ENGLEWOOD 12/28/12
Herald Englewood
December 28, 2012
75 cents
A Colorado Community Media Publication
ourenglewoodnews.com
Arapahoe County, Colorado • Volume 92, Issue 46
‘Biggest Winner Challenge’ launched Residents can sign up to get fit, lose weight By Tom Munds
tmunds@ourcoloradonews.com
Englewood Police Officer Andrea Friday looks on as children, left to right, Kara, Violet and Margaret, select gifts as part of the Shop with a Cop program. Photo by Tom Munds
Officers help families with holiday shopping Englewood Walmart sponsors annual event By Tom Munds
tmunds@ourcoloradonews.com More than a dozen uniformed Englewood police officers volunteered to be at Walmart Dec. 19 to take part in the annual Shop with a Cop program. “We have 14 families going shopping with our officers, and that means shopping for parents and 40 children,” said Toni Arnoldy, police community relations coordinator. “We are able to help more families this year because the Walmart sponsorship was larger.” She said the ability to help more families have a better Christmas is needed because it seems there are more families in
need, and this year, all Shop with a Cop families were nominate by Englewood officers. “We are glad we can be part of this program,” said Denise Allison, Englewood Walmart store manager. “Our company looks for opportunities to give back to the community we serve. Helping families in need is special, and my reward is seeing the smiles on the face of a child getting a gift he or she really wanted.” She said helping families with children is special because she has a 5-year-old daughter, and it reminds her how lucky she is and stresses the real meaning of Christmas. The officers and families gathered, met
Santa and then headed out to do some shopping. Each member of the sponsored families had $50 to spend. An Englewood police officer went along to help them shop for gifts for themselves or for family members. This was the first year Englewood Police Officer Tom Rowley’s duty schedule made it possible for him to be part of the program. “This is such a great program and I am so glad I can be part of it,” he said. “It is even more special because I know the family I am shopping with. These are nice people who are just struggling a bit. I hope the gifts they get today makes it a nicer Christmas for them.” He and his wife went along with John Shop continues on Page 5
The Englewood Recreation Center is offering a program designed to help residents keep their New Year’s resolutions to get fit and lose weight. “We have had a fitness challenge for the last few years, but this one is different,” said Rowan Velasquez, program administrator. “This program is called the Biggest Winner Challenge. “Its focus is providing support, guidance and information to help those who sign up improve physical fitness and lose weight,” she said. Velasquez said that while previous challenges addressed fitness, the programs didn’t specifically address obesity. The new program is designed to provide motivation and encouragement for participants. Signing up for the program provides free visits to the recreation center and free visits to fitness and wellness classes. People taking part are eligible to win prizes during the six-month program. “This year’s program is a six-month weight-loss challenge that provides motivation and tools to help people make lasting life tyle changes aimed at improved fitness and helping participants shed some pounds,” Velazquez said. “The challenge is really three challenges in one because there are three categories, teens, adults and seniors. At the end of the six months, one person in each age group will win prizes and the title of the biggest winner based on the greatest percentage of weight lost.” A challenge kickoff party will be held from 8 a.m. until noon Jan. 5 at the EngleChallenge continues on Page 5
Remembering a year of tragedy and triumph The past year was some kind of ride — an emotional roller coaster, if you will. The year brought the nation a presidential election and the barrage of campaign ads preceding it. It brought us a Summer Olympics and a contingent of American champions. In Colorado, 2012 brought us a slew of wildfires that cost some people everything and filled the skies with smoke as far as you could see. The year brought us the Aurora theater massacre. South Metro Denver residents shared in all of this in one way or another. But here, we also saw signs of a potentially booming economy as more and more developers and employers moved in. We saw a school
district entangled in controversy. And we saw tragedies that hit on a smaller scale, but were equally heartbreaking to area communities. What follows is a compilation of the South Metro area’s top 10 stories of the year as chosen by the newsroom staff of Colorado Community Media. These are the stories we believe had the greatest impact on our readers in 2012. They are presented in no particular order. We’ll let you, the reader, be the judge of the single biggest story of the year. 2012 continues on Page 15
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In July, Mairya Savchuk lays 12 long-stem roses at the base of memorial markers across the street from the Century 16 movie theater in Aurora. On July 20, 12 people were killed and 58 were injured during one of the worst mass shootings in United States history when James Eagan Holmes, 24, allegedly opened fire during a midnight premiere of “The Dark Knight Rises.” File photo