The home at 1520 Irving St. and The Wilder apartments beside it are separated by a row of trees. (Justin Wingerter/BusinessDen)
On a recent Tuesday afternoon, The Wilder apartment project along West Colfax Avenue cast dark shadows on the humble, 70-year-old home of Griselda Barbosa Martinez.
“They took my sun,” she said in Spanish, a phrase that was then translated by her attorney, “and now they want to take my trees. They want to take the very little that we have here.”
The they in question are the City of Denver and The Wilder’s builders. The trees in question line the alleyway that separates Martinez’s home from the nearly finished apartments, which broke ground in late 2022.
On Sept. 4, Martinez received a letter from Saunders Construction that shocked her.
“It was discovered that the trees that align (sic) the ally (sic) next to the Wilder Apartments project are in the city’s right of way,” that letter stated. “The city has instructed Saunders to remove these trees to pour a concrete alley. In addition, the retaining wall on the southside of the property is also in the city’s right of way. This will need to be removed.”
The removal was scheduled for Sept. 12. A week after that, Martinez’s retaining wall would be bulldozed and concrete would be poured on a portion of her property, the notice said.
“They called my trees trash but they are beautiful, they give me oxygen to live,” Martinez said in the living room of her home. “That’s what makes me sad: They called my trees trash.”
Inquiries to the city and Denver City Council were ignored, Martinez said, “and they don’t take my calls anymore.” So, she and her husband, Jorge Jaime Cardenas, went to a bilingual legal aid clinic and found an attorney, Anna Martinez, who began making some calls of her own.
Bulldozers have been kept at bay since but construction crews have painted the trees that they plan to uproot. So, on Oct. 3, Martinez and Cardenas sued the city, Wilder developer The Max Collaborative, and Saunders Construction for trespassing on the couple’s property.
A tree separating 1520 Irving St. from The Wilder is seen on Tuesday, Oct. 15, 2024. (Justin Wingerter/BusinessDen)
“A private company was authorized by the city to take property from the plaintiffs without any form of due process or right to be heard,” their Denver District Court lawsuit alleges.
Darren Gold, a spokesman for the developers, declined to comment on the case. Denver’s transportation department deferred to the City Attorney’s Office, which opted not to weigh in. Saunders Construction did not answer BusinessDen’s requests for an explanation.
City records dating back to the 1950s show that there should be a 20-foot-wide alley between the home at 1520 Irving St. and what is now The Wilder. That’s how wide it was when the city repoured the alley in the late 2010s. Martinez and Cardenas say that no one from the city has ever told them their property line, which hasn’t moved, encroaches on the alley.
That suggests it is The Wilder that encroaches on the alleyway, the couple says. Now, in order to keep it at 20 feet, the alley must be moved north — onto their private property.
Martinez and Cardenas see this as the latest in a series of intrusions and entitled behavior from builders of the apartments. Two utility poles were relocated from The Wilder’s property onto 1520 Irving St. without any warning or compensation, according to the couple, and last week they showed off a collection of construction materials that have fallen into their yard.
They and Martinez, their lawyer, were also surprised to learn that Safehold, a New York company that ground leases the land under the Wilder to Max Collaborative, owns it under the name 1520 Irving Street Ground Owner LLC. But Safehold doesn’t own ground at 1520 Irving — they do. The Wilder’s parcel has the address of 1521 Hooker St.
Martinez and Cardenas’ warm, colorful home is an anomaly on a block of modernly designed multi-family buildings of black and gray. It is where they raised their children, who are now adults living nearby. So, unlike their neighbors, they have chosen not to sell it to developers.
“I like to live here,” Martinez says. “I didn’t want to sell because I want to live here.”
Cardenas recalls walking through a small park across the street — a place that he and his wife cherish — and coming across a neighbor who was crying tears of regret at his decision to sell his home. So, problems with The Wilder notwithstanding, they do not regret staying.
“Everything is really close by,” says Cardenas, who has lived in the West Colfax area since the 1970s, long before developers were buying up land there and building apartments. He and his wife like the area’s vibrancy, its sights and sounds, and have for decades now.
The trees have been at 1520 Irving St. for as long as Martinez and Cardenas have been, 20-plus years. They provide shade and privacy “and, more than anything, they keep some noise out,” according to Cardenas. But absent a judge’s order, they could soon be felled.
“It’s like a crime,” Martinez said in a pleading tone. “They want to take my trees and kill them.”
