Station: KLZ, 560 AM

Show:     Rush to Reason

Guests:  Kochevar

Link:      https://soundcloud.com/rushtoreason

Date:      September 14, 2016

Topics:

 

CO-HOST JOHN RUSH:  Susan Kochevar, joining us now. She is running for House District 29, here in the state of Colorado.  SusanforColorado.com is the website where you can find out more about her.  So, how goes the battle?

CANDIDATE FOR HOUSE DISTRICT 29, SUSAN KOCHEVAR:  It’s going pretty well!

RUSH:  Doing all right?

KOCHEVAR:  I’m doing really well.  Yes.  The race is really heating up.  And we have 55 days left.  And every day is important.

RUSH:  Fifty-five days!  There it is!  Dan and I were trying to figure it out earlier.

CO-HOST DAN MUERER:  Fifty-five days.  Okay, so that’s what it is.

KOCHEVAR:  Yep.

RUSH:  Five five.  I can’t drive fifty-five.  So, anyway, 55 days.

MUERER:  [chuckles]  I really can’t.  Sorry!  Don’t tell anybody.

RUSH: That’s pretty hard to do, period.

KOCHEVAR:  [laughs]

RUSH:  So, let’s talk a little bit about — first of all– your district, what it encompasses, folks listening that – you know, basically, folks listening that will find your name on their ballot.  Let’s talk to them first.

KOCHEVAR:  Yep.  So, my district is in Arvada and Westminster.  It’s bordered on one side by Sheridan, and Wadsworth on the other side.  To the south it’s bordered by I-70 and it goes all the way up to 120th and then it curves kind of around the Stanley Lake area.

RUSH:  Okay.

KOCHEVAR:  It looks like a gun.

RUSH:  Looks like a gun!

MUERER:  Hey!

KOCHEVAR:  Yeah, the lake part is the handle.  Yeah

Wow!

So, when the Democrats drew that up, did they know that?  Did they realize it looks like a gun? Somebody should be in trouble over that.

Yeah.  They’re going to scare a whole lot of people.

That’s exactly right.  Some kid will look at that map and have nightmares forever.

[laughs]

So, what are your—and I know you very well.  So, I have to be careful how I do this because I know Susan extremely well and, you know, she’s been on Rush to Reason numerous, numerous times in the past.  But I want to make sure I get the right information out to folks that are trying to decide who to vote for.  So I need to put some of what I know away and ask questions that might sound dumb to, you know, Dan and I and even you, but I do realize a lot of people listening that may not know who Susan is, in the first place.  So what are — or what do you feel are some of the most important issues or things that are facing your district that don’t have good representation now.

Right.  Well, for me it’s about less government.

Okay.

You know, I run a small business in Commerce City and I employ people.  And the taxes and regulation have just exploded exponentially.  And that is really hurting all the individuals with dreams in my House District – all the people that want to start businesses and grow them or just make more where they are.  Their employer can’t pay them more.  We know where all the healthcare issues and insurance issues and just complying with all that regulation – it’s massive.  Did you know, I was looking at a sign code just in the city that I’m located.  Forty pages!

I’m laughing just because I know what she’s going to say.

Forty pages? Just in the sign co–you’ve got to be kidding me!

No.  It’s ridiculous.

Really?

That’s just the sign code!

It’s ridiculous.

And that’s just the city.  It’s not the state or federal.

No.

Don’t these people have anything else to do?

No. It’s so micromanaging.  And it’s interesting, I was at a forum–.

Yeah, and real quick, it’s not like it’s just, “Okay, Dan.  You can have a sign that equals, you know, X size, and it can be X from the street” and so on.  I mean, I get the fact that we have to have some sign codes .  Okay?  I’m not  going to say that we don’t have to.  You know, if the city  didn’t have them you’d have, you know, some guy next door to some guy that, you know–.  You’d have one business that could afford to have a billboard on his property and the guy next to it would have some little bitty thing.  Okay, I get the reason why we have to have codes:  to make things look fairly uniform and make a city look better so you get people actually moving and live there.  I get that, okay?

