A bill for an ordinance designating 2600 Milwaukee Street, the Henderson House, as a structure for preservation. Approves an individual Denver landmark designation for property located at 2600 Milwaukee Street in Council District 9. If ordered published, a public hearing will be held on Monday, 11-26-18. The Committee approved filing this item at its meeting on 10-2-18.
Please refrain from profane or obscene speech. Direct your comments to the Council as a whole and please refrain from individual or personal attacks. Kathleen Kennedy, will you please? What counsel? Bill 1208 on the floor. Yes, I move that council bill 18 dash 12 await be placed upon final consideration and do pass. In the system is moonlight. And second, it has been moved and seconded. The public hearing for Council Bill 1208 is open. May we have the staff report? Good evening. I am Karen with Landmark Preservation, with Community Planning and Development and we are here for a designation of 2600 Milwaukee Street known as the Henderson House. The landmark ordinance, established in 1967, provides the ability to designate properties. This particular property is brought forward by Councilman Elvis Brooks as the applicant. The owner of the property, Leon Henderson, is in support of this designation. His father, John Henderson, started the designation process earlier this year and unfortunately he passed away this summer as it was going through the writing process. The property is located on the corner of 26th Avenue and Milwaukee Street, across the street from the City Park Golf Course. As you know, in order for a property to become a Denver landmark, it needs to meet the designation criterion in at least two of the following three categories. It needs to maintain its historic and physical integrity, and the LPC should consider how it relates to a historic context or theme. This particular application puts forward that the property is significant under history for having a direct association with the historical development of the city, state or nation, and under two criteria for architecture embodying, embodying a distinguishing characteristic of an architectural style and being a significant work of a recognized architect. For the first under history for having a direct association with the historical development of the city of Denver, this house was designed by John Henderson. In 1959, he became the first African American architect who was licensed in Colorado. He worked as a draftsman and an architect for several prominent firms in Denver, as well as for the federal government. When he came out here in the 1950s, there had been a considerable growth of Denver in the postwar time period. But unfortunately, due to redlining, which had further entrenched segregation, there were limited options for the Henderson family. John Henderson spoke in detail with Shannon Stage, who is the author of this designation, about his difficulties in finding a location in a house to purchase because they couldn't find a place to purchase. He worked with Charlie Cousins, who was a prominent African-American businessman, to purchase this particular plot of land. As you can see noted on the screen, it was one of the final plots of land that had not been purchased and developed in 1960. So he owned this and then he designed this property and he designed the house. And in his style, there is what he felt was the his his preferred style, which is a mid-century modern house. So in addition to be being significant as the home of the first licensed African-American architect in Denver and Colorado, it is also significant for its architectural style, which is midcentury modern. It also has strong international style elements. The character defining features of this property include a recessed entrance, minimal ornament, ornamentation, the horizontal elements of the building, the very large windows that are seen on multiple facades, on the southern facade, on the northern wing and on the corners of each wing . As part of the design of a mid-century modern. It connects the inside of the house to the exterior of the building. And this property has exemplifies the architectural characteristics of a mid-century modern building. And finally, the property is also significant under architecture for being an significant example of the work of a recognized architect. As I stated before, John Henderson was the first licensed African-American architect in Colorado. He worked with multiple midcentury firms, as well as going on to work for the federal government, working as an architect for them. The 2600 Milwaukee property is the property most associated with Henderson. Although he worked on the Byron Rogers Federal Office Building on the Denver United Bank, as well as properties for the Colorado School of Mines. This is the building that is most strongly associated with John Henderson and designed in the style that he most and enjoyed. In order for a property to be a Denver landmark, not only does it need to meet their criteria, it also needs to maintain its historic and physical integrity. And so in order to retain integrity, it needs to retain the aspects of location, design, workmanship, materials, setting, feeling and association on this particular property. The Southern Wing was first was first designed and built in the early 1960s, and then after that had been paid off. The Hendersons then expanded the house to include the northern wing as well as the garage, and that was completed in 1971. So although there have been changes to the