Meet Councilwoman Candi CdeBaca on May 5!

A woman in business attire standing on top of a fence.


Please join us on Tuesday, May 3 to meet District 9 City Councilwoman Candi CdeBaca. We will meet in the Multi-Purpose Room at the Carla Madison Recreation Center, 2401 East Colfax Avenue, at 5:30 pm. Parking is behind the Center, accessible from 16th Avenue.

CW CdeBaca will share her vision for Denver and, in particular, City Park. She will speak about Denver Parks and Recreation’s emphasis on equity and lead us through the process of submitting projects for consideration of Capital Improvement Funding. There will be a Q & A following her presentation.

CW CdeBaca is a proud fifth-generation native of northeast Denver and a graduate of Manual High School and the University of Denver. Raised by a single mother and grandparents, Candi understands the importance of tight-knit communities and stepping up for neighbors in need. She continues to be a fierce advocate against the criminalization of poverty, environmental racism, and the displacement of black and brown communities. Looking forward, she will continue to fight for community every day and infuse city government with policy expertise, a lens for justice, and ancestral wisdom.

City Park Friends and Neighbors is honored to have CW CdeBaca as our May speaker. A CPFAN Board Meeting will follow CW CdeBaca’s presentation at 6:30 pm. Light refreshments will be served.

City Park History and Birding Tour on May 7
Martin Luther King Statue & Photo: Bald Eagle, Henry Feldman 
CPFAN invites you to a unique tour of City Park that will highlight both the history of the park dating from its founding in 1882 and the rich diversity of avian species that has developed in this inner city open space. John Brett and Patrick O’Driscoll will lead this 1 1/2 hour stroll through the People’s Park on May 7 starting at 8:30 am in front of the Snowmastodon sculpture at the NW corner of the Denver Museum of Nature and Science. Parking is available in the lots to the north.

John Brett is a retired University of Colorado anthropology professor who has lived near and used City Park for nearly 40 years. As a member of the CPFAN board, he is working with others to preserve the central values of City Park while accommodating to changing values and uses. In presenting the history of City Park, John points out the visionary nature of the park, having been established just 20 years after Central Park in NYC and reflecting the early “back to nature†sentiment of the time—pastoral, naturalistic with grand vistas.  “What was dry prairie became an urban jewel characteristic of much larger cities with a botanic garden, a zoo and a natural history museum included,” says John. Specific highlights of John’s tour include the pavilion and bandstand, each of the distinctive lakes, the multiple, distinctive gateways into the park and the Civil War era cannons.

Patrick O’Driscoll calls City Park his “home patch” for birding. He has recorded lists of bird sightings in the park almost weekly over the past nine years. Patrick also leads free field trips in City Park for Denver Field Ornithologists (DFO). He is a retired newspaper journalist and national parks information specialist and is the editor of Lark Bunting, DFO’s monthly newsletter.

Patrick describes May as a peak spring bird migration month in and around Denver. “Any number of sparrows, flycatchers, warblers, tanagers, woodpeckers, grosbeaks, and thrushes may be in the park on May 7. Also present: City Park’s resident jays, chickadees, nuthatches and Bushtits — not to mention several hundred Double-crested Cormorants nesting at Duck Lake, where the year’s first hatchlings may be seen and heard squawking for food from their parents,” says Patrick.

CPFAN is offering the tour free of charge to the public. Donations are always welcome. We are limiting the tour to 12 participants. If you would like to attend, please register by emailing info@cpfan.org with the message, City Park Tour, May 7, 2022. We’ll send confirmations to the first twelve who sign up and alert others about our Waiting List.
Come dig with us!
Adopt-A-Flowerbed is back for its second season
Adopt-a-Flowerbed Volunteer, Amy Mancini digs weeding!
Will you join us to keep City Park blooming and beautiful? This year, Denver Parks and Recreation (DPR) has pledged to plant 100% of the flowerbeds in the park instead of the 50% allotted last year due to the pandemic. The City Park Maintenance crew and Horticulturists will need our help as volunteer gardeners to maintain the extra beds. DPR’s Adopt-A-Flowerbed program, launched last year in City Park by the Parks and Open Space Committee of Greater Park Hill, Inc., City Park Friends and Neighbors, and City Park Alliance is poised to serve as a volunteer launching pad once again. Last year’s participants reported great satisfaction creating beauty in City Park and building community at the same time.

