05-7-25 - *FULL SHOW* Property Tax Pain; US v Houthis; Pakistan v India; Great Art

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
The worms have come out of the ground and they
get on the walkway to the So I thought about,
but didn't pick up a worm and put him back
on the grass.

Speaker 2 (00:10):
I should have. I feel bad about it.

Speaker 1 (00:12):
I probably should go down, you know, during the break,
and go find that worm and put him on the grass.
He can probably find his way there. He's probably probably
not mad at me. Speaking of animals, mad at me.
Haven't seen Cyril the squirrel this morning, so don't know
if he's dead. If you weren't listening to the show yesterday,
then you won't know what I'm talking about. We have
a lot to do on today's show. We are going

(00:33):
to talk with a couple of very different guests, one
guest about a half an hour from now named dbak Das,
who is an assistant professor at the University of Denver
in the School of International Studies, and we're going to
talk about what's going on between India and Cashmere. I'll
come back to that in a moment then the other guests,
and I want to just kind of prepare you for.

Speaker 2 (00:52):
This in case you're going.

Speaker 1 (00:53):
To have questions for that guest, but don't send him now.
But at ten thirty three have Tony Toby Damish, who
is the Douglas County Assessor, because and you can have
questions for him even if you don't live in Douglas County,
because he will be able to answer questions about the process. Overall,

(01:14):
the process among the various counties not too different. And
what we're talking about is that we are about to
get in the mail our newest property assessments, and you
will recall the last property assessments caused an immense amount
of financial pain to people. Yes, the value of their
homes went up, but your home is not a source
of cash flow. So if the value of your home

(01:34):
went up thirty percent, your property tax went up thirty percent.
You're just paying that out of whatever income you already have.
And it doesn't make you feel all that much better
that your home is worth more, because you don't really
want to be forced to sell it. But anyway, this
time around, it looks like in most of the counties
around Denver, the average change will be a small negative number.

(01:57):
Believe it or not, that's going to be the first
time in a while that that's happened. But of course
there are differences not only between counties but differences within counties.
You can have one county, for example, that has a
significant rural area but also has a significant suburban area.

Speaker 2 (02:13):
Think of what Adams County just as an example.

Speaker 1 (02:17):
Right, So we're gonna talk with Toby at ten thirty
and if you've got questions about property assessments, we're gonna
we'll take your questions by text at that time. Let
me just take one minute on the India Pakistan thing.
I was gonna do more than a minute, but I
just was able to book the guest for half an
hour from now. We're gonna go into it in more details,

(02:37):
so I you know, here's like literally, I'll do this
in less than a minute. So a couple of weeks ago,
there was a terrorist attack in Indian controlled Kashmir. Kashmir
is a I guess you would call it a disputed
territory in northern India next to Pakistan, and they each
kind of claim it, but India controls it, and some

(02:59):
pack standy Muslim terrorists machine gunned down a whole bunch
of tourists, almost all of whom I think either all
or almost all were were Indian. India responded first by
threatening to cut off water going into much of Pakistan
from a river that flows through India.

Speaker 2 (03:17):
And then yesterday India lobbed some missiles into.

Speaker 1 (03:20):
Pakistan and they said, we were only attacking known terrorist camps,
terrorist infrastructure. We're not attacking civilian sites, We're not attacking
Pakistani military. I was hoping, and India said justice is served,
which is diplo speak, you know for like, hey, we
don't want to get this any you know, this to
get any big or any works of a problem.

Speaker 2 (03:41):
But we had to do something.

Speaker 1 (03:42):
We're a country of a billion people and you just
murdered some of our people and we had to do something.

Speaker 2 (03:47):
So that's what we did. So can we can we
just call it done?

Speaker 1 (03:50):
In the Pakistanis have basically said we don't think so,
and well, but they haven't done much yet. Pakistan claims
to have shot down some Indian air including a few
advanced rough alle if that's the correct pronunciation, fighter jets
made by the French company des Soo. So in any case,

(04:10):
that's where it is right now. Neither side is really
backing down much rhetorically, and we need to be very careful.
I suspect that I was one of the only, if
not the only local talk show host in America to.

Speaker 2 (04:23):
Tell you two weeks ago to pay very close.

Speaker 1 (04:27):
Attention to what was going on between India and Pakistan
because it could turn into the most dangerous situation in
the world. I don't think you heard that anywhere other
than here until like last night. So anyway, there you go. Now,
let's talk about the pope stuff.

Speaker 2 (04:43):
A little bit. So starting today.

Speaker 1 (04:46):
Start basically now, there can be one hundred and thirty
three cardinals from seventy different countries. I believe it's every
cardinal who is under the age of eighty is allowed
to vote on who the next pope will be. And
I was just doing a lot. I'm Jewish, so I
don't know a lot about this. All I really know

(05:06):
is the black smoke and the white smoke. You know,
at the end of the day, if they haven't picked
a new guy, they send black smoke up the chimney,
and if they have picked a new guy, they send
white smoke up the chimney. But I've been reading a
little bit more about some of this, and I just
want just for you know, it's it's interesting. I want
to just share a little bit with you. This is
from a Catholic website called the National Catholic Reporter.

Speaker 2 (05:29):
So this is this thing that cardinals are doing is
called a conclave.

Speaker 1 (05:33):
During the conclave, they stay in a place called Casa
Santa Marta m a Arta, which is actually the same
place that Pope Francis lived. And rooms are assigned by
a lottery, and I'm just quoting here every single room.
They are simple rooms that each have their own small
private bathroom. Meals will be served in the refectory and

(05:55):
prepared by selected staff, subjected to strict rules of silence
and isolation. The planned menu includes breakfast of tea, coffee, bread, jam,
lunch and dinner pasta or rice, white meat or fish, vegetables,
bread and fruit, drinks, small amounts of wine, absolutely no
hard liquor desserts only on rare occasion. To ensure maximum secrecy,

(06:20):
all forms of communication will be prohibited and punishable by
automatic excommunication. Before entry, cardinals will have all electronic devices
with drawn and shielded cell phones, tablets, computers. In addition,
the windows of the Cystine Chapel will be blacked out.

(06:41):
Every room will be sealed and subjected to electronic sweeps
against hidden bugs or transmitters, even the rooms in Santa
Marta where they're living for these However, many days it
takes the common areas and the kitchens will be monitored
with all of that stuff I just named. Travel between

(07:03):
Santa Marta and the Sistine Chapel will take place on reserved,
isolated and monitored buses along a route protected from any
outside contact.

Speaker 2 (07:14):
Cardinals who wish to walk.

Speaker 1 (07:16):
Must mandatorily follow a protected route guarded by the Vatican
Swiss guards.

Speaker 2 (07:24):
So arrangements have been set up in the Sistine Chapel.

Speaker 1 (07:27):
Desks have been set up for each cardinal, a pan
what's on the desk, a pen, a folder with notepaper,
a booklet of the Liturgy of the hours with psalms,
a copy of the I'm not going to do this
very well Ordo Rituum Conclavis, the liturgical guide to a conclave.

Speaker 2 (07:44):
Each seat will have a named placeholder.

Speaker 1 (07:46):
In the past, distinctive colors were used, red for cardinals
created by the deceased pope, green for those who were
created previously. To protect the mosaic floor, a raised platform
was installed with wood panels, metal pipes, carpeting and ramp access.

Speaker 2 (08:00):
And now the last thing you need to know.

Speaker 1 (08:02):
In the corner of the Sistine Chapel, next to the
chimney outlet, two stoves have been installed, a historic cast
iron one used since the Conclave of nineteen thirty nine
and engraved with all the dates of use, and a
modern one introduced in two thousand and five, which uses
electronic chemical cartridges to avoid color ambiguity. Each cartridge contains

(08:27):
five charges that burn sequentially, meaning one after another for.

Speaker 2 (08:32):
About seven minutes.

Speaker 1 (08:35):
The black smoke comes from potassium per chlorate, anthruscine, and sulfur.
The white smoke comes from potassium chlorate, lactose and rosin.
The chimney is preheated with electric heaters and has a
fan to improve visibility to confirm the white smoke. And
so white smoke is what you get when they've chosen
the next pope. Black smoke is when they haven't been

(08:56):
able to that day and they're going to call it
a day and come back tomorrow.

Speaker 2 (09:00):
Saint Peter's festive.

Speaker 1 (09:01):
Bells will also be activated if they don't get jammed
as they did last April. So all right, that's probably
all I got time for at the moment. But I
actually think that's quite interesting, even though I'm not Catholic.
I may share a little more of that with you
later in the show. We'll be right back on KOA
from the police Department in Greensboro, North Carolina.

Speaker 2 (09:19):
And I love this. And if you're not of a
certain age, you might not understand it.

Speaker 1 (09:24):
You probably need to be at least forty or forty
five to get this.

Speaker 2 (09:28):
But this is from the.

Speaker 1 (09:32):
Office of the police Chief in Greensboro, North Carolina. And
it's just a little bit I won't go quite so
far as to call it a warning, but maybe an
alert about coyotes. And here's what it And there's a
picture taken at night of a coyote kind of walking
through a wooded area, and here's what it says. During

(09:52):
the spring and early summer months, coyote sightings can increase
due to pop rearing. This season is common when newborn
come out to play for the first time. Typically, coyotes
are nocturnal, but it is not uncommon to see.

Speaker 2 (10:06):
Them during the day.

Speaker 1 (10:07):
Just seeing one is not a reason to call nine
to one one. Below are reasons you should call nine
to one one And these are bullet points. Now coyotes
in hot air balloons dropping anvills, coyotes with giant magnets,
coyote pulling a giant catapult, coyote with rocket shoes, coyote

(10:33):
with anything marked TNT, coyote setting.

Speaker 2 (10:37):
Out bags that say free bird seed.

Speaker 1 (10:42):
Please call nine one one immediately if you see any
of the above behavior.

Speaker 2 (10:47):
So there you go. Fabulous.

Speaker 1 (10:49):
And I think I think that would apply anywhere, right,
I don't think that's only a North Carolina thing, so
I would say even here in color So here in Colorado.

Speaker 2 (10:57):
We do have the same thing.

Speaker 1 (10:59):
And I actually happen to live in an area which
is pretty suburban but which has shockingly high coyote activity
during this time of year. And you know, you go
in the parks nearby and there are signs about the coyotes,
and actually there's a sign that says something like high
coyote activity here, and my wife wants to know if

(11:20):
the coyotes are, you know, smoking pot and anyway. So
but it can happen here too. So again, you don't
have to be from North Carolina. You gonna be right
here in Colorado. And it's still true if you see,
for example, a coyote with a giant magnet, or coyote
setting out bags that say free bird seed. You just
probably called nine one one. I don't think. I don't

(11:42):
think this is only an East Coast thing, right you
with me on that, Jen's probably it's probably nationwide. I
would say this applies nationwide. Let me just do a
quick story. It's kind of a national thing. But more
about the principle of the thing. So look, I'm I'm Jewish.
I don't really dig it when there are people out
there who are verbally attacking or even physically attacking, but

(12:07):
verbally attacking Israel, Jews, Jewish organizations, Jewish students, all this
stuff that's going on. In fact, oh my gosh, yesterday
was at University of Washington. You had these Antifa people
all wearing black, wearing black masks, and they kind of
had a.

Speaker 2 (12:23):
Face off with the police.

