ARISE Music Festival

06/02/2025

FINAL POST CONTINUED (and last post in the series).

WHY DID THE GOVERNMENT SEEM SO DETERMINED TO DESTROY ARISE?

In my last post, I asked the question why did the Government seem determined to destroy Arise?
In this post, I will answer that question—which can then lead to some solutions for festivals.
Also, I want to say I am not against government at all—totally for good government. And want to show my respect for the many good and competent people who work in government, many of whom have helped Arise through the years.

--First answer: its easy to deny festivals permits. Fortunately, American people, if they are citizens, have the right to exist in this country. Businesses, too: you can pollute, kill people, break laws and etc. and at the worst, you will get sued or fined.
In most or nearly all counties in Colorado, festivals have to ask for permission to exist every year—and go through as many twenty departments for that.

--You can then be denied the permit for most any reason as the process is political not legal. In most counties, you do not have recourse to reverse decisions: some have appeals that are more legal in nature.

--Authorities do not evaluate benefits and detriments well. If at all.
For example, Arise brought millions of dollars to the county; and provides art for thousands of its residents; and gave jobs to thousands across the state. But authorities will shut you down because there are 20 complaining neighbors (who are not even impacted by the festival) or one disagreeable Sheriff.
And think that makes sense.

--The people choosing to accept or deny your application do not benefit from the festival. In some cases, they work more, get paid the same and incur more responsibility and risk. So why not just say: “no.”

--And many in government are opposed or disdainful to cultures like Arise. Even worse, I would not be surprised if some division of law enforcement somewhere targets cultures like Arise for destruction: happened before, could be happening now.
Law enforcement is frequently antagonistic for no reason.

SUGGESTIONS FOR FIXING THE PROBLEM: some suggestion

--Allow festivals to pay for all services the county provides; this already happens some. This incentivizes the county to support the festival more,

--Allow festivals to, essentially, rent the right to produce in their county, so they receive additional money straight into their accounts. The politicians can then use that as justification for supporting the festival.

--Make counties give two or three year notice to cancel a festival—so the festival has time to find another location.

--Standardize regulation of festivals, across the state (doubt this is possible).

--Clarify if festivals have constitutional rights. Corporations do; this is supposed to extend to for profit organizations. But it does not apply to festivals, in practice.

--I tried to sue the Pueblo Sheriff for multiple reasons: one was to regain lost cash for Arise and others associated with the event. But if I had won, the suit might have established some sort of precedent, giving festivals more rights. But as mentioned, the whole legal profession would not support me in this attempt.
In my opinion, the government, probably at the federal and state level, want to keep events like Arise under their or corporate control.

As of now, I assume that millions of dollars and a lot of talent leaves Colorado for other camping festival in other states. Meanwhile, Colorado could probably produce, I am guessing, about three more in different genres—and maybe even have their own small Coachella (sad but true, only AEG could produce this type of festival in the state given their monopolistic positioning).
Arise represented the best of Colorado: love of the outdoors, music, art, community, wellness, and exploration of new ways to live. At the moment, the governments of Colorado, locked up in peculiar self and special interests, wonky procedures, and cultural prejudice, are not able to support this aspect of the culture of the state.
Much support to all of you who made Arise happen…..and hope you continue onward with your journey…and find some way to create.
Me, I have published an award-winning book, with two more on the way, and started another company and invested in several others….Life goes on….

05/29/2025

THE CENSORSHIP OF ARISE IN COLORADO.

What happened to Arise?
The final report or reports.
Arise 25 would have happened last weekend Memorial Day Weekend for the third time at the Cradle, if it was not cancelled, without cause or explanation, by the Pueblo Sheriff’s Department. Additionally, I may soon announce plans for another festival and before doing so, wanted to log our difficulties with prior governments.
To be clear, Arise Music Festival was destroyed by persistent mistreatment, abuse and disrespect from the government—and I never want to see that happen again to anyone. Or, said another way, Arise was well-financed, extremely popular, and well managed, with an excellent record, and ready to continue into the future with exciting and amazing plans—and all that is not happening because of the government.

