Preservation push for Wash Park home fails to advance to Denver City Council
A bid to preserve a home on the east side of Wash Park has come up short.
An owner-opposed landmark designation application submitted for the home at 800 S. Franklin St. in Denver failed to advance past the Landmark Preservation Commission on Tuesday.
Three commissioners voted to forward the application to the Denver City Council and recommend approval. Another three voted to deny the application.
The application needed five votes in favor to advance to the council, according to a city attorney.
The home dates to 1884 and was once the home of William Burnett, a Denver County and Denver District judge from the 1950s through the 1970s.
In February, the home was purchased for $2.6 million by Tony and Robin Kohake, who planned to knock it down and build a new house for themselves and their four children on the corner lot.
The couple were surprised to learn, when they applied for a demolition permit, that Denver has a process that allows for homes to be named a city landmark against the consent of the owners. Landmark designation effectively prevents a home from demolition.
Three nearby residents — Jody Debs, Stefanie Jacobs and Susan Holbrook — submitted their application in late August after city-mandated mediation talks with the Kohakes failed to find common ground.
Commissioners who voted in favor of recommending approval Tuesday stressed that the body is supposed to consider only whether the landmark application meets certain criteria. They aren’t supposed to consider other factors, such as whether funds are available to fix up and maintain a property. Those additional factors are supposed to be considered only by the council.
“I’d like to commend the owners — I think you’re trying to do the right thing. But sadly, our purview is limited,” said Nick Foussianes, who voted to forward the application.
Other commissioners, however, said they didn’t believe the application made a convincing case on certain criteria, including whether Burnett was a prominent enough figure to justify preservation. Commissioner Rusty Brown called that argument “nebulous at best.”
Commissioners also noted that they don’t particularly enjoy weighing in on owner-opposed applications. Much of the time, they focus on things such as whether certain windows or entire additions to a home conform to the standards of the specific historic district it’s within.
“This is not fun, not that I’m here to have fun,” said commissioner Erika Warzel.
Public input was against preservation. The commission received 55 letters in support and 100 in opposition, plus a petition in opposition with 121 signatures. But two registered neighborhood organizations did voice support. And Historic Denver, the local nonprofit, assisted the applicants in their bid to keep 800 S. Franklin St. standing.
The majority of those who spoke at the meeting Tuesday also voiced opposition to landmarking the home.
Among those was Mark Rinehart, who found himself in an identical position in early 2024 when he sought to build a home on a Montview Boulevard corner lot in the South Park Hill neighborhood. That application was soundly rejected by the landmark commission in a 6-0 vote.
“While the application to preserve Montview was weak, the Franklin application was even weaker,” Rinehart said.
After he finished reading his prepared remarks, he continued to speak off the cuff, noting that his new home is nearly done and that staring down a landmark application is tough.
“I can assure you that the stress is incredibly real,” he said.
After the hearing, with landmark status no longer a threat, Tony Kohake said he had expected the commission to forward the application.
“We thought it was going to City Council,” he said.
He had some hope for that stage, he said, having found Councilman Paul Kashmann, who represents the area, to be “logical in a recent discussion.”
The couple said they now have to regroup on their plans for a new build, which they set aside when the landmark threat arose.
“We didn’t want to be optimistic about it, because we were really scared,” Robin Kohake said.
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A bid to preserve a home on the east side of Wash Park has come up short. An owner-opposed landmark designation application submitted for the home at 800 S. Franklin St. in Denver failed to advance past the Landmark Preservation Commission on Tuesday. Three commissioners voted to forward the application to the Denver City Council…