Who will control Lakewood growth
Outside real estate developers or
The folks who live here, work here, play here, pay the taxes, drive the roads and send our kids to school.
The real estate development community spent over $600,000 this summer
To try and stop Cathy Kentner’s citizen initiative
A citizen initiative to reestablish resident control over growth policy for Lakewood.
They tried to stop Cathy and
They lost.
But that hasn’t stopped them from trying to defeat the citizen initiative another way.
Elect a Lakewood Mayor and Councilmembers who will reverse the citizen initiative.
Elect a Mayor and council who will restore the developers as the dominant leaders of growth policy for Lakewood.
Look at all the money.
Here are the details. The campaign finance disclosures, like budgets, tell a fun little story all their own.
https://www.lakewood.org/Government/Departments/City-Clerks-Office/Elections
The money comes all the way from Washington, DC. Lots of it.
The National Association of Realtors from Washington, DC gave $95,000 to Adam Paul
And then $15,000 to Dana Gutwein (Ward 5) and Henry Hollender (Ward 3) and Kara Degruy (Ward 1).
For canvassing.
Those folks knocking on your doors were paid by the Washington DC National Association of Realtors through a company named “Blitz Canvassing” to sell Adam Paul, Dana Gutwein, Henry Hollender and Kara deGruy.
Guess these candidates didn’t have enough resident volunteers – they had to pay people to get us to to vote for them.
And the fun part is the name of the committees that they used to launder the money:
For Dana Gutwein National Association of Realtors a/k/a “Lakewood for Better Environment”. More high density high rise apartments equal a better environment.
For Henry Hollender National Association of Realtors a/k/a “Lakewood Neighbors for Open Space” They like our open space. They can fit a lot of high density high rise apartments on all that open space.
For Kyra deGruy National Association of Realtors a/k/a “Save Foothills”. Yes, save those foothills for those high density high rise apartments.
And not to be outdone, for Adam Paul, National Association of Realtors a/k/a “Support Parks and Open Space”. Yes, save those parks and open space so we can build more high density high rise apartments in those parks and open space. After all, isn’t that why we have open space – to build on.
Then there is the secret money. Super secret. And lots of it.
$320,000 for Adam Paul’s television, online, robo calls, robo emails and glossy mailbox stuffers.
From “RMDC5 LM Coop Issues Committee” Really. And when you look them up – they don’t exist.
And they laundered the money through another committee.
“RMDC5 LM Coop Issues Committee” a/k/a “Business and Labor Together” All $320,000 worth. And all for Adam Paul.
Sounds catchy, right. Friendly. Neighborly.
Just like an anonymous internet scam artist.
“RMDC5 LM Coop Issues Committee” a/k/a “Business and Labor Together”. It gets even sillier if you read it out loud.
So, you ask, how is Adam Paul doing financially. Well, remember how Adam Paul and his supporters spent over $600,000 to fight Cathy Kentner – the single mother school teacher.
And they lost.
As of the end of October, Adam Paul and his supporters have collected another $611,489.97 – and that is not the final tally.
To put that into context, when Adam Paul ran for Mayor in 2015, he spent $104,486.00.
He is apparently worth a lot more this time to the real estate development community. At least 6 times as much – $611,489.97 so far.
So they will likely spend as much if not more trying to elect Adam Paul as they did trying to stop Cathy Kentner. And the total they have spent on both is over $1.2 million. So far.
Where do they get all this money to spend on a ballot issue and local election for Lakewood. Well, think about it. Every time we buy or sell a home we are contributing to their lobby chest. And a big chest it is.
But it is a mere pittance, pennies in a tin can, compared to the billions they stand to make in profits if Adam Paul and his group get elected. All considered, $1.2 million is a very very small investment.
It is time, again, to send another message.
The citizens, the voters, the residents
Not the real estate development community from Washington DC or whatever hole “RMDC5 LM Coop Issues Committee” crawled out of.
The people who live, work, play, pay taxes, drive the roads and go to the schools.
These people, we
Are in charge of setting growth policy for Lakewood.
And we’ll keep saying it again and again and again no matter how much money they spend.
Vote. Its worth billions to them.
But its worth a lot more to us.
Its our home and our community.
Not their business investment.
John Henderson
Thanks, Kathy! It’s astounding that big developers and realtors envision enough future profit in Lakewood to invest big dollars in candidates who are willing to sell their souls and betray the voters.
Well Said, Mr. Henderson…always follow the money. We know who our candidates truly represent once we read who funds their campaigns or pays to get them elected. So sad that Lakewood elections have come to this, even AFTER the so-called campaign finance reform. It did do some good things (did you know candidates in the previous elections could accept more money than candidates for state offices! So reform was overdue and it only happened because citizens pushed for it and demanded it. The reform did not come from this present administration. IN fact, one candidate now running for re-election said at a Campaign Finance Reform committee meeting that we had to leave IECs alone; there is nothing we could do….looking at the contributions now, you can see why this person was counting on them. The “Independent’ IEC committees are anything but. They are a funnel for dark, manipulative money that owns the candidates they pay to get into office. Lakewood deserves to be represented by people who are owned by no big developers, no realtors, no agenda- pushing pot industry, no industry of any kind, in-fact. They say there is nothing worse than not voting. No. What is worse is to vote ignorantly. To vote without doing your own fact checking like looking at the money flow and looking at voting records and knowing who has fought citizens to overdevelop this town for their own ambitions. To vote only under the influence of FB & online ads paid by this big, dark money, ads that even Mark Zuckerberg admits will not be forced to be truthful, is dangerous. Follow the money. Don’t let our homes, our community, our neighborhoods, the quality of our lives and our children’s lives be sold out to greed.
A really good post, this time, John. Inspirational even!