STRIKE ONE

Prior to 2018, we had good relations with the Larimer County government. But somewhere around 2018, all that changed.
--First we were informed by the Larimer County Commissioners that we could no longer receive a “Special Event Permit” for our existing location, Sunrise Ranch. They provided some kind of explanation—but it did not make any sense.
They refused to “grandfather” us in. We did produce 2019—but from thereon out we were a festival without a location.


STRIKE TWO

I then attempted to permit another piece of property in Larimer County. Though receiving approval from all technical departments, the Sheriff, Justin Smith, sat on our application and then started to sabotage our permit one week before the hearing and ultimately succeeded, without good cause or explanation.
He never returned my phone calls.

STRIKE THREE

During the pandemic, I purchased my own property about 1300 acres along the Arkansas River to host the festival. Before hand the property was rigorously reviewed by professional for festival function and safety. I also received an enthusiastic welcome from the Larimer County Planning Department.
But the Sheriff’s Department, represented by Kirk Taylor and Steve Bryant, sat on our application for five months and never respected our requests to either approve or disapprove so we could cancel—and this tripped the festival to fail.
Arise, nor the public, ever received any explanation.
If the Sheriff denied our permit earlier, I could have cancelled the festival but saved the company—but his dereliction of duty causes us to fail.
I chose not to cancel the festival myself because I operated on this assumption:
--That the Sheriff was attempting to scare me into cancelling.
--But he himself did not have any stated or legitimate reason for cancelling.
--And if cancelled us for illegimate reasons (personal prejudice, laziness, opportunism), I could sue him and this would deter him from cancelling.
As you will see, I could in fact sue the Sheriff—but the entire legal profession would not help me.


STRIKE FOUR

Two weeks after the cancellation, Tayor and Bryant, were promoted to higher offices—Taylor to the highest law enforcement office in the country, Federal Marshall by Colorado’s two state senators: Hickenlooper and Bennett. Both of these people were the most incompetent, corrupt and bazaar people I have ever encountered in the work force.

STRIKE FIVE

After my attorneys affirmed that Attorney Generals could sue Sheriffs, I contacted Phil Weiser to help me sue the Sheriff on behalf of the many thousands of Coloradoans harmed by the cruel cancellation. Additionally, the AG advertises himself as someone who cares about justice and all Coloradoans.
I send him a formal, quasi-legal complain with supporting evidence—and then wrote to the Arise community, encouraging them to contact him to merely review the case. I sent somewhere around ten communications to his office over six months; and then asked an attorney to contact his office.
I was systematically ignored and shuffled around from one department to another—not even remotely acknowledged.


STRIKE SIX

I contacted at least ten different attorneys involved in first amendments, civil and property rights—and was systematically ignored by all of them, even these liberal attorneys in Boulder, CO.
Its not like they did not like the case: they just would not look at the case.
I even offered the mediation firm, JAG, to consult on the case since they are retired judges; and they refused.

STRIKE SEVEN AND EIGHT

I am not sure these final “strikes” are really strikes—but more like the cost of doing business in a frequently irrational world, but I will mentioned them anyway. Around 2018, we were sued due to an “accident.” However, this accident did not happen at Arise (but close to Arise), was not caused by Arise, and was not managed by Arise. (Our medical team responded to the incident, but Arise does not manage our medical team.)
This lasted for years until the Judge was finally told by all jurors that Arise had nothing to do with the incident.
However, as a result of the suit,, we were blacklisted by insurance companies (who ultimately paid for legal suit for the fees). I ultimately paid twenty times more for insurance to save the company.
Ask yourself this thought experiment: If this same incident happened with the Denver Broncos, would the judge accept the case; would the insurance companies blacklist the Broncos.

STRIKE NINE

The press: I submitted many press releases in the aftermath of Arise around Colorado. Outside of the immediate reporting, they did not report anything more or even enquire.

