Residents launch effort to unseat councilwoman

As campaigning for the Nov. 6 ballot ramps up to a fever pitch across Colorado over the next several weeks, a smaller — but no less nasty — political battle will reach its crescendo this week in Englewood.

In this city of 35,000 directly south of Denver, a group of residents has launched an effort to unseat Councilwoman Laurett Barrentine from the Englewood City Council more than a year before her fouryear term ends. A recall election in District 3 of the city is being held on Tuesday.

The issues swirling around the removal effort involve city finances, government transparency and allegations of improper treatment of city staff. But they also seem to hinge on the far more personal: charges of bullying, troublemaking and “creating turmoil.”

That’s how former Councilman Steve Yates sees Barrentine’s tenure on the sevenmember council, both when he shared the dais with her and in the 10 months since he’s been off the council.

“It’s about creating turmoil — it’s not about planning for the future,” Yates said. “That’s what she does in the council meetings.”

Yates and others behind the recall effort, which includes two former Englewood mayors, say Barrentine is an “obstructionist” who “repeatedly refused to approve (the) city budget, jeopardizing police, fire, streets and water.” They accuse her of routinely violating the city charter, wasting time and resources with unnecessary requests for information and data, and being unprofessional with col leagues and residents.

They even posted to their prorecall campaign website a police report from May, in which Councilwoman Cheryl Wink told law enforcement that “she did not feel safe” after Barrentine followed her out of a meeting and yelled at her.

“The way she speaks, she rubs people the wrong way,” said Eric Keck, Englewood’s city manager, who earlier this month announced that he was stepping down from his post of four years on Oct. 5. “Is she tough to work with? Absolutely, she’s tough to work with.”

Keck said his decision to leave the city for a job in the private sector was not primarily due to his interaction with Barrentine, though he said her continued presence in city leadership was part of his calculus to step down.

But Barrentine, who was elected to council in 2015, says she is only one of seven on the City Council and that trying to persuade her colleagues to see her point of view on issues — “that’s my job.” She said she was unaware that she had upset Wink earlier this year and said she has since sat down and shared drinks and laughs with her colleague.

“I like her,” Barrentine said. “I’ve enjoyed working with her.”

Barrentine, who served a stint on council from 2003 to 2007, admitted she can be blunt and direct with people but that getting answers about city operations is what she was elected to do.

“I ask a lot of questions,” she said. “I would prefer not to be recalled for doing my job.”

Specifically, she said the latest trouble began when she asked for a forensic audit of the Englewood Environmental Foundation and Englewood McLellan Reservoir Foundation, two private entities that help oversee redevelopment in the city — notably the former Cinderella City mall site that has become the city’s municipal center.

Barrentine wants to know more about how the foundations have been spending taxpayer money and whether there has been financial mismanagement at either one of them — mismanagement that could point back to former political leaders in the city.

“Past mayors and council members who don’t want things they’ve done exposed,” she said. “Under their stewardship, things happened that they didn’t want to come out.”

Barrentine didn’t offer any details as to what form of financial mismanagement might have been taken, but she questioned why the city would be so reluctant to do the kind of examination she is asking for.

“We should do business in the open and above board,” she said.

But Yates accused Barrentine of making outlandish accusations about people working for the city, upping the level of stress and prompting employees to look toward the exits. He characterized some of her requests for information and data as “frivolous” and redundant to what council members are provided in their biweekly packets.

“She will make life so unpleasant that these professionals will leave,” he said.

Keck said he hopes Englewood and its city leaders can move past the backbiting and recriminations that have arisen of late — no matter whether Barrentine is booted or not.

“As the community moves forward, they are going to have to heal and figure out how to work together,” he said.