Current Issue
October 2009 Issue
Cover Story
Real estate: Cisneros touts his company’s Boulder condo project
By Mike Cote
Former HUD chief Henry Cisneros recently visited Boulder to tout the Peloton, a mixed-use development his company is helping to finance - a $150 million project that increased sales recently by slashing prices.
Cisneros, who served as secretary of the Department of Housing and Urban Development in the Clinton administration, operates CityView, an institutional investment firm based in Los Angeles that focuses on urban communities. It’s working with developer Bancroft Capital.
The first phase of the 10-acre development, built on the campus of defunct data storage company Exabyte, includes…
Articles
Real estate: Cisneros touts his company’s Boulder condo project
By Mike Cote
Former HUD chief Henry Cisneros recently visited Boulder to tout the Peloton, a mixed-use development his company is helping to finance - a $150 million project that increased sales recently by slashing prices.
Cisneros, who served as secretary of…
State of the State: Technology
Denver-based ReadyTalk chose last month’s Fifth Annual CSIA DEMOgala to announce its newest product: the ReadyTalk Media Player, which helps businesses make better use of social media by allowing them to easily embed recorded content into websites, blogs and other platforms.
“As the social-media revolution intensifies, businesses are looking for…
On Management: A simple approach to selling more
By Pat WiesnerWe were being good parents, helping one of our children look for a house. (Details have been disguised enough in this story that none of those involved would recognize themselves.)
This was not my favorite thing to do, so I resolved to sit in the back seat and quietly amuse…
Readers respond
WE NEED TO LET SOLUTIONS FLOW TO SAVE WATER
“Tapped out,“ by Allen Best (October) is a wonderful, beautifully written commentary, long on history and definition of the Western water challenges, but painfully short on answers.
Water banking is essential for survival, and alternative crops may replace some of the…
Small Biz: Frozen burrito biz lands believers, backers
By Mike TaylorDenver is already the cradle of the giant burrito, with Chipotle, Qdoba, Chez Jose, Bocaza and Illegal Pete’s all emerging here in the early 1990s.
Boulder’s Phil Anson aims to make this the mecca of the frozen burrito, too.
Less than a year after securing financial backing, Anson’s natural and…
State of the State: Brewing
We know Colorado makes lots of beer - typically more than any other state in any given year. That’s always worth bragging about when bellying up to a bar in, say, California or Texas.
Quantity’s fine, you say, but how about quality? Well, the results of the Great American Beer…
The Economist: What is the best way to measure a country’s happiness?
By Tucker Hart AdamsThere has been lots of talk recently about the shortcomings of Gross Domestic Product, the most widely used measure of a country’s output of goods and services.
Various pundits have argued that it is an incomplete measure of how well a country is doing, since, for example, it excludes unpaid…
Vine: ‘Tis the season to be sustainable
A MARK ON THE WORLD BAGS
At the behest of their son-in-law, Phil and Karen Schilling started importing handmade, fair-trade bags from Indonesia nearly a decade ago. The first bags were made of rattan, which the Schillings had replaced with recycled material in 2003. “The…
Guest column: Trucking industry needs to get in gear with the times
Hiroko Kawai
You drink sustainably harvested coffee and eat only local produce. You bicycle to work, and walk to the farmers’ market. But even if you consider yourself a very conscientious citizen, your life is still touched by trucking.
The trucking…
Top Company: nonprofit
In a giant warehouse in Centennial, a small group of volunteers sort through piles of medical supplies and pack them in boxes bound for Third World countries. Everything here has been donated, from the blue medical garb factory samples to the cardboard cartons that once…
Tapped out: The future of water on the Front Range
By Allen BestI. STORM ON THE HORIZON
It’s been said that every glass of water in Colorado comes from the Western Slope. Strictly speaking, that’s wrong. A few places - Burlington, Trinidad and Castle Rock come to mind - get no water from west…
Natural Wonders: Colorado is rich with mineral and energy resources
By David LewisGold. Coal. Oil. Natural gas. Wind. Water. Solar.
Colorado is blessed with an abundance of mineral and energy resources. Mining was the main reason the state came into being, followed by ranching, which developed largely in order to feed those thousands of hungry miners. From the founding of Denver -…
State of the State: Education
Tony Frank, who became the 14th president of Colorado State University in June, oversees a campus that includes 25,000 students, 1,400 faculty, 6,500 additional employees and a budget that tops $800 million. ColoradoBiz recently sat down with Frank at CSU’s Denver office to discuss funding for higher education.