AEG

In some posts on Facebook, I alleged that the corporate monopoly, AEG, was involved in our cancellation. This may sound conspiratorial but it was just reality for me. AEG is known for targeting their competition for destruction; they told me they wanted to destroy Arise; they attempted to destroy Arise with their own competing festival, Vertex, on the same weekend, two hours away, with the same concept in 2016. AEG had high motive to see Arise destroyed: we threatened their monopoly and their spread into southern Colorado. And AEG, and its owner, Colorado’s richest man, Phil Anschutz, has always played politics, along with the people who run AEG. The senators mentioned above were both professional and social friends with the leaders of AEG, as well as Anschutz himself and contributed to their campaigns. And then some people who once worked for Arise, but left under bad terms, later affiliated themselves with AEG and then tried to permit our old location in Larimer County in 22 and 23 with plants that looked like Arise.

CONCLUSIONS

In reality, Arise had a good record in public safety, crime prevention and not disturbing the neighborhood. Additionally our values were quite clear: community, music, art, camping, yoga, well-being and environmentalism in contrast to the typical, American entertainment fixated on competitioin, violence, p**n, exploitation and nihilistic spectacle. Furthermore scientific studies actually confirm increases of mental health for attendees.
Yet the government seemed determined to destroy us.
Why?
I will address that question in another post.

Luke Comer
X producer of Arise

05/24/2024

Good news.
However, this does not play any part in Colorado because the monopoly here is not LiveNation but AEG. The Justice Department is busting LiveNation for controlling something like sixty percent of the market in the US whereas some estimate that AEG controls about 80 percent of the market in Colorado.
Worse, the government colludes in that control.
Here is the rub: the Attorney General of Colorado, Phil We**ie, put his name on the lawsuit against Livenation--even though his own state is monopolized, brutally, by AEG.
So what is his motivation, to help his buddies at AEG get more market share nationwide?
Because his motivation is sure not to help independents, based on his treatment of my formal complaint adressed to him on behalf of Arise.

Accused of violating antitrust laws, Live Nation Entertainment faces a fight that could reshape the multibillion-dollar live music industry.

10/05/2023

What happened to the Arise Music Festival?

In May of 2022, Arise was cancelled two weeks before the festival was planned to happen due to the Pueblo Sheriff, Kirk Taylor, not approving our Special Event Application—which then caused the ruin of the company. In the aftermath I attempted to discover the reason for the lack of approval while reporting, periodically, to the Arise community. This is my latest update.

--The Pueblo Sheriff never offered any reason for the cancellation to the public or Arise.
--They did write an inter-governmental explanation, that I recovered through CORA; however, that explanation was full of lies and misrepresentations. I could not find any evidence that the Sheriff failed to approve our application for the usual reasons: risks to public safety, crime prevention, disturbance to the neighborhood or our prior record of over ten years in another county.
--I then sent a formal complaint about the Sheriff to the Attorney General of Colorado, Phil Weiser. However, his office sent only confusing and evasive emails in return so that, in the end, I decided they were just evading the issue.
--About eight months later, I still do not have any verified reason for the cancellation. Given that I tried to work through the system, but the system did not work, I now feel justified in offering my opinion about the cancellation. Based on considerable evidence listed below, I believe the most likely explanation is that the festival was not approved because the Sheriff (democrat) did not want the festival in his county for his own reasons. I also believe he was both supported and encouraged in this viewpoint by Senators Hickenlooper (d) and Bennet (d) who were acting in the interests of their supporters, donors and friends at AEG, Rocky Mountain. I believe Phil Weiser (d) then ignored my complaint because he was not interested in investigating members of his own party. I am not aware of any evidence that suggests that anyone, involved in our lack of approval, was acting in the best interests of the Pueblo County government, or its people or the citizens of Colorado. Below, in the next section, I list the facts to support my opinion, along with sources or ways to access those sources, but I encourage you to interpret those facts as you wish. In this denial of our application, I think some fundamental and American rights were not only denied, but not even considered:

--Denial of Freedom of Assembly as long as you are not causing any harm.
--Denial of Freedom of Speech as Arise was about the voice of the people.
--Denial of Property Rights as Arise was to happen on land owned by me.
--Destruction of a unique and independent culture.
--Abuse of free enterprise by a governmental authority.

If you have any questions, you can contact me here: [email protected]. I am now bumping my request for an investigation to the federal and non-partisan level (although not yet clear how to do that.)

Below is the longer version.

Luke Comer, X producer and owner of Arise.