The Adopt-A- Flowerbed program begins with an on-site orientation in early June at the City Park Pavilion with City Park’s Horticulturists and Adam Smith, the East District Superintendent. Responsibilities include watering, weeding, pruning, and fertilizing. City Park Horticulturists and Maintenance crew participate with and oversee volunteers’ activities. Volunteers can sign up to work with a team or on their own in flowerbeds of their choice. The Horticulturists will announce large group projects throughout the season as well.

Please respond to Maria Flora at mjflora@msn.com or Georgia Garnsey at ggarnsey@ecentral.com if you are interested in joining this effort. Indicate the time commitment you want to make, the flowerbeds you might be interested in maintaining, and whether you have friends or neighbors interested in volunteering, either individually or as part of a team. Let’s keep City Park blooming!
Horticulturist, Julie Lehman with Adopt-A-Flowerbed volunteers, Sharon Johnson, Lorraine Dixon Jones & Jackie June
Photo: Janina Gotlin
Plant trees and Celebrate City Park on May 21
On Saturday, May 21, Denver Park Trust will be hosting a park clean-up and tree planting event in City Park. The event will begin at the City Park Pavilion at 9 am and last until 12 pm. From 1pm – 4pm, there will be a free celebration featuring the Denver Civic Band, food trucks, games and more. Those signing up to volunteer for the morning activities will receive a free meal ticket.

The Trust is partnering with Civic Center Conservancy, Denver Mountain Parks Foundation, the Greenway Foundation, and The Park People to sponsor clean-ups throughout the city on May 21 as part of Denver’s first annual Parks, Rivers, Trails and Trees program. The Denver Park Trust was founded in 2019 and their mission is “to improve and add new parks in the neighborhoods that need them most.” They are a fundraising organization that works in partnership with Denver Parks and Recreation.

Let’s make City Park shine! Come join us on May 21 to plant trees and pick up trash, then celebrate our community and our beautiful City Park, known as the People’s Park since 1906!

Here is a link to the Denver Park Trust’s website with all the information on Parks, Rivers, Trails & Trees, including another link to the volunteer signup form. The first 50 to sign up will receive free meal tickets.
Meeting Dennis Gallagher in City Park 
Robert Burns Statue and Garden, City Park, Denver
The passing away of Dennis Gallagher on April 22 at his home in northwest Denver is a huge loss to the Denver community and to the vast community everywhere who loved and admired him. Ebullient, caring, witty, intelligent – Dennis charmed, persuaded and delighted everyone who met him. There was nothing he couldn’t do. Not only did he serve as Denver City Auditor, Denver City Council member, State Senator and State Representative, he uncovered the buried Mezuzah at Golda Meir’s family home in West Denver, helping establish the home’s authentic link to one of Denver’s most distinguished residents.

Dennis was proud of his Irish heritage and that was part and parcel of who he was. He often spoke of the importance of “helping the stranger among us,” in accordance with the Irish wisdom passed down to him by his mother in particular.

A few years ago, I was walking past the Robert Burns statue in City Park and noticed a group of people gathered in a shaded area to the side. I came closer and recognized Dennis  reading passages from Burns’ poetry to the group. I learned the group was Denver’s James Joyce Society.

Just last summer I ran into Dennis at a backyard event in my neighborhood and asked him about the Society and its connection to Burns and the statue in City Park. We talked about the happy circumstance of the statue of Robert Burns facing the statue of Martin Luther King in this middle section of City Park.

To my delight, Dennis wrote me a letter following up on our conversation and here is a portion of it:

“Joyce had two volumes of Burns’ poetry in his library in Italy.  There are lots of illusions to Burns and his poetry in Finnegan’s Wake, not so much in Ulysses.

“The James Joyce Reading Society of Greater Metropolitan Denver was founded on Joyce’s 100th birthday in the back room of Danny Sullivan’s pub on Court Place, gone alas like our youth too soon.  Founders, Ned Burke, Robert Ross whose dad was born in Scotland, and myself.  Ned is in heaven now chatting with Joyce about various passages in the texts.  Bob is still with us and can recite Burns vastly from memory.  We meet every first Tuesday every month at different homes. We are reading Ulysses for about the 7th time.