Speaker 1 (12:25):
The police should have severely beaten them about the head
and neck. These people were setting fires and they're bad
These people are bad news. And they were there because
they're anti Semites, and they were putting up Palestinian flags
and all that. And I don't like these people at all.
But if you're gonna just you know, I'm not talking

(12:46):
about now taking over proper they took over a building
at the university as well. Every single one of those
people should be arrested and charged. They probably won't be
because it's Washington State and they'll probably just be let
off with a not even a slap on their But
it's the United States of America. And if you're just
going to go somewhere and speak your mind, even if

(13:09):
even if your mind is you know, apparently made of oatmeal,
you need to be able to do that. Now, not
setting fires, not taking over buildings, but you've.

Speaker 2 (13:17):
Got to be able to speak. You've got to be
able to.

Speaker 1 (13:20):
Protest, even if the only actual outcome of the protest
is to show what a moron you are and to
hopefully show potential employers that they should never hire you,
which would really be the right outcome of this sort
of thing. And every once in a while you'll even
hear people call for a boycott of Israel. And again,
you know, if you if you do call for a
boycott of Israel, you're a stupid, evil person, and Karma

(13:43):
will take care of you.

Speaker 2 (13:43):
But I do want Karma to take care of you.

Speaker 1 (13:46):
I don't want you know, unless you're doing something violent, right,
I just want to let you know, let things come
around the way the way they will. Now, there was
a bill, it was going to be in the House
of Representatives. It was going to be called the Igo
Anti Boycott Act, and it was, and it.

Speaker 2 (14:04):
Was a bill that would have.

Speaker 1 (14:09):
Here I'll just quote, would criminalize US citizens or companies
for complying with or supporting boycotts called for by international
governmental organizations like the United Nations or the EU. Under
the law, those who violated could face fines of up
to a million dollars in prison terms for up to
twenty years.

Speaker 2 (14:29):
And the Congress critters.

Speaker 1 (14:30):
Who put it, who introduced it, said it would stop
these international governmental organizations like the UN.

Speaker 2 (14:35):
From discriminating against Israel.

Speaker 1 (14:37):
The problem is, it's just a massive infringement on freedom
of speech. And so even though I don't want anybody
to go along with all these all the world's anti Semites,
we do have to protect basic principles in the United
States of America. I was surprised the bill got as
far as it did, but yesterday House leadership pulled it
in part due to opposition from more conservative memory members

(15:00):
of the House of Representatives who said what I just
said and their right to pull it.

Speaker 2 (15:06):
That's not the kind of bill.

Speaker 1 (15:07):
That's the kind of bill you would expect in Europe,
not in the United States of America. We need to
take care of the anti Semites by moral suasion when
they're not violent, and by beating them when they are violent.
You know, if you've been listening to me for some time,
that my major in college was basically foreign policy, and
that I probably follow international stuff a lot more, not

(15:32):
just a little more, a lot more than your average
local talk show host in America.

Speaker 2 (15:38):
And I think you probably also know that.

Speaker 1 (15:40):
I've been to India three times, I haven't been to Pakistan,
and a couple of weeks ago, when some terrorists from
Pakistan came in and machine gunned a bunch of tourists
at a hotel in India controlled Kashmir, India responded by saying,
we're going to cut off some water from a river

(16:00):
that you need for farming, in particular in Pakistan. I
don't think they've done it yet, but they threatened it.
And we'll talk in a minute about what's happened in
the last twenty four hours. But I said to you
on the show, I said, look, I know him early
on this, but I understand this situation a little bit
because I've been studying this stuff for a long time,

(16:20):
and this has the potential I'm not saying it will
or it has the potential to be the most dangerous
situation in the world, more much more than Israel versus Gaza,
and more than Ukraine versus Russia, depending on how it goes.
But I only know enough to be dangerous and not
enough to be helpful. So joining us to actually be

(16:42):
helpful is Dbakdas and Dbak is a assistant professor at
the Corbel School of International Studies at the University of Denver,
where he studies peace and national security and has a
particular expertise in this part of the world. So, Dbak,
thank you for doing this, especially on such short notice.

Speaker 2 (17:01):
I just reached out to you last night, so I
appreciate it.

Speaker 3 (17:05):
Thank you so much for having me us.

Speaker 1 (17:07):
But before we so, I want to get into this
in a somewhat nerdy way with you, like a little
bit in depth. Okay, So before we talk about just
what happened yesterday, just give us one or two minutes
on the historical context of the situation around Kashmir.

Speaker 2 (17:26):
Thanks to us.

Speaker 3 (17:27):
Yeah, So in terms of a historical sort of quick backgrounder,
I think what we need to know is that Kashmir
is an area which India and Pakistan both claim is there.
And this really goes back to nineteen forty seven, which
is when we had a partition in India and Pakistan,
and Kashmir was an independent Priennsyvy state and it was

(17:53):
us by both India and Pakistan to join. The thing
is it had a Hindu king but the Muslim majority population.
As things turns out, both the king Hari Singh didn't
actually join India or Pakistan immediately, and as Indian Pakistan
Wan becomes states, Pakistan then invades Kashmir, Hari Singh reaches

(18:16):
out to the Indian Prime minister and asks for help
and in return, Harri saying signs what we call the
instrument of accession joining India. Now, this of course then
later on went to the UN. Pakistan doesn't recognize that
that this instrument of accession was signed, and and we've
we've had this territorial dispute between India and Pakistan ever since.

Speaker 1 (18:40):
Who was the Indian Prime minister at the time of
that document.

Speaker 3 (18:44):
Indian Prime Minister was Jomo Lal Nahru, who was the
first Indian Prime minister.

Speaker 1 (18:48):
Yeah, and that's that's right, and obviously a hugely important
person in Indian history.

Speaker 2 (18:53):
I figured it might be might be him.

Speaker 1 (18:55):
So all right, so how about from then till now? Again,
it's sort of a broad question. I don't mean every
little thing that's happened, But would you say there's been
kind of a consistent level of disagreement and tension and whatever.
Has it ever been really calm? Has there ever really

(19:15):
been agreement? And maybe you can also add, actually, how
close has it do you feel like these two countries
have come to war over Kashmir before the current situation.

Speaker 3 (19:29):
Right, so we've had a number of wars over Kashmir already. Right,
So nineteen forty seven, forty eight, this initial break when
I was talking about that was the first India Pakistan war, right,
as both countries were essentially born, right as soon as
British colonialism was sort of thrown away. And you know,

(19:49):
let's let's give our hat tip to the British for
having left us with this problem to begin with. But so,
so ninety seven ninety forty eight is the first war.
Nineteen sixty five is the second India Pakistan war that
happens directly over Kashmir. Nineteen seventy one is the third
war between India and Pakistan. Doesn't happen over Kashmir, happens

(20:10):
over the creation of Bangladesh, so East East Pakistan becomes Bangladesh.
And then nineteen ninety nine is the Kargil War, which
is also over Kashmir, over the Kargil region of Kashmir.
Between India and Pakistan, since nineteen ninety nine we haven't
had a war, but since nineteen seventy one, where Indian

(20:31):
and Pakistani forces meet is this line called the line
of Control, and you know, we have firings over the
line of control very regularly. There is a ceasefire agreement
between India and Pakistan which gets broken very regularly. And
the other thing is, you know, has it been peaceful?

(20:55):
There are times that it has in fact been peaceful
despite these wars. Right So, for example, the problem of
terrorism that that really is what's part of the most
recent crisis is not one that we talked about in
the nineteen sixties or seventies. It really starts towards the
end of the eighties and the nineties are sort of

(21:17):
the a day of terrorist activity in Kashmir, which is
in many ways aided and abetted by the Pakistani military,
and you see a lot more civilian casualties starting to
take place because of essentially indiscriminate acts of terror.

Speaker 1 (21:36):
Is the population of Kashmir still a Muslim majority?

Speaker 2 (21:42):
It is, yes.

Speaker 3 (21:43):
So if you think of the state of Jummu and Kashmir,
Kashmir is the valley and slightly higher ups. It's a
smaller population, but it is a Muslim majority population. If
you think of Jumu, it is a Hindu majority population.
It is no longer a stake I should I should say.
In twenty nineteen, the Indian Parliament passed an act which

(22:08):
basically turned Jammu and Kashmir into a what we call
a union territory, which means that it is now directly
under the governance of the Indian government in New Delhi.

Speaker 1 (22:21):
If there were a vote of the people in Kashmir,
would they vote to be part of India or vote
to be part of Pakistan.

Speaker 3 (22:30):
That's a difficult question. It's a difficult question because I
think Kashmiri's might say that they want to be independent.
There is a strong set of folks who might say,
we want to be with Indian because and independent Kashmir
would have India, Pakistan, and China on their borders, three

(22:52):
nuclear countries. And you know, there'll be some who might say,
you know, we want to be with Pakistan. It's difficult
to predict how that would go. But I do not
think a majority of the Shmiri's would necessarily say as
Pakistan claims that they want to be with Pakistan. I

(23:16):
think that is not correct.

Speaker 2 (23:17):
We're talking with d.

Speaker 1 (23:18):
Bakdas from the University of Denver, from the Corbel School
of International Studies there. All right, so now now let's
talk about what happened in the last few days and
the current situation, and maybe you can just sort of
describe what happened over the Just give us, like a globalie,
a quick summary of what happened in the last few days.

Speaker 3 (23:42):
So in very second of April, we had a terrorist
attack on the Indian side of Kashmir at a police
called Pehelgam and twenty six civilians were killed. This was
one of those attacks where the terrorists sought out civilians
and they killed them fairly discriminately, which was very which

(24:06):
was new. Later on after the event took place, a
group called the Resistance Front, which is a part of
the lash Curry Taiba terrorist outfit, claimed responsibility. Now this
is essentially since two thousand and eight when the Mumbai

(24:26):
attacks took place on India, on India in Mumbai, on civilians.
This is probably the most brazen terrorist attack that we've
seen which directly target civilians. So in response, India first
put in abeyance the Indus Water Treaty, something that you
mentioned a little earlier, and the idea there was essentially

(24:50):
that you know, you're the main river that flows through
Pakistan actually as its origin in the Himalayas, flows through
India first, and it's India saying, you know, we recognize
that military options are not our only options, that we
have a broader set of things in our toolkit to

(25:12):
be able to respond to a terrorist action on the
Indian side of the bottom. So that was number one,
and then of course May seventh, essentially we found out
yesterday that India launched something called Operation Shindur, which was

(25:33):
a reference The term Sindur is vermillion that Hindu women
put on their head as a mark that they are married.
This was a sort of reference to the fact that
these men who were husbands of these Hindu women were killed.
So it was it was very concerted in that sense.

(25:54):
Operations Cindur basically had nine targets in Pakistan, four in
Paklin directly Pakistan, and the rest were on the Pakistani
side of Kashmir and it was conducted within half an
hour span between one am and one thirty am. No
military establishments for target it targeted. The Indian government essentially

(26:18):
said that it had targeted bases an infrastructure of the
terrorist groups that were operating on the Pakistani side of
the bottom.

Speaker 1 (26:30):
Pakistan claimed to have shot down at least five Indian
aircraft and a drone, of which three would be a
fairly advanced French fighter jet.

Speaker 2 (26:41):
Do you think that's true.

Speaker 3 (26:46):
We don't have any evidence about that. For US in general,
if a plane has been shot down, a few things
are reported right away. First is the debrie tends to
be scattered around a large area. And the second thing

(27:07):
is that there is some form of acknowledgment that there's
been an engagement and some sort of casualties from the
site that has lost the plane or a pilot potentially.
We have not had that from India. We have not
had any reporting that shows evidence that there have been

(27:29):
planes shot down that said. Could we find out in
a couple of days potentially, but right now it sounds
more to be rhetoric than based in fact.

Speaker 1 (27:43):
All right, two last questions, what are the odds that
the ISI knew about this attack? The ISI, for listeners,
being the Pakistani intelligence service that is much too cozy
and has been for many years with terrorist groups. They
really play both sides all the time.

