The Trump appointee leading the White House-backed opportunity zone initiative visited Denver on Thursday where he faced some tough questions and criticism of the program from City Councilwoman Candi CdeBaca and her chief of staff Lisa Calderón.
Scott Turner was named executive director of the White House Opportunity and Revitalization Council in April, a post that puts him at the center of the economic development program established by the 2017 Tax Cut and Jobs Act. Opportunity Zones seek to spur economic development in disadvantaged areas by providing tax breaks to investors who put capital gains into funds that invest in those areas, among other levers.
On Thursday morning, Turner joined more than a dozen federal and Denver-area officials for a roundtable discussion on the National Western Center campus. The 250-acre property is in an opportunity zone, though opportunity zone funding is not being called on to support the $1 billion overhaul that is now underway there.
“This is not only economic development, it is community development,” Turner, a former Texas state legislator and Denver Broncos player, said of the program. “Long-term sustainability is not just a phrase, it’s not just a check the box. That is the spirit of this law and the spirit of this council.”
CdeBaca and Calderón are far from convinced. CdeBaca’s District 9 includes that National Western complex and the Globeville and Elyria-Swansea neighborhoods that surround it. The neighborhoods are predominantly Latino and have been largely ignored by public and private sector investment for decades.
“I object to some of the ways this community is being talked about as if no one was here before opportunity zones came down and saved us,” said Calderón, who ran for Denver mayor this year. “Opportunity zones have also been used as a way to get rid of and displace communities of color and that’s part of the struggle we are having right now in Denver.”
CdeBaca, who lives in Swansea, unseated incumbent Councilman Albus Brooks this spring by running on a platform of pushing back on development that displaces residents from their longtime homes. She was at the forefront of the fight against the Interstate 70 widening project. That work and the National Western Center project resulted in the acquisition of more than 60 residential properties in the area.
“The challenge with opportunity is defining opportunity for whom,” CdeBaca said, criticizing city leaders for committing money to the National Western complex but not addressing the neighborhood’s noted pollution problems.
She questioned the Trump Administration’s commitment to combatting the country’s affordable housing crisis.
“Because the housing problem nationally is that federal support for housing is shrinking, and we haven’t heard anything to contrary, even with the opportunity zones,” she said.
Turner highlighted elements of the opportunity zones — such as allowing communities to speed up permitting processes — that are expected to bring down the cost of development, allowing socially-minded developers to pass on savings to residents. A U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development representative said that agency is giving priority to opportunity zones projects when awarding grants. In total, 17 federal agencies are involved in the opportunity zone council, something Turner said is part of an unprecedented commitment of resources to boosting community revitalization.
“That doesn’t mean that it’s easy. It doesn’t mean that it’s going to be perfect. It doesn’t even mean that people won’t take advantage of it in the wrong way,” Turner told CdeBaca. “But I have my ear to the ground for those types of situations and so do you.”
