a new concept in the space this spring.Jared Leonard, owner of Au Feu Brasserie at 81 S. Pennsylvania St., told BusinessDen the restaurant’s fine-dining nature just wasn’t working.“The amount of time and food costs in fine dining, it’s just a format that’s kind of dying out,” Leonard said. “It’s hard to do in the current economy.”Leonard opened Au Feu in January 2021, after the restaurant had a short stint in RiNo’s Zeppelin Station food hall. Before that, he’d operated Budlong Hot Chicken in the Pennsylvania Street space.Au Feu offered small plates such as poutine and grilled oysters in the $12 to $25 range, according to a menu still posted on the window. Entrees ranged from $17 for fried chicken to $30 for steak frites.Leonard said he’s pivoting to launch a French cocktail bar in the space.“It will be more of a cocktail bar with small plates, instead of a full-service restaurant with cockt...

Heartburn in Golden: Food hall operators accuse partner of conflict of interest

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 18:00:37 GMT

Denver chef Jesus Silva, who started his restaurant career at 11 in his home country of Mexico, has won respect and recognition for his work and creative food concepts from the Denver Central Market to the Stanley Marketplace and Milepost Zero in McGregor Square.Silva, like many of his peers, struggled when COVID-19 hit. One venture closed at the height of the pandemic, but he opened stalls at the Milepost Zero food hall and helped open the Golden Mill food hall in Golden.Then legal troubles hit. The legal dispute has spawned accusations of conflicts of interest, intimidation and bullying tactics. Silva said it has left the fate of his business and his more than 30 employees at Golden Mill up in the air.“The worst thing we ever experienced in the industry was COVID,” Silva said. “I would think after COVID, nothing can be worse. And now I’m dealing with this. Oh my god, this is never going to end.”By “this,” he means strife between him and hi...

Movie review: “Luther: The Fallen Sun” a grander, but sillier version of show

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 18:00:37 GMT

Idris Elba’s John Luther finally has made it to the big screen.And sure, many — at least on these shores — will watch “Luther: The Fallen Sun” in their living rooms, but that doesn’t change the fact that this cinematic offshoot of the British drama series “Luther” feels theater-worthy.Already in a cineplex here and there, it arrives on Netflix this week.It does so as a bigger, bolder and, unfortunately, increasingly over-the-top version of the show.Created and penned by Neil Cross, the series revolves around its namesake, a detective chief inspector in London. Obsessive about catching killers to the point where he’s willing to blur some moral and ethical lines, DCI Luther found himself in a lot of legal hot water at the conclusion of the show’s fifth season — or “series” in Brit speak — in 2019.In its opening moments, “The Fallen Sun” takes us back in time slightly, to a bit of extortion that leads to a spot on a road that quickly becomes a crime scene. It soon is visited by Luther,...

Cars trapped by rain-fueled mudslides in Baldwin Hills

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 18:00:37 GMT

Multiple mudslides in Baldwin Hills snarled traffic and trapped vehicles late Tuesday night and early Wednesday morning as yet another storm hit Southern California.The mudslides impacted multiple areas, including traffic on La Brea Avenue, footage from the scene showed.Perhaps the largest incident occurred at about 2 a.m. Wednesday on La Brea just north of Don Lorenzo Drive, where all northbound traffic had to be halted, but not before vehicles were caught in the debris.At least two cars were caught in the mud, and tow crews had to be brought out to help remove the vehicles.Another mudslide affected the 5200 block of El Mirador Drive just after 11:30 p.m. Tuesday. In this instance, debris flowed from the back of a property facing Punta Alta Drive.The rain