“Love the Burns statue in City Park and that he and MLK are close enough to hear each other is very fitting…Dennis”

Dennis invited me to a meeting of the James Joyce Reading Society and I didn’t make it. What a mistake!  At least I know that Dennis is in Heaven now, chatting it up with Ned Burke, James Joyce and his old buddy, Robert Burns to boot!

I feel a celebration of Dennis Gallagher’s beautiful life around City Park’s Robert Burns statue coming during Summer, 2022. There will be poetry.
– Georgia McCracken Garnsey, Editor, City Park Friends and Neighbors newsletter
“A poet, peasant born,
Who more of fame’s immortal dower
Unto his country brings
Than all her kings.” – Robert Burns

CPFAN ANNUAL MEETING AND PROGRAM, April 5, 5:30 pm

A boat floating on the water near a tree.


Photo: Katy Charles

 

Please join us on Tuesday, April 5 for our 2022 Annual Meeting at 5:30 pm at the Carla Madison Recreation Center, 2401 E. Colfax Ave. Parking is available behind the center and can be accessed off 16th Ave and then turning south into the lot. The meeting will be held in the Multi-Purpose Room just off the lobby. Signs will direct you to the beautiful room. You may also access the meeting and program by registering on Zoom. If you prefer just to attend the program and not the meeting, click the Zoom link at 6:30 pm.

Register in advance for this meeting:
https://us06web.zoom.us/meeting/register/tZYkcuusqTgtGNLQQn3Ah2-iAwZfAE_SNe3l

After registering, you will receive a confirmation email containing information about joining the meeting.
The meeting will begin with general business followed by a presentation by Frank Rowe, Executive Director of the Denver Park Trust. Frank cofounded the Denver Park Trust with Denver City Councilwoman Kendra Black in 2019. The mission of the non-profit, in partnership with Denver Parks and Recreation, is to raise funds to improve and add to Denver’s parks “where they are needed most.†Frank will expand on the organization’s mission and accomplishments to date and announce a special celebration of Colorado’s public parks, “Parks, Rivers, Trails and Trees†that the Trust will sponsor in City Park on May 21.
The election of CPFAN Board of Directors Members for the 2022-23 term will follow Rowe’s presentation. The Nominating Committee has presented a slate of eight nominees:

Brooke Badon
Fred Bender
John Brett
Kelly Crosby
Georgia Garnsey
Joe Mauro
Patricia Paul
Sandy Robnett

Nominees will present brief bios and their reasons for wanting to serve on the CPFAN Board. At the meeting, members may nominate other Board candidates “from the floor” and any such additional candidates will also present brief bios and their reasons for wanting to serve on the CPFAN Board. Once all the candidates are published, CPFAN members will be asked to vote for individual candidates by ballot if you attend in person or by email if you attend by Zoom (the email address will be provided at the meeting in Chat). Once the new Board has been elected, the new Board will will elect the new officers. We will announce the new CPFAN Board and officers no later than the next CPFAN Mail Chimp in May.

Following the meeting at 6:30 pm, Park Hill artist and photographer, Katy Charles will present a slideshow of her photographs of City Park along with vintage photos from DPL’s Western History Department. CPFAN is honored to cap off the Annual Meeting with this talented and visionary artist’s work. 
Katy Charles
Katy Charles is a fourth generation Park Hill resident. She received her M.A. in art history from CU Boulder, and served as curator for William King Museum in Virginia. She is a painter and photographer and has been documenting Historic City Park for the past several years. As evidenced by her photographs, Katy believes in the power of parks. She says: “Our city parks are a refuge. The few wild and open spaces left in our quickly changing urban landscape are critical to our well-being, and bring us closer to our true nature.”

Her paintings are in local collections including the Lindsay Flannigan Courthouse, Nagel Hall (DU), and O’Brian Architecture in NY. Her photographs can be seen in private collections in England, Alabama, California, Chicago, and Denver.

