Denver, CO
These childhood best friends are trying to survive together in Denver after their lives derailed
Michael Webb and James Peters, best friends since third grade, sit on their e-bikes and lean against the brick wall of a vacant storefront.
They glare at the Capitol Hill King Soopers where, they say, workers just kicked them out.
“I’m too depressed to talk,” Peters says.
The whole ordeal started at 6:07 a.m., the day before, on a Monday. Peters had put all of his change — all the money he has in this world — into the store’s Coinstar machine.
The machine printed out a receipt, and he took it to the counter to collect his $111.
“But it was 6:07 a.m., and they don’t cash the vouchers until 8 a.m.,” Peters says.
He had a court appointment in Aurora that morning, so he left the store and came back on Tuesday with Webb. But when they arrived, a worker explained that they were too late. They should have come back on Monday — receipts need to be redeemed the day they’re printed.
The men felt the store was robbing them of $111 they desperately needed, and there was nothing they could do about it.
Peters’ temper boiled, and the store employees kicked him out for good.
Staff at the store declined to comment on this story.
“They robbed my brother,” says Webb, who called Coinstar on behalf of his friend. “I was on hold forever, but when they answered this super nice woman gave me a code and just made sure the transaction was right.”
Since Peters had been 86’d from the store, Webb went into King Soopers with the receipt and the code. Six people, he says, surrounded him to kick him out. He ignored them and walked to the counter.
“The poor man working there was going, ‘Oh my God, this guy’s back,’” Webb says. “But I gave him the code, and we got the money.”
The $111 was in their hands again. To them, it was a fortune. And it was so little at the same time.
“How is this all the money I’ve got in the world,” wonders Peters.
Not that long ago, Peters was thriving. Now, he’s crashed.
Peters is a master tiler and the owner of Trinity Tiling. For 19 years, he’s done custom tiling jobs for Denver homeowners.
Owning his own business, he made more money than he needed.
“Two, three years ago, I was renting a house out in Aurora in Southshore — $3,300 a month,” he says. “And that was chump change to me at the time — like easy. I had 10 grand for first and last month’s rent and a deposit. I was living like a baller, as they would say, and now I find myself all the way at the bottom.”
When he had the money, he spent it furiously. Then, he split with his wife. The pandemic and inflation disrupted the construction industry. Customers quit calling for tiling jobs.
These days, his business hardly earns a dime.
“I bill at $125, and with that, I can barely afford overhead to live in my parents’ basement for free,” Peters says.
His has his belongings locked in a storage unit. A rodent has the full run of the place.
“It’s in there eating through the golf club bags and eating the seat off my dirt bikes and my boots for my wakeboards and bindings and snowboard boots,” Peters says. “It’s all just trashed.”
For that kind of storage, he pays $400 a month — a bill he’s not been able to afford.
“I’m so broke right now because I haven’t had work,” Peters says. “I can’t even get into my storage unit right now. So it’s like, all my s*** is in the hands of God — me getting money before the first of next month. Is all my s*** going to be gone? Or am I going to live to die another day with that deal?”
Over the years, he’s struggled with drug and alcohol addiction, and he recently relapsed after five years of sobriety.
“I don’t even eat anymore,” he says. “I don’t work out anymore. I don’t do s***. Literally, I’m giving up on life. That’s how bad it’s been. I’m still alive, unfortunately, but I almost accomplished my mission the other day with an overdose. But my baby’s mama called 911, and they came and got me and took me to the hospital.”
For the third time in his life, he kicked fentanyl cold turkey, sweating and suffering in his bed alone.
He’s been sober for a week.
“I’m glad you’re here,” Webb says. “I don’t have anybody else.”
Webb, too, has struggled with addiction, though his housing situation has been improving.
When he was 12 years old, he says, he accidentally burned down a post office.
“That pretty much screwed my life up from the get-go,” he says. “Drugs and alcohol happened very early after that.”
He’s lived all over Colorado, from Parker to Castle Rock to Loveland to Fort Collins. But Denver felt most like home, and all his life, he’s wanted to live downtown.
“I always wanted to live downtown, until I was homeless downtown, and that’s not how I wanted to live down here,” he says.
When he was 25 years old, he lived outside under an overhang at the Althea Center for Engaged Spirituality, a church at 13th Avenue and Williams Street.
During the day, he would hide his belongings in a nearby bush while he worked in construction cleanup for $50 a day at Ready Labor. At night, he’d drink at the Satire. Then he’d go back to the church to sleep, hoping his belongings would still be there. Often, they weren’t.
