In this episode of Murphy's Law, host Murphy Robinson sits down with Dave DeVia — President and CEO of Colorado Concern, fifth-generation Denver native, former Westminster City Councilman, "recovering banker," 18-year veteran of the building trades, and co-owner of one of Denver's most beloved neighborhood bakeries for over two decades. Murphy invited Dave on because he's fascinated by him: a guy whose family has been building this city, literally, since 1884, and who has spent his career moving between small business, labor, local government, and now the boardroom — always landing on the same question: how do we make Colorado work for everybody?
This conversation moves fast and covers a lot of ground. Dave traces his family's roots to Pioneer Ironworks, the company his great-grandparents founded that forged the ornamental ironwork still hanging in the Brown Palace today, and tells the story of his great-grandmother — the second woman in the City and County of Denver to hold a driver's license, whose elopement to Boulder made the newspapers. He talks about cutting his teeth at Jake Jabs' American Furniture Warehouse, banking, nearly two decades in the building trades working alongside labor unions, and finally Colorado Concern, the 200-member coalition of CEOs and business owners he's led for the past three years.
Some of the best moments come from the bakery. Dave and his wife Kathleen ran it for 23 years before selling it — five weeks before COVID hit, a stroke of luck he's the first to admit he didn't plan. He tells the story of TJ, an employee on the autism spectrum who worked the register and boxed cookies for over a decade, treated by the whole staff like family. And he tells the one about the day he covered a shift and kept steering every customer toward the same chocolate mousse torte, only for Kathleen to remind him there were twenty other cakes in the case.
But the heart of this episode is policy, and Dave doesn't pull punches. He and Murphy dig into Colorado's affordability crisis — the state ranks 49th out of 50 on CNBC's affordability index — and the regulatory pileup behind it: 487 bills signed into law last year against roughly 100 a decade ago, and only 487 new condos built statewide against a real need closer to 8,000. Dave makes the case, drawn from his own time on Westminster's nonpartisan, at-large city council, for a different way of doing government — one built on proximity, collaboration, and an actual "bigger tent" rather than a bigger fight.
Key Themes & Takeaways
A Family Business Literally Built Into Denver Dave's family has been in the Denver construction business since 1884. Pioneer Ironworks, his family's company, forged the ornamental iron still visible in the Brown Palace's banisters and ceilings today. His great-grandmother was the second woman in the City and County of Denver to earn a driver's license — he still has the card — and made local headlines when she eloped to Boulder to get married.
Westminster's Model for Getting Beyond the Aisle Before Colorado Concern, Dave served on Westminster's city council under Mayor Brent McFall — a council with no districts, no party labels next to anyone's name, and Democrats and Republicans elected at-large and simply doing the work. Dave holds it up as proof that local government can function without partisanship getting in the way, if the structure is built right.
487 Bills, 487 Condos One of the episode's sharpest exchanges: the Colorado legislature signed 487 bills into law last year, up from roughly 100 a decade ago, on top of hundreds more items added through agency rulemaking. That same year, the state built exactly 487 new condos — against an estimated real need of 8,000 — because policy decisions in the early 2000s made condo construction too risky to insure. Dave and Murphy trace the state's affordability crisis directly back to that mismatch.
Business Isn't a Four-Letter Word Both men push back on the idea that profit and job creation are something to be suspicious of. Murphy shares the story of personally handing an employee $2,000 and emptying his own freezer when he faced eviction; Dave tells a nearly identical story of helping an employee move out of an abusive situation on a Saturday afternoon. Their point: the owners taking the financial risk are very often the same people quietly taking care of their people, off the record and out of pocket.
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