The home at 1520 Irving St. and The Wilder apartments beside it are separated by a row of trees. (Justin Wingerter/BusinessDen)
On a recent Tuesday afternoon, The Wilder apartment project along West Colfax Avenue cast dark shadows on the humble, 70-year-old home of Griselda Barbosa Martinez.
“They took my sun,” she said in Spanish, a phrase that was then translated by her attorney, “and now they want to take my trees. They want to take the very little that we have here.”
The they in question are the City of Denver and The Wilder’s builders. The trees in question line the alleyway that separates Martinez’s home from the nearly finished apartments, which broke ground in late 2022.
On Sept. 4, Martinez received a letter from Saunders Construction that shocked her.
“It was discovered that the trees that align (sic) the ally (sic) next to the Wilder Apartments project are in the city’s right of way,” that letter stated. “The city has instructed Saunders to remove these trees to pour a concrete alley. In addition, the retaining wall on the southside of the property is also in the city’s right of way. This will need to be removed.”
The removal was scheduled for Sept. 12. A week after that, Martinez’s retaining wall would be bulldozed and concrete would be poured on a portion of her property, the notice said.
“They called my trees trash but they are beautiful, they give me oxygen to live,” Martinez said in the living room of her home. “That’s what makes me sad: They called my trees trash.”
Inquiries to the city and Denver City Council were ignored, Martinez said, “and they don’t take my calls anymore.” So, she and her husband, Jorge Jaime Cardenas, went to a bilingual legal aid clinic and found an attorney, Anna Martinez, who began making some calls of her own.
Bulldozers have been kept at bay since but construction crews have painted the trees that they plan to uproot. So, on Oct. 3, Martinez and Cardenas sued the city, Wilder developer The Max Collaborative, and Saunders Construction for trespassing on the couple’s property.
A tree separating 1520 Irving St. from The Wilder is seen on Tuesday, Oct. 15, 2024. (Justin Wingerter/BusinessDen)
“A private company was authorized by the city to take property from the plaintiffs without any form of due process or right to be heard,” their Denver District Court lawsuit alleges.
Darren Gold, a spokesman for the developers, declined to comment on the case. Denver’s transportation department deferred to the City Attorney’s Office, which opted not to weigh in. Saunders Construction did not answer BusinessDen’s requests for an explanation.
City records dating back to the 1950s show that there should be a 20-foot-wide alley between the home at 1520 Irving St. and what is now The Wilder. That’s how wide it was when the city repoured the alley in the late 2010s. Martinez and Cardenas say that no one from the city has ever told them their property line, which hasn’t moved, encroaches on the alley.
That suggests it is The Wilder that encroaches on the alleyway, the couple says. Now, in order to keep it at 20 feet, the alley must be moved north — onto their private property.
Martinez and Cardenas see this as the latest in a series of intrusions and entitled behavior from builders of the apartments. Two utility poles were relocated from The Wilder’s property onto 1520 Irving St. without any warning or compensation, according to the couple, and last week they showed off a collection of construction materials that have fallen into their yard.
They and Martinez, their lawyer, were also surprised to learn that Safehold, a New York company that ground leases the land under the Wilder to Max Collaborative, owns it under the name 1520 Irving Street Ground Owner LLC. But Safehold doesn’t own ground at 1520 Irving — they do. The Wilder’s parcel has the address of 1521 Hooker St.
Martinez and Cardenas’ warm, colorful home is an anomaly on a block of modernly designed multi-family buildings of black and gray. It is where they raised their children, who are now adults living nearby. So, unlike their neighbors, they have chosen not to sell it to developers.
“I like to live here,” Martinez says. “I didn’t want to sell because I want to live here.”
Cardenas recalls walking through a small park across the street — a place that he and his wife cherish — and coming across a neighbor who was crying tears of regret at his decision to sell his home. So, problems with The Wilder notwithstanding, they do not regret staying.
“Everything is really close by,” says Cardenas, who has lived in the West Colfax area since the 1970s, long before developers were buying up land there and building apartments. He and his wife like the area’s vibrancy, its sights and sounds, and have for decades now.
The trees have been at 1520 Irving St. for as long as Martinez and Cardenas have been, 20-plus years. They provide shade and privacy “and, more than anything, they keep some noise out,” according to Cardenas. But absent a judge’s order, they could soon be felled.
“It’s like a crime,” Martinez said in a pleading tone. “They want to take my trees and kill them.”