The Long version (with notes about sources when applicable.)

Arise operated in Larimer County for ten years with an excellent record in crime prevention/public safety (records avail upon request or through CORA.) We brought millions in revenue to that county, entertained many people with mixed genres of music, yoga, art, dance, wellness and workshops and was generally regarded as one of the best camping festivals in the country, as evidence by reviews online. Our only detriments were occasional noise complaints, which we strove to remedy immediately, as well as occasional misdemeanors requiring police and minor injuries requiring ambulances. We were sued for one major insurance incident but later cleared of all wrongdoing by all jurors in a court of law.
After purchasing our own property during the pandemic in Pueblo County to relocate the festival for 2022, we attained approval from all relevant, government agencies, as well as our neighbors (records available upon request). However, The Pueblo Sheriff neither approved nor denied our permit after five months of our requests which then forced the Planning Department to deny our special event permit two weeks before the event (records avail upon request). If the Sheriff actually denied our permit at some reasonable date, we could have appealed the decision and probably won (part of their county code). So this raises the question: why did they not deny our permit at some earlier date especially given Arise constantly asked for their response? Were they trying to prevent the appeal and cause as much damage to Arise as possible?
Within several weeks of the cancellation of Arise, Pueblo Sheriff Kirk Taylor (democrat) was nominated to Federal Marshall, mostly at the behest of U.S. senators Bennet (d) and Hickenlooper (d) and then soon thereafter appointed the job with their help.

https://www.chieftain.com/story/news/2021/02/03/pueblo-county-sheriff-kirk-taylor-finalist-u-s-marshal-colorado/4374913001/

https://www.bennet.senate.gov/public/index.cfm/2022/6/bennet-hickenlooper-applaud-nomination-of-pueblo-county-sheriff-kirk-taylor-as-u-s-marshal-for-colorado

https://www.nbc11news.com/2022/06/06/pueblo-county-sheriff-nominated-us-marshal-colorado/

Arise’s contact, Captain Steve Bryant, was then promoted to Undersheriff of Pueblo. (Before he headed the Emergency Services Bureau.)

https://www.pueblosheriff.com/directory.aspx?EID=10

Of course, this was strongly noticed by me: on the one hand, I regarded that Sheriff’s Department as evasive, deceitful and unhelpful and even much worse—yet they were all being promoted?
Through CORA I then pulled records from both Larimer and Pueblo County, trying to find reasons for the denial—but found none as mentioned in the summary above. In the Sheriff’s interoffice emails, I found excessive amounts of evasion, intentional or unintentional incompetence and malfeasance, and most especially, outright lying that was easy to prove through documentation. (Details found in the Complaint sent to the AG which is published on Arise’s Facebook.)
Since AG’s have some oversight on Sheriffs (legal brief avail upon request), Arise then sent a formal, class-action complaint to Phil Weiser (d), noting that many thousands of Colorado people, businesses, artists and etc. were harmed by this cancellation amounting to millions of dollars. For six months the AG gave me the bureaucratic shuffle, especially their communications director, Lawrence Pacheco (d). In the end, I concluded that the AG was just trying to bury the issue.
Interestingly, six weeks before the cancellation, I contacted the Attorney General’s office to inform them that the Sheriff was not following due process but the AG just claimed that they were. I contacted Senators Hickenlooper and Bennett, as well as the Pueblo County Commissioners (d) and the current Sheriff (d) at various times and with various informal complaints--all whom ignored me. (Most of these emails are available upon request: and one note, Bennett said he would have his staff look into the issue but then I never heard back from him.)
--Senators Hickenlooper and Bennet were closely linked, and assumably still are, to Arise’s central competitor: what is generally perceived as the the quasi monopoly and monopsony, AEG Rocky Mountain. (My writings on this company are available upon request.)
--Senator Bennett was the managing director for six years of the Anschutz Investment Company (the A in AEG) which, as Forbes magazine insinuated, explained why he was one of the richest politicians in the US:
https://www.forbes.com/sites/michelatindera/2019/09/26/how-2020-presidential-candidate-michael-bennet-built-a-15-million-fortune/?sh=1a6e2cd96ed3

https://www.denverpost.com/2010/09/25/bennets-storied-career-is-marked-by-adaptability/

https://www.forbes.com/sites/michelatindera/2019/09/26/how-2020-presidential-candidate-michael-bennet-built-a-15-million-fortune/?sh=1a6e2cd96ed3

https://www.denverpost.com/2010/09/25/bennets-storied-career-is-marked-by-adaptability/

