“The more journalists you have, the closer you’ll get to the truth.”

So said Patricia Calhoun, longtime editor of the alt-weekly Westword, at a recent conference on Denver journalism.

This is precisely the reason we launched The Denver Gazette five years ago today — to add more voices to Colorado’s journalism ecosystem, to make sure Coloradans get more facets of the truth. In a decade when more than 60 newspapers have shut down in Colorado, Clarity Media has added three new publications and a network of writers to extend the mission of Clarity’s 153-year-old flagship, the Colorado Springs Gazette. Clarity launched Colorado Politics in 2016, The Denver Gazette in 2020, The Colorado Network in 2024 and Colorado Living magazine this year. OutThere Colorado, which was launched 15 years ago before Clarity bought the Gazette, is also part of the Clarity family now. 

“When we initially launched the Denver Gazette, I was asked repeatedly why we would enter a ‘crowded’ media marketplace like Denver,” our CEO Chris Reen said. “What I told people then, and we believe and espouse now more than ever, is that covering local and national news in a fair, balanced and objective way is critical to a healthy understanding and debate of the issues. Combined with our center-right opinions and a wide range of commentary on the day’s most pressing issues — we believe we offer an excellent alternative to most other media in this state.

“And our readers agree,” Reen added. “With our wide coverage of city, state, rural, political, investigative, sports, and feature stories, our growth and loyalty in just 5 years has been outstanding. That gives us the confidence and resolve to continue to serve the communities we care so deeply about with the utmost fervor.”

Our publications now have more than 150 journalists and columnists contributing to Colorado’s media ecosystem.

And in the last year, the Denver Gazette has expanded its horizons with The Colorado Network, a collective of more than 30 freelancers all around the state to bring our readers even more perspectives, some of which haven’t been getting the attention they deserve as they were drowned out by voices along the Front Range.

Our Colorado Living magazine provides a grand, visual vista of the characters, culture and things to do and see all around our endlessly interesting state.

And our recent Rural Reckoning series on the rural/urban divide was meant to send a message to the far corners of Colorado that we’re paying close attention to rural issues.

The Denver Gazette also continues to strive to be the hometown paper in Denver with our tough accountability reporting on the mayor, governor, Aurora gangs, and 16th Street mall crimes and closings. We’ve reorganized staff so that we have reporters dedicated to covering Denver, Aurora, Jeffco and Dougco, which helps us better cover issues that impact the entire metro area, like license plate cameras, homeless migrations, changes in school enrollments and fluctuating real estate markets.

Our sports staff is anchored by the two best-known sports columnists in the state, Mark Kiszla and Woody Paige.  

Our investigative team, the largest in the state, continues to lead the way in big investigations. Investigative editor Chris Osher won a national fellowship to partner with ProPublica on a major investigation of the marijuana industry in Colorado.

National award-winning investigative reporter Jenny Deam has owned coverage of the Missy Woods DNA scandal, helping to free two people whose cases were based on shoddy evidence, and uncovering systemic problems with the CBI office that are finally being acknowledged and addressed by official inquiries. Jenny’s reporting has spurred a wider look into CBI’s culture and the reopening of hundreds of cases.

Investigative reporter David Migoya wrapped up his 5-year-long deep dive into the corruption in the judicial system with a blockbuster on a system of private judges the wealthy can go to, who the judges are, who uses the system, and all the illegal campaign contributions these judges are giving to clients.

We also continue to shine a bright light on mental health in the state. Reporters Mary Shinn and Carol McKinley teamed up to uncover serious deficiencies in how the military handles mental health, and Colorado Network reporters have contributed to a Mental Health in Mountain Towns series.

One of the most important things we do as a company is identify the issue of the moment and then flood the zone with stories on all different aspects of that issue.

Nuclear energy is a case in point. Reporter Brennen Kauffman got the ball rolling with his scoop on Colorado Springs Utilities admitting they were not going to make their emissions goals, and saying the only way to do so was to add nuclear energy. Copo’s Marianne Goodland documented the push in the legislature to declare nuclear energy a clean energy, and then Scott Weiser of the Denver Gazette came back with a Sunday piece on how there was a shift afoot in favor of nuclear energy in the state. And then State Sen. Larry Liston penned a full-throated nuclear explainer piece for us in Perspective Sunday.

Within a few weeks, the legislature passed a bill declaring nuclear energy a clean energy source and Polis signed it, a huge reversal in Polis’s attitude toward nuclear energy. We think our coverage helped set the table for this shift.

At the five-year mark, we believe fair, balanced, objective journalism is more important than ever, especially after the news week we just lived through, with the shooting of children in our backyard and the shooting of a high-profile political activist in the state next door.

“American politics has sides. There is no use pretending it doesn’t,” an old colleague of mine, Ezra Klein, wrote this week. “But both sides are meant to be on the same side of a larger project — we are all, or most of us, anyway, trying to maintain the viability of the American experiment.”

And for all of us here at the Gazettes, Copo, OutThere, the Colorado Network and Colorado Living, we’re very much on the side of maintaining the viability of Colorado journalism as well. Our impartiality is a function of our commitment to that larger project of our profession, state and country. 

We fully intend to keep that commitment in Denver for as long as we’ve kept it in Colorado Springs, maybe longer — five years going on 153.

We can’t thank you enough for tagging along for the ride.

Vince Bzdek, executive editor of The Gazette, Denver Gazette and Colorado Politics, writes a weekly news column that appears on Sunday.