City Park’s Water: Jeff Prink, Denver Parks and Recreation Irrigation Project Manager to Speak, March 1

Two ducks swimming in a body of water


As concerns about the effects of Global Warming are felt throughout the world, Denver, like other U.S. cities, struggles to meet the challenges of a warming climate. With Denver’s dry, sunny weather, its residents are particularly attuned to the pressing need to conserve water and establish gardens and landscapes that support water-conserving strategies. In the 2018 City Park Master Plan Update, recommendations supported new strategies for conserving water and creating exciting new, native landscapes in City Park. For example, the Master Plan suggests transforming the expansive blue grass lawn of the South Meadow (just south of the Denver Museum of Nature and Science and bordering Colorado Blvd) into “a native grass meadow…and adding cool and warm season grasses and wildflowers consisting of native and hardy species…and plant species that provide habitat for pollinators, wildlife, and birds.â€Â  (City Park Master Plan Update, Recommendations, Water, Page 52)
South Meadow, City Park
To learn how City Park’s irrigation system will support new concepts for creating water-friendly gardens and landscapes in the future, join us for a presentation of the City Park Irrigation Master Plan by Jeff Prink, Denver Parks and Recreation Irrigation Project Manager. The Zoom program will take place on March 1 at 6:30 pm following the CPFAN board meeting at 5:30 pm. Click on the link below to register. You may attend the 5:30 pm CPFAN board meeting and the program that follows or just come on board at 6:30 for the program.

You are invited to a Zoom meeting.
When: Mar 1, 2022 05:30 PM Mountain Time (US and Canada)

Register in advance for this meeting:
https://us06web.zoom.us/meeting/register/tZwtcOuprzgpHtDjvuaIFbkRaKCpOcymd9O8

After registering, you will receive a confirmation email containing information about joining the meeting.

Remember to click the Zoom link at 6:30 pm if you only want to attend the program. This program is sponsored by City Park Friends and Neighbors and City Park Alliance, the two groups who – along with you! – advocate for City Park.
Adopt-A-Flowerbed Reblooms!
Deb Gallegos, DPR & Maria Flora, Adopt-A-Flowerbed volunteer
We reached out to you a year ago to help us launch a volunteer gardening program in City Park – and so many of you reached back!!! As the COVID pandemic strained the capacity of our Denver Parks and Recreation’s (DPR) Horticulturists and Maintenance staff to care for our park, you signed up to implement DPR’s Adopt-A-Flowerbed program. What a difference your commitment made.

More than fifty volunteers showed up in May, 2021 for orientations sponsored by Adam Smith, the Superintendent of the East District for Denver Parks and Recreation. Neighbors from all around the park participated, including Park Hill, South City Park, Whittier, Congress, Cheesman, Cherry Creek – and beyond! Smith and City Park Horticulturists outlined gardening responsibilities that included watering, weeding, pruning, and fertilizing. Participants organized into teams and picked the gardens they wanted to maintain.

As the gardening season progressed from Spring to Fall, volunteers gathered in teams or individually – sometimes weekly, bi-weekly, monthly or whatever worked for them – and began to work on larger team projects organized by the Horticulturists as well. Sometimes the word would go out that the Benedict Rose Garden or Sopris or Thatcher needed help and a group of a dozen or more would show up to make it happen. Gardening was always accompanied by much laughter, trading of gardening tips and camaraderie. Getting to know the City Park Horticulturists was a particular bonus.

City Park’s Adopt-a-Flowerbed volunteers racked up 1200 volunteer gardening hours in 2021 – the first year of the program. We are well into organizing for the 2022 season now – with new materials and concepts for making the program even better and more enjoyable. Please join us! GPHC Parks and Open Space Committee, City Park Friends and Neighbors and City Park Alliance are City Park’s Adopt-A-Flowerbed sponsors. Email mjflora@msn.com or ggarnsey@ecentral.com with your interest and we’ll get back to you with more info and updates. This is a flexible and happy volunteer program we know you’ll enjoy as you keep our City Park, the People’s Park – beautifully blooming!
Birding Tour in City Park
Bald Eagle at Duck Lake, City Park, February 19, 2022 Credit: Henry J. Feldman
Prepare for a special treat in City Park! On Saturday, March 12 at 7 am, Denver Field Ornithologists (DFO) will sponsor a Field Trip to view the birds in City Park. The leader of this special excursion is Patrick O’Driscoll, editor of DFO’s Lark Bunting newsletter. Here is Patrick’s description of the tour:

“At a time of transition, we’ll stroll throughout an uncommonly birdy urban hub of central Denver habitat. The returning Double-crested Cormorants at Duck Lake will be growing as the big birds build and spruce up colony nests and perform courtship rituals. The last of thousands of overwintering Cackling and Canada Goose flocks will be leaving. Resident songbirds, corvids, raptors and some winter visitors (sparrows, ducks, etc.) will continue, with a few early spring migrants perhaps dropping in. Dress for the weather and bring water/snacks.”