--Senator Hickenlooper appears deeper into AEG than his friend, Bennet.
To quote the past president of AEG, Rocky Mountain, Chuck Morris: “I don’t know of any other person (then Governor Hickenlooper) in a major political office who has supported music like he has. He has made all of our jobs easier — for a band to become famous, for a promote (Morris) to do well.”
In Colorado, AEG is about the only promoter in the state; so Morris is basically saying that Hickenlooper does a lot to support his business.
https://www.denverpost.com/2017/03/06/governor-hickenlooper-music-industry-educate-colorado-kids/
https://www.denverpost.com/2010/09/25/bennets-storied-career-is-marked-by-adaptability/

Additionally “We used to joke that he (Hickenlooper) went to more shows than three-quarters of my staff when I was at AEG,” Morris says.

https://www.westword.com/music/chuck-morris-pulls-together-all-star-lineup-for-hick-a-palooza-11809953

Hickenlooper started “Take Note Colorado” with Libby Anschutz, the daughter of Anschutz.

--Both of these senators, especially Hickenlooper, receive political contributions from the heads of AEG, Rocky Mountain. https://www.opensecrets.org/donor-lookup

--Generally, AEG is regarded as some version of a monopoly or monopsony in the state of the Colorado as the article below mostly supports. I additionally add that its government supported. AEG owns many of the venues in Colorado, control others and then book others—both at the smaller and larger level—and locks most musicians into “radius clauses” and other forms of leverage. They then also control the ticketing for all those venues. The government contracts with them heavily for their venues and for their ticketing. As a monopoly or quasi-monopoly without any signifigant competition, they are able to control what they pay for musicians and production, and what they charge for tickets—and thus, most likely, profit excessively. (It’s a private company so these records are not available.) Even one competitor, like Arise, however, can expose and upset that system thus suggesting their likely motive to disrupt our business.

https://www.denverpost.com/2015/01/28/aeg-live-rocky-mountains-expands-to-northwest-region-worrying-local-promoters/

--Red Rocks was almost always scheduled by AEG with bands that competed for our same demographic.

--In 2016, AEG produced their own Arise look-alike on the same weekend as Arise, three hours away, with bigger acts. https://www.facebook.com/VertexFestival/

--In 2022, they attempted to produce an Arise look-alike at our prior location in Larimer County in the same month with many of the same people who were once associated with Arise.

https://retro1025.com/aeg-summer-music-festival-west-of-loveland-not-happening/

https://apps.larimer.org/specialevent/application_detail.cfm?id=6068
(Please see names of past Arise workforce listed on the application.)

--These same people were associated with people who attempted to undermine Arise’s reputation by making posts on social media and writing letters to music and booking agencies. (Available upon request.)

--I have way more evidence on all these point; however, I cannot present it for legal reason—at least not in this context—because I cannot verify it. The evidence comes from conversations with AEG, people who experienced AEG direct and my experience in the Colorado market.

--One dictum of logic is: correlation is not causation. In this case, there is lots of correlation yet I am aware that I do not have the cause: “the smoking gun.” However, there is so much correlation, and way more than presented, so that I feel justified in saying: well, this probably is causation. To summarize: I do not have any justification for the Sheriff’s lack of approval. But I know the Sheriff, based on his bio, probably did not want the festival. I know that this Sheriff was communicating with these senators during our application. And these senators were positioned to help or hurt his promotion—and thus had leverage over him. I also know that these senators were closely tied to AEG and I know AEG was likely motivated to see Arise fail not only to preserve their marketshare, but their monopoly as well. I also know that nobody would be dumb enough to leave any “smoking gun” behind. So they all agreed with each other, in some private conversation, hey, yea, well, we do not like that festival—and thus our end. And finally, I then went to all these people and said: hey, can you provide some explanation or investigate this, or hold these people accountable. And everybody said either nothing or nothing that made any sense. And thus the “cover up.”
At the least, AEG blatantly receives government favors while returning those favors while another business, Arise, does not even ask for those favors, does not brownnose politicians, and does not give them money or promote them, but succeeds on its own merit even in an adverse marketplace, and is then blatantly mistreated and abused by the government. One way or another, this is corruption.
One final note: If you are not familiar with festivals like Arise, you might ask: who cares, its just a concert in a field, right. Not really. Research shows that independent festivals like Arise that offer mixed experiences, including Burning Man, Lighting in a Bottle, Dirtybird Campout and etc. provide enormous benefits for our culture. A study from Yale University concluded:

