BOULDER, Colo. — Only smiles surround Helen Davis, a Boulder artist who could double as a comedian.

Davis has lived in Colorado since 1948 and in Boulder since 1960. As she's watched the city change over the decades, she's also gathered several groups of friends, drawn to her magnetic personality.

“Helen is a force to be reckoned with. She speaks her mind," said Carol Watkins, who met Davis in the early 90s. “It's her energy. Her energy is just exuberant. I mean, at 99 years old."

Davis' 99th birthday was on May 31.

Before that, she was out to lunch with Watkins and other friends when she mentioned she would like to fly in a glider plane.

Watkins and other friends chipped in to buy Davis a flight at Mile High Gliding as a present.

“I don't know what I expected, but I loved every minute of it," Davis said after the flight. “Next year, I'll be back if I'm still around.”

Her friends say Davis stays young because of her busy social schedule and her constant creation of art.

“I love her," Watkins said. "I feel like I wouldn't be who I am today without her.”

After the flight, Davis' friends were waiting for sweets and songs for her birthday. Davis shows no signs of slowing down, saying she would like to go parasailing next.

Collette Bordelon at KMGH first reported this story.

BOULDER, Co. – Farms across the country have been struggling to stay operating with the pandemic. One in particular was forced to lay off all of its workers, but with some creativity, the owner was able to hire his whole staff back on.

He said his company’s recovery started when he threw his business plan out the window and reinvented the farm’s revenue strategy.

In that process, owner of

Black Cat Organic Farm,

Eric Skokan started an ice cream truck style produce delivery truck. “Mabel” the farm truck is offers fresh produce and pre-made meals from the farm’s restaurant right to family’s driveways.

“We’re making guests happy, fundamentally, that’s what we used to do, but of course it looks completely different,” said Chef and Owner of Black Cat Organic Farm, Eric Skokan.

This new rolling recipe for business began when COVID-19 shut down the farm’s two restaurants.

“It was like a bomb went off,” said Skokan. “I laid off 30 employees, everything came to a screeching halt,” he said.

Skokan says letting his employees go was like losing family.

“To see it all go was sad and frightening, but in the end, within minutes, I was thinking, ‘I can’t let it happen’,” he said. “I have to go down fighting.”

That fight started with throwing his once successful plan in the trash.

“It’s kind of like Legos,” said Skokan. “You take it apart and build it up into something totally new.”

They opened a farm stand, and then revved up “Mabel.” By selling his produce fresh off the farm, Skokan said he was able to sell as much food as he usually moved through his restaurants. In a way, they were staying afloat.

“I was able to start grabbing the employees that I had laid off and bring them all in,” said Skokan. “Instead of the sommelier, you drive a tractor, or Mabel,” he said.

With his employees taking on new roles, the farm is reaching more people than ever before.

“As a kid growing up, the thing you were always listening for was the ice cream truck, and to be able to pass that on to my kids with a healthier option, as well as during a time of crisis, really presents a unique experience,” said Eric Henderson, a neighbor who looks out for Mabel rolling by.

Skokan’s mission is to provide a moment of normalcy with a dose of nostalgia, all while providing employment for his family.

“Everything is different, but the core part that feeds my soul is still happening,” said Skokan.

Business experts said pivoting quickly, like Skokan did, is a key factor in starting to bring revenue back to family owned businesses.

Kenda Eaton, a business owner and small business expert with Business.com, said she made sure her own company,

Sprinkled With Pink,

also pivoted quickly.

She advised that businesses make sure to invest in marketing and be more engaged online than ever before.

She said, as Skokan did, to bring your product to the customer whenever possible.

Want to learn more about Black Cat Organic Farms? Click

HERE.

High school sophomore Jadyn Lewis is seeking answers to questions concerning her community, like how climate change impacts the food we eat and why COVID-19 affects some groups more than others.

“Especially with this pandemic, people are wanting to know what’s happening exactly and the details and science behind that,” she said.

Lewis and other students across the country are now learning how science impacts everyday life through a national educational effort led by the University of Colorado Boulder.

This innovative way of studying science focuses on students’ experiences and their challenges.

“That means for Black, Latinx and indigenous students who might encounter science as a white endeavor, we want to privilege and center the experiences and work of Black scientists for example,” said Bill Penuel, Ph.D., a professor of learning science at CU Boulder, who is leading this program with help from educators at some of the most prestigious universities in the United States.

Penuel says the goal is getting students interested in science by having them ask questions about the world around them.

“By the end, