DENVER – Owning a business in Denver takes a certain amount of endurance, and for business owners in Denver’s Five Points neighborhoods who grew up in the area, that endurance has transformed into resilience.
As the Denver7 news team prepared for a special on-location newscast in Five Points, several neighborhood business owners shared their personal experiences with its history, current challenges, and everyday happenings.
The Present
“I’m excited about Five Points because…the culture, the vibrancy, the vibes, the food, and then, most importantly, the people. And so when we think about where we're at, there's a reason so many people want to be where we're at, and I'm excited about where we've been, and I'm equally excited about where we're going,” Jeff “Brother Jeff” Fard, owner of Brother Jeff’s Cultural Center said.
Fard has owned businesses in Five Points since the 1990’s.
Risë Jones opened her business, Tealee’s Tea House and Bookstore with her partner seven years ago.
“I feel and see a quiet evolution, and what I mean by that is I’m blocks from Cleo Parker Robinson’s new building, and that's exciting to me, just not locally, but nationally, that is a big deal. That's 54 years of work, and that building is a testimony to her work,” Jones said. “I have the Little Bodega next to me, which started two years ago by a newcomer, and then TeaLee’s also exists…then you have the mainstays. Welton Street Café came back, bigger and better, fought their way back.”
Norman Harris has been part owner of Spangalang Brewery for 3 years, he’s also the executive director of Juneteenth Music Festival and the Five Points Business Improvement District (BID).
“One of the most positive things I'm proud of is that this community is moving forward collectively. The BID has been working to establish a vision transforming the corridor into what we define as a modernized cultural marketplace. And in order to do that, we need to have our stakeholders believing in it, as well as working towards it. So the fact that we are acting and working collectively together is a really positive movement,” Harris said.
Outside of everyday business and entertainment, Five Point is also home to many festivals and cultural events.
But those celebrations haven’t resolved some of the neighborhood’s well-known and under told issues.
Current challenges
“Today in Five Points, you're talking about triple net leases. You're talking about commercial entities and big money. So, I don't know where the small person, I'm talking mom and pop shop person, gets a foot in the door. I know people, in terms of those who were not able to sustain and move past the light rail coming right down the business district. I think the folks on Colfax are now experiencing that with the massive transit that's going from downtown into Aurora,” Fard said.
Fard said the light rail essentially cut businesses off, and made it hard for customers to access them.
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For Jones, the evolution of Five Points has made it harder to identify Denverites who are invested in seeing the community grow and thrive.
“When we were growing up, when you would say, ‘who's the community that supports Five Points?’, it was pretty clear. It was between Five Points, and I would say Park Hill…and I think now we're in a time where you have to redefine who the community is,” Jones said.
Jones said one clearly defined part of the neighborhood is the River North Arts District (RiNo).
“When I hear RiNo I think River North. I think of a community that's associated with five points on the map,” Fard said. “We call this Five Points, basically because the landmark is the five intersections that come together. And so, I'm not really offended by RiNo. I do know that that community was rebranded with artists and entrepreneurialism, etc..”
Jones said the success of RiNo reminds her of rebranding’s currently underway in other major cities.
“I think Harlem is a good example. So, if you go into New York today, they're trying to call Harlem, SoHo. I'm like, there's already a SoHo,” Jones said.
But Jones, Harris, and Fard said RiNo is a reminder of the stigma that is still attached to Five Points.
“The number one image that comes up when you say RiNo for most people, is gentrification. But at the same time, when I hear the term ‘Welton Street Corridor’, that's also a rebranding, attempting to get away from Five Points, because Five Points had a negative connotation, particularly in the 90s,” Fard said. “There was a dynamic that took place at Juneteenth at midnight in a whole another part of town, right? And the news broadcasted it as a shooting at Juneteenth… that’s the fight that we have to do, to rebrand and to be on top of what Five Points really means to us.”
Harris said he has battled that negative connotation, while also embracing the positive outcomes of RiNo.
“I think it just provides a solid example of ‘here are some things that maybe we can borrow upon, but to put our spin on them, to make it work for us’. But I agree with (Brother Jeff) 100% in terms of like, the word Five Points itself has always been associated with some sort of negativity that could have happened anywhere remotely close to downtown,” Harris said.
Appreciating the present and hopes for the future
“We often get the moniker to come down and visit, to experience or to celebrate something that's happened in the past. And what I'm really adamant on is for folks to come and celebrate the folks who are contributing now,” Harris said.
Harris said that includes the businesses that have survived and continue to offer quality services and programming.
Harris said First Friday’s Five Points Jazz Hop is a good example of the everyday community events still happening in the neighborhood.
“There has not been a time where jazz was not in Five Points, poetry was not in Five Points, authors and literary greats were not in Five Points,” Fard said. “When I think about Five Points moving forward, I'm able to stand in the gap and support leadership, visionary leadership, that is moving into the future.”
Jones said she also thinks it’s important to think about ways to help the next generation become Five Points residents.
“One of the things that I've seen at Tealee’s is like their expression of spoken word and the new musicians. And we need their energy. We need that inner-generational energy. So, how do we do that? Because they're the ones, unlike us, who have never had that sense of a traditional community that we had,” Jones said.
Fard said he has some ideas on how to incorporate the younger generation.
“When I think about young people, and I talk to them of all races and backgrounds, they don't see themselves as being owners in a neighborhood, you know, they see themselves as being renters or transitory, moving from place to place. But actually taking up roots and being a part of the fabric and being able to afford to be in place, not just a place to go and visit and eat and be entertained, but a place to where this neighborhood is, ‘my community’ is important,” Fard said.
Fard, Jones, and Harris are proud of their community and said they’re committed to being a part of helping it evolve.
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