Q. You’ve…
State of the State: Restaurants
By Patricia KaowthumrongFast-food patrons along Denver’s 16th Street Mall might have done a double-take when the McDonald’s at Cleveland Place reopened recently after being closed several months for remodeling.
“I’m pretty sure this is the nicest McDonald’s I’ve ever been to. And I’ve been to lots of McDonald’s,“ said Juante Chavez, who…
Readers respond
‘GREEN’ GOVERNOR BE GONE
Just read the September article in ColoradoBiz about Gov. Bill Ritter and his agenda to turn Colorado into a green state (“Power Glide,“ Robert Schwab). From the sounds of it, we are well on our way.
Too bad. Colorado is rich in natural resources, which Gov.…
Q4 Tech Report: match game
By Eric PetersonSometimes finding a plumber or other service provider can be akin to pulling a marble out of a jar. You can just pluck it out and hope it’s not a bad one. But there are too many different marbles to be sure.
On Management: The banks need to get back in play!
By Pat WiesnerTwo men I know well own a business in a small mountain town. They have been there a number of years and have been good for the area, bringing business and pretty good success to themselves. They employ a dozen or so people and are active around the community. The…
State of the State: Economy
By Mike TaylorFormer U.S. Treasury Secretary John Snow says the U.S. economy is showing signs of recovery, but he warns that threats remain, and if deflation were to occur it could cause a recession relapse, what he calls a “double dip” such as that experienced in the Great Depression.
“I think we’ve…
The Economist: Simple solutions to complex problems
By Tucker Hart Adams
My father was an engineer, and he always insisted on buying the simplest piece of machinery available, arguing, “The more complicated it is, the more opportunities there are for something to go wrong.“
In listening to the various proposals to deal with the problems facing the U.S., I think…
State of the State: Leadership
By Mike Cote
As a financial adviser for TIAA-CREF, Sterling Rowe wouldn’t normally mix with Denver Mayor John Hickenlooper, former Mayor Wellington Webb or Gov. Bill Ritter.
Through the Colorado Black Chamber of Commerce’s Chamber Connect program, he’s had the chance to meet informally with such…
Guest column: The five big lies of inventors
By Thomas Frey and Thomas FranklinThe economic downturn has forced us to rethink our lives. For many, this means a time of stepping into the workshop to give shape to ideas that have been waiting for the right opportunity to emerge.
While Hollywood likes to portray inventors as the wacky mad-scientist type, nothing is further…
Colorado: By the numbers
9 percent - Anticipated decline in Colorado sales- and use-tax revenues for fiscal-year 2008-09 from the previous year. The Office of State Planning and Budgeting attributed the decline in its June 22 revenue forecast to the “rapid collapse auto sales, the rise in fuel prices to nearly $4 a gallon…
Rundles Wrap Up: Lather. Rinse…..
By Jeff RundlesBy many accounts, the Great Recession is either over, or “may be over,“ or soon will be over, or we are on the verge of an economic rebound. The Dow is on a relatively upward swing, housing has stabilized, retailers have reported lower losses, and a story in mid-September said…
Executive Edge: Jodi Chambers
By Lynn Bronikowski
PHOTO BY TODD NAKASHIMA
Dr. Jodi Chambers will never get the image out of her head - an 18-year-old near death in the emergency room of St. Anthony Central Hospital, a victim of a gang stabbing. Chambers was head of…
Sports Biz: Something new in football—humility
By Stewart Schley
Like the swallows returning to Capistrano and the leaves of Aspen trees turning a brilliant gold on Independence Pass, football descended again to the planet Earth. And it was good.
It happened without announcement or ceremony or any particular blowing of any particular horn. It just happened. Suddenly one…
Cote’s Colorado: Here comes the sun
By Mike CoteYou can hear the enthusiasm in Bill Lowstuter’s voice and see it sparkle in his eyes as he describes how much power his Golden company’s solar panels produce and how much carbon dioxide they offset.
Maybe that’s because he’s waited a long, long time for his moment in the sun.…
Small Biz: Tech Startup
By Eric Peterson
INITIAL LIGHT BULB: A mechanical engineer who’s designed ejection seats for fighter jets, William Oliver developed a prototype for a better, greener alternative to the Styrofoam peanut in a Sedalia garage early in the millennium.
Oliver soon met Miguel Baldwin, a…