The tour is rated as easy. Attendees will meet at the parking strip on the north side of Ferril Lake.

To register: https://dfobirds.org/FieldTrips/Register.aspx?TripID=13854
February Sightings:
Double -Crested Cormorants, Female Northern Shoveler, Male Hooded Meganser: Henry J. Feldman
Ferril Lake birds: Susan Langley
Tribute to Larry Ambrose
by Dave Felice
A pillar of community activism in Denver and great friend of the city’s parks, Larry Ambrose, is dead at age 76. Ambrose died on January 28, 2022. A native of Pueblo and graduate of Central High School, Larry had an amazing reach and helped shaped the destiny of his adopted city.

Ambrose, a hypnotizing story teller, excelled in many fields. He is as responsible as anyone for the survival of the little Denver house where Golda Meir once lived. Larry oversaw moving the house to the Auraria campus in 1988 as head of the newly-created Auraria Foundation. In the post he loved to smooze with the campus community.

Ambrose was a staunch advocate for the protection of City Park. He fought fiercely against city plans for park events requiring paid admission, such as the proposed Mile High Music Festival in 2007. Developed secretly months before being publicly revealed, the festival would have closed the western third of City Park for a three-day rock concert.
Denver Inter-Neighborhood Cooperation presented the Lifetime Achievement Award to Larry Ambrose on March 13, 2021 for his longtime work in preserving and enhancing the quality of life in Denver’s neighborhoods.
Larry opposed excessive noise and congestion coming from park events. He helped arrange sound monitoring for a heavy metal rock band performance. The event was so disruptive city officials told promoters they could not return.

In 2010, Ambrose formed a coalition of neighborhood representatives to oppose city plans for an outdoor movie theater on the lawn behind the Museum of Nature and Science. The proposal was withdrawn.

Ambrose also advocated in favor of rebuilding Dustin Redd playground on a neighborhood scale, control of park zoning by the Parks Department, and against a proposed gas-producing incinerator at the zoo.

Larry also provided valuable inspiration and guidance behind the scenes, leading to formation of City Park Friends and Neighbors as a Registered Neighborhood Organization in 2014.
Before settling in Denver, Larry was heavily involved in entertainment, including a stint managing a renowned Hollywood nightclub. He took on the establishment by successfully organizing a cabaret workers union. In the 1970s, Ambrose operated a booking and talent agency in Denver, and was co-owner of a nightclub in Lakewood.

Along the way, Ambrose earned a Bachelor of Sciences in Business from CU-Boulder, a Masters degree in Arts Administration from UCLA and a Juris Doctorate from DU. Even with his degree, however, he was never a practicing attorney.

Always proud of his hometown, in the early 21st century, Larry managed the Pueblo Convention Center. He was a close partner of his wife of 48 years, Jane Parker-Ambrose, in her amazing kite business, and the promotion of her international One Sky One World Kite Fly for Peace festival.

Ambrose was very active in Denver politics. He ran twice as an unsuccessful city council candidate. In 2015, those disgruntled with the Michael B. Hancock administration rallied around Larry with a remarkable two percent of the vote as an undeclared write-in mayoral candidate. Those voting did so in part because they knew Larry as a champion of parks. He was far more qualified to run the Parks and Recreation Department than most of the people recent mayors had appointed.

As much as anything, Larry was a community activist. He was a long-term president of Sloans Lake Neighborhood Association. As president of Inter-Neighborhood Cooperation (INC) from 2012 to 2016, he helped shape the direction and influence of the city’s neighborhoods. He formed and headed the INC parks committee to protect, enhance, and expand the city’s park system.

Always ready with a story, Larry created a marvelous portrait of the world around him. He was a captivating presence who worked to improve everything he touched. Not afraid to take on city hall, he endlessly had a vision of uplifting everyone. This came out particularly in his last job, executive director of the Southwest Improvement Council in the less affluent Brentwood area.

Long-standing health problems, including a bizarre cancer of the ankle, led to Larry’s death. His funeral was at Emanuel Cemetery at Fairmount on February 1. Besides Jane, he is survived by numerous cousins. Most of all, Larry is remembered by the multitude of people he met, educated, entertained, and assisted.
We miss him.
Donations are Welcome!

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