This time of year, and especially this year, money is on everyone's mind.

Holiday spending is ramping up, the cost of living is high, and businesses are adjusting to new demands and tariffs.

Nonprofits and local agencies are also feeling the pinch from budget cuts.

Yes, there's some challenging financial news, but it could be worse.

And there are glimmers of hope as we look ahead into the new year.

The insiders are ready to break it all down, along with other stories making headlines this week.

So let's get started with this week's Colorado Inside Out Hi everyone.

I'm Kyle Dyer.

Let me get right to introducing you to this week's insider panel.

We start with Patty Calhoun, founder and editor of Westword, Krista Kafer, a columnist with The Denver Post, Eric Schneiderman, columnist with Color Politics and the Denver and Colorado Springs Gazette.

And Carlos Martinez, president and CEO of Latino Community Foundation of Colorado.

With a steady stream of financial headlines, including this week, many are kind of wondering what 2026 holds for all of us.

Well, the annual C you lead School of Business forecasts does not predict a recession for Colorado, but leaders statewide do not expect the kind of growth that we've been seeing over the last decade.

Uncertainty is the challenge.

And Patty Westword reported this week that Denver now has the second highest rate of home D listings in the country.

Well, you also think people got so optimistic about what homes were worth and you're still being billed property taxes that show what homes were worth a couple of years ago, but now you're not going to get that amount of money.

So a lot of people are just pulling them off.

There also are the issues.

What are you going to buy?

How are you going to finance that?

So we're just behind Miami.

That's the top De-listing town.

The forecast was fascinating because they use the word uncertainty 72 times, three times as many as last year.

And there was plenty of uncertainty when we were heading into 2025.

You understand why though, because so much coming out of Washington is affecting our economy.

Denver, Colorado is not on its own anymore.

When you look at what the tariffs have done to agriculture, and agriculture is definitely dropping next year, they predicted what I think a 5.8.

5.8% drop in agriculture.

They're talking about a slow low growth of maybe two 2% in jobs.

So it's it's not a recession, but it's not fast.

Although those of us who moved to Colorado when it was like a hidden gem, no one knew how great it was.

It wasn't touting itself as so great.

We might get back to that point again, where all of a sudden you can do great secret things because you're not out there talking about how great you are.

Okay.

All right, Chris, your thoughts?

I mean, we can only hope.

I would love to be able to go to the mountains on the weekends again.

So may we be hidden eventually.

I don't know, a couple of things that probably wouldn't make the CSU or the Q report.

Last time I was at our thrift stores, the prices have gone up.

So, yeah, not target, not Walmart, not the mall.

But even arc is seeing higher prices of houses.

I see houses in my neighborhood that have been on the market for months now, Obviously bad choices being made at the federal level.

Tariffs being probably the worst choice, but also immigration.

We need immigration.

We need immigrants.

We Also think about bad choices here at the state level.

Things that the state legislature has done to jack up the prices of home insurance, to jack up the prices of health insurance, all of these mandates, that sounds so airy and wonderful when they pass them, actually have a really they have a pernicious effect on the pocketbook.

So expect higher heating bills, higher insurance, higher grocery stores.

You know, if you think you can get a deal at Ark, you're not necessarily going to get a deal there either.

One thing.

Our gas prices are so low, second lowest in the country.

Eric.

That is true.

I filled it up the other day and was pleasantly surprised.

So thank God for for small favors.

I found it interesting in this report as to what they identified as the higher growth industries.

And those were in order, I believe if I have in order education, government and health care.

Now, if you're in one of those businesses as well, bullet for you.

But those are not where economist those are not the bedrock of economies.

There are a lot of headwinds out there.

Tariffs are an incredible headwind.

The immigration crackdown is it is a headwind.

The lack of population growth in Colorado even live in the leaving the immigration piece out of it.

The lack of other population growth in Colorado, the lack of job growth, all of it combines to, you know, somebody use the word uncertainty.

And that certainly is the case.

There is probably a recession in this country's future.

I mean, that's part of the economic cycle.

And you can only put it off so long.

It strikes me as where the Trump interests and the JD interest are going to diverge, which is that Vance would probably prefer that recession to come next year.

Trump doesn't want it next year because he certainly doesn't want it in advance of the midterm elections.