- Homelessness is up in Denver, but fewer people are sleeping outdoors than the year before
Now 38, he’s finally getting his life back together. He’s spent multiple stints in hardscrabble rehabs. He’s relapsed and suffered through withdrawals that led to brutal seizures. He found some stability in the Denver Rescue Mission’s New Life Program, where he stayed sober, kept a job and eventually earned a car upon graduating.
And he recently lived for nine months in a safe-occupancy site, where he slept in a heated tent with a refrigerator. Sure, he was still homeless, but at least he managed to find some stability.
Through government subsidies, he got a RadPower e-bike. Tired of driving, he sold his car and enjoyed cruising through the city. Then he crashed into a fire hydrant going 18 miles an hour and broke his leg — a tibial plateau fracture. He received 50 staples in his leg and needed to use a wheelchair.
In the spring, Webb connected with a volunteer at the Saint Francis Center who helped him find a studio at the Colburn Hotel and Apartments, the housing above the classic Denver dive Charlie Brown’s.
For the first time in his adult life, Webb is living near downtown, in a home in Capitol Hill. Peters moved his belongings in for him. Webb used crutches to get to his fourth-floor apartment. Without Peters, he doesn’t know how he would have pulled off the move.
“Man, he’s done a lot for me,” Webb says. “If I didn’t have him, I wouldn’t be around. I’d be gone. Not gone from Denver, gone from the world. It’s good to have a friend, a brother.”
Webb says Denver has programs that helped him out along the way.
“When I first became homeless, when I was 25, I really dug into resources and really researched,” Webb says.
There are many homeless people who go without food, and as he sees it, that’s entirely unnecessary.
“There’s all kinds of places that give out food and stuff,” he says.
- Aurora booted hundreds from an apartment building. We followed one mother of three as she figured out what to do next
Medicaid saved him when he had to go into treatment for his alcoholism and when he broke his leg on his bike.
“If you’re homeless, you can get Medicaid,” Webb says. “And Medicaid is the best insurance that you can possibly have. I’ve had Medicaid. It’s saved my a** multiple times through alcoholism. I’ve been to treatment centers. Medicaid has saved my butt with medical stuff.”
Webb says the investment in his health is ultimately good for society.
“I’ve done a lot of work through my years,” he says. “I feel like I’ve worked enough to feel like I’m not ripping off the taxpayer. I pay taxes every year, so, I’m damned grateful for it … Denver’s been pretty terrible, but pretty good to me, honestly. Like, when it comes down to it, Denver’s been wonderful to me. I mean, I’m lucky to be where I’m at.”
But Medicaid hasn’t worked for Peters. His prior income has disqualified him from having the coverage.
Peters broke his leg in a motorcycle accident five years back.
It took him a year, walking on his broken leg, to finally seek treatment.
The doctors asked him, “How did you do that?”
“Drugs,” he replied.
He felt like he didn’t have any other choice and says he couldn’t afford “millions of dollars in medical debt.”
“You gotta do what you gotta do,” Webb says.
“I have two abscessed teeth,” Peters says. “And I can’t get approved for Medicaid because of my taxes in prior years.”
He reaches into the pocket of his cargo short looking for his Orajel, and realizes it’s missing. He can barely open his mouth.
“This guy’s worked his whole life, hard work,” Webb says. “He’s the hardest worker … It sucks. His teeth are blowing up, and he can’t get them fixed right now. There’s a lot wrong with this place. It’s hard to keep happy. It’s hard to smile all the time. It’s hard to be nice.”
But being nice matters to both men. It’s something they see less and less of in Denver since the pandemic.
As they speak about how the city’s becoming tense, a man at a bus stop down the street screams at a woman in her car. He’s mad she’s blocking a bus that’s nowhere in sight.
Even though Peters acknowledges the woman is parked illegally, he is appalled by the man’s behavior.
“Everyone deserves the benefit of the doubt,” Peters says. “Be nice, too. You don’t know what they’re going through. They could be going through something 10 times worse than what you’re going through. They could have lost a parent this week and a parent last week. You don’t know. Be nice. Everyone doesn’t have to be so high-strung.”
Peters is strong. He knows how to defend himself and has saved Webb from the sort of scraps people struggling with addiction find themselves in all too often.
But, these days, Peters avoids confrontations. Even with the King Soopers workers who refused to give them their money, he and Webb helped each other stay grounded, he says. They worked to keep their cool as best they could, even as they felt robbed.
“Everyone looks at you like you want to fight,” Peters says. “It’s like, ‘I’ve got no interest in fighting. I want to buy donuts for my daughter and go back home.’”