property, including the addition of the hipped roof that happened within the period of significance, and those properties have also acquired significance. And so the LPC also considered how the structure related to historic contexts or themes in Denver history. And so while the property is related to the discriminatory housing practices through redlining and the segregation of Denver's neighborhoods, it's also associated with a small but growing number of African-American architects. Shortly after John Henderson became a licensed architect, a year later, Bertram A Bruton received his license in the state. And so both men were trailblazers in Colorado. But they also had contemporaries throughout the country. And they followed the careers of other African-American architects throughout the country. After the World War Two. So the Landmark Preservation Commission found that it met the criteria under history and architecture, that it maintained its historic foot and physical integrity, and they considered how it related to historic contexts and themes. They voted seven zero to recommend it for your approval. We have received six letters of our emails of support in this particular designation. Application and staff finds that it meets the landmark designation criteria. I'm happy to answer any questions. Thank you very much. We do have four individuals signed up to speak this evening. A few signed up to speak on this matter. Please come to the front bench. When I call your name, please step directly up to the podium as your time will start to elapse. First up, we have Lynne Henderson. Okay, my name is Lynne Henderson. I am the son of John Henderson and my dad's wishes. Now, Martin, my father passed this past June, so his wishes were to have. This house designated before he closed his. Eyes for the last time. And he wanted this. This was written in his will. That's all I have to say. Thank you. Next up, Shannon Stage. Good evening, council members. My name is Shannon Stage. I am the preservation coordinator at Historic Denver. Historic Denver is a preservation nonprofit that helps the community through outreach, advocacy and education efforts to retain Denver's unique character. Historic Denver is thrilled to be here tonight to show our support at the City Council Public Hearing for the Henderson House landmark designation. Friends of the Henderson family actually reached out to historic Denver to put us in touch with John Henderson earlier this year and hear about his wish to designate his home. We were so excited to hear about this potential designation. We actually took it on ourselves and I personally researched, interviewed Mr. Henderson and wrote the designation of the Henderson House. So if you have any questions about the actual application, you feel free to ask me. In the spring, Mr. Henderson invited us over to his home, which he designed in 1963 and a mid-century modern architectural style. I remember from our first conversation how very proud he was of his home and the design he fashioned after his architectural role model, Mies van der Rohe. The exterior and interior are great examples of the mid-century modern design, complete with large plate glass windows, open spaces on the inside that flow from one to the other, and intricate storage spaces that hideaway into the structure of the building. Mr. Henderson was a fascinating man that I had the honor of personally getting to know through writing this designation. He led an interesting life and always looked on the bright side. He overcame many obstacles not just racism, but also being blind in one eye. He was a determined man and followed his dreams to become an architect. Not only did he become an architect, but the first licensed African-American architect in the state of Colorado in 1959, which he boasted proudly when we talked to him about his life and career by designating the Henderson House at 2600 North Milwaukee as an individual landmark. It will be the first landmark in the City Park North Skyline neighborhood and one of the few individual landmarks highlighting the African-American contributions to Denver's development. The home will also be one of the few mid-century modern homes listed as a Denver landmark. Historic. Denver supports this unique landmark that tells the story of the first licensed African-American architect in Colorado who designed a mid-century modern house in his neighborhood. This home also tells the story of the development of Denver and how the Hendersons had limited options of where they could build a house in the in Denver in the sixties due to segregation. As Mr. Henderson told me in an interview, I feel like I have contributed something to Denver that should be restored and preserved. He wanted to know his home was protected from demolition before he closed his eyes for the last time. Unfortunately, Mr. Henderson did close his eyes for the last time this summer. But historic Denver has been working closely with his son Lynn to fulfill his father's wishes to see his home as the next designated Denver landmark. And it's also been wonderful to work with Councilman Alvis Brooks to help put this designation through the process as well. Thank you so much. Thank you very much. Next up, Chairman Sekou. My name is Chairman. I represent the. So acts of movement for self-defense. Proud advocate for poor, working, poor, homeless, senior citizen youth. The vulnerable, the oppressed. I'm also candidate and will be the next mayor for the City Council of Denver. City County. Denver. Sure. I know this young man. We grew up together. We went to school together, man. These times. We used to help him. It is school. And. Outstanding, Sam. And the information that you are receiving is faulty. First of all, the first black licensed architect was George GREENE, who designed the federal center and the Finance Center, graduate of Man High School, and also a graduate of the University of Denver. Yeah. George. Let's get the record straight. Not only that, but George was actively involved in the neighborhood. Well, we saw him every day in Monroe High School and on the five points. Along with other notable people like album called World and Mr. Causes, all these folks that used to get their hair cut at my father's barbershop. A vicious barbershop. 