Speaker 3 (28:01):
I think odds are fairly high there, as Ben, and
you might see this in social media as well. Right
after the attack took place in Pahlgam, you saw that
a number of clips of the Pakistani Army chief Asimnair
has been doing the rounds and he seems to be

(28:25):
the new Pakistani Army chief seems to be very interested
in having some sort of role to play on Kashmir,
something that he thinks potentially that the Pakistani civilian government
has not done enough off now. As a result, he
did right before the attack in Pelgramtic took place, he

(28:47):
did say that Kashmir is Pakistan's jugular vein, somehow connecting
Pakistan and Kashmir into one entity and saying, you know,
this is our lifeline and our lifeline, which seemed like
you would think an odd thing to say, but in
the context of what's been going on, perhaps not so odd.
So is it possible to short to answer your question,

(29:09):
ensure that the Pakistani is SI and the army knew
about this. I think it's very possible that the Pakistani
army and the ISI knew about this. Was it directed
by them? We are not sure. We don't have evidence.

Speaker 2 (29:23):
Of that yet. Okay, I've got about a minute and
a half left here, So what now.

Speaker 3 (29:30):
I think that given past trends, we might expect some
form of retaliation from Pakistan. I think that the way
that India conducted these attacks in Pakistan and the Pakistani
side of Kashmir have room for some off ramps. So
no military infrastructure was targeted, for example, which means that

(29:53):
the Pakistani it gives the Pakistani army and the Defense
ministry a chance to say, look, our army was not attacked.
Right now, that said, Pakistan's government has already sort of said, well,
this is an act of war, which means that it's
keeping all its options open at this point in time.

(30:15):
Could it retaliate with a similar sort of air strike
or missile strike on the Indian side. I think the
answer is yes, it could, but if it did, it
would also be met with a retaliatory cycle from India.
So this is kind of that point to us where
I would say it's it really is up to the

(30:37):
Pakistani government. They could choose to take the off ramp
and say, well, we call it a freeze here and
we follow up with other sort of rhetorical as well
as diplomatic action, but we don't take military action. But
the chance of military action is pretty high at the moment.

(30:58):
Not to worry you, but that is.

Speaker 1 (31:00):
I mean, they they shouldn't, right pakistanis I'm not saying
the government, but Pakistani's started it. India retaliated again against
terrorist targets, they say, and it's not possible for Pakistan
to retaliate military to retaliate against India militarily without either

(31:21):
attacking India's military infrastructure, which would be a very bad move,
or attacking Indian civilians, which would be a very bad move.
What else are they going to target, like a shopping
center at night when nobody's in it. What's the point
they if they're smart they're going to take an off ramp,
but emotions are very high, so so we'll see dbactas

(31:42):
from University of Denver. Thank you so much for making
time for us again, especially.

Speaker 2 (31:47):
On short notice. I really appreciate it. We'll we'll keep
in touch as this situation develops.

Speaker 3 (31:53):
Thanks for having me us.

Speaker 2 (31:54):
Very glad too, very glad. All right, So there's that.
I hope you. I hope you found that interesting.

Speaker 1 (31:59):
I don't think you're going to get a lot of
that conversation on a lot of local talk radio, so
I hope you find it worth your time. A listener
mentioned to me yesterday because I had mentioned Kenyon City,
and a listener said, do you know about the Museum
of Colorado Prisons? And I guess it's in the former
women's prison. In our original it is called Women's Correctional Facility.

(32:22):
That was that was built in nineteen thirty five. And
I just wanted to share this with you because a
listener sent it to me and said, it's a cool
thing if you're down in that part of the world,
right a little bit south of Colorado Springs. I guess,
I said Fort Collins yesterday, but a little bit south
of Colorado Springs. This looks pretty neat. And the tourism

(32:42):
website for Canyon City, which is Kenyon City, Colorado dot com.
And for those of you knew to the area, it's
c ano n. There's no why in Canyon. It's not
the it's not the English spelling of the word. It's
c A n O N. And if you were writing
it out you could put a little squad over that first,
and that makes it like an ny sound if you

(33:04):
know you're Spanish, which I really don't anyway. So what
they say, a visit to the Royal Gorge region isn't
complete without stopping and doing time, which is cool in
this historic cell house that was the original women's correctional facility.
Exhibits at the museum cover over one hundred and forty
years of history, depicting prison life from the early territorial

(33:27):
days forward, and what the listener said is basically they've
turned each prison cell into a display about some part
of prison history. Exhibits include office furnishings used by warden
Roy Best, what a great name for a warden? And
documentation on the prison riots of nineteen twenty nine and

(33:49):
nineteen forty seven. Other exhibits feature infamous inmates like Alfred Packer.
That's actually a very famous cannibal, right antone Woods, I
don't know him, a twelve year old convicted of murder,
working and living conditions, punishments, and other assorted topics. All
of the artifacts and exhibits depict lives of inmates and
guards as they lived and worked in the Colorado Prisons.

Speaker 2 (34:12):
So there you go.

Speaker 1 (34:13):
It is the Museum of Colorado Prisons on First Street
in Canyon City. I think I'm going to check that
out the next time I'm in the hood. We'll be
right back. I had mentioned that Kristin and I were
giving some macadamia nuts to a local squirrel who comes
to the window of our house and barks at Kristin
until Kristin puts out some food. And a listener sent

(34:36):
me a thing from some website that said macadamia nuts
are poisonous to squirrels and will cause muscle tremors, and
don't feed macadamia nuts to squirrels. And we had Kristin
on the show yesterday talk about it, and I thought,
what if that website's wrong? And so I did a
little homework this morning and I asked Kristin to come

(34:56):
back on the show so I could go over some
of what I have learned this morning with my lovely bride, Hi,
Kristen Hi.

Speaker 2 (35:05):
So here's what I've got, AI overview of.

Speaker 1 (35:08):
The answer to the question are macadamia nuts bad for squirrels?
And here's what I've got. Macadamia nuts are generally considered
safe for squirrels as a treat. They should be offered sparingly,
sparingly and unsalted. While macadamia nuts are poisonous to dogs,
they are generally not harmful to squirrels. And then there's

(35:31):
another website that says, let's see nuts and seeds for if.

Speaker 2 (35:37):
This is for people who have pet squirrels.

Speaker 1 (35:39):
So maybe we don't want to only give.

Speaker 2 (35:40):
Them nuts and seeds, but two per day.

Speaker 1 (35:44):
Let's see almonds are Almonds are the healthiest, followed by
hazel nuts and macadamia nuts, and.

Speaker 2 (35:53):
Then uh, walnuts, pecans, pistachios, and they say peanuts are
okay too.

Speaker 1 (35:58):
We should look that up because our kid who knows everything,
our kid who thinks he knows everything, has said that
peanuts are bad for squirrels.

Speaker 2 (36:07):
And let's see what this says.

Speaker 1 (36:08):
Squirrels can eat peanuts, but they're not the best choice
for their diet and should be offered in moderation. Walnuts
and acorns are better, and I guess macadamia nuts if
you're bougie and want to feed your you know, might
burn one hundred dollars bills to feed your squirrels. But anyway,
I just wanted you to feel better so that you're
you know, you're not a squirrel killer.

Speaker 2 (36:29):
I'm not coming squirrel size.

Speaker 1 (36:31):
No, you're not, you're not. I haven't seen him this morning.
Did have you seen him as he come to bark
at you yet?

Speaker 4 (36:38):
No?

Speaker 5 (36:39):
I haven't seen him.

Speaker 2 (36:40):
Maybe it's the weather. I do give him a handful,
I give him a lot more than two. Yeah, that's okay.
You know he looks like he's in good shape. He does,
I mean boy at any size, right.

Speaker 1 (36:55):
Exactly right? Anyway, I don't, I don't. I don't need
to keep yet. I just wanted to share that with
you and and let you know that.

Speaker 3 (37:00):
The one thing I didn't sleep at all last I know,
it's up all night feeling terrible about what I've done
to the local squirrel population.

Speaker 1 (37:10):
And Dragon was saying, well at least tomorrow's trash day.
You can pick up the squirrel.

Speaker 2 (37:13):
Bodies and just put them out with the trash.

Speaker 1 (37:16):
But I guess, yeah, but apparently you're you're not a
squirrel killer.

Speaker 2 (37:24):
And I just wanted to let you know that I'm
just going to go to Hell and be tortured by
giant squirrels in humans weather suits. That's really creepy. That
is really really creepy. Thank you, Kristin. You can get
on this your day now, bye, thank you, bye. Oh

(37:44):
my god. All right, so.

Speaker 1 (37:46):
We went to a haunted house. Christian and I went
to a haunted house at least ten years ago, around
ten years ago, and it was, you know, one of
these haunted houses where you got people doing jump scares
and really trying to scare you and such.

Speaker 2 (38:03):
And at the very end, at the very end, there was.

Speaker 1 (38:09):
A guy in a giant rabbit costume holding a chainsaw
who would jump out from behind the wall. And the
chainsaw was on there's no chain on it, but you
have the engine on, so it sounds like a chainsaw.

Speaker 2 (38:22):
And he just he jumped out in front of.

Speaker 1 (38:24):
Us, and Kristin basically screamed in peede in her pants
a little bit, and.

Speaker 2 (38:34):
I thought that was the greatest thing ever.

Speaker 1 (38:36):
And so that's probably why Kristin has this ongoing fear
of rodents and things with nasty sharp teeth like the
Killer Bunny and Monty Python in the Holy Grail. So
there you go. Did you have something to add to
that or no, dragon, No, okay, let me do an
international story. I got a lot of international stuff today.
This is actually a very interesting story. And it broke.

Speaker 2 (38:58):
It actually broke during show yesterday.

Speaker 1 (39:01):
I think Chad, I think Intrepid Chad Bower mentioned it
and then I thought, oh, I should talk about that,
but then I didn't, So I want to talk about
it today.

Speaker 2 (39:09):
So yesterday President Trump announced.

Speaker 1 (39:13):
That the US is gonna stop bombing the hooties in Yemen,
and I'm quoting from Reuters now saying that the Iran
aligned group had agreed to stop interrupting important shipping lanes
in the Middle East. So I'm gonna I'm gonna go
now to the Wall Street Journal's take on this, which
I think is right on target and it's and it

(39:35):
also has the additional benefit of being kind of short
and here. But here's the question to keep in mind.
Apparently the Huthi said they would stop attacking shipping in
the Red Sea and stop attacking American ships. They didn't
apparently say they were going to stop attacking Israel. Actually,
the main airport in Israel was closed for a while
on Sunday because a Huthi rocket landed on a frontage

(39:57):
road next to it, and a lot of airlines say not.

Speaker 2 (40:00):
Taking that chance. They paused or canceled flights for a while.
So what's the US.

Speaker 1 (40:05):
Gonna do if the Hoothies keep attacking Israel? Is the
US gonna do nothing? Is the US gonna just tell
Israel to take care of it? It's a very tricky situation.
Now here's the journal. President Trump declared victory over the Hooties,
Iran's terrorist proxy in Yemen yesterday.

Speaker 2 (40:20):
They've capitulated.

Speaker 1 (40:21):
He said, they say they will not be blowing up
ships anymore, and I will accept their word, and we're
gonna stop the bombing of the Huties.

Speaker 2 (40:28):
Mission accomplished. If the Houthis whose slogan is God.

