Wesley Schultz, the Lumineers lead singer and guitarist along with Nathaniel Rateliff & the Night Sweats and other Colorado musicians will march on Greenwood Village City Hall Monday night to oppose the city’s decision to shield its police officers from civil liability.
The march and play-in will begin at 7:30 p.m. at city hall, 6060 S. Quebec St., a news release from state Rep. Leslie Herod, D-Denver, said.
Earlier this month, the Denver suburb passed a resolution saying it would never find its police officers to have acted in bad faith so they would not be liable to pay up to $25,000 in civil penalties if they are found to have acted unlawfully. The resolution was a response to police reform legislation passed by the Colorado General Assembly where one measure would allow police officers to be sued individually for civil rights violations.
The City Council’s move sparked protests in the city and led Rateliff and other prominent artists to vow they would not play concerts at Fiddler’s Green amphitheater until the resolution is reversed.
“We support the Black Lives Matter movement and were so proud to see Colorado lead the nation in implementing police reform last month by passing Senate Bill 217 with a huge bipartisan majority,” Rateliff wrote in a letter to the mayor and city council. “We were appalled last week to learn that the City of Greenwood Village, CO passed a resolution to undermine the applicability of SB20-217 within its community…[t]he new resolution shockingly predetermined all future police abuse as justified to further shield bad officers from enforce- ment mechanisms created within SB20-217. Recently we have discussed plans to play at Fiddler’s Green, we write to you today to publicly announce that we will not play music there until Greenwood Village rescinds its recent resolution permitting police to act without accountability.”