2626 Wilton Street. I never in my life. 67 years. Born and raised here. Grew up on the five points. Ever seen this man on a bike once? No, never. His home was never open to poor people. Never. Never. So let's get the record straight about who and what is going on down here, because it's no more than a petty bourgeois couple is left of lucky effort to legitimize their class interests like the previous book does about this drug mess and its corrupt chairman. Please stay on on this topic. And so I'll close with this. I just had a meeting this weekend with Kathy Donahue, who's the first woman on city council of 1975 for 20 years. And she told me about the corrupt. She said, I'm sorry. It's exactly what you say. Your time is up. You don't give a damn about poor people. Thank you very much. Next up, Jesse Paris. Hmm. Good evening, members of council. My name is Jesse Paris. I'm representing four black star acts of self-defense. Denver, homeless out loud and community actually commitment for change. We are actually on approval of this. This neighborhood, unfortunately, has become rapidly gentrified, as Chairman Sekou said. This isn't right. In the sense that you want to make a historical district, this house historically district and the people that built this house can't even afford to live in the neighborhood. I actually, in fact, live in this neighborhood skyline. I grew up in this neighborhood. I'm a long time resident of this neighborhood. And we can't even afford to live in this neighborhood. But yet you want to make this historic. Historic for who? We're going to let the gentrifiers know. Hey, we had architects that were black that weren't even allowed to live in this neighborhood for the longest amount of time. For us, for all those that are listening, the reason why we have a street called race is because blacks were not prior to 1970 allowed to live past race. That's why we have a race street. If just in case you were wondering. But yeah, like I said, Deborah Hermosillo last a movement. We're in favor of this is very untimely that the brother had just passed, but his son just said it was in his will. So I'm sure he is happy about that wherever he may be. So with that being said, I am an at large candidate for 2019. We need to sweep council at this. We put in the homeless. Thank you. Thank you. Next up, David Roybal. Dave Roy Ball 742 West Ninth Avenue, Denver, Colorado 80204 Also. Candidate for District three. And I'm in favor of this. You know. It has a lot of history. And the change in has come in here and and, you know, to hope that it stays the same and makes it affordable. And I know what happened. So the golf course, I probably don't see it becoming affordable. And, you know, so I don't. Not only, you know, preserve. Historic homes, but preserve the people, preserve the story, because. Don't expect Metropolitan to keep your history alive. You know, it's people like us, community activist, family members, grandmothers, people of Denver that keep the story alive and, you know, in favor of the family's wishes, you know, to make this historic and to know and to know how racist our city has become. And it's still going on. It's just divided by classism. So we'd hoping that we hoping that that that it does a good for the neighborhood, keeps it affordable, keeps the same people around, keeps the culture alive. Thank you. Thank you. That concludes our speakers. Are there any questions from members of Council Councilman Brooks. Yeah, thank you, Mr. President. Lynn, can you come up? Then just a just a couple questions for you. When was the first time that your father came forward and wanted to designate the home? This past summer. Before he because I know he passed in June. So was it last year or. Yeah. Yeah, it was. Yeah, it was pretty much last year. Okay. He knew that his days were numbered. Okay. And and when we we did do some research around your your father being the first African-American architect, do you have his license? According to the Institute of Architects, uh, a his. Number was, I believe, 176. And Bertram Bruton's number was 250. Yeah, which would make him the first. I just wanted to make sure that blasphemy was carried out. Okay. And the other issue is, I just. Tom Morris Yeah. Did you get a chance to that. Did you work with Thomas as well to. Yeah, my dad did. I asked him to to appear, but he said. He he he. He declined. Okay. Thank you. You're welcome. And then, Shannon, just a quick question for you. I'm sorry if I missed this. So Mr. Henderson worked with Mr. Cousins to build. What year was that? So he found the empty plot of land that you could see in Kerry's PowerPoint presentation that at 26 in Milwaukee and that empty plot of land was owned by Mr. Cousins. And then he bought the land from Cousins. Okay. Thank you. You're