Speaker 1 (40:32):
Is the greatest, death to America, death to Israel, cursed
be upon the Jews, victory to Islam stop shooting at
US vessels, then yes, that was the objective presented when
the US began began bombing. The White House said a
couple months ago, it's been over a year since the
US flag commercial ship safely sailed through the Suez Canal,
the Red Sea, or the Gulf of Aden. No terrorist

(40:55):
force will stop American commercial and naval vessels for freely
sailing the waterways of the world, and this would satisfy
that criteria.

Speaker 2 (41:02):
Though some senior UTI.

Speaker 1 (41:03):
Officials deny the group will end its Red Sea blockade.
We may learn more when their leader gives us speech tomorrow,
But the real test is when US vessels try to
go through those waters again, and what about chips from
other places. The US does have an interest in preventing
any group of modern day pirates from denying commercial traffic

(41:24):
access to.

Speaker 2 (41:25):
Vital sea lanes.

Speaker 1 (41:26):
Now it appears that this deal was negotiated through Oman,
which is also trying to negotiate between the US and
Iran about these nuclear talks. So we will we will
see credit mister Trump for using sustained force against the
Uties and threatening their weapons suppliers in Tehran. Biden wouldn't
do either, even as the HUTIES tanked Red Seed traffic

(41:49):
raised costs and prices worldwide and fired with impunity at
the US Navy to appease Iran, Biden had taken the
UTIs off the terror list. This story, more than an
anything for me goes to show, goes to highlight how
incredibly terrible and incompetent the Biden foreign policy team was.

(42:10):
In any case, Israel was not expecting this deal. So
we'll have to see how this plays out if the
Huties attack Israel.

Speaker 2 (42:18):
Clearly Israel is going to attack back.

Speaker 1 (42:21):
The question is whether the US will attack the Huties
if the Huties attack Israel, and that remains.

Speaker 2 (42:26):
To be seen.

Speaker 1 (42:27):
Sometimes you want your state or city to be on
a top ten list or top fifty list or top whatever,
and sometimes you don't.

Speaker 2 (42:38):
And this is one where you don't.

Speaker 1 (42:41):
This is from Westward magazine from a few days ago.
Three weeks ago, a disgruntled customer called a particular King
Souper's location in Denver the worst grocery store in America.

Speaker 2 (42:54):
It turns out that customer was pretty.

Speaker 1 (42:56):
Close in actuality. It's the second worst grocery store in America,
according to a new analysis of three thousand grocery stores
across one hundred cities released on Wednesday, April thirtieth. So
I'm gonna give you some of these locations because we

(43:16):
don't like being on this list. So the King Soopers
at eighteen six oh five Green Valley Ranch Boulevard ranked
second on the list of the fifty worst grocery stores
in the entire country, beaten out only by a Safeway

(43:38):
in Washington, DC that nabbed the dishonor of ranking first,
but Denver earned its own first place finish, though Mile
High City has the most low ranking grocery stores of
any city. Wow, six of the fifty worst grocery stores

(43:58):
are located in den And just for fun, I'll tell
you where they are.

Speaker 2 (44:03):
The Safeway at.

Speaker 1 (44:04):
Seven to fifty Seventiast twentieth Avenue that's in seventh place,
the King Supers at thirteen thirty one Spear Boulevard thirteenth place,
the King Supers at twenty eight ten Quebec Street that's
thirty eighth place, the Walmart at fifty one forty one
Chambers Road that's in fortieth place, and the Safeway at
ninety one sixty West Callfax that's in forty eighth place.

(44:25):
And then and then outside of Denver. Three other Colorado
grocery stores also made the bottom fifty, and they are
all in Aurora, so close enough to Denver. A Walmart
at ten thousand, four hundred East Colefax fifteenth place, another
Walmart at fourteen thousand East Exposition that's in twenty eighth place,

(44:47):
and the King Soupers at fifteen one oh nine East
Colefax that's in thirty fourth place.

Speaker 2 (44:53):
There was the Walmart that.

Speaker 1 (44:56):
I mentioned that was in fifteenth place, actually closed in June.
The report concluded Denver has a particularly downer shopping experience. Denver, Colorado,
are Aurora, Colorado, and Irving, Texas have the lowest average
rated grocery stores in the US. This, according to Westward,

(45:18):
is a dismal performance even for Colorado. Last year, only
five grocery stores in the state cracked the fifty worst list,
topping out a third place. By comparison, Colorado has nine
this year.

Speaker 2 (45:34):
Including the second. Worst.

Speaker 1 (45:36):
Rankings are based on Google reviews of grocery stores in
the nation's.

Speaker 2 (45:40):
Most populated cities.

Speaker 1 (45:41):
The study looked at Denver, The Springs, and Aurora, the
three largest cities in Colorado.

Speaker 2 (45:46):
Colorado's worst rated.

Speaker 1 (45:47):
Grocery store that King Soopers on Green Valley Ranch Boulevard
had an average review score of three point four on
Google and one point eight stars on Yelp. The stores
negative reviews largely complain of rude employees, locked away merchandise,
poorly stocked shelves, dirty conditions, and overbearing security officers. Quote

(46:10):
this store has deteriorated into an absolute embarrassment. One review
posted a couple months ago said it feels unsafe and
dystopian at this point, I will never be back. Another
one said this store is a blight on the community. Well,
I do wonder if King Supers and Safe Way and
Walmart will be paying attention to all this and if

(46:31):
they'll do anything about it. The other thing that I
you know, to be fair to these to these companies,
I mean, if you are in a place where you
frequently have people come in who are willing to steal
anything they can.

Speaker 2 (46:44):
Get their hands on, and you're in a business.

Speaker 1 (46:46):
By the way, supermarkets are very very very low margin business.

Speaker 2 (46:50):
Right.

Speaker 1 (46:50):
Supermarket companies do make a lot of money, but they
make a lot of money because they sell a lot
of different things they sell. I mean, they sell a
high volume of things, but normally You're talking about something
like a three percent net margin, and so if somebody
comes in and starts, you know, stealing stuff, especially expensive stuff,
it's very hard for a supermarket to even break even
when that kind of losses are high. And what are

(47:13):
you gonna do. You gotta lock it up. You've got
to have real security guards. It's not the company's fault,
or at least it's not only the company's fault that
these stores have these bad reputations and these bad vibes
about them. It's really the fault of the people who
go to steal the stuff there. And maybe one way

(47:34):
to fix it would be to change the punishment for
people who steal stuff like cut off a finger. I
was talking about these supermarkets around the Denver area. This
this this group basically went and did an analysis, and
it's very it's not like deeply scientific. They went and
looked at Google reviews and then maybe Yelp reviews as well,
but it's basically they looked at Google reviews of supermarkets

(47:58):
in the biggest cities and then just rank them. And
the Denver Aurora area has basically the worst in America,
the most in the fifty worst supermarkets in America, and
I'm not going to go through all that again.

Speaker 2 (48:14):
But what I wanted to.

Speaker 1 (48:16):
Mention today was that I got two different texts listener
texts that were very, very similar, and I thought I
would share them with you because they're interesting. I deliver
beverages to all of these grocery stores, and the employees
hate working there. Their companies don't care about them, so

(48:39):
they don't care about the company or customers.

Speaker 2 (48:43):
Wow. Wow.

Speaker 1 (48:46):
And then another one another listener, I deliver to the
Green Valley King Supers and their management does have an
attitude problem. I am not surprised by this ranking at all. Wow,
how about that? So I don't know.

Speaker 2 (49:06):
Maybe maybe what I should do is.

Speaker 1 (49:09):
A bit of a public service would be the email
management get in touch with management somehow at King Souper's
and say, you know, maybe you you know that you've
shown up on this list here, but I want you
to know what my listeners are saying, like my listeners
who have to who aren't shoppers there, but who do
business with your store, and say, your people at those stores,

(49:32):
for whatever reason, are not very good. So all right,
So that was interesting that that's one of the that's
one of the beautiful things about this job, Like the
people who listen to this can be anywhere doing anything
at any time. And if if I need some input
on I mean, how random is that? Like what's your
experience with the And I didn't ask the question, the

(49:53):
listener volunteered it. But you know, what's your experience with
management at a particular grocery store? And now I got
two people with answers to it regarding the grocery store
that was ranked second worst in America based.

Speaker 2 (50:06):
On this study. I think that's pretty cool, all right.

Speaker 1 (50:09):
So I think it was Chad Bauer, in maybe his
first newscast of the morning, round nine thirty, talked about
this thing that that I want to just mention briefly.

Speaker 2 (50:20):
Briefly.

Speaker 1 (50:20):
New York Post headline Chador Sanders fan suing NFL for
one hundred million dollars over emotional distress of the quarterbacks
draft fail or No, it's fall, but it could be
a fail too, but it's it, says fall. So one
fan claims they have one hundred million reasons to be
upset over Shadour sanders stunning free fall in last month's

(50:43):
NFL draft. A Sanders supporter identified as John Doe, although
I suspect his name is Dan Caples is suing the
league for one hundred million dollars due to by the way,
I don't actually think this is Dan Capless.

Speaker 2 (50:55):
That was a joke. Capitalist is a huge CU fan.

Speaker 1 (50:58):
If you're listening, Dan is suing the league for one
hundred million dollars due to the quote emotional distress and
trauma suffered as a result of the NFL's collusive practices
and the harmful statements made regarding and that's the end
of the quote, but regarding Sanders, who shockingly slid all
the way down to the one hundred and forty fourth

(51:19):
pick by the Browns in the fifth round. According to
court documents that were viewed by The New York Post.
In the court filing submitted last week, the plaintiff who
is not using his name, and I don't think Dan
Caplis would be shy about using his name, So that's
why I think it's not Dan is described as a
dedicated fan of Colorado football and has closely followed Schdor

(51:41):
Sanders throughout the twenty twenty three and twenty twenty four seasons,
and the lawsuit a ledges that quote reports and leaked
statements suggested that Sanders quote tanked interviews, wasn't prepared, and
was two cocky, which contributed to a narrative that has
unjustly harmed his reputation and potential as a player.

Speaker 2 (52:03):
Now, there may actually be some legitimate.

Speaker 1 (52:07):
Points in that lawsuit about kind of how that all
played out and the rumor mill about Sanders, And although
I think he probably did show up in these meetings
to cocky I if I had to guess, if I
had to guess, and he hasn't really denied it. He
actually said I don't have a quote in front of me,
but he said something like, you know, I've learned a
lot from this about maybe how I could do things better.

(52:28):
So I think the rumor mill was saying things that
were true. I do think also, though, that the rumor
mill hurt Sanders and that they're just developed this very
negative vibe about him as just sort of a guy
you don't want to deal with, separate from talent. And

(52:49):
there may also have been a thing about like do
you really want to get Dion Sanders now? Is like
nitpicking at your team from the cheap seats or the
expensive seats, And so I think all that kind of
conspired to bring Shador Sanders down. I do think that again,
the rumor mill, as you might as you might.

Speaker 2 (53:05):
Put it, has something to say about it.

Speaker 1 (53:07):
And the end, the plaintiff is essentially claiming that the
rumor mill was was like these whispers, like a like
a game of telephone among the NFL teams, not even
really so much out in public, but among the NFL teams.
And so he's claiming a violation of the Sherman Anti

(53:28):
Trust Act. And he's alleging, and I'm quoting again, collusion
among NFL teams to influence the drafting process and the
subsequent low selection of Shador Sanders constitutes a conspiracy to
restrain trade and limit competition within the league. So I
think some of the dynamics probably are what this guy

(53:49):
is claiming. But he's got some serious issues here, and
I'm just gonna take it seriously for a second.

Speaker 2 (53:56):
Okay, he's got some serious issues.

Speaker 1 (53:58):
First, I do not think any court will allow somebody
to claim harm from emotional distress and attach a monetary
value to it based on actions by an organization that
the plaintiff has nothing at all to do with.

Speaker 2 (54:19):
He's purely a spectator.

Speaker 1 (54:21):
How can you possibly claim emotional distress from being from
being a spectator in what is a spectator sport? And
I realized the draft isn't the football game, but the
draft is still a spectacle, and you.

Speaker 2 (54:35):
Are a spectator in the spectacle.

Speaker 1 (54:38):
So I don't think this person can get standing. I
don't think he could ever establish any kind of value
at all, much less one hundred million dollars on any
sort of bad feelings he has about it. And to
take it a little bit less seriously, I think it's
an insane waste of time. And whatever judge gets this

(55:02):
first should do two things. Should dismiss the case as
fast as possible, and and and charge the plaintiff the
maximum amount he can.

Speaker 2 (55:17):
Charge the plaintiff.

Speaker 1 (55:19):
In terms of a fee, I don't even mean a
I don't even mean a fine. But if there is
a fine, that would be okay too. But I mean
more of a fee for a use of the court's time.
And there are laws about frivolous lawsuits, and I don't
know how they may play in something like this. If
you're a lawyer and you have a sense of you
know what how frivolous lawsuit might might play out if

(55:41):
if you bring one how that gets handled in court,
then then let me know.

Speaker 2 (55:46):
You know what would be kind of fun, Dragon, Do
you have Dan Kaplis's contact information? I'm sure I can
find it. I think I think I have it. I
think I have it.

Speaker 1 (55:54):
I think it would be fun to try to get
him on the show right now and just kind of
just kind of play around with him a little bit.
I'm gonna see if I can share this information with
you right now, Dragon, and then you see if you can,
if you can get them on the phone, let's see.

Speaker 2 (56:10):
Let's semi professional radio. Stick with me here. Okay, there's
that that all right? I just sent you out, So
let's see if you can find it. I'm gonna do
other things in the meantime, and.

Speaker 1 (56:18):
You see if please see if you can if you
can get our esteemed, our esteemed counselor Dan Caplis. I've
had this story for for a couple of days and
haven't gotten to it. And I'm not I'm not a
celebrity gossip kind of person, and I don't normally even
cover this kind of this kind of story. But I

(56:40):
actually think there's an aspect of it that's that's quite interesting.
So I don't roll your eyes when I say the
name Kim Kardashian, Okay, I don't. I don't care about
the Kardashians. I never watched the show. I don't care
about any of it. But she is a very very
famous person, very rich person, has a lot of followers
and influence and all that.

Speaker 2 (56:59):
A lot of money as well well.

Speaker 1 (57:00):
And you may recall that nine years ago, nine years ago,
she was staying I don't know actually if it was
a fancy hotel or some other kind of building that
was more like an ultra upscale, you know, Airbnb. I
don't know exactly what it was. But she was in
Paris for fashion Week, as a Kardashian would be, I suppose,

(57:26):
and some folks who were dressed I think as police officers,
if I remember the story correctly, but wearing masks, came
in forced somebody in the building or hotel or whatever
to open the door at gunpoint, and then they tied
up Kim Kardashian and threw her in the bathtub, and

(57:48):
then they stole her stuff, and they took about ten
million dollars worth of jewelry, including a four million dollar
diamond engagement ring that Kanye West had given than her
when Kanye West was only a little bit insane, and
Kardashian being Kardashian, when she got this four million dollar

(58:09):
diamond ring, she had been flashing it around on social
media and wherever.

Speaker 2 (58:15):
And you know that's up to her. I don't care
and uh any luck dragon, Uh you do waiting to
hear back? Okay, all right, are you trying by text? Yeah?

Speaker 4 (58:27):
Okay, the best way, Kelly, Kelly gets hold of him.
That way, That the best way. Okay, we'll see what happened.
So so here's the first thing you need to know.
This happened to Kim Kardashian nine years ago. The trial
started last week. You think the American justice system is slow, right?

(58:49):
The trial started last week.

Speaker 1 (58:53):
The other thing, again, if you follow this stuff, if
you follow this stuff at all, you you need to.

Speaker 2 (59:00):
Know that.

Speaker 1 (59:02):
Kim Kardashian is going to testify a week from yesterday
next Tuesday in Paris.

Speaker 2 (59:07):
That is probably going to be.

Speaker 1 (59:08):
The most insane media circus that you can imagine for
in quite a long time. Anyway, So they started the
trial and they've got like ten guys, are nine guys
and a woman. And oh, I should note before I
get further into this, as far as I know, none

(59:29):
of the jewelry has ever been recovered, and it's thought
that all of the precious metal parts of the jewelry
have been melted down, right, gold or whatever, just sold.

Speaker 2 (59:39):
The diamonds, you know, sold however, And there's that. So anyway,
these guys are on trial.

Speaker 1 (59:48):
One of the one of the defendants is dead already,
another one is sick and is going to face trials separately,
I guess. But the first defendant is a a seventy
one year old guy who I guess had a criminal
record in the past petty crime, drug trafficking and then

(01:00:11):
bank robberies. And they're gonna be making excuses for him.
He grew up in Algeria. I'm looking at the BBC.
He had a difficult childhood, partly in Algeria, marked by
the deaths of two of his siblings, spent almost a
third of his life in jail. And this is there's
a couple funny parts about this. He wrote a memoir
entitled I Held Up Kim Kardashian Wow.

Speaker 2 (01:00:34):
And then when he.

Speaker 1 (01:00:35):
Was asked if he had any sympathy for his victims.
He said that he never did before the Kardashian heist,
he said, but this time I do regret what I did.
It opened my eyes and I guess he saw how
sad she was or something, and she felt she felt
bad about it, some crazy thing like that. Now one
of the other people though, I realized this is kind

(01:00:56):
of like TMZ, you know, and not KOA. But there's
another aspect of this story that really jumped out at me.

Speaker 2 (01:01:05):
Listen to this part.

Speaker 1 (01:01:06):
The court also focused on a guy named Gary Madar Madar,
whose brother's company provided transportation and taxis to the Kardashians
for several years. Now thirty five years old, the father
of two, has been accused of feeding information to the

(01:01:29):
gang about Kim Kardashian's location on the night of the heist.

Speaker 2 (01:01:35):
Wow, Wow, how do you? How do you do that
and think you're not gonna get caught.

Speaker 1 (01:01:42):
At the time, Gary worked as a customer service agent
in airports for the transport company. His task was to
welcome VIPs arriving at Paris airports and escort them through passport.

Speaker 2 (01:01:54):
And customs checks.

Speaker 1 (01:01:55):
Through his job, he met the Kardashians several times, but
he also worked at a cafe owned by another defendant,
a guy named Flores Harui fifty two years old, to
whom investigators believe Madar passed on information about Kim Kardashian.
Now he has denied this, but in any case, and
then there's another defendant who supplied the gun, and on

(01:02:17):
and on and on. Anyway, a pretty crazy story, and
it's it's not really the trial of the century. It's
not the OJ Trial or anything. And basically they know
that at least some of these people did it right.
One guy wrote a book saying, I held up Kim Kardashian.

Speaker 2 (01:02:33):
By the way.

Speaker 1 (01:02:34):
He also said, and I don't know, I don't know
if I believe this, and I also don't know if
I care, but he said that he actually had no
idea who she was when he was robbing her. He like,
in terms of her overall fame, he just knew this
is a rich person who I'm told has a lot
of expensive jewelry, didn't know anything about the Kardashians. And
you know, he's like an Algerian, an old guy who's
French Algerian. He might not he might not have known.

(01:02:56):
But in any case, can you imagine separate from all that,
can you imagine nine years to get to trial? Nine
years and you think the American system of justice is slow. Oh,
I want to mention something I had said incorrectly at
the very beginning of the show that Toby Damish, the

(01:03:17):
Douglas County Assessor, is going to be on. I said
at ten thirty, it's actually eleven thirty to talk about
property tax assessments that you'll be getting in the mail soon,
So that will be coming up just about forty minutes
from now. If you have questions about property taxes and
how all this works and what it's looking like this year,
even if you're not in Douglas County, but especially if

(01:03:38):
you are, we'll take some listener questions by text. Then
all right, I've got one more hour with you. We
still have a ton of stuff to do. Keep it
here on KOA producer Dragon was able to get Dan
Kaplis to agree to join us in about ten minutes.
Thank you to all the listeners who texted in saying
you may not be able to get Dan because he's
in court this week.

Speaker 2 (01:03:57):
I think that's kind of cool.

Speaker 1 (01:03:58):
We get so many people listening to us and then
listen to Dan in the afternoon and so but I
guess he's got a break and he's going to be
able to join us for a few minutes, so we're
going to do that.

Speaker 2 (01:04:08):
So I do need to correct. I made an error earlier.

Speaker 1 (01:04:11):
I said that the cardinals who were voting on the
pope will send up the black smoke for no new
pope at the end of the day if they haven't
decided on one.

Speaker 2 (01:04:24):
But that's not right.

Speaker 1 (01:04:25):
They send up the smoke at the end of each vote,
at the end of each vote.

Speaker 2 (01:04:30):
So if they have a vote.

Speaker 1 (01:04:31):
And you don't get and I don't remember, I'm going
to find this for you and share it with you
actually a little bit later in the show, because I
don't recall if you just need and maybe someone can
tell me if you just need a simple majority or
if you need some kind of super majority, like how
many votes, how many cardinal votes do you need to
become pope? But anyway, if nobody gets however many that

(01:04:53):
is on that vote, then they send up the black smoke.
It's not an end of the day thing. So I
said that wrong. Before another thing, a listener. A listener
sent a text before when we were talking about squirrels,
and you know, nuts that would be bad for squirrels
and so on, and a listener sent in a text saying, well,
you know, what kind of nuts would be poisonous for raccoons?

(01:05:16):
And raccoons can be quite annoying if you get them
around your house going through your trash. They get used
to it. They're they're they're not really very nice animals.

Speaker 2 (01:05:24):
Well, apparently it's the listener yesterday. They love oreos, and
they love oreos. That's true, and.

Speaker 1 (01:05:28):
That's you know, that doesn't exactly say a lot of
good things about the character of of of raccoons.

Speaker 2 (01:05:35):
You don't care for organ No, no, I mean.

Speaker 1 (01:05:37):
The double stuff is all right, but it's only because
there's double the stuff.

Speaker 2 (01:05:40):
So uh.

Speaker 1 (01:05:41):
Anyway, the listener said, what kind of nuts would be
poisonous or it would be harmful? Harmful was the word
he or she used to raccoons, And I said, and
I said, one's laced with poison, right, And then the
listener texted back and and said what kind of poison?
And I said blue cheese. So I think that's the answer.

(01:06:04):
I think if you want to kill raccoons, feed them
nuts with blue cheese on them.

Speaker 2 (01:06:08):
Dragon.

Speaker 1 (01:06:08):
Our friend, our friend Kelly from the Egypt trip says
that to be the next pope you need two thirds
of the votes. So thank you, Kelly, Thank you Kelly.
All right, let me do another thing. This just changed
gears for a minute.

Speaker 2 (01:06:20):
And then in the next segment with Fagos courding plan,
we'll have we'll have capitalist.

Speaker 4 (01:06:25):
What I got stuck on something you said, Yeah, okay,
it reminded me about the double stuff Oreos.

Speaker 2 (01:06:29):
Yeah, you said they've got double the stuff. Yeah. No, Now,
actually don't have double the stuff. How much more stuff?
They have fifty percent more or.

Speaker 4 (01:06:37):
I don't have the full study in front of you,
but it.

Speaker 2 (01:06:38):
Was less than double.

Speaker 4 (01:06:39):
It was a high school math class. They have one
point eight times the filling. Wow, yeah, it's not double
the stuff. Now what about the mega.

Speaker 1 (01:06:47):
Isn't there a mega that's got like more than a
double stuff?

Speaker 2 (01:06:51):
And if that's right, I wonder how many? And that
does seem a little bit fraudy, doesn't it.

Speaker 4 (01:06:56):
You know, double the stuff double double.

Speaker 1 (01:06:59):
I mean it's better that you know it's eighty percent
better instead of one hundred percent better. But that does
seem a little fraudy, which isn't a word but I
like it.

Speaker 4 (01:07:06):
This was a high school math class doing the experiments.

Speaker 2 (01:07:09):
Oh, I believe it. Then, I believe it.

Speaker 5 (01:07:11):
Right.

Speaker 1 (01:07:12):
So yesterday I spent a few minutes with you talking
about an interesting issue coming out of the federal government,
where I said, I didn't realize this was already federal law.
I'm glad it's already federal law, and I'm glad they're
going to start enforcing it again. And that was a
thing about how if enough of a college's graduates go

(01:07:37):
delinquent on their student loans, the federal government can then
refuse to give student loans to people who want to
go to that college because they have good reason to
believe that taxpayers are going to get stuck with that bill.
So that was already in law, hadn't been enforced for
a while. The Trump administration is resuscitating it, and I'm

(01:07:59):
really glad about that. Now I have another story that
is similar, uh, and I want to share this with
you because this is one of those worlds I know
nothing about.

Speaker 2 (01:08:08):
And I'm talking about trucking.

Speaker 1 (01:08:10):
Okay, I do not know anything about being a professional
truck driver, but this story was very interesting to me,
so I'm sure it wouldn't surprise you to know that
there are lots of truck drivers in America who are
from Mexico, Central America, maybe South America, but mostly I

(01:08:31):
would say probably Mexico and Central America who are driving
around this country. I'm not saying they're illegal aliens. I'm
not talking about immigration status. Okay, that's not what I'm
getting at here. But but there're folks who don't speak
English very well, and you know, I guess if something happens,
if they get an accident, if you know, maybe if

(01:08:52):
they speak English little or not at all, they'd have
a hard time talking with police officers. Just as an example,
I did not know that there was already in federal
law a provision for truck drivers that has not been enforced,
at least not for a long time, and I don't

(01:09:14):
know if they've ever really enforced it. That says, and
I'm quoting this is from federal law, as written in
an executive order by President Trump a couple of days ago.
A driver must quote, read and speak the English language
sufficiently to converse with the general public, to understand highway

(01:09:37):
traffic signs and signals in the English language, to respond
to official inquiries and to make entries on reports and records.
Now I'm reading from the executive order from Donald Trump.
Yet this requirement has not been enforced in years, and America's.

Speaker 2 (01:09:55):
Roadways have become less sinfe.

Speaker 1 (01:09:57):
My administration will enforce the law law to protect the
safety of American truckers, drivers, passengers, and others, including buy
upholding the safety enforcement regulations that ensure that anyone behind
the wheel of a commercial vehicle is properly qualified and
proficient in our national language English. Now, I don't think
Trump is actually doing this as a safety measure.

Speaker 2 (01:10:19):
I think he is doing this as part of his overall.

Speaker 1 (01:10:23):
Appeal to the most conservative part of his base. He'd,
you know, some of the stuff he's doing with the
transgender his proclamation of English as the national language. Although
the implementation of that was actually pretty moderate. It wasn't
it wasn't what I would call extreme, It was very reasonable.
But in any case, what this order says is he's
ordering the Secretary of Transportation and some other folks in

(01:10:46):
the federal government to rescind a document that was put
out in the Obama during the Obama administration in twenty
sixteen that essentially stopped the enforcement of this provision of law.
And there's an organization out there called the CVSA, the
Commercial Vehicle Safety Alliance, and this is it's not a

(01:11:07):
governmental group, but it's kind of a group that coordinates
regulations and qualifications and stuff like that for the whole
trucking industry.

Speaker 2 (01:11:15):
At least that's how I understand it. You can text
me if I have it, if I have it wrong.

Speaker 1 (01:11:20):
But what they are saying is that starting June twenty fifth,
the quote out of service criteria, meaning things that can
happen that will cause you to not be able to
be a driver anymore, will include.

Speaker 2 (01:11:36):
If a.

Speaker 1 (01:11:38):
If an assessment of the driver cannot demonstrate proficiency in
reading and speaking English. That's supposed to start June twenty fifth.
So on the one hand, I'll say, I get it,
and it's interesting that was already federal law, and it's
interesting that it hasn't been enforced in almost ten years.

Speaker 2 (01:11:54):
I get.

Speaker 1 (01:11:54):
But the other thing to keep in mind is there's
a shortage of truck drivers, and if doing this eliminate
it's a significant number of truck drivers, you can end
up with a situation with even more of a shortage
of truck drivers and that could lead to higher prices,
and then whoever they are, we'll have to decide whether
it's worth it. We'll be right back with Dan Kaplus
if all goes according to plan, I'm going to play
a little Sherlock Holmes here. And first of all, Dan,

(01:12:17):
this is kind of a funny thing I mentioned on
the air, Gosh, I'd like to have Dan on the
show today, and a bunch of listeners texted in to
me saying, Dan's in trial this week.

Speaker 2 (01:12:26):
Wow.

Speaker 5 (01:12:27):
Yeah, it is so cool, and I appreciate your mentioning
that I am in trial this week. And then what
happened I've never had this happen ross in forty years.
Is there was an illness on the jury and so
the trial ended right in the middle because of not
having enough jurors. So very strange. Wow, yes, that you
got me at just the right time. It's grateful to

(01:12:49):
be on.

Speaker 1 (01:12:49):
Do we wait for that juror to get healthy again,
or do you start over or replace the juror or
what happens?

Speaker 5 (01:12:55):
What a great question. Yet that the judge did it
just right. He actually got the sick juror on the
speakers in the courtroom, brought them up so everybody could
hear him, and a depth per juror was just sick
as a dog, and his whole family was sick, some
kind of stomach bug. And so yeah, now at that
point the court could not wait, and yeah, the trial

(01:13:18):
just had to be ended. So very frustrating. But we
get to go back on July seventh. So we're just
getting sitting here talking about the retrials.

Speaker 2 (01:13:26):
So there isn't an alternate to replace that.

Speaker 5 (01:13:28):
Juror with yeah, you know, there normally is in this case,
and I don't want to bor you with the details
you want him In this case, there was a technical
legal reason why there wasn't.

Speaker 2 (01:13:39):
Wow.

Speaker 5 (01:13:40):
Wow, But then the parties, the parties can agree to
proceed with five. So I've been in a bunch of
trials over the years where Sybil, you have to have six,
as you know, criminal felony twelve. So I've got a
bunch of trials over the years where for whatever reason,
it got down to five jurors, and in every other case,
the defense had agreed to go forward with five. In

(01:14:00):
this case, the defendant did not agree to go forward
with five. And so wow, I think they believed we
were winning. We believed we were winning, and it was
just unfortunate. But well we'll get them in July.

Speaker 2 (01:14:12):
Yeah, you will, you will.

Speaker 1 (01:14:14):
It does sound like they thought you were winning, or
they would have said yes to go ahead with five.

Speaker 2 (01:14:17):
Okay, so kept going there. Yeah, all right.

Speaker 1 (01:14:20):
I'm gonna be a bit of a Sherlock Holmes here.
I have a theory and something confuses me a little bit.
So I know, I know you as one of the
biggest University of Colorado Buffalo's football in particular fans that
there is, right, you think that's fair?

Speaker 2 (01:14:37):
Is that a fair characterization? Well I am the biggest, right, Okay,
the biggest cat. Okay, got it.

Speaker 1 (01:14:43):
So I'm sure you know about this lawsuit that was
filed against the NFL for one hundred million dollars over
emotional distress and trauma as a fan and consumer. That's
in the lawsuit regarding what the plaintiff is arguing as
a violation of the Sherman Anti Trust Act.

Speaker 2 (01:15:02):
And his claim is.

Speaker 1 (01:15:03):
That the football organizations basically shared negative rumors amongst each
other about Shudor Sanders and caused him to plummet in
the draft. Now, the lawsuit is filed by a John Doe.
And here's what I'm confused by. I have never known
you to be shy, and I want to know why

(01:15:26):
you didn't just use your name.

Speaker 5 (01:15:31):
You are a funny guy. No, and Russ, nobody should
be allowed in that setting to file a John Doe lawsuit.
I mean, if you've got a kid as a planner
for something else, but if you're not willing to put
your name on the lawsuit, it's probably not a good lawsuit.

Speaker 2 (01:15:47):
So first, let's do this real quick. I literally have
two minutes.

Speaker 1 (01:15:51):
Is it even theoretically possible that somebody could get.

Speaker 2 (01:15:53):
Standing in a situation like that?

Speaker 5 (01:15:56):
No, and it makes all of us look so bad
cases serious cases, is completely frivolous. It makes a mockery
of the system.

Speaker 2 (01:16:04):
I agree. I'm not a lawyer, but I agree.

Speaker 1 (01:16:06):
So the actual question that I wanted to ask you, then,
is what are the options for the first judge who
catches this case? Assuming the judge believes as you and
I do, that it is obviously frivolous, what can that
judge do to the plaintiff?

Speaker 2 (01:16:26):
Not just throw the case out?

Speaker 1 (01:16:27):
But can the judge find Kenny any penalty in Colorado?

Speaker 2 (01:16:33):
Yes?

Speaker 5 (01:16:33):
Yes, And that plaintiff, and I hate to even use
the term right that plaintiff should be hammered, should be hammered.
The judge can hammer the plaintiff for attorney fees if
the defendant has had to incur any but beyond the
attorney fees and cost incurred by the defendant. I'm not
aware of any other kind of penalty the court can inflict.

Speaker 2 (01:16:56):
On the planiff.

Speaker 5 (01:16:57):
But in this case, I hope they find a way.

Speaker 2 (01:17:00):
I do too.

Speaker 1 (01:17:01):
There might not be a way, and I understand why
there might not be away because you might not want
to get in a situation where judges start penalizing people
who annoy them or something like that. But this is
just so so outrageous. And I understand why you didn't
put your name on it, Dan, I do.

Speaker 5 (01:17:18):
There, but it hurts me because there are so many
plaintiffs with a legitimate claim. Obviously this is horrific. So
I do hope that Planeff gets hammered and has to
pay a lot. And we know, right the defendant's going
to have to file an answer because it will incurse
some attorney fees and cost. And then in this case
that that plane if should have to pay.

Speaker 1 (01:17:37):
Those and do you think that Shadoor Sanders will have
a decent professional career.

Speaker 5 (01:17:46):
If he wants to. I think he's enormously talented. And
if he wants to be a great NFL quarterback and
put in the work and take to physical abuse, he
will be tremendous. But he's a very smart, talented young guy.
He's already made a lot of money.

Speaker 2 (01:18:02):
He decides he doesn't.

Speaker 5 (01:18:03):
Want to really be in that meat grinder and wants
to go make his riches in business or entertainment. You know,
he won't be a great NFL quarterback, but it'll be
a great something else.

Speaker 1 (01:18:13):
That's a good answer. I wonder what his dad would
have to say about that. Seriously, I wonder what his
dad would have to say about about that.

Speaker 2 (01:18:19):
I do too, I do too well.

Speaker 1 (01:18:21):
If anyone, if dad, if anyone has an inn to
talk to Prime is probably you.

Speaker 2 (01:18:26):
So if you find wish I did, but not. I'm
a big fan of.

