The crime fight is a top priority for Denver voters as the April 4 mayoral election approaches. In a recent poll commissioned by The Denver Gazette and its partners, 57% of the likely voters surveyed said crime is their No. 1 concern among local issues. 

Meanwhile, a report by the Common Sense Institute finds that Denver’s crime rates are still higher than before the pandemic. Metro Denver is among the most crime-ridden metro areas in America, especially for auto theft.

Ask cops on the street what is driving the city’s spiraling crime, and they’ll likely cite two factors: lax laws watered down by a soft-on-crime legislature – and a severe shortage of police. Denver’s next mayor only can do so much to talk sense into the state legislature – but can do a lot more to bridge the gaps in local public safety. First of all, by backfilling Denver’s shortfall of nearly 200 cops.

Kelly Brough will make that her first order of business. It’s one of the most compelling reasons she has earned our endorsement – and deserves your vote – in Denver’s mayoral race. Brough is committed to getting Denver’s police ranks back up to full strength so the city can turn the corner on crime.

Her response to a new Gazette news questionnaire of mayoral candidates this week emphasizes that her top public-safety priority will be filling vacancies in the police and sheriff’s departments and 911 call centers.

“We have a budget that is allocated already, but unspent for these needed personnel,” she elaborates. “I will ensure we’re fully staffed across our public safety agencies to provide timely response and service.”

Brough also intends to boost funding for the Support Team Assisted Response (STAR) program and other crisis-outreach efforts. They provide first responders to non-criminal emergencies such as people having a mental-health crisis. That frees up police to fight crime.

And Brough wants to channel more funding to police training that is based on national best practices. She wants to raise the bar for the city’s public safety agencies when it comes training, transparency, and accountability. She says she would employ data-driven strategies and emphasize disclosure for public-safety incidents involving police and other responders. She supports continuous improvement and peer learning within public safety agencies so personnel hold each other accountable.

But Brough also will use her bully pulpit to call for more common-sense policies to be enacted in the state criminal code at the Capitol. She wants some state laws revisited to help keep Denverites safe, and she challenges recent lawmaking at the Capitol that made it easier for repeat offenders to return to the streets and prey on the public. She has made clear she wants the legislature to restore felony status for possession of deadly fentanyl in any amount.

Brough will assure Denverites effective law enforcement that is also accountable. That’s why – as noted on her campaign website, https://kellybrough.com/issues/ – Denverites as diverse as former DA and Gov. Bill Ritter, and former American Civil Liberties Union political director Denise Maes have endorsed Kelly Brough for mayor.

Denver is facing no less than a crisis of rising crime, and it requires a mayor who is up to that challenge. Gov. Ritter observed in a commentary published recently in The Gazette that Brough, “is the leader we need for the time we are in.”

We agree. Vote for Kelly Brough for Denver mayor.

Denver Gazette Editorial Board