Denver, CO
One tree at a time: Denver nonprofit works to close shade gap as heat dome threatens neighborhoods
DENVER — Some Denver neighborhoods are far more vulnerable to this weekend’s incoming heat dome than others — and the difference comes down to trees.
The Valverde neighborhood on the city’s west side has about 9% canopy cover, leaving residents with little shade as temperatures climb toward triple digits.
▶️ WATCH: Denver7’s Claire Lavezzorio learns more about The Park People and how it is helping neighborhoods in Denver.
One tree at a time: Denver nonprofit works to close shade gap as heat dome threatens neighborhoods
Kim Yuan-Farrell, executive director of The Park People, a nonprofit that plants trees in underserved neighborhoods, said the disparity across Denver is stark.
“We have some neighborhoods that have wonderful canopy cover, like 20 to 30% of those neighborhoods are forested. Then a number of our neighborhoods have really low canopy cover, between four or 8% where it’s just significantly less,” Yuan-Farrell said.
Denver7
The Park People identified 28 neighborhoods in need of more tree cover, including Westwood, Globeville and Northeast Park Hill.
Trees can cool an area by 15 to 20 degrees, making a significant difference.
The National Weather Service (NWS) warned the heat dome could last through next weekend.
“The exceptional thing about this is how long it will last,” said NWS meteorologist Russell Danielson. “If you do have trees to take shelter under, it does actually cool down the temperature a decent amount.”
Yuan-Farrell said trees are more than a comfort — they are a critical piece of urban infrastructure.
Denver7
“We really consider it a really essential element of green infrastructure, a real nature-based solution to a lot of these really serious local environmental problems,” Yuan-Farrell said.
In the map below, explore Denver’s libraries and rec centers that welcome the public in from the heat during business hours.
When asked whether Denver has a long road ahead, she did not hesitate.
“We have a lot of work ahead of us,” Yuan-Farrell said. “And we really need our whole community to get involved in that.”
The Park People plant anywhere from 1,200 to 2,000 trees a year. You can apply for one in your yard. Planting is set to begin in September.
Denver7 | Your Voice: Get in touch with Claire Lavezzorio
Denver7’s Claire Lavezzorio covers topics that have an impact across Colorado. If you’d like to get in touch with Claire, fill out the form below to send her an email.
To the well-trained eye, Denver figured to be one of the epicenters of this NBA offseason.
With two starters due for a combined $25.8 million salary increase, and with a potential rising star on the bench determined to land a lucrative contract extension, something had to give. The Nuggets were about to get too expensive for owner Stan Kroenke to stomach. Especially after their debacle of a playoff run, which ended before it could begin.
This was the prevailing sentiment for two months leading up to free agency. Almost all Nuggets-related chatter, both inside and outside Ball Arena, was about which player(s) they would sacrifice in a trade. Team president Josh Kroenke poured jet fuel on the rumor mill when he declared in May that “everything is on the table” except trading three-time MVP center Nikola Jokic.
Another high-ranking official in the Kroenke sports empire, Kevin Demoff, had hinted months earlier that Denver’s inclination might be to avoid the luxury tax entirely next season as to avoid paying the NBA’s punitive “repeater tax” rates. That was long before the Nuggets revealed to their power brokers that they were nowhere close to championship-worthy.
So, uh, what’s going on in Denver?
More than a week since the league’s free agency period began, most teams have completed their offseason business. The Nuggets have been puzzlingly idle. A few highlights so far: Tim Hardaway Jr. leaving for Miami as expected, Jonas Valanciunas getting waived for salary cap relief as expected, Marvin Bagley III and Tyus Jones signing one-year deals.
Going all-in or playing it conservatively?
Something doesn’t add up. As in, it adds up to a sum that continues to leave most NBA observers skeptical. Denver is leaving everyone guessing right now, even other teams.
Should fans be frustrated by the lack of action? Encouraged by it? Or is everything simply on hold?
There are two sides to this to unpack: the financial and basketball perspectives. They’re obviously intertwined, but when trying to make sense of this situation, it’s best to start with the financial side, because that was an obstacle that seemed to be motivating Denver’s roster decisions even before the on-court problems that emerged against Minnesota.
Before last season, the Nuggets were choosing between two extension-eligible 2022 draftees who had one year remaining on their rookie contracts: Christian Braun and Peyton Watson. They chose Braun, the more proven player at that point, an efficient 15-point-per-game starter the previous season, and a strong (if flawed) defender. They signed him to a five-year deal that would go into effect in 2026. They felt comfortable taking Watson to restricted free agency and maybe even losing him. Three years into his career, he seemed to be developing into a solid 3-and-D bench player, and maybe not much more than that.