Trump would like it in 27 or whatever, and that would be J.D.

Vance, his worst nightmare.

And Q leads did say there could be a recession in 27, not 26, maybe 27.

We'll see.

I think with that report, you know, I think our economy is going to be stable for next year.

But underneath though is kind of like what we're we're seeing this it's being referred to as the K shaped economy.

So you have folks that are on the upward trajectory of the K. And that's those industries that Eric just talked about where they're not going to.

And tariff is not going to impact them.

You know inflation's not going to impact them.

But then you have those at the bottom K which are falling behind.

Those are folks in the some of the construction industry service injury hospitality restaurant industry.

And as they're falling behind they're the ones who are going to be seeing those increases in gas.

And in other areas, insurance and so forth.

Because the top part of the K is going to keep it stable.

But what we're seeing with this now is a kind of like a two tiered economy.

Before everybody would be doing well or we or everybody wasn't doing well.

But now we have those who are doing well and those who are not.

What's going to be very interesting, is what policies are we going to put in place to be able to narrow that gap so that we don't have and create this, large, divide between those who are doing well and those who are don't the ones who are not going to be doing well.

Those are the ones who are going to be seeing the difference every day, going to the store, paying the insurance, filling the car up with gas, who just can't seem to get ahead because their, income is not going to keep pace with the, with the increase in costs.

Okay.

You know, looking ahead to next year's midterm elections, it is shaping up to be a test for Colorado Democrats.

And that's a challenge from within the own party.

Current Democratic leaders are being challenged by progressive candidates who say that they can and will do more than the Democrats who are currently in office.

Krista.

You know, it's interesting, if we were to get in a time machine right now and go back to to the George W Bush era, see it a moderate, you know, moderates were pretty pretty much in charge both parties.

Right.

And then, you go into the Obama years, he's he's definitely to the, you know, more on the left on that that spectrum.

But in those years, you see the beginning of the populist.

Right.

They didn't like George Bush.

They obviously hated Obama.

They hated moderates that tried to work with Democrats.

And out of that comes somebody, like, like Trump.

Right?

I think we're seeing something similar in that you've got, you know, the right in charge of frustration brewing among Democrats of saying we aren't we're not making any advances here.

We're not pushing ahead.

We need to try something else.

We need to get rid of moderates like a Hickenlooper, like a Bennet.

We need somebody who can really kind of take it to the Republicans and and shine with a a progressive vision.

I think that, moderate Democrats and they're sitting at this table, would be very unhappy to see a, resurgent progressive populist left come in charge.

Not only do I think they have bad policies, but if Republicans have any hope of ever getting an office again in this state at the statewide level, it's having a really lousy progressive person running.

And Coloradans faced with these high prices, saying, no thanks, we'll go ahead and go with a moderate like a Barb Kirk Meyer.

And, we definitely don't want to go down the path of New York City.

So watch what you watch what you wish for.

I think a progressive, populist bent, resurgence on the left would be bad, not just for the country, but bad for Democrats as well.

What I find interesting here, Kyle, is Colorado is very much in play this year, but unlike the old days where it was in play in November, now it is simply in play in June at the primary election, you go up and down the ballot.

Obviously, the big news this week was, State Senator Julie Gonzalez's announcement been long rumored, but her announcement that she was challenging John Hickenlooper for that Senate nomination.

It's my column this week.

Viewers can, check it out when it runs.

This weekend is my take on on what may develop there.

But then you have the governor's race, and I think Phil Wiser is a little bit miscast as a progressive.

He is mining the progressive ranks and he's getting a lot of support there in juxtaposition to Michael Bennet.

But I'm not sure that a Governor, Phil Wiser, is never going to be mistaken for a mayor or an Monami or even a potential senator, Julie Gonzalez.

He's a different kind of cat.

But then you have Diana to get our permanent, forever lifetime congresswoman in Denver, who's being challenged from the left as well.

You have the primary up in Congressional District eight, the most competitive race in the state where you have, you know, a Shannon Byrd, kind of moderate, very strong legislator, who's being challenged from the progressive left.

It is the theme in the Democratic Party right now is this conflict and battle for the heart and soul of the party.

Colors.

Yeah.

I think what I'm seeing also, you know, when we look at what's happening throughout the country and what's happening here in Colorado is generational transfer of political power.

