*(Los Angeles, CA) As reported by ABC Channel 7 Denver an African-American man by the name of Shawn Bauck went into Cousin Pat’s Pub & Grill in Estes Park for food and drink, but instead received a heaping portion of Jim Crow.
The environmental science major was told by the Trump-supporting waitress that although he seemed “educated” and “different” that the majority of black people were “thugs, wife beaters and gangsters.” Amidst the recent killing of 23 year old Elijah McClain who died in police custody, the server sympathized with the police and justified racism on the basis of daily encounters with the black community.
Even more alarming, the waitress felt comfortable using the “n” word in front of Bauck and his girlfriend. When Mr. Bauck took the appropriate measure of lodging a formal complaint with the owner in the restaurant for the use of derogatory language; the owner smirked and did nothing. The owner (Patrick Beard) simply replied “well in what context was it used?”
“The law, if not our history, does not allow a restaurant owner to do nothing when a black person informs him of racial slurs being used by employees in the establishment,” says Mr. Bauck’s attorney, Jason Flores-Williams. “The image of a person of color leaving a restaurant with their heads down, and without due process, is a fixture of our history that we should no longer be willing to accept in any form.”
Bauck filed a racial discrimination lawsuit against the restaurant and the matter is currently before the Colorado Civil Rights Division. Bauck said “It’s really sad I have to file this lawsuit in 2021. Apparently some people in Colorado have totally forgotten all about the Civil Rights Act of 1964 which has only been on the books as federal law for like I don’t know 57 years.”
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Colorado has a deep racist history, although The Rocky Mountain National Park is one of the top tourist destinations in the United States, many visitors don’t know that the state has several “Sundown Towns” including Estes Park. Sundown towns are basically all white neighborhoods that practice racial segregation by excluding people of color using local laws. The original terminology came from signs that were posted saying “colored people” had to leave by sundown.
There are currently race-restrictive covenants still on the books, extending back to Jim Crow. Just like the Alabama constitution technically still allows school segregation, the Colorado state constitution penned in 1876, still allows slavery for those in prison – commonly called inmate labor. Estes Park historian John Meissner said, “This is kind of like our Confederate statues in Estes Park, except these are statutes. These are subdivisions or neighborhoods where they have race-restrictive covenants in place.”
In particular Stanley Heights was founded by a man who stated that no race should live in it but the white race, he also founded the Stanley Hotel which currently displays his statue. The hotel was made famous by Steven King, who wrote the classic thriller “The Shining” and based his hotel off the Stanley.
Meissner, Flores and Bauck are calling for action. Even though old, race-restrictive covenants were deemed unconstitutional in a 1948 U.S. Supreme Court decision, individual homeowners need to take a stand against them since they still appear in property records.
Bauck has set up a Gofundme to help with his legal fees and fighting racial discrimination in Estes Park, Colorado.
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