Okay, well–.

But you don’t need 40 pages to explain that.

Well, maybe it’s in large print, so the elderly can read it.

[laughs]  It’s not.

It’s not large print?

No, I can understand some of that.  You know, you don’t want a sign too close to the corner so people  can’t see the curve–.

Correct!  And so it’s blocking the intersection, and

You know?

Yeah, and so yeah, I want to make sure everybody understands that I’m not saying we can’t have any guidelines at all.  Because – and I understand that it’s also – Susan, you know this as well as I– it’s some bad business owners, at one point in time, that caused some of the codes and regulations that we have today, because some knucklehead decided, “I’m going to put a billboard up on the corner so no one can see around and we’ll have traffic accidents after that.

Well, and sometimes, you know, –.

When, if you would use common sense to begin with, that may never had been an issue.

Well, and sometimes, some of the regulations come from bureaucrats because they think something is going to be dangerous –

That’s true.

–and it’s not.

It’s never been there.

I cite roller skat – uh, I cite ice skates as an example.  You know, that probably never would have flown.  “You’re going to do what?  On a blade??

That’s a good point.

So, yeah.

Yeah, right, right, right, right!  On a single blade, even.

Single blade! On ice!!

Yeah. “You’re going to ski downhill with what?”

[Laughs]

Yeah, I mean, yeah!  You know!

You won’t catch me skiing.

Bureaucrats would have been involved in some of that from the get-go.  You know, a unicycle never would have been built.

mm-mm.

So, I get where you’ve coming from on that, and everybody knows me on this:  I am definitely not a guy that believes in a lot of regulations and big government, and anything along those lines.  I also know this, and I understand where certain individuals at cities and counties have to wear certain hats for a reason, because you just can’t have a free-for-all.  I get that also.  Now some would say, “Well, yeah, John, you can!”  Well, not if you want people moving into your city and spending money and making things work for everybody that lives there.  You do have to have some order — quote unquote.  Without order, it’s total chaos and you can have that either.  Now, how far you push the order — quote unquote.  That’s the problem that I have.  Forty pages?  Way too much.

I think we’re way past that point of just keeping order.

They’re probably getting – now, correct me if I’m wrong, but they’re probably even getting into the nuances of font types and sizes and what can be on the sign, and on and on, right?

Yeah, how tall it can be – all these kinds of things. It’s interesting, though, because some of these cities actually violate their own –.

Their own signs violate the code, right?

Yeah, violate the code. Now I’m running for state legislature, so, that –. I don’t have any say there, but  that’s just an example of one thing that business owners have to keep up.

Right.

And if you’re trying to start a business, boy!

I wouldn’t want to start over.

No. It’s tough.

I’ve done this for a really long time, and fortunately I’ve done this a really long time, but I would not want to start from scratch again. It would be hard.

Well, yeah, and a good deal of these regulations

will be hard yeah and a great deal of these regulations – even for somebody who has a good idea and they’re ready to go – if you set up a business, you have to meet so many regulations and codes that you had to take an enormous amount of debt in order to keep up with those.  And that really destabilizes our businesses.

Okay. Makes sense

Yeah.

One of the main issues for Susan are regulations, and some of these start clear down at the – I mean, you talk about the local level – I mean, some of these are at the city level, the county level.

mm-hmm.

They then kind of work their way up to the state level.  But typically speaking, –most folks don’t realize this, but typically speaking, most sign codes and regulations revolving [around] what color you can paint your building, even — those are all done at the county or the city level.

Mm-hmm.  Yeah.

And some people thought – said, “Wait a minute!  You just said, ‘Paint the color of your building? Uh, there’s actually codes for that?’” Yeah.

Yeah.

There is.  Yeah.  Major.  Just make sure everybody understands this:   just because you own your own piece of property, doesn’t mean you can build whatever you want to on it.