Speaker 5 (01:18:30):
His, but I do not know the man.

Speaker 1 (01:18:32):
Dan Kaplis is on our sister station KHOW weekday afternoons
from four pm to six pm.

Speaker 2 (01:18:39):
Thanks for being a.

Speaker 1 (01:18:40):
Good sport and making yourself available on short notice.

Speaker 2 (01:18:43):
Dan, Thank you My friend. Appreciate it all right. When
we come back, we'll take questions from.

Speaker 1 (01:18:48):
You if you'll want. For my next guest, Toby Damish
is the is it is it long A or the short?

Speaker 3 (01:18:55):
Ay?

Speaker 2 (01:18:56):
Is it Damash? Damash?

Speaker 1 (01:18:58):
Sorry, I just I'm just you to Toby, and I
never even think about the last name. So Toby's the
Douglas County assessor, and we're gonna have property valuations coming
out in your mail for your property taxes and so on.
We know how much pain there was the last time around.
It's gonna be a lot better on average, at least
this time. And so we're gonna get some information and
answer questions. So if you've got questions about property taxes,

(01:19:21):
even if you don't live in doug Co, write something
that any assessor might be able to address. Text those
questions to five six six nine zero. We'll talk with
Toby right after this. My next guest, Jul joins me
in studio. It's pretty fabulous. Is way more popular than
he was two years ago. Assessor Toby Damash is the ARAPO.

(01:19:43):
I'm sorry, Douglas County, I said a rappo because I
live in Rapa is the Douglas county assessor. And he's
the dude who has to deal with property valuations for
purposes of property tax assessments. And before we talk about
what's going on right now, just very a brief retrospective.

Speaker 2 (01:20:01):
What was it like for you two years ago?

Speaker 6 (01:20:03):
It was a nightmare. It was as much of a
nightmare for the property owners who have to, you know,
who had to deal with their increased values. As you know,
this is for our staff. We had in Douglas County
one out of every four proper homeowners filed an appeal.
That is ten times the average. It was absolutely out
of control. And but we understood that we really average

(01:20:25):
value up forty percent or something. We were forty eight
percent in Douggas County, Oh my gosh, you know across
the front range thirty fifty sixty percent. Yeah, the mountain
communities were eighty ninety percent.

Speaker 1 (01:20:35):
Dude, I had to sell my house because the property
tax Increasedood, I sold my house and I moved.

Speaker 2 (01:20:39):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (01:20:41):
So, and what percentage of those people who filed the
the appeals? Is that the right word? Yeah, got a
reduction in property taxes.

Speaker 6 (01:20:53):
I don't know statewide nor front range ride, but in
Douglas County through the three different levels of appeal, because
it's not just one, it's three. We adjusted almost exactly
fifty percent of the homeowners who filed an appeal.

Speaker 2 (01:21:05):
Oh and that was a record high for us.

Speaker 1 (01:21:07):
Yeah.

Speaker 6 (01:21:08):
Usually we're a little lower number, thirty forty somewhere in there.
That's already high, pretty high. Yeah, so it was incredible.
We if we found a reason to adjust, we did
it because we understood the extreme natures.

Speaker 2 (01:21:20):
Okay, I'm going to come back to that in one second.

Speaker 1 (01:21:23):
So most people, if they're going to appeal, they do
the first level of appeal. And most people, I think,
whether or not they win, probably even if they don't win,
maybe don't do the next steps because they're harder and
they're more involved.

Speaker 6 (01:21:38):
It's correct, it's more involved, it's more work. You've got
to put that first level. You really don't have to
put much effort and be honest, so return a post
guard to go online, clicks to your appeal CBUE level
second level, maybe ten percent continue on.

Speaker 1 (01:21:50):
And of the people who continue on, which means they
didn't get what they wanted the first time around. What
percentage of the people who go through those two steps
do get a reduction?

Speaker 2 (01:22:01):
Did get a reduction?

Speaker 6 (01:22:02):
This question all the time, and I generally tell people
one third to one half at each level, get an
adjustment one third to one half, right, So it's worth
it for a lot of people to do that.

Speaker 1 (01:22:12):
Yeah, Okay, gosh, you said something else a moment ago
that I wanted to respond to, but I don't remember
what it was. So this year now, So last year
the average of forty eight percent in Douglas County. Yeah,
what's it looking like this year for the average change
in residential property value?

Speaker 6 (01:22:29):
Yeah, so the Douglas County average change is actually down
three and a half percent. But I think the bigger
headline is this values are flat in the metro area
and across the front range, the vast majority of homeowners
are seeing a negative ten to a positive ten value
change cenator around zero. So whether you're in Douglas, a
rapa Hoe, Adams, Denver, we're all seeing flat value changes.

(01:22:55):
And the difference really is what neighborhood you're in. And
you've got some neighborhoods where there's been more man than others.
I heard Keith at Denver talk about Cherry Creek, both
commercial on residential the other day went up. Yeah, and
so there's a lot of demand happening in Cherry Creek.
So if you look at any county and you get
to dig into the neighborhoods, we got slightly different answers
at the neighborhood level, but everything is really close to zero.

(01:23:17):
You get out of the metro area, you get into
the resort communities, You've got listeners statewide, right, So you
get in those resort communities and they're giving us some
different answers. They're up, they're still going up, positive double ditch.
It's positive ten, positive twenty, and so a different answer
for some of those communities.

Speaker 2 (01:23:33):
I'm not an expert on on doug Co.

Speaker 1 (01:23:36):
I've thought of doug Co as more, especially lately, kind
of suburban kinds of communities. But I'm sure there's some
rural in Dougco two, a lot of rural, Okay, I
guess toward the south, towards the south side of doug Coe.
So is there is there a difference that you can
generalize about regarding changes in valuation, again for residential property

(01:23:59):
in the Highlands, ranch, loan tree, suburban parts versus the
southern parts of the county that are more rural or
were they kind of.

Speaker 6 (01:24:07):
Similar, very similar. Actually, I think there's still, you know,
because of the affordability issue. I mean, you know, and
we've talked a lot about the fact the cost of
home ownership in Colorado is about the highest in the country,
and it's the highest on record in the state of Colorado.
You put everything that it costs to own and manage
a house together, is extraordinarily expensive, which means lower price

(01:24:29):
neighborhoods are stable and doing better. So if there's a
kindo for sale, they're selling fast. You get into a
three million dollar rural property, it doesn't sell in a week,
get on the market longer, so there's a different buyer
seller dynamic happening. But in terms of pricing, they're still
relatively close. We didn't see huge price collapses. We didn't

(01:24:50):
see any subgroup of properties go way up in the
suburban markets.

Speaker 2 (01:24:54):
And that's true.

Speaker 6 (01:24:55):
Rappa Hoo, Adams, Jeff co a lot of similar experience
in those differ Okay, I've got.

Speaker 1 (01:25:01):
A bunch of listener questions and I think I'll probably
start plowing through these rather than come with more of
my own. If you have a question for Toby Damash,
who is the Douglas County assessor, and it you know,
obviously he'll know more about Douglas County, but the behavior,
the trends, what's going on in most of these counties

(01:25:22):
right around Denver are going to be pretty similar.

Speaker 2 (01:25:25):
So even if you're not.

Speaker 1 (01:25:26):
In doug Coe, you can send a question if you
have one. One listener who was paying close attention remembered
what it was you said that I wanted to respond to. Okay,
you said, if we saw a reason to lower someone's
property taxes when they did appeals last time around, we did,
And I wanted to give you a moment to elaborate
on this a little bit because I actually frequently came

(01:25:50):
to the defense of assessor's offices last time around when
a lot of people were saying they're just the government
and they want all our money. And I said, well,
I get that, but actually the assessor's office, first.

Speaker 2 (01:26:04):
Of all, they don't get your money, no.

Speaker 1 (01:26:06):
And second of all, these are like normal people with
their own homes as well.

Speaker 2 (01:26:12):
They understand what we're going through.

Speaker 1 (01:26:14):
And I said on the air, but this it was
speculation on my part, not knowledge that I think they
want to help us. Can you just talk a little
bit about that, and then we'll go through some listener question.

Speaker 6 (01:26:26):
Yes, first two things, we are very aware of your
engagement in this topic. I don't think there's any other
radio show in the state of Colorado that's been so
engaged on this. And it was a big issue for
two straight years, and we're all paying for it. I mean,
taxes went up, our values went up in twenty three
fifty percent. Well, taxes went up thirty percent. They didn't
fix anything. Man, it's a problem, right, it and it

(01:26:49):
increased this issue of cost of home ownership. Homeownership, homeowner
interest rates are up, insurance is up, all of that's up.
So's it's painful for all of us. So we're all homeowners, right,
and my staff are all homeowners. Two thirds of them
are real estate appraisers. They all own a home, some
of them in Douglas County, some of them in a
rapo and so on. So they feel this pain like

(01:27:11):
everyone else. The staff in our offices receive no benefit.
In fact, it's much harder and much worse to deny
these appeals, and it's much easier to adjust them.

Speaker 2 (01:27:23):
We had.

Speaker 1 (01:27:23):
There's like if you deny it. Do you then have
to be a witness at the c at the next level. Yeah,
we've had work for ourselves, so it's much easier in
many ways to go ahead and adjust it. In twenty
twenty two, there was broad acknowledgment that this was really
a crisis. This is a very serious situation. Property taxes
should not go up thirty percent one year. They should
never happen ever anywhere in the world, you know, but

(01:27:45):
we let it happen here, and so there is a
vast awareness of that staff are paying taxes. So there's
a lot of sympathy. So we're looking for what is
it about this appeal that we receive that we can
use the hook?

Speaker 2 (01:28:00):
What's the justification?

Speaker 6 (01:28:01):
And if we if we were given one, or we
found one, then we'd use it.

Speaker 1 (01:28:06):
What made you believe or know or whatever that I
have been actively involved in this issue? I mean, it's true.

Speaker 2 (01:28:13):
But how do you listener? Okay, so I've got I've
got Koa.

Speaker 6 (01:28:17):
On playing on my office and annoys my staff because
Koa is always blasting.

Speaker 2 (01:28:22):
So that's how I know. That's how you do all.

Speaker 1 (01:28:24):
Right, Let's see, I got a lot of listener questions
I'm just going to go actually one.

Speaker 2 (01:28:27):
More of my own.

Speaker 1 (01:28:29):
Any important difference in assessment valuation trends between residential and commercial.

Speaker 6 (01:28:37):
Yeah, well, I think the headline is that the commercial
is pretty flat too. So that's interesting because usually they're different,
all right, Locations are usually different, counties are usually different.
This is this is unusual. This is because everything feels
the same. But there are exceptions. I mentioned Cherry Creek
that's a standout as a neighborhood goes residential and commercial.
And Douglas County we reduced our big office building significantly

(01:28:58):
because we have because of the work from home trend
and other things going on in the office space. You've
talked about them in the radio. We've had some discounted
sales of large office spaces in the South Tech Center,
so we responded to that by reducing our large office
building value significantly.

Speaker 1 (01:29:14):
I'll give you a little story for people who are
driving on I twenty five near Spear on the west
side of the highway, there's a big complex I think
it's four buildings, kind of towards the Highlands neighborhood called
Diamond Hill, and you can see it from the highway
and there are four sort of old buildings. I own
a fraction of a percent of that from an investment
I made probably twenty years ago, no more than that,

(01:29:36):
twenty five before I lived in Colorado, and recently the
company that's been managing it says the value of that
property now is probablyst somewhere close to zero because there's
so little demand for office space that probably all that
is going to be done with that property is to
knock those buildings down and.

