I recently attended a Boulder Police Department town hall. People with urgent concerns around homelessness, drug addiction and crime came to seek relief. They described what they are seeing in their neighborhoods: open air drug use, camping garbage, stolen bike parts, discarded needles, human waste. But this conversation was different. It didn’t start and end with demands that police alone do something. This time, I saw people grappling with a …

Bill would also restrict the practice for those who are pregnant, under 18, or who have an intellectual or developmental disability By Moe Clark Meghan Baker, a staff attorney for the advocacy organization Disability Law Colorado, asked state lawmakers during a bill hearing on Tuesday to imagine what it would be like to spend 23 hours a day alone in a jail cell. “You can’t see a TV or a clock, …

Prolonged isolation behind bars is cruel, inhumane, degrading treatment and harmful to health. Rep. Judy Amabile2:56 AM MDT on Apr 4, 2021 This past year has been one of loneliness and isolation for many. We have been denied the company of family and friends. The things that bring us joy and help us mark the time have been taken away. Social distancing and quarantine have taken a toll on our …

Published in the Daily Camera | August 14 My son’s friend came over Saturday to say goodbye. For the last two years, BB (not his real name) had been living in hotel on the southeast side of Boulder. During regular if infrequent dinners over the years, I have gotten to know him. He is animated and interested in a wide variety of topics. The dinners were fun. He always brought …

By DAILY CAMERA GUEST OPINION | openforum@dailycamera.com | Boulder Daily Camera May 1, 2020 at 1:26 p.m. During the stay-at-home order, I have been volunteering at the COVID Recovery Center at the East Boulder Recreation Center. Citizens experiencing homelessness with symptoms of the virus can go to the center to recover and isolate. Boulder moved quickly to establish this resource and has seen relatively fewer cases among the unhoused. The CRC is staffed with …

These are strange days. Along with feeling concern about the immediate crisis, I’m thinking of what Coronavirus has revealed about our health and economic systems. We need to strengthen both. Today, The Boulder Daily Camera published my opinion piece on the subject. I’d love your feedback. A Colorado Plan for Economic Action I’ve just published my Economic Plan for Colorado. Working people are hurting in our state. Policy choices around …

By DAILY CAMERA GUEST OPINION | openforum@dailycamera.com | Boulder Daily CameraPUBLISHED: March 17, 2020 at 5:10 p.m. | UPDATED: March 19, 2020 at 10:03 a.m. The new coronavirus got our undivided attention last week and shifted American life in startling ways. Now is a critical moment. Our willingness to practice strict socially distancing — or not — will determine the trajectory of infections and deaths in our community in the days and weeks to come. When the …

Amabile isn’t an easy name to remember or pronounce (uh-MAA-bee-lay), but it does have a nice connotation. It’s an Italian word with a range of translations; from simpatico, to amiable and even lovable. t was a good surname for my father – in some ways. My dad was both a lover and a fighter (details here would be entirely TMI.) Suffice it to say he was a good man and a skilled …