“Overall, 63.2% of participants (in these festivals) reported having transformative experiences so profound that they left the events feeling radically changed, including a substantial number of people who did not expect or desire to be transformed. People who reported transformative experiences also reported feeling more socially connected with all human beings, and with every passing day they spent at these events, participants expanded their circle of generosity beyond family and friends towards including distant strangers. They recontacted some of the original attendees and also 2,000 people who had attended the event but were not originally interviewed. The researchers found that transformative experiences and their prosocial feelings persisted at least six months.”

https://news.yale.edu/2022/05/27/transformative-effects-mass-gatherings-burning-man-are-lasting

I knew that Arise connected people, made them feel they were part of something larger than themselves—and this in turn explained our byline: “Community through Creativity.” Given that we Americans are increasingly isolated through technology and ideology, and many other factors, Arise was providing one of the best possible survices for our culture—and I hope that the people, who made us fail, are brought to justice and held accountable.

Luke

Relevants notes about me:
I do not have any police record, maybe one speeding ticket from several years ago, no tax evasion, or valid, public complaints. Arise only had one lawsuit against us, but as mentioned, we were cleared of any blame. One party tried to sue me, back in 2019 (I think it was) but those parties were later proven associated with AEG: the suit was also dismissed as not only groundless but also stupid by my attorneys. I always made sure everyone was paid at Arise, even when we lost money. Before closing the company, I made sure everyone was paid for any money out of their pocket, or for any services actually rendered, even as they were not paid for services not rendered. Ticket buyers were refunded, but denied their processing fees which went to the ticketing company not Arise. I have never advocated for the use of alcohol, ma*****na or other substances that alter consciousness (aside from writing about psychedelics, in balanced ways, on Facebook maybe two times in ten years). I am not politically motivated or inspired—but I at least vote (except for the past year) and always voted Democrat, as does nearly all of my family. This update is not politically motivated: I only hope we can help each party be the better version of itself. I once believed that the Colorado democrats would probably align with Arise’s mission: to generate community and creativity, protect the environment, foster entrepreneurship, support impoverished areas of the state and challenge the corporate monopoly—but in reality, I have seen zero evidence of this support and everything to the contrary. I have only received support from one Republican in my tenure, but only in votes and words to this effect: as long as you are not hurting anyone, I support your business whether I care about what you are doing or not.
I do not personally know Sheriff Kirk Taylor or Senator Bennett and Hickenlooper; based on their history, I would guess they are honorable people but I have been around long enough to know that surface is not always reality.

05/09/2023

Update on Arise Music Festival's Complaint against the Pueblo Sheriff Department, to the Attorney General of Colorado, regards the cancellation of Arise 22.
--For initial info on this matter, see prior posts here on Facebook.
--Below is the image of the person who, according to the records, caused the failure of our permit, possibly acting alone.
(I am claiming "fair use" in using this image.)
--The AG has received and filed the complaint but tell me, because of their procedures, they cannot reveal any of their actions or lack thereof.
--Attached below is the complaint to the AG.
--As part of that complaint, I also included the personal statement of Arise's Public Safety Director--which supports the claims in the complaint. I also included his resume establishing him as one of the nation's leading experts in public safety for live events--while also working for the FBI, CIA, Homeland Security and other agencies. (However, for reasons related to privacy, those documents are not included here but likely available upon request.)
--If anyone is interested in litigating this matter, or reporting on this matter, or knows of any information related to this cancellation, please contact me at: [email protected].
--As of now, I cannot produce another festival because the same thing that just happened could happen all over again, unless the problem is somehow adressed.
In this case, it appears that this one man, possibly acting alone, with unknown motives, caused the cancellation of the Arise Music Festival, without valid and studied cause, causing detriments to thousands, many of them in his own county.
--The Complaint was derived from our log of events which, in chronological order, gives the date of any data, the subject as well as the people involved; the log is then linked to the actual email or document. The log, of course, is derived from data from both Arise and CORA and excludes nothing unless the Sheriff hid documents—and is available upon request.
--In publishing this Complaints, I am opening myself to potential claims of defamation; however, those claims are only valid if my complaint is untruthful. So I doubt anyone will make any claims.

From Luke Comer, X producer/owner.

ARISE MUSIC FESTIVAL, LLC VERSUS THE PUEBLO SHERIFF DEPARTMENT

COMPLAINT SUMMARY: Arise Music Festival (and thousands of others) against the Pueblo Sheriff Department regarding the cancellation of the Festival, Memorial Day Weekend, 2022.

In effect, the Pueblo Sheriff Dept. caused the cancellation of Arise Festival in 2022. In doing so, I believe they acted wrongfully against Arise in ways that are possibly subject to legal action/lawsuit on behalf of many in this state who were damaged.
As stated in the Pueblo Planning Department’s Special Event Permit, the Sheriff was supposed to “agree” to our planning for security, medical and fire; or assumably, he was supposed to disagree. But the Sheriff:
--Never agreed or disagreed—even after at least five or ten requests from Arise.
--Never followed the due process from Planning or any process or timeline of their own.
--Delayed any possible decision over four months.
--Never presented any viable reasons for not “agreeing” to the festival to Arise or to each other.
--Communicated to Arise that they did not need any more information from us; and then, in interoffice emails, relayed invalid reasons for not agreeing to the festival, not giving us the chance to defend.
--Otherwise, they were tardy, unsupportive, prejudiced and uncooperative.
If Sheriff Dept. disagreed to the festival early on, then Planning would have cancelled our application. In that case, Arise could have appealed the decision and probably won the appeal. If we lost the appeal, Arise could have cancelled the festival sooner and saved millions of dollars, tons of aggravation and survived. The Sheriff Dept knew this—so it raises the question: Did they try to avoid due process and cause Arise as much damage as possible?
Otherwise, Arise had the support or non-objection from all other government entities. We also had the support of over ninety percent of the neighbors to the site of the festival.
Additionally Arise had an exemplary record in public safety for nine years at their prior location in Larimer County. For 2022 Arise hired one of the nation’s leading experts in public safety to oversee the festival; and hired the best firms in security and medical as well—and presented plans commonly accepted in many jurisdictions across the country. Arise had their own security team onsite; their own medical team, including doctors, nurses, and emt’s as well as its own ambulance. Arise agreed to have a fire truck onsite, if requested. Arise also agreed to nine deputies onsite as dictated by the Sheriff Dept.—even though we never had any in the past or ever needed more than one or two. All of the above was paid for by Arise.
Generally, I and the public safety director believe that the Sheriff Department never intended to approve the festival for reasons not directly related to security, medical, fire and etc. So they pretended some version of process, delayed, and framed the festival to fail with as much damage as possible while trying to avoid any accountability. They caused lethal damage to Arise, about three million in losses; thousands of contractors lost half their pay; ticket buyers lost half their processing fees. Pueblo County lost millions in revenues and taxes, not only for 22 but for many years into the future.

NARRATIVE OF EVENTS

--I am the X producer and owner of the Arise Music Festival. https://arisefestival.com/
--The festival was cancelled, in effect, by the Pueblo County Sheriff Department two weeks before the event was to happen on Memorial Day weekend in 2022.
--Financial losses: Arise: 3 to 4 million. Artists, engineers, contractors: half or all of their fees. Ticket buyers: processing fees. Pueblo County: taxes and one million in revenue. State of Colorado: losses from revenue, my tax write-offs. My staff: terminated. The company: folded.
--On behalf of all parties above, I am asking that you investigate the Pueblo Sheriff for consideration of a class action lawsuit to reclaim those losses.
--To produce the event, I needed approval from Pueblo County Planning Department for their Special Event Permit Application which, in turn, required “agreement” from other government departments. In the end, Planning cancelled our permit because they did not receive “agreement” from the Sheriff.