I think that, you know, we baby boomers back in the 70s and, 80s were very much in political, you know, had political power and helped shape their ideology into politics.

I think what we're seeing now was a lot of them dying off.

And now millennials and Gen Z's coming up and trying in the right, and they're learning right now how to go out and build their political power.

They're running for office.

They're coming out in greater numbers and voting.

And what they're doing a lot also is organizing themselves, which we haven't seen them do that before.

But I think it's going to be interesting to see how Colorado navigates this transfer of generational political power.

You didn't mention the Generation Xers who have always been known as slackers, so you had no part of that.

You just kind of skipped over us.

We had no play.

Okay, great.

Well, Carlos is right.

It's interesting to talk about.

We're talking now about layers.

So it's much more vertical and horizontal where you with the far left and the far right.

I think age and generations is what is linking people much more than really politics.

In some cases.

If you talk to some young voters, they don't know the history, they don't know necessarily what the Progressive Party is.

They don't know what parties stand for, but they know they are tired of seeing the same old faces.

Now, to confess this old face was, before Diana DeGette was elected.

I was on this show, but I like I like institutional knowledge.

I'm not sure you need it forever in the Senate or obviously you're not going to have it in the state House because we voted in term limits in Congress.

People are tired of seeing some of the same old faces.

I believe Eric Schneiderman wrote an essay about that regarding Hickenlooper and again, and got more comments than on any other piece you've written.

Right?

People want to see new faces.

They want to hear new voices.

They want to hear voices that speak to them.

I think the Julie Gonzalez run is fascinating.

People were encouraging her to run instead for mayor, or maybe to get seat, but she said, no, I'm sticking with it.

I'm going for Hickenlooper.

It'll be interesting.

Okay.

All right.

The federal Department of Justice is investigating 21 Colorado prisons and 12 youth detention facilities in Colorado because of reports that inmates are being mistreated and not receiving proper medical care.

On Monday, Governor Polis, Attorney General Wiser, prison officials and wardens throughout our state all received the heads up that a civil rights investigation is underway.

Eric, let's start with you.

You know, there's also been the same kind of similar allegations being made to the federal government who are running the detention centers as well.

Color me rather dubious here, that Pam Bondi is justice Department is all of a sudden so deeply concerned and deeply passionate about civil rights.

If there is any meat to this inquiry, great.

If there's a problem, let's go fix it.

But I'm going to be somewhat dubious and maybe even slightly cynical here about what the motivations are.

I think this all emanates the one organizing principle among the Trump Republican Party, and the one thing you cannot deviate from if you want to be part of the MAGA movement, is that the 2020 election was stolen.

Obviously, that is at the root of the Tina Peters case.

The whole election denial thing.

It stays with us.

It produced January 6th, but now even worse than January 6th.

It has seeped into the soul of this country.

And there are people who have simply lost their mind.

I mean, a particular you know, we have a podcaster here in Colorado, Joel Altmann, a particularly hateful guy who has called for Polis and Griswald and wiser all to be, quote unquote, strung up.

And it's not lost on anybody who pays attention that all three of them happen to be Jewish.

So that takes on that dynamic as well.

The whole thing is disgusting.

And I'm I seriously think this falls into that narrative and is less about prisons and maybe some problems in the Colorado prisons than it is about retribution.

All right, Carlos.

I guess I'm concerned that DOJ is going to come in and really do a witch hunt here.

And really, look, they're going to be here to find something with our prisons.

And so I think what concerns me, it's going to bring up things and who knows how they end up writing the report.

Okay.

To, to see how they can go and impact Colorado even more.

So, I mean, we know that, the administration is not friendly to Colorado.

And I think this is going to be another move for them to figure out how they can go ahead, and paint a narrative on Colorado.

Now, on how it treats its prisoners.

You know, prisons were go ahead and built to go ahead and, keep to punish criminals, to go ahead and do public safety in our community, as well as to rehabilitate folks.

And I think they're going to be focusing on other things than really what the true role of a prison is about.

Just to go ahead and make Colorado look bad.

Here's the one thing.

It could be retribution for Tina Peters and all Colorado's bad behavior.

But we also know there are real problems, especially in the youth offender system in Pueblo, we had a facility that was technically starving.