welcome. Anything else? Councilman Brooks, are you all done? I'm doing thank you very much. Seeing no other questions. Never mind, Councilman Espinosa. We want this. I don't know if you want this actual clarification, but I did look up both on Dawes website. Well, this is the questions if you want to make a comment about that, unless you have a question about the numbers. Just to address. From Councilman Brooks. Why don't we just switch over to comments and then you can do that. Councilman Flynn, were you in comments or you have a question or a question? Go ahead, Kara. I don't know if you can answer this. I look through the staff report and if it's in there, I my eyes must have escaped it. Can you give us other examples of homes or buildings that Mr. Henderson has designed in Denver? Just wondering what the other examples of his body of work are. Yeah. So he worked a lot for the federal government, so a lot of his work was with that. But then I don't know that there were any particular homes that I had. Okay. And that may be a Shannon question, but I do know is he worked on the Byron Rogers Federal Office Building, the Denver United Bank in the Colorado School of Mines, where some of the main buildings that were called out as other properties that he had worked at the the housing at the School of Mines has actually been demolished. Oh, okay. Thank you. Stage, can you. Add to that list? Thank you. Yes. So he actually, as Kara mentioned, he did work on a lot of institutional, bigger buildings. But in the eighties, he actually went out on his own and was more of a consultant and working with construction firms and just doing the designs of homes. He actually designed one of the homes in Cherry Hills of the Little Rock 9 Million Years House. And actually, there's a photo in the application of him opening up the drawings because he actually had Lynn pull out the drawing from the basement and show me the house that he designed for her. Thank you. You're welcome. That's almost. Prison. Thank you. Thank you, Councilman Flint. All right. Seeing no other questions. The public hearing for Collinsville 1208 is closed now. We're on to comments by members of council. Councilman Brooks, did you want to go first because it's yours or did you want Councilman Espinosa to provide his. He can he can come right. Right after. Okay. Thank you, Mr. President. And first, for a start, I just want to acknowledge our former judge, Claudia Jordan, in the audience who lives in the area as well. What a historic night. And I think we all should be really proud. Some names, I mean, Dr. Charlie Cousins. I mean Mr. Henderson was a part of some incredible was in part of an incredible part of Denver and I got a chance to meet him in person and hear a little bit about some of the issues going on in the neighborhood as well. He's very clear about what he felt like in the neighborhood, but the history that he had was just incredible. And so I am in full support of this. I was so thankful that we were able to sponsor this. Like Councilman Lopez always says, the one regret is that we always want to give people flowers when they're alive. And that he could not you know, he passed in June. And so but we know he's looking at this and he's excited. I don't know if he's doing the cabbage patch or he's just doing whatever, but he is excited. And he was a lively individual. Very, very bright, very sharp even in his older age, and had a incredible perspective on architecture as well. And so, Councilman Espinosa, you would have been incredibly impressed at his sharp mind. And so today we give honor in the midst of so much change in the city of Denver. This is, again, proof that preservation and revitalization can coexist. And so I strongly support this. And I asked my colleagues to do the same. Thank you. Thank you. Councilman Brooks. Councilman Espinosa. So it's sort of I'm a stickler for details. So when something comes up, I scrambled to try and verify to the best that I can. And so, yes, I was able to confirm that, John. It was very close. And that is not to diminish the work of either. But John was, in fact, 19 October 7th, and his first issuance was October 7th, 1959. The other one was October 7th, 1960. So the. So that was that clarification. So now I want to go into my actual comments. I've been thinking a lot about first, especially because earlier this month there were so many firsts, including the first Native American and Muslim women heading to serve on our U.S. Congress or in the U.S. Congress here at home in Colorado. We are sending our first African-American to Congress, where we also elected the first openly gay governor in the country. We've also elected our first trans woman to the Colorado state legislature. We all know that you can't be what you can't see. So this landmark designation is important not only because the structure is architecturally significant, but because it celebrates the breaking of barriers that need to be broken. Many thanks to my colleague, Councilman Brooks, for championing this important application and an end in case it isn't clear, in the words of Councilman Brooks and the hell yes on this application . Thanks. Thank you. Guzman. Espinosa Guzman. We can. Thank you so much, Mr. President. First, I'd like to say to Mr. Henderson I'm sorry for your loss, and my thoughts are with your family. I have the honor of serving as the council's representative, along with Councilman Flynn, on a committee that's looking at the landmark ordinance and the process. And one of the things that