Author Archive

The City Proceeds Carefully on a Municipal Electrical Utility

Author(s) : Alan Boles Published: December 2nd, 2012

Heather Bailey, Executive Director of Energy Strategy and Electric Utility Development (photo from COB website) At a talk on the evening of November 8 sponsored by PLAN-Boulder County, Clean Energy Action, and 350.org, Heather Bailey, Executive [...]

How Effective Has the Climate Action Tax Been?

Author(s) : Alan Boles Published: November 4th, 2012

graph courtesy City of Boulder At a PLAN-Boulder County forum on Friday, October 19, Jonathan Koehn, Regional Sustainability Coordinator for the City of Boulder, asserted that the Climate Action Plan (CAP) tax has allowed Boulder to avoid [...]

Boulder County’s Proposed Transportation Master Plan

Author(s) : Alan Boles Published: September 4th, 2012

Graphics courtesy Boulder County At a PLAN-Boulder County forum on Friday, August 10, Julie McKay, planning division manager for the Boulder County Transportation Department, presented the main elements of the proposed Transportation Master Plan [...]

How Green is Boulder’s Land Use Transportation System?

Author(s) : Alan Boles Published: August 12th, 2012

Utrecht, Netherlands (Flickr creative commons http://flic.kr/p/bGMNz2) At a PLAN-Boulder County forum on the evening of July 30, Kevin Krizek, professor of planning and design at CU-Boulder, suggested that Boulder supplement or replace its [...]

Can a Housing First Project Be Developed with Minimal Controversy?

Author(s) : Alan Boles Published: June 17th, 2012

Housing First PLAN-Boulder Forum, May 7 (photo from student website http://www.yourhousingfirst.weebly.com/ ) At a PLAN-Boulder forum on the evening of May 7, 2012, a class of seven graduate students in the Urban and Regional Planning Program at [...]

Poll: Public Transit Options for the Northwest Corridor

Author(s) : Alan Boles Published: March 21st, 2012

At a PLAN-Boulder County forum on March 19, 2012, the majority of a panel of current and former local officials concurred on the need for more details and guarantees from RTD with respect to its recent “hybrid” proposal for transit in the [...]

Daily Camera Building Redevelopment Proposal

Author(s) : Alan Boles Published: March 12th, 2012

At a PLAN-Boulder forum on Friday, March 2, 2012, about the redevelopment proposal for the Daily Camera building, project architect Chris Shears and project manager Vicky Canto-Ponte of Karlin Real Estate revealed that the new, redeveloped building [...]

Colorado’s Looming Budget Crisis

Author(s) : Alan Boles Published: March 3rd, 2012

At a PLAN-Boulder County forum on February 24, 2012, former Boulder City Council member and leading civic figure DeAnne Butterfield depicted the scope of Colorado’s long-term, fiscal, structural deficit and outlined some possible remedies. [...]

Down on the Farm in Boulder County

Author(s) : Alan Boles Published: February 5th, 2012

At a PLAN-Boulder forum on Monday, January 30, a panel of five Boulder County farmers, moderated by a CSU extension agent, related, among other details, that their practices have changed significantly over the years so that they plow much less — [...]

Development Proposed in the South Boulder Creek Flood Plain

Author(s) : Alan Boles Published: January 16th, 2012

At a presentation sponsored by PLAN-Boulder County on Friday, January 13, neighbors of the proposed Hogan-Pancost development, in opposing the project, acknowledged that high groundwater levels and flood hazards probably should have kept the City of [...]

About the author:

Alan Boles remains the First Gentleman of Boulder as a result of a proclamation signed May 10, 2011, by Mayor Susan Osborne that he would retain that office as long as he resides in Boulder. He lives on the western edge of the City's Latin Quarter with former Mayor Osborne, two greyhounds, Digger and Peggy, and a Himalayan cat, Moon. He was a member of the Reservoir Reivers softball team until it disbanded several years ago, and he created its official cheer. He applied twice for appointment to the City of Boulder Liquor Board, once for appointment to its Planning Board, and once to its Open Space and Mountain Parks Board of Trustees, but was rejected each time by the City Council. He is an Aquarius.