Boulder restaurateur calls on community to vote Aquiles for mayor, reminds readers of stakes
Dave Query’s letter to his mailing list lays out a business owner’s case against Boulder’s spending and the $400 million bond, and asks readers for $100.
BOULDER, Colo. Dave Query opened his email the way a restaurateur might: “Good Morning Lovers of Great Democracy, Outstanding Governance, Experienced Fiscal Prowess and Fantastic Coffee.”
What followed was a roughly 1,000-word argument, sent to his mailing list in early October, that Boulder is losing ground and needs a new mayor to get it back. Query called the Nov. 3 vote possibly “the most consequential election” in the city’s history, and he closed by urging readers to back Aquiles La Grave.
CREDIT, THEN CRITICISM
Query began with credit for Mayor Aaron Brockett, who has served on the City Council since 2015. “His service during difficult times deserves real appreciation,” he wrote. But during Brockett’s five years as mayor, and especially the last one, he wrote, “Boulder has lost significant momentum.”
He backed that with sales tax figures from his own industry and the streets around it. Restaurant sales tax receipts rose 7 percent this year, he wrote, from $9.40 million to $10.06 million. Downtown receipts across all categories fell 14.4 percent year to date and are down 8.2 percent over the last 12 months. At 29th Street, home mostly to national chains with free parking and around-the-clock security, sales tax rose 18.5 percent.
Query faulted city leaders for ignoring falling business on the Pearl Street Mall and for brushing off talk of free parking, which he noted Denver and Fort Collins have used successfully. He also criticized the quick sale of the Spruce and Broadway parking lot, which he said raised $7.5 million to cover a budget shortfall “without meaningful community involvement.”
His list went further: a shrinking population, closing elementary schools, worn recreation centers and streets, and downtown parks and a creek path he called “dangerous.” He blamed repeated power shutoffs on aging infrastructure that Xcel Energy committed to fixing years ago, a promise he said the city manager has left unchecked.
Nearby towns, he wrote, are doing better. “Louisville, Lafayette and Longmont are clean, safe and thriving.” Each, along with Denver and Fort Collins, uses a downtown development authority or a similar tool, which Boulder’s council recently rejected.
THE NEW EAST BALLROOM PROJECT
Query saved his sharpest lines for the Western City Campus, the city’s new office building at Alpine-Balsam, which he introduced with a joke: “The new East Ballroom proje… I mean, the Western City Campus.”
He put its projected cost at $368 million, or about $2,484 a square foot. He compared that with the 125,000 square feet of Class A office space Google bought in Boulder in 2021 for $97 million, or $782 a square foot, with nearly three times the parking. A similar purchase, he wrote, could have saved the city about $250 million and left the old hospital site free for affordable housing.
The same leadership, he wrote, is now asking voters for $400 million through Ballot Issue 2K. Higher property taxes, he argued, will push commercial rents higher, and tenants, not landlords, will pay. “Small independent businesses that are barely hanging on will be hit hardest,” he wrote.
He asked how leaders who talk about affordability and inclusion keep making choices that drive up home prices and rents while downtown vacancy sits at record highs. His answer was direct: “Vote no on Ballot Issue 2K.”
WHAT HE WANTS IN A MAYOR
Query described the mayor he wants: someone who will question how the city works, push the city manager to scrutinize big construction projects, weigh alternatives before spending, and size city staff to fit the economy. He contrasted that with a line he attributed to the current mayor: “I do not have a voice, I am one of 9 votes on council.”
He drew on his own business. “Small businesses must answer to investors, banks or their own finances when operations fail,” he wrote. “The City of Boulder simply spends, then asks the community to cover the overage.”
He called for an outside auditor, saying the only way to get spending information from the city manager’s office now is through repeated open records requests.
A CALL FOR UNITY
The letter’s tone shifted near the end. Query called for a council that balances moderate, liberal and progressive views, and he listed goals he said Boulder already shares: affordable housing, public safety, financial responsibility, transparency, transportation, homelessness, wildfire mitigation, LGBTQIA+ inclusion, economic vitality and education.
“We can ALL get behind this,” he wrote, adding a profanity-edged rallying cry.
He thanked sitting council members for their time and asked readers to stop “treating disagreement as enmity.” “We don’t have to all always agree,” he wrote, “but we have got to stand united for Boulder.”
THE ASK
He also urged readers to research and support council candidates who would rein in spending, and he explained why the email reached people outside city limits. “Even if you don’t live here, you have a stake in Boulder’s success,” he wrote. “That’s why you’re on this email.”