I really credit our staff with doing is to take a look at disparities that we have. And I think that for me, this is just an important moment to to talk about how, you know, institutionalized racism works. Because if you look at the landmark ordinance, there's nothing about it that's racially obvious. There's nothing about it that's culturally obvious, right? It's about architecture and history and time. But what we know is that according to the research by the staff, that we have very few historic landmarks from the African-American history of our city and probably an even bigger disparity on the Latino piece of our history, given the number of Latinos that have been a part of the city's history and the percentage of the population. Neither comes anywhere close to a representative sample. And so you have to think about why is that right? So what about laws or ordinances or standards that look neutral on their face has bias built into them structurally. And so it might be that, you know, the quality of the integrity of the workmanship, right. Who had access to certain materials that we consider worthy of material of preserving versus materials that we might not consider is worthy of preserving, who is able to work in what parts of town? Right. So there's a lot of landmark designations downtown perhaps, but maybe fewer in West Denver. What are the the standards that we have and how many of those criteria have to be met? You know, we don't have as much, perhaps media coverage or the documented history of the contributions that kind of support and application, perhaps because the stories that might have been told in a neighborhood setting might not have been told in The Denver Post. So whereas we heard stories today that came from interviews, if we didn't have, you know, the living individual to interview, I wonder if there was coverage in the Architectural Digest rate or some of the prominent places we look for history. So there's all these subtle ways that it's probably more difficult to find, document and meet the standards we have for those who may have been, you know, facing more barriers in the in their work, if they were architects or maybe their stories weren't told, if it was based on the history of the subject, who lived in the home or owned the business. So I just think it's a really important moment for us, not just to celebrate and pass this actual designation, but to think about how we find and honor more of that history. And just to warn us that using the rules that we thought looked so neutral on their surface might not be sufficient . We may have to think about, you know, as equity demands, sometimes you have to take a different or more enhanced approach to overcome the past barrier. And so, you know, we, I think, should think more about this. It may be a little bit beyond the scope of the task force that we're on, but how is it that we find more of these cases right now? For example, we put the onus of all this research on the community to do so, the question of who has the resources to do the research, and if we want to uncover and do more of this historic recognition of, you know, Latino residents or residents who from other disadvantaged backgrounds , do we as a city need to step up more? So I just want to challenge us to think about not just designating this home today, but the ways that we might need to do things differently or with a different approach in order to get to, frankly, a more equitable result. So with that, I'm really excited to to support it today and want us to keep thinking about doing more of this in future. Thank you. Thank you. Councilwoman, can each. Councilman Lopez. Thank you. I'm proud to support this as well. I think, you know, Councilman, can I just summed up a lot of what I was going to say. There are architects that go back a thousand years. I'm in this and in this part of the world and never get any credit. I think it's important that as we identify. Opportunities like this to bring them into these chambers and to make it so. Right. Technology to honor that. So I'm I'm definitely a yes. It's one thing to be the first in anything. It's quite an honor to do that. And over the years I've seen a lot of firsts, people being the first. And now. I just can't help but think it's not about just being the first. It's about not being the last. And that to me has been everything that I've worked for and everything that I see now. It's an honor to be the first. We just cannot be the last. And that's what we have to focus on. And the more that we, you know, designate either a structure or a street name in this city or something that reflects who we are. And then I want to say that diversity, but the true culture of who we are in Colorado and everybody that has made it such a great state and city that we can be the last. Right. So these chambers are exactly the vehicle for it. Thank you. Thank you for bringing this forward. Congratulations to many more African-American people of color, Chicano architects. Thank you, Councilman Lopez. See no other comments. I'll just add a thank you to everybody who made this possible and brought it forward. And thank you, Councilman Brooks. I am excited to support this tonight. Madam Secretary, roll call. Black eye. Brooks. Now. So I went out of Gilmore. I turned in Hi. Cashman. How can each Lopez? I knew Ortega. I Susman. Mr. President. I am secretary. Please. Because voting in those results. 1212 hours council bill 1208 has passed and seeing no other business before this body. This meeting is adjourned.