The summary below covers the narrative of events leading to the cancellation. The summary is derived from documents from Arise as well as from from Pueblo County that I and my attorneys collected through CORA.
--Prior to 22, Arise operated in Larimer County for nine years:
*Capacity: 13k.
*Exemplary record on insurance claims, public safety and law enforcement.
*Arise well loved by fans and press, https://web.facebook.com/arisemusicfestival/?_rdc=1&_rdr
stressing music, art, community, wellness and caring.
--During the pandemic, I purchased my own land in Pueblo County (1300 acres) to “next level” the festival. Before the purchase Pueblo Planning Dept. gave their verbal and excited approval of the event.
--In the first week of January, five months before the event, my team started the permitting process. Eventually, Arise was approved (or about to be) by every government agency in the county and state. Arise was also approved by over ninety percent of neighbors in the area. (CDOT is mentioned as not approving the event—but records show they were about to approve and asked not to by the County.)
--So the Sheriff, in effect, caused the cancellation of the festival alone.

Below are facts on Arise’s relationship with the Pueblo Sheriff:
--Arise was best practices for public safety for 22. Comer: ten-year festival owner and producer of many events. Dennison, public safety director: military, law enforcement, festival specialists for fifteen years, over 50 festivals per year; nine recommendations from such as NYCPD, Homeland Security, other producers. Established and respected security and medical firms: Battle-tested and Paradocs. They all come with planning documents, established over decades in the industry and approved by law enforcement across the country. We all work together to review sitemap, further plan and coordinate. All rate Arise low risk due to the type of culture and music.
--Early January: Dennison contacted Sheriff over ten times, finally got someone responsive.
--Jan 25: Arise meets with Sheriff and presents on public safety and festival values and culture. Undersheriff Hall closes meeting with comments about Woodstock, ma*****na, mud, hippies and similar.
--Feb 10: Comer submits to Captain Steve Bryant all requested documents totaling about 200 pages, including Sitemap, EOP (Emergency Operating Procedures), Security Plan, Evacuation Plan, Medical Plan, resumes, org charts etc...etc.…
--March 25 and again 29: Arise asks for approval.
--March 29, seven weeks later, Bryant lists some concerns; Arise addresses same day. One point of contention: Bryant wants approximately 9 deputies on festival site for all hours and command center, at Arise’s expense. Arise response: never had any deputies in the past, good record, not necessary. Arise welcomes 2 deputies; forced to comply with 9, at expense of about 60k. Arise asks for deployment and invoice; Bryant never sends. All other issues never mentioned again so assume they are “handled.”
--March 31, Arise again requests approval, especially because we are close to the Planning Deadline.
--Bryant asks what entity of the government are we submitting our permit?
--April 4: Comer summarizes steps to date, enquires about any other steps needed, and enquires about their procedure for approval and presses them to make a decision because time is money.
--No response.
--April 5: Bryant communicates they have all information they need.
--April 8: Even after saying they have all they need from Arise, Bryant goes behind Arise’s back to Planning with list of concerns, but Planning sends them to Arise who addresses all concerns the same day: most of their issues are not informed and beyond their jurisdiction. Some needed additional info which Arise provided.
Never hear back from them on these issues—so assume they are “handled.”
--In interoffice emails, excluding Arise, Bryant list issues about Arise.
--Luke writes summary letter, asking Sheriff if they have any further concerns.
No response.
--April 22: Comer summarizes correspondence to date and says not aware of any reason for Sheriff to deny the permit.
No response.
--April 29: Around four months after initial contact, Bryant submits another round of “issues” with Arise. Arise, same day, addresses all of them.
No response.
--May 5: Bryant says he has all he needs.
--Dennison presses them for approval.
--NOTE: due to technical difficulties, the remainder of this "Complaint" is attached to this post as screenshots in comments from Arise.