Boys at Lookout Mountain is just barely starting up again after real problems there.

Those were problems.

Colorado created.

They were not created by the feds, so there may be something they can find.

I actually think this is a lesson here for anyone in this room, anyone watching, really, who wants to go out and commit crimes.

And there may be somebody here.

Eric, you know who you are, who's thinking about a life of crime.

Kidding, obviously.

But, that, if you're going to do some crime in the next three years, be it corruption, be it, I don't know, importing 400 tons of cocaine into our country.

Whatever you're planning to do, make sure that it's a federal infraction, not a state infraction.

Because if it's a federal infraction, you can get a get out of jail free card.

We look at the 12 politicians that have recently been pardoned.

We look at all the people who attack the Capitol, who have been pardoned, Trump's lawyers who have been pardoned.

And yet he can't get Tina Peters out of jail because what she did was a state crime.

So to anyone wanting to commit a crime, keep it federal.

Okay.

All right.

This week, Australia became the first country to ban social media for those under 16.

Some are calling for the US to follow suit.

Now, just last month, a federal court paused a Colorado a new law in Colorado that requires social media companies to warn young users about the potential harms of being on sites if they're on for more than an hour, the court said the law likely violates the First Amendment.

Carlos, I will start with you.

So, I understand the impulse right now with parents and policymakers or in addressing the harm around social media.

But I don't think a ban in itself is the answer, to this, these platforms are created to go ahead and get people to scroll to stay on their as long as possible, to basically generate ad revenue.

So the business model that we're using right now for social media is one where we're collecting data, and right now we're collecting vast data from youth.

Okay.

And we're using that then to make sure that how we get them hooked onto it to generate revenue, that's the business model, So if we if we're able to go ahead and adjust the or look at the, algorithms as well as a business model and put policies in place that help to go ahead and regulate that better, I think that, we'll address the issue a bit more than trying to go ahead and ban a completely, and because otherwise we're just addressing the symptom symptom, but we're not addressing the business model, and we keep that machine still intact to do what it's doing.

Patty.

What it means is probably Australians under the age of 16 will be the only ones able to visit the United States, because Trump is now suggesting that visitors to the United States have.

They will go through five years worth of their social media postings.

Have you heard this one?

We should have a committee that says who is allowed to post, not do it by age, but ban Trump.

We don't need any more of the sleaze box sleazebag stuff.

And speaking of sleazebag, maybe Pola should also have a little, governor on the speed with which he posts, because he just recently suggested following a white supremacist and someone who is a little odd on the child pedophilia stuff.

So people, we're not going to be able to ban this.

The that horse is out of the barn.

So you are just going to go steal yours or their mothers or their, you know, they're going to find him on the streets, they will find phones.

But you want the companies that run those businesses to be reasonable and monitor themselves.

Right.

Kristen I'm actually okay with banning I think what Australia is that is a good thing.

We, we keep young people away from certain substances.

We keep them away from, you know, porn sites or online gambling, alcohol, marijuana things that they're just not allowed to do.

And we recognize that there's a certain level of maturity required to be able to handle certain things.

So I think banning is an option.

The route that Colorado took, though, I don't think is, and that's requiring social media companies to post warnings.

Now, I think this was well intended, but you cannot force a business to post a message against that business.

That's actually a First Amendment violation.

It's a coerced speech.

So I don't think our law will hold up in court.

I do think an outright ban, though, just might, because it's not forcing a message one way or the other.

It's simply saying that below a certain age, we don't feel that kids have the maturity to be able to handle being on here, and I think it's worth considering.

Okay.

Yeah.

I actually think in terms of long term consequence, this is probably the most important issue that we're talking about today, and I'm probably closer to Krista in terms of where I come down.

Her cheap shot at me a few seconds ago notwithstanding, their, my general attitude over the years about social media and media more broadly has been very much a free speech light touch in terms of regulation.

And I'm not sure that in thinking about it that any of that is really working.

Hats off to Australia for at least surfacing the issue.

And easy for us to say from 8 or 10,000 miles away.

But being a bit of a laboratory for how this works, can it be enforced?

Does it withstand judicial scrutiny and all of the rest?

So let's see how this plays out.

But there can be no doubt of what the impact of social media has been on younger people in terms of their ability to think, their ability to concentrate, their ability to basically read, on top of basic issues of anxiety and mental health and all of the rest.

