Housing
Marijuana Growers Sow Displacement Fears in Denver
The city’s cultural community supported the movement to legalize recreational cannabis—but now artists are competing with “ganjapreneurs” for cheap industrial space.
Mark Sink, a fine art photographer, moved home to Denver from New York City in 1991. He bought his two-story brick house in the city’s urban Lower Highland neighborhood for $50,000, with the help of owner financing. More than two decades later, houses like his in the now-trendy LoHi neighborhood go for upwards of $1 million, and Sink often finds developer business cards in his mailbox asking if he’s willing to sell.
“First come the artists. Then come the developers. Then it’s all over for everyone,” says Sink, who co-founded the Museum of Contemporary Art Denver.