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My Page: Amy Brouillette

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HATE CRIMES (PART DUEX)

Thanks to local tipsters, Boulder Police this week arrested a suspect linked to last month’s brutal hate crime—and without even having to leave their own back yard. The 38-year-old suspect, Phillip Bernard Martinez of Lafayette, was already locked up in Boulder County jail on unrelated drug charges when police issued his arrest warrant Tuesday. [more]

WAVE THAT FLAG

Along with America’s independence, yesterday also marked the centennial celebration of Eldorado Springs Resort—Boulder’s sleepy pool enclave that was once the pinnacle of high society in the west. Monday's gala was a nod to resort’s glory days, back when the pool was a prestigious 40-room hotel-and-spa getaway, a place to see-and-be-seen for upscale folk and celebrity types. Glenn Miller and Louis Armstrong played the resort's once-grand ballroom; Jack Dempsey was a frequent hotel guest, and Dwight and Mamie Eisenhower even honeymooned here. [more]

COFFEE SHOP BEAT

When owner of Penny Lane coffee shop, Isador Million, revealed to local media this spring he would soon close his doors after 24 years in the art-house coffee biz, unable to afford the raised rent at its prime Pearl Street spot, many thought things would somehow be made right—that good would prevail and the bohemian institution that for many defines Boulder would somehow be spared.
This same thing happened over a decade ago, in 1994: When Penny Lane’s lease ran up, the landlord refused to renew it. Patrons rallied, vigils were held and Million managed to secure a larger space exactly across the street (a perfect dig at the old landlord who clearly wanted a break, visual and otherwise, from Penny Lane's riff-raff). Alan Ginsberg himself, an old Penny Laner and Boulderite, even dedicated the new joint, headlining the poetry reading on opening night. [more]

JAM BAND REVIVAL

It was all about hippies this weekend at Red Rocks Amphitheater, as Widespread Panic played a three-night stand, returning to their favorite venue after a year-plus hiatus from the road. The Athens, Ga.-based jam band with a grassroots following a la the Dead took a reprieve from touring after beloved lead guitarist, Michael Hauser, died of cancer in August 2002. His passing left behind a broken band (the group was named for Hauser, who suffered notoriously from panic attacks), and a bitterly divided fan-base, especially after a new guitarist, George McConnell, stepped in just a week after Hauser's death to finish out the ongoing tour. [more]

UNION DUES

A local college student is heading an effort by a small clan of disgruntled Wal-Mart workers to form a union at its store in Greeley, Colo., the Greeley Tribune reports. If successful, the 21-year-old Greeley student, who doubles as a clerk at Wal-Mart, along with a handful of other brave souls will have gone where few other Wal-Mart workers ever have. Going up against the largest retailer on the planet on this issue, a company whose least favorite word is “union,� has so far been losing battle: workers at only one Wal-Mart outlet in the nation (3,744 total) have so far successfully managed to organize (in 2000)—a month later, the company nixed that union representative’s position company wide, says the Rocky Mountain News. [more]

Rocky Mountain Tourism

Today marks summer’s official start, and with it, a season that brings an annual stampede of tourists through Colorado and the Rocky Mountain West. Proof Americans remain captivated by the region—its natural beauty and its Wild West cowboy ideal—the annual rush west each summer brings millions of visitors, and billions of dollars, into the Rockies and beyond. In exchange for the open-house tour of its natural and cultural goods, Western economies get back billions in revenue, around $120 billion region-wide each year, according to recent study by the Western State Tourism Policy Council. So vital is this annual cash injection, tourism ranks third among the region’s top industries, a key source of revenue that fuels Western economies. [more]

NOBO SERIES

In Boulder's newest haunt, NoBo, signs are everywhere this fledgling neighborhood is at last coalescing from a once-jumbled assortment of cool-looking housing into a community de facto. That it's so new adds to the Holiday neighborhood's already surreal, futuristic vibe—with rows of perfectly xeriscaped front lawns, immaculate sidewalks and Pottery Barn front porches. But beneath Holiday’s eerily pleasant, freakishly-ordered surface, an actual human dimension is taking hold, as residents here dig in and get on with the real business at hand:growing a community. [more]

CLEAN ENERGY

In yesterday’s successful bid by Democrats to add a renewable energy portfolio to the energy bill now being kicked around on the Senate floor, Colorado’s freshman pick Sen. Ken Salazar once again proved his political promise. His constituents back home had already spoken loudly on green energy, making history last November by passing the country’s first voter-initiated renewable energy legislation. It was his turn yesterday to deliver the go-green message, along with 51 other senators (including eight Republicans and one Independent, minus two Democrats) who rallied behind an eco-friendly amendment that would require utilities to generate 10 percent of their electricity from renewable energy sources like solar, wind, hydro and biomass by 2020. [more]

REGIONAL HAZE BEAT

The assault on Western wilderness areas continues, as the EPA today rolled out new guidelines regulating how states should manage industrial pollution junking up skies in national parks—a measure that includes weakened emission standards in several key areas affecting embattled national parks here in the west.
The agency’s new regulations slashed certain emission-reduction goals for the region's largest coal-fired power plants in half, from the proposed 60 to 65 percent to 30 percent, a rule which has serious implications for worsening air quality in the Four Corners region of the Colorado Plateau, dubbed the “Golden Circle� of national parks and wilderness areas, according to a press release from the Environmental Defense Fund. Specifically, according to the Environmental Defense fund, the rule allows coal-fired power plants to continue pumping out toxic nitrogen oxides (NOx) at increasing rates. [more]

Gusher's End

A key priority of President Bush's second-term agenda will be vigorously tested in coming weeks, as the Senate ramps up for what many anticipate will be a heated debate over the long-awaited energy bill beginning Tuesday. In late April, lawmakers in the House passed a form of the bill, a sweeping energy overhaul that aims to address U.S. dependency on foreign oil by increasing domestic energy production.
Meanwhile, an old, radical idea is gaining mainstream footing: the “peak oil� theory. [more]

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