The Nuggets were looking ahead to their 2026-27 payroll and didn’t want to commit large chunks of money to both players. Watson told The Denver Post in October: “From what I understand, it was just a financial business decision. Obviously, with the new CBA and the second apron, things of that nature, they wanted to stay out of that.”
Braun went on to have an injury-riddled season, the worst of his career. Watson had the best season of his career, particularly by showcasing his off-the-dribble ability when Jokic was hurt in January.
And so the Nuggets knew they would be entering the 2026 offseason with six starter-level players whose combined salary would result in a roster payroll above all three tax thresholds: the luxury tax ($200.4 million), first apron ($209 million) and second apron ($221.7 million). They wanted to keep Watson, recognizing the importance of his two-way talent and athleticism. They signaled as much to other teams.
If their previous actions had already indicated they were prepared to sacrifice him to stay under the second apron, then changing course and keeping him would surely mean sacrificing someone else.
This was the foundational logic that led people around the NBA to believe they were almost guaranteed to trade a starter. An oversimplification of the salary cap math looked like this: Lose one of your six starter-level players to get under the second apron, or lose two to duck the tax entirely. Perhaps other creative ways to shed salary would emerge, but this was the basic state of the union. Jon Wallace and Ben Tenzer would be tasked with threading the needle between cutting payroll and improving the roster.
From this perspective, the fact that Denver has not traded any of the six starter-level players yet can ironically be interpreted as an aggressive stance, not a conservative one. The moves that were expected to have happened by now would’ve been motivated primarily by money, not purely by basketball. Could it be that the Kroenkes are going all-in to chase a second championship? Suddenly, in the last few days, there’s been reporting from national media outlets such as The Athletic that “Denver’s ownership has not given its front office a mandate to cut costs.” The Post has been told similarly.
But that didn’t seem to be the case three weeks ago when the Nuggets were actively exploring the trade market for Braun and Cam Johnson, as The Post and other outlets reported.
What can it mean? Maybe there’s been a change of heart, and an executive decision has been made to spend lavishly. Maybe it’s connected to the team’s pursuit of LeBron James in free agency (how do you even begin to pitch him on coming to Denver if you’re not willing to pay up?), or maybe it’s a reaction to Jokic’s decision to wait one more year to sign a new extension. As direct as he was in publicly stating his plan to sign next summer, maybe the pressure of him entering the last guaranteed season of his current contract scared the Nuggets straight.
Maybe this is an earnest, full-throttle statement of championship intent.
Or maybe the abrupt timing of this leakage is a little too convenient.
Gauging the Watson market
The Nuggets have multiple reasons to want the rest of the NBA to believe they’re working with a blank check right now. One of those reasons: Watson.
Negotiations have clearly not gone smoothly. The line of demarcation is $25 million. That’s Braun’s average annual value on his new contract — the deal Denver prioritized over Watson — and now it’s the number Watson’s camp can fixate on. His side can point to last season and claim that going forward, he is worth the same amount or more. The Nuggets can point to the previous three years and say Braun’s overall body of work is better so far. As this is happening, another team is reportedly lingering, with a desire to poach Watson. The Clippers reside in his hometown, and they’ve already made moves this summer to get younger and clear their books.
Watson is a restricted free agent, meaning the Clippers must extend him an offer sheet, the terms of which Denver can match to retain him. Offer-sheeting a player can be risky because it ties down your cap until the situation is resolved, with no guarantee that you will successfully land the player you’re targeting. The Nuggets are saying behind the scenes that they’re prepared to match any offer sheet. Basically, they’re trying to scare off LA (and any other suitor) by indicating the offer sheet would be a waste of time, and the only real way to get Watson from them is to execute a sign-and-trade, sending Denver other assets in exchange for the right to sign the RFA. Utah just did this with Walker Kessler, who ended up with the Lakers via sign-and-trade. How can you bolster your leverage in a situation like this? By signaling publicly that you’re willing to pay an exorbitant payroll and tax bill to keep Watson and everyone else.
This also sends a message that you aren’t desperate to trade a starter (or two) to keep Watson — that you’re more than happy to hold on to Johnson, Braun, Aaron Gordon, or Jamal Murray if the offer isn’t strong enough.
If there is a spending mandate, then other teams might look to take advantage with low-ball trade offers.
So maybe the lack of a spending mandate could turn out to be a bluff for leverage. Or maybe it’s a real edict, a genuine commitment to competitiveness at all costs. There’s almost no way to know for sure until the Nuggets take an action to back up their words. For now, inaction has the appearance of aggression, as Denver attempts to feel out the market.
Certainly, it seems like the key domino will be how the Watson dilemma works itself out — either in the form of a contract extension, or an unmatched offer sheet, or a sign-and-trade, or a begrudgingly accepted qualifying offer ($6.5 million).
ESPN front office expert Bobby Marks (a former NBA executive) projected this week that if the Nuggets retain Watson at a $25 million cap hit and don’t trade any starters, their luxury tax bill next season would exceed $170 million — an almost unprecedented amount that includes second apron and repeater tax penalties. That’s in addition to what the raw roster payroll would be.
Between player salaries and taxes, it would be a $400 million team.
Which finally brings us to the basketball perspective on Denver’s offseason holding pattern. It would be one thing to pay that much if the Nuggets had just lost the NBA Finals in a tight six-game series with their current roster — if they knew for a fact that a championship was barely out of reach last season.
But the Nuggets didn’t make the Finals. They didn’t win a single playoff series. They lost in the first round to an injured opponent. They weren’t close.
Fans of an NBA team obviously have no obligation to care about the dent in a billionaire owner’s wallet. But it’s also reasonable enough for Nuggets fans to want change this offseason, independent of the financial complications. There’s a fair case to be made that Denver should be pursuing trades purely based on basketball, even if the Kroenkes have decided they’re willing to spend like few owners have ever spent. Perimeter defense, shot creation depth, downhill quickness and frontcourt physicality are all visibly lacking.
It’s just that the reason fans want change might not be exactly aligned with the reason this ownership group would want change.
It’s difficult to imagine the Nuggets feeling satisfied with the results of the last three seasons enough to truly run it back with the same top six players and less depth.
Then consider that those six players are aging. Then consider that the cost of those six players is multiplying.
That’s more than enough evidence to leave you wondering if Denver’s silence is misleading.
Want more Nuggets news? Sign up for the Nuggets Insider to get all our NBA analysis.
DENVER — Denver Mayor Mike Johnston is launching a $100 million plan to boost the local economy and support 10,000 jobs over the next three years.
Johnston announced the four-part program Thursday morning, flanked by business leaders while praising downtown businesses like brunch eatery Snooze.
▶️ WATCH: Denver7’s Alex Dowd reports on the plan
Denver mayor promises to create 10K jobs in next 3 years
Snooze Co-Founder Adam Schlegel said his business benefited from a similar program when U.S. Sen. John Hickenlooper was mayor in the early 2000s.
“The city really was the one that stepped up,” Schlegel said. “We wouldn’t have started if it wouldn’t have been for the economic development office. We ended up getting an incentive from the city to open up, particularly in this space [downtown]. It was a fiscal incentive to do it, in addition to coaching.”
Both of those are offered in the new four-part Denver Jobs Agenda. With funding from the Denver Downtown Development Authority and the Office of Economic Development and Opportunity, Johnston aims to develop start-ups in the city, grow existing businesses and draw in new companies while working to advance the Denver-area workforce across industries.
At the end of the last fiscal quarter, Denver’s unemployment rate hovered around 3.6% — under the national rate of 4.2% — according to U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, while office vacancy sits just under 40%, according to commercial real estate broker CBRE.
Johnston and other speakers made multiple references to more jobs bringing more people downtown.
“Denver has so many things going for it, so it will come back,” Schlegel said. “It’s not coming back as fast as I want, or as much as anyone will, but will it have a long-term future? 100%. It’s things like this, though, that I think give us a lot of hope that it can happen sooner than waiting it out.”
▶️ Watch the full press conference
Press conference: Denver mayor announces Denver Jobs Agenda
Chris Berthiaume, the city’s director of workforce industry initiatives, says the three workforce development centers across Denver serve around 20,000 people each year. He’s confident this new initiative will help more of those visitors find employment.
“We want to focus on things like aerospace, cybersecurity, green construction,” Berthiaume said. “This new initiative really just tightens the focus on sectors that we know are growing. Colorado is home to a huge aerospace culture. Quantum technology is emerging and coming. Green workforce are jobs that we know drive around Denver. Construction is everywhere. We need to make sure we have a skilled workforce that’s ready to take on those jobs.”
While also finding employers to hire them and stay within the community for the long haul.
“I think the reason businesses work — certainly restaurants work — is that you are integral to the community specifically where you are,” Schlegel said. “There are so many people in our community that really believe in Denver and want to see what it can be, and so it will get there.”
It’s well on the way. Denver’s Economic Development Corporation says they’re working with 52 active prospects that could bring more than 12,000 jobs to the area.
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