Aurora already has been down the well-beaten path toward urban despair.
Crime, both serious and petty, proliferated in some neighborhoods in the not-too-distant past. The city’s streets teemed with chronically homeless substance abusers, who littered public spaces with their tent camps and their very public use of drugs and alcohol. As the pandemic set in, Aurora was afflicted with rampant auto theft and shoplifting.
Then in 2021, Colorado’s third-largest city elected a new majority to its City Council. It re-energized City Hall in a whole new way. In close cooperation with Mayor Mike Coffman, the majority reaffirmed the city’s commitment to long-flagging public safety. Given a state legislature that had dropped the ball in the crime fight as the state’s crime rate soared, Aurora’s council enacted tougher local sentencing for crimes like auto theft and shoplifting. The council restored productive relations with law enforcement and the city’s police chief…