Speaker 2 (01:29:55):
Use that land for something else.

Speaker 6 (01:29:56):
Absolutely, that's not just one example happening in Douglas County.
We've got a property that was a trophy office punning property.
I don't name which one that was acquired, and they're
going to tear it down or redevelopment. I'm going one
hundred and twenty thousand square foot building that's only twenty
years old and it's going to be gone. That's an
interesting situation.

Speaker 1 (01:30:15):
All right.

Speaker 2 (01:30:16):
We'll go through questions as quickly as we can. Here.

Speaker 1 (01:30:17):
I'm going to paraphrase this one because it's long. This
listener has six rental properties. Five of them the assessment
were flattered down in the sixth to one. The property tripled.
It's a plain house, but mixed use, and the main
floor is commercial, the basement is residential rental. Was there
any change in law that could have changed that, like

(01:30:38):
having the commercial part suddenly be worth a lot more
or something.

Speaker 6 (01:30:42):
I would call your assessor, whether that's us or another one,
immediately and ask what happened, because there's something going on
with that property that they changed in the record, might
have changed the use breakdown or apportionment of use. You
know that the non residential rates are four times residential rates.
So if as an assessor viewed that and said, wait
a minute, this isn't half commercial, it's eighty percent commercial,

(01:31:05):
that's what might make that happen.

Speaker 1 (01:31:06):
Right, Or if it was if it was categorized as
all residential and then they made half of it commercial, Yes, right,
that could I would have done it. That could be
a ross. I'm in a Rappo county. At the bottom
of the postcard it says seniors over sixty five and
living in a house for ten years can qualify for
a property tax exemption. What can you tell us about this?
I'm sure not just a county thing.

Speaker 6 (01:31:28):
This must be a state there, a statewide thing has
called the senior property tax exemption and It astonishes me
that not everyone's taking advantage of this. If you're sixty
five year older, you own and live in the home
for ten years, you get one hundred thousand dollars of
value cut off before the tax is calculated.

Speaker 2 (01:31:42):
But it's not automatic. You have to apply for. You
have to apply for.

Speaker 6 (01:31:44):
You have to apply because we don't know right, we
don't know ages of everyone. So every county assessor has
an application. You apply with your county assessor and then
you can do that via email, in person, online. They're
going to process the application. And if you're wondering, well,
what happened to those tax dollars, the State of Colorado
reimburses the local authorities who lose funds from that god

(01:32:06):
so that is funded through the State of Colorado budget.

Speaker 1 (01:32:09):
We're talking with Toby Damash, who is the assessor for
Douglas County.

Speaker 2 (01:32:13):
I'm just going through some listener questions.

Speaker 1 (01:32:15):
If my tax assessment drops twenty three percent, does that
mean my property tax bill will go down by twenty
three percent?

Speaker 2 (01:32:22):
I hope so.

Speaker 6 (01:32:23):
But you mentioned law changes to law, and since Gallagher
was repealed, you've spoken about the Gallagher Amendment. It was
repealed in twenty twenty. You remember that, And in the
past four years we've had major proper tax legislation every
year and that has made to the question that has
made tax calculation of tax is really difficult because the

(01:32:44):
law has gotten really complicated. So we can't even give
people an estimated tax now. So what's going to happen
is the tax rates, the mill levies are going to
be determined this fall and will know what the final
tax bills are later in the year. So if your
value is flat, we hope that your taxes will be flat,
but we won't know it.

Speaker 2 (01:33:01):
To the end of the year.

Speaker 1 (01:33:01):
Unfortunately, I have a manufactured home on a foundation. The
zoning for the area was changed and the new valuation
went up a lot. Is it possible for a thirty
year old building to have a big jump like this
because of a zoning change.

Speaker 6 (01:33:15):
This is a great question. I don't know if it's
about this. First of all, zoning change can cause a
big jump because if you go from a low density
use to a high density use, that increases the value.

Speaker 2 (01:33:24):
Automatic.

Speaker 1 (01:33:25):
Yes, so I think they went from mixed use to residential.

Speaker 6 (01:33:28):
Well, that means their taxes should go down. So there's
two things there. But let me say this, you're asking
about anomalies manufactured housing in the state of Colorado. Values
have exploded, but it's the values of the park and
the values of the home. The prices in the past
fee they continue to go up. They went up fifty
percent in the last three appraisal. They're going on fifty
percent again. So it's one of the anomaly. Wow and outliers. Yes,

(01:33:49):
So owners of manufacturer homes are going to notice big
differences this year.

Speaker 1 (01:33:53):
If I want to protest the assessment, what's the time
period for comparable sales? And how many comfortable sales should
I have?

Speaker 6 (01:34:00):
So first get your appeal in before June eighth. That's
the most important thing because that's the deadline of file
and appeal. The study period for providing comps is July
one of twenty twenty two through June thirty, twenty twenty four.
So the two year period since the last three appraisal
again July twenty two through June and twenty four. Do

(01:34:21):
not give us sales after June thirty of twenty four,
we can't use them.

Speaker 2 (01:34:28):
What should you include?

Speaker 1 (01:34:29):
What information should you include about your home that the
assessor might not know?

Speaker 6 (01:34:35):
Well, you answered the question answers itself tell us what
we don't know. Yeah, and we don't get into houses.
We don't want to be inside people's houses. So what's
going on inside your house? Do you have major condition issues?
Is there a bunch of stuff that's not broken? We
had a lot of growth here throughout the front range
of the nineties, and a lot of those homes have
been updated. A lot of them haven't.

Speaker 3 (01:34:54):
Right.

Speaker 1 (01:34:54):
We get a lot of homes in the nineties that
have never been touched. Right, bought I told you about
the house I bought. Yeah, it was built in nineteen
seventy five and never updated.

Speaker 2 (01:35:02):
Yeah.

Speaker 6 (01:35:02):
See, so we need to know that that you can.

Speaker 1 (01:35:04):
So what you send in pictures not just a statement,
but sending pictures like this thing is a bad condition
and therefore shouldn't be valued this high. It's one less
per square for you're a neighboring out. We can't do
anything without pictures. This statement tells us what's going on,
But give us photographs.

Speaker 2 (01:35:19):
Okay.

Speaker 1 (01:35:20):
Do disabled veterans have any better chance at reducing property taxes?

Speaker 2 (01:35:23):
Or do there anything.

Speaker 1 (01:35:24):
Else for disabled veterans in this We when we review
an appeal We're not looking at names or ownership, We're
just looking at the real estate.

Speaker 6 (01:35:33):
But there is an exemption identical to the senior exemption
or disabled veterans. So if you're a disabled vet, contact
your local assessor, go to the website or call them
and ask them if you qualify for the disabled Veteran exemption,
which is the same as the senior one hundred thousand
dollars off the top of the value.

Speaker 2 (01:35:50):
If you're a.

Speaker 1 (01:35:50):
Disabled veterans senior, do you get both and you don't
know the other one or the other? Is there anything
else you want to add for listeners as far as
recommendations to give the best chance of set on appeal.

Speaker 2 (01:36:00):
Well, I think we talked about it.

Speaker 6 (01:36:01):
Tell us what we wouldn't know about, and sometimes you know,
I like to say, you are the expert in your
neighborhood and we are using the sales from your neighborhood
to value your home. So is there something that that
when we sent your notice and you look at value
and you're not liking it or doesn't make sense to you,
is there something about the sales that occurred in your

(01:36:22):
immediate area that we might not know about, And sometimes
that can help us. Actually, I remember a story you
told I think a couple of years ago, because you
had appealed your property for remember correctly, Ross, and did
you find one of the comps that the assessor used
had some story issue with it, a sale between family
members or something like that. We don't know all those stories,

(01:36:43):
and so that can help us if we're like, the
best comp is one look at the father sold to
the son.

Speaker 2 (01:36:48):
That's why it's it was crazy.

Speaker 1 (01:36:49):
And we only have about a minute here, but I'll
just so it was. It was a family that came
from an older couple that came in from California that
wanted to buy a house near their grandkids, and they
had missed two houses they and they were very rich
and they didn't care. So they went to my neighbor
who had her house for sale, and said, we'll pay
you in cash a million over your asking price.

Speaker 2 (01:37:11):
And they did. And that was in the comps.

Speaker 1 (01:37:14):
And actually the assessor of the staffer said to me,
I never.

Speaker 2 (01:37:20):
Thought this should be in the comps. There you go.

Speaker 1 (01:37:22):
But you know what was also really interesting. I said, well,
what take it out for everybody? And he said, I can't.
That part's done. I'll take it out for everybody who
appeals who has that in their comps, because it shouldn't
have been in there. But I can't go back and
take it out for everybody. He's correct.

Speaker 6 (01:37:36):
We can't go in there and in him fix two
hundred values that I already went out, unless there is
some sort of systemic error, like we really messed up
a neighborhood and this in Douglas County.

Speaker 2 (01:37:47):
We did this.

Speaker 6 (01:37:47):
There's a neighborhood caught inspiration which you might know I do,
And we went in there and we saw a high
appeal rate when we started reviewing appeals.

Speaker 2 (01:37:56):
Is how high adjustment?

Speaker 4 (01:37:57):
Right?

Speaker 6 (01:37:57):
We went in there and adjusted the whole neighborhood in
twenty twenty three. So that does happen from time to time.

Speaker 1 (01:38:01):
As far as the ten year thing for seniors, Yeah,
does it start? Does the ten years start on the
day you close on the property?

Speaker 2 (01:38:08):
Correct? Yeah?

Speaker 1 (01:38:08):
Okay, all right, we're out of time. But I did
I put anything in your head that you want to
make sure to say to listeners before we go. Yeah,
before you decide to an appeal, just look at the value.
Ask ask this question, could you have sold your house
for that amount in juneo, twenty four, because that's a
question we're going to be asking. Very good and I
should note let's see I lost this here here listener text.

(01:38:30):
Toby has a video on the Douglas County Assessor website
on how to file an appeal.

Speaker 6 (01:38:36):
It's very helpful, that's true. Yeah, we did that in
twenty three because we know we're going to get thousands
of them. So now that video is specific to our site.
All the rules are the same for every assessor. So
but I walked through how to file an appeal in
Douglas County. It's similar to other camp. All right, I
don't want to make Mandy late. We're already about one
minute in.

Speaker 1 (01:38:53):
But since Toby is your county's assessor, do you want
to ask any property text question while he's here?

Speaker 7 (01:39:00):
No, I just want to say big thank you for
the twenty grand introduction.

Speaker 2 (01:39:03):
I'll take it all right. Oh, you got yours already? Yeah,
we got ours the other day. Mine's probably in my mailbox.
You have to understand what I got mine. Last year.

Speaker 7 (01:39:09):
I was like, can I just have the county write
a check to me for this amount? Because I thought
it was way out of line.

Speaker 2 (01:39:14):
We got that online.

Speaker 7 (01:39:15):
It was like, none of my neighbors or none of
the comps matched that I pay attention to.

Speaker 2 (01:39:19):
Did you appeal last year?

Speaker 7 (01:39:20):
I did, and we had turned down, So thanks for that.

Speaker 2 (01:39:22):
But anyway, so do you think that your evaluation is
kind of close?

Speaker 7 (01:39:26):
I think it's much more accurate now than it was before.

Speaker 2 (01:39:28):
All Right, real quick, what you got coming up?

Speaker 7 (01:39:30):
Uh? You know, so this and that kind of show,
all right, talking about people not having kids because they
can't afford it. News flash, none of us have ever
been able to afford it, and yet we've reproduced you.

Speaker 2 (01:39:41):
Got weather Wednesday as well? I do everyone stick around
for Mandy