Pearl Street Mall Crawl #Fail
The crowd started gathering at the 1100 block of Pearl street sometime around 9:30 p.m. It started with around 200 people, according to police. But by 11:30 there were somewhere between 1,000-2,000 costumed Mall Crawlers pressed against one another, shoulder to shoulder, chanting, climbing lamp posts, cresting rooftops, jumping off balconies, and, apparently, smashing up outdoor heaters and patio furniture, damaging windows and doors of businesses.
The Halloween Mall Crawl unofficially returned to Pearl Street on Friday, October 29—reminding many why it’s been discouraged and disallowed in recent years.
“We understand the desire to go out and have a good time on a beautiful holiday weekend,” Deputy Police Chief Stephen Redfearn said in a statement. “The police department supports safe, responsible gatherings. What occurred on Pearl Street last night, however, posed significant danger to participants, resulted in unacceptable damage to property and required extensive police resources to address.”
While there were no official organizers of the Mall Crawl this year, several Instagram pages—including @bouldermallcrawl, @barstoolbuffs, and @bouldercolorado—advertised the event in the days and hours leading up to it. The @bouldermallcrawl account also links to a website (bouldermallcrawl.com) promoting the 2021 return of this infamous Halloween celebration and listing event details.
“Meet outside Pearl St. Pub on the Mall. As the crowd grows it’ll spread up and down the mall from there.” the Event Info page instructs; going on to note, “Be cool. We want this to be big and fun, and for it to keep happening, we need to treat the city proper like.”
Several businesses sustained property damage, but Japango was hit the hardest. Its outdoor patio furniture and heaters were left smashed to pieces in the wake of the event.
While Japango did not respond to a request for comment, Erin Banis, one of the restaurant’s owners, told 9News the next morning, “This isn’t how we want Boulder to be. This isn’t what we want this community to go through.”
No one applied for an event permit for Friday’s massive Mall Crawl, according to police. As of yet, it remains unclear who was behind the creation of the
@bouldermallcrawl Instagram page, or the bouldermallcrawl.com website which seems to have unofficially advertised and promoted this year’s massive mall crawl. Through a series of posts that were then shared by @barstoolbuffs and @bouldercolorado, word spread quickly drawing the crowd of thousands to Pearl Street.
Redfearn said, “We will be using our investigative resources to demonstrate that there are consequences to destruction of property and other unlawful behaviors.”
Colorado’s hits vaccination milestone as transmission rates spike to highest 2021 levels
On Tuesday, November 2, Governor Jared Polis updated the state on COVID-19 Cases, Boosters, and Monoclonal Antibody Treatment. He was joined at the capitol by state epidemiologist Dr. Rachel Herlihy, and Incident Commander Scott Bookman to make the announcement.
“We hit an amazing accomplishment in the fight against COVID-19 yesterday by reaching 80 percent of adults vaccinated across Colorado with at least one dose of the lifesaving and free COVID-19 vaccine,” said Governor Polis. “But this milestone is nowhere near signaling that COVID-19 is over. Instead, Colorado is in the middle of record COVID-19 case transmission levels and close to record hospitalization rates largely coming from the unvaccinated minority in our state, who make up the vast majority of hospitalizations in all age groups. Currently, one out of every 51 Coloradans is infected with the virus. It’s critical now that every Coloradan takes advantage of every tool available to slow and stop the spread of COVID, with the most effective tool being the vaccine.”
Herlihy then gave an overview of the current hospitalization and COVID-19 case rates across Colorado.
“Over the last few days, we have seen an increase in hospitalizations across the state. As of today, we have 1,847 Coloradans hospitalized,” Herlihy said. “That is the highest number we have seen in Colorado this year.”
BLM moves forward selling Colorado public land to oil and gas companies
The U.S. Department of Interior’s Bureau of Land Management announced plans to continue to move forward, selling oil and gas leases on public lands in Colorado, Montana, Nevada, New Mexico, Utah, Wyoming and in several eastern states. In total, the BLM is proposing to sell more than 730,000 acres of public land—over 1,000 square miles—to oil and gas companies.
The proposal comes just a week after the United Nations published a report warning the world that “Governments’ fossil fuel production plans dangerously out of sync with Paris limits.” This has prompted some activist groups like the WildEarth Guardians to threaten litigation.
“Frankly, we’re sick of going to court to defend the climate, but if President Biden continues to reject the law, the science, and the public, then we’ll have no choice,” Jeremy Nichols, climate and energy program director for WildEarth Guardians, said in a press release. “We hope the administration reconsiders these latest plans to sell public lands for fracking, but we will not hesitate to fight back to protect our planet and our future.”
