Immigration and Crime Issues Take Center Stage
Trevor Phipps
As one of the strangest election seasons in U.S. history slowly winds to a close, a slew of political candidates vying for office this November were given the chance last week to address the public and seek voter support in Teller County.
The candidates’ forum, held at the WP Council Chambers, was sponsored by the Greater Woodland Park Chamber of Commerce, which holds these types of events on a regular basis.
Those candidates who partook in the discussion consisted of contenders facing competitive seats at the regional and state level. None of the county candidates, who are running unopposed, participated. Another no-show was Brittany Pettersen, the incumbent Democratic for Colorado’s 7th Congressional District due to a prior commitment.
The candidates taking the stage were Sergei Matveyuk, the Republican candidate for the 7th Congressional District; Stephanie Luck and Kathryn Green, who are running for the state District 60 Representative slot; and Michael Allen and Jeremy Dowell, the contenders for the 4th Judicial District Attorney seat.
As he has in the past, Steve Woolf, who has been involved with the chamber, moderated the forum. In addition, some questions were asked by local journalists.
During the forum, Woolf asked pre-picked questions that the chamber pooled from area residents. The questions covered a wide variety of topics including rural versus urban policies, crime, immigration, affordable housing and business issues.
One major topic, directed at the district attorney candidates, dealt with crime and ways to prevent recidivism or the tendency of a convicted criminal to reoffend. Both Allen, the incumbent, and Dowell, the Democratic challenger, offered ways to reduce the rising issue of criminals becoming repeat offenders. The issue of recidivism statewide has been brought up frequently by the Teller County sheriff and the county commissioners.
Allen mentioned that the DA’s office has the power to put people in jail for the rest of their lives or use other methods to reduce the number of repeat criminal offenders. He mentioned specialty courts, such as the recovery and domestic violence courts, that have high recidivism rates.
He also cited a “problem solving court” that exists with the 4th Judicial District that is aimed at helping veterans who commit crimes. “It’s up to us to get those folks steered back in the right direction,” Allen said of veterans who have experienced trauma. “Just not that long ago we were deploying military forces into combat zones at a rate high than ever in our history including the Civil War. So, these people were coming back very damaged and committing offenses. And our veterans’ trauma court is our most successful problem-solving court. In fact, the recidivism rate is very low for that particular program.”
Dowell, meanwhile, said that he spent three years implementing and helping manage problem solving courts within the state’s 16th Judicial District. “I think one of the reasons that the veterans’ trauma court is so successful is because the DA’s office really supports it and encourages maximized funding, and maximized support for that at all levels,” Dowel said. “If I were elected, I would bring that same approach to all case types. If there is a case type that there currently is a problem-solving court working to address, the cycle of crime is almost always driven by substance abuse or some kind of PTSD (Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder) across populations, it is not just limited to the veterans’ community.”
The democratic candidate for the state District 60 House of Representatives slot, Kathryn Green, emphasized the need for programs that monitor convicted criminals. “Once somebody has committed a crime, if they are at the point of getting paroled or move into a halfway house or something, they can’t just be turned loose to see what else they will do,” Green said. “They really need to be monitored and also we need to have more programs in place to try and move people back into society or into prison if they deserve it.”
The incumbent for this seat, Stephanie Luck, mentioned a number of programs within the prison system and community groups that help criminals with reintroduction into society. “I know Pueblo has a very robust means by which they do that,” Luck said. “They provide everything from tents that people need to access to jobs to clothes. They have an office that is dedicated to that program. What I would point to is our need to strengthen our families on the front end, so we are preventing people from getting into some of these anti-social behaviors from the beginning.”
Matveyuk, the GOP candidate for Colorado’s 7th Congressional District, who immigrated to the country himself from Poland, said that people entering the country illegally leads to an increase in crime. He also reiterated Luck’s sentiment that the increase in broken families causes a hike in crime and repeat offenders.
“Those illegal immigrants that commit crimes should be deported,” Matveyuk said. “Those that harm our citizens and cause a threat to our neighborhoods should be deported.”