So something needs to be done.

Hats off to the Aussies for taking it on.

Okay, now let's have each side or express there are highs and lows that they've witnessed this week.

We'll start on a low note and with Patty.

We'll go to an older media.

The Denver Post has now missed five payments to the city of Denver on the bill.

The Old Post Building and Civic Center.

And maybe that explains why the post just recently increased its monthly home delivery rate to $331 a month a month.

Sorry, Krista, and I hope it all goes to you instead of the city of Denver, but that's unbelievable.

Okay, it's still a great paper.

My shame on the week.

Okay, shame on me for teasing Eric, but, I'm going to give it to the, the PUC, the public utilities Commission, for making it absolutely unreasonable demand on power companies trying to, force those of us who use gas to, I don't know, freeze in the winter.

I'm not quite sure what they're what they're going for, but, shame on them.

We all need to stay warm over that over the winter.

Okay, Eric.

a Supreme Court justice, Melissa Hart, who's on this extended leave of absence.

There may well be good reason for it, but she needs to be a little more forthcoming and transparent in terms of what's going on.

maybe we could take some different paths here.

So my, my, my love for this week, I guess, is, reading some articles on the lack of snow and rain that we've had and the draft that we're going to be going into and the impact that's going to have.

And I see that the, you know, as we're talking earlier about economies and so forth, what will the drought do to our economy in the coming year as well?

Yeah.

Concerned about that.

We need a whole bunch more last spring coming.

Right.

Yeah.

All right.

Something good, Paddy.

Nathaniel Rateliff and the Night Sweats just inducted into the Colorado Music Hall of Fame.

It's a great organization.

And what a great band.

Nathaniel Rateliff also, he is so generous with his methodology Foundation.

So pay attention to sorry to the Marigold Foundation.

Pay attention.

Marigold.

Another wonderful, group of musicians, Saint Martin's Chamber Choir, they do amazing work, and I don't think everybody knows just how fantastic they are.

But if they got concerts this weekend.

So if you have a chance to see this beautiful choir perform.

And I just got the chills at the thought.

All right, Eric.

Through some personal experience, I just came across a wonderful story about Regis University, and I want to do a hat tip to Regis.

They had a program in sustainable development with a number of young students, rock stars, all of them from Africa, participated in this program.

The entire program was virtual online.

But then these students were coming to Denver for a graduation ceremony.

After a two year program.

All of these African students have had their visas denied in the current climate.

So Regis, to its credit, put a couple of its senior executives on an airplane, went to Nairobi and did the graduation ceremony there.

Well done.

That is really good.

And Carlos.

This past weekend I went to the Parade of Lights.

I live in downtown, so I went out to the Parade of Lights, and it's just wonderful to see so many people out there.

But after the parade, we were walking down 16th Street Mall, and it was just wonderful to see so many people on the mall that evening, and also just hearing people who had been there for the first time since they did all the renovations and so forth.

Just excited to be there in downtown again.

So it was just wonderful to see that excitement of folks coming into downtown again.

Yeah, I sure is.

We're on the same wavelength, because my high this week is the sheer enthusiasm and joy radiating from the players who have come to Denver to join Denver Summit FC.

They were the new soccer team were the, kicked off the parade of lights last weekend.

They were the grand marshals.

The players walked the full route, merrily stepping up to fans along the way.

No matter what is happening at City Hall right now regarding the new stadium, seeing the excitement on these women's faces was absolutely contagious.

When I interviewed recently, the team owner, Rob Cohen, he told me that players from all over the world were calling Denver and saying, hey, we give us a look.

We'd love to come and play there.

These athletes want to be part of Colorado.

And their dedication showed as they completed the entire parade route with energy, pride and genuine love for being here in the Mile High City.

So it was great to see those faces.

Thanks, insiders, we appreciate all of your insight this week.

Thanks to you who are watching or listening along to our podcast.

And one more shout out to all of you who supported PBS 12 on Tuesday.

It was our biggest Colorado state ever, so thank you.

I am Kyle Dyer.

I will see you next week here on PBS 12.

And in the meantime, Happy Hanukkah to all of you who celebrate.

I hope you have a wonderful eight nights starting this coming Sunday.

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