When I first heard about what’s been happening to residents of the Front Range mobile home park here in Broomfield, I couldn’t believe it. Harassment, threats, legal intimidation, predatory fines, reprisals — the details of abuses by Front Range management echo based-on-real-life movies like Erin Brockovich and Michael Clayton.
I have friends who live at Front Range who are afraid to speak out publicly about their experiences for fear of retaliation. I worry about them, which is why I attended and spoke as a faith community representative at a May meeting of Front Range residents with Broomfield city officials. It’s also why I joined 50 or so others at a ‘rally’ on Wednesday in support of Colorado Mobile Home Residents’ United, an advocacy group for local mobile home residents led by Billy Bear Jarrett.
I came away from both events encouraged and grateful, even, for Billy’s unsung and tireless work behind the scenes, and for the tangible involvement and support of local government officials, including Broomfield Mayor Randy Ahrens and Broomfield City Council Member Guyleen Castriotta, and for the attention brought (and to be brought in future) to this important story by investigative TV reporter Theresa Marchetta of ABC’s Channel 7 in Denver.
The sad and scary part about this is that Front Range residents are not alone in what they’ve endured — residents at other area mobile home parks, including Friendly Village of the Rockies, Lamplighter and others, all owned by Kingsley Management of Provo, UT, have similar stories, as do residents at mobile home parks nationwide.
This is an epidemic of injustice perpetrated on some of our most vulnerable fellow citizens. There are many layers to it, ones I hope to unpack here in the months to come, but for now let me be very clear — what’s happening to these people, our neighbors, is wrong and it must stop.
