Defending Liberty from Local Zoning to Land Grabs

On Thursday, October 2, 2025, Kim Monson returned from a trip to western Wyoming to tackle threats to property rights at every level of government. Cory Ohnesorge exposed Lakewood’s “gentle density” zoning push, Drew Dix championed character education through the Center for American Values, Karen Gordey described her campaign for Lakewood City Council, Karen Levine shared fall real estate preparation tips, and Virginia Macha sounded the alarm on Xcel Energy’s eminent domain campaign across eastern Colorado.

Lakewood’s Zoning Overhaul and the City Council Race

Start listening at 9:33 – Hour 1

Karen Gordey, owner of Radiant Painting and Lighting and candidate for Lakewood City Council, explained why she decided to get off the sidelines and run for office. Frustrated by city council votes on zoning and spending, Gordey described her door-to-door campaign with 10,000 door hangers to distribute before ballots mail on October 10. She encouraged volunteers to visit karenforlakewood.com to sign up.

“I was just fed up, in short, with the way city council was voting on numerous issues and decided it was finally time to get off the sidelines and get involved.”

Karen Gordey, Candidate for Lakewood City Council

Gentle Density and the Referendum Fight

Start listening at 17:14 – Hour 1

Cory Ohnesorge, a Colorado Union of Taxpayers board member, broke down Lakewood’s push to increase housing density through ADUs, duplexes, triplexes, and quadplexes under the euphemism “gentle density.” Mayor Strom promoted the changes while avoiding questions about eliminated parking minimums, a move Ohnesorge warned would force residents to park blocks from their homes and compromise safety.

Ohnesorge revealed that the city split its zoning changes into four separate ordinances, each requiring a separate citizen referendum with roughly 4,000 signatures to challenge. He called this a deliberate strategy to make opposition nearly impossible. He also highlighted Lakewood City Manager Hodgson’s $3.6 million golden parachute and $2 million Evergreen home, all funded by taxpayer dollars, while the city employs roughly 1,700 workers compared to Centennial’s 80 to 90 for a smaller but comparable population.

“What happens in Denver yesterday is happening in Lakewood today and is coming to a neighborhood near you unless you stop it, unless we can stop it here in Lakewood.”

Cory Ohnesorge, Colorado Union of Taxpayers Board Member

Honor, Integrity, and Patriotism in Education

Start listening at 31:43 – Hour 1

Drew Dix, Medal of Honor recipient and co-founder of the Center for American Values in Pueblo, detailed the center’s work training K-12 educators in character development. Nearly 50 teachers attended a recent training hosted in partnership with the Medal of Honor Society, and Dix reported that every participant expressed appreciation for the center’s approach of teaching students how to think, not what to think.

Dix emphasized that honor, integrity, and patriotism transcend political affiliation, recounting a story from the center’s 2010 opening when a woman assumed it was a conservative organization. He argued that a lost generation of parents has outsourced child-rearing to government institutions. The conversation turned to the Charlie Kirk assassination, which Dix described as a wake-up call for Americans to reject political violence and return to civil discourse.

On military readiness, Dix drew on his 20 years of Army service, including command of a company of draftees, to argue that the current administration’s efforts to trim top-heavy command structures are overdue. He warned that fewer than 30 percent of young Americans qualify for military service due to physical fitness and background issues, making national investment in a healthy, proud citizenry more urgent than ever.

“We take great pride in being able to convince or tell the students that they have an opportunity to think, but we don’t tell them how or what to think, just that they can do it, that it’s okay to think about things that come across their minds, and they should go to their parents in most cases to get an answer.”

Drew Dix, Medal of Honor Recipient

Preparing Your Home for Fall

Start listening at 63:05 – Hour 2

Karen Levine, award-winning RE/MAX Alliance realtor, walked through essential fall home maintenance tasks. She recommended scheduling sprinkler system winterization within the next 30 to 45 days and getting furnaces cleaned and serviced before heating season, noting that regular maintenance extends furnace life and avoids costly replacement recommendations from less scrupulous HVAC companies.

For homeowners considering a sale, Levine described her “walk and talk” service with a professional stager to optimize home presentation. Decluttering topped the list of staging priorities, and she encouraged listeners to treat fall as a second spring cleaning opportunity.

“One of the biggest or most common things asked for in a home inspection is to ensure that the furnace has been cleaned and serviced in the last 12 months.”

Karen Levine, RE/MAX Alliance Realtor

Eminent Domain and the Renewable Energy Land Grab

Start listening at 71:54 – Hour 2

Virginia Macha, founder of Stand for the Land Kansas, exposed the scale of land seizure underway in Colorado for renewable energy transmission and generation. The Xcel Energy Colorado transmission line’s 150-foot-wide easement alone consumes roughly 10,000 acres, equivalent to 8,000 football fields, and an estimated 127,000 acres of agricultural land face repurposing for solar, wind, and battery projects.

Macha detailed how the Biden administration used executive orders across 11 cabinet agencies to embed thousands of rule changes without proper paper trails, including making federal tax credits transferable so utilities like Xcel could sell them as untraceable, untaxable cash on private auctions. In 2023 alone, Xcel collected $850 million in federal transferable tax credits. She explained that between 2020 and 2025, Xcel initiated over 200 eminent domain actions across Colorado, with more than 30 targeting Elbert County landowners despite county commissioners denying the permit.

Macha warned that solar installations destroy topsoil organisms permanently, creating dust conditions that cause respiratory problems in southern Colorado communities. She urged citizens to attend town halls, support county commissioners who resist utility bullying, and push for cash bond requirements to fund decommissioning before taxpayers are stuck with the bill.

“Once you kill the organisms in the topsoil, or actually they remove the topsoil, and then what organisms are left in the soil, they kill off those colonies. And once you do that, you will see the earth has no nutrition and it becomes dust.”

Virginia Macha, Founder of Stand for the Land Kansas