Right.

Am I right in saying that?

Absolutely.  Yeah.

You can own it free and clear and want to — and have some grander plan of something you want to put on it.  Think again. Because you will now have to start the process of what we call ‘land entitlement,’  which means you have to get entitled to actually build what you’d like to put on that piece of property.  That includes if you need to subdivide it.  That includes the type of building you would put on it.  That includes how much square footage each building will have, how tall it will be, its footprint, how much green space it will have, how many trees will be there, how wide the sidewalks will be, how many light poles will be there, — do you get my gist?

I get it!  I’m just –.

It goes down the line.

You’re making my head explode.

It’s – it can make you –.  And we all – I shouldn’t say ‘we all.’  Some of us out there get very upset and mad at developers.  Let me tell you what, folks:  developers carry a huge risk and a huge burden when they take on a piece of property and develop it like I just mentioned.

Yeah, they do.  And they’re required to put parks in and all kinds of things.  You know, –.

‘Dedicated Open Space’ they call it.

That’s right.  If you wanted to build a carwash, for example, in a city you have to go through city planning.  And sometimes, the city staff doesn’t want a carwash there, —

Right!  Been there and done that!

—even though you found the very best location and they – you just get denied!  And maybe it would actually be good for the rest of the citizens. Maybe they would actually like that, too. So—.

Here’s something that’s interesting. Folks probably don’t realize this, but carwashes actually save water.

Oh, yeah!

Because a lot of what’s in a car wash — the water there gets recycled, filtered, and reused. And it’s actually uses less water when somebody actually goes to the car wash that actually washing the car in their own front yard.

Yeah!  Very, very efficient compared to that.

But most cities look at carwashes as a bad thing, not a good thing.

Right.  Yeah.

Why? they like dirty cars?

No, it’s just not the –quote unquote –you know, type of business most cities want to see out front on one of their major thoroughfares because it’s not quote unquote attractive. Okay?

These people make my head spin!

No, I’m being honest.  And you’ll find cities that if they do allow it the only thing you’ll see of the car wash is the sign in the side of it.

Right.

You will not see the bays.  You position it in such a way where you screen it with walls or landscaping where you cannot see the bays because they don’t want them being seen.   There are cities in this town –and I know them specifically, one of them happens to be up in the Boulder area, starts with an L and ends with an E–.

Hmmm.

You can’t say it.  I can say it!

Actually, and I think there’s a baseball bat “Slugger” that goes along with the name of this particular city.  And up there, you cannot put any auto shop anywhere where it’s got any kind of visibility to a main street, at all.  Period.  It doesn’t exist in that town, new.  If it exists, it’s because it was there, grandfathered in from years ago.

That’s absurd!

Those are what cities do! So, to your point, Susan, that’s what we’re up against as business owners.

Yeah, and sometimes those things wind up being, I think, dangerous for drivers and for the elderly.  If you’re looking for something and it’s all hidden, you know, that makes it more difficult to get around.

Yeah, and if you don’t know how to use your dumb phone—

Yeah!

— you may never not –. You know, and you may not be a dumb phone user.  You may never find what you’re actually looking for.

That’s right!

And the other thing that they do when they do this – just by the way, folks, real quick – when cities and counties do the sorts of things that I just mentioned, they may think they’re doing something really great for their city but what they’ve done is made it impossible for businesses in that particular area or zone to succeed.

That’s right!

Because without the visibility of that drive-by traffic, they may never be able to succeed.  And there’s examples all up and down—our different cities around here, and I can go to every different city in our area – from you know, Louisville all around, you name it — I can go pretty much anywhere and show you where there are businesses that struggle because the city did not allow the complex to get built the way it should of been built to begin with.  They thought they had a better idea than the developer.

Yep!  Yep.  And sometimes they arrange it so that we can’t even get out of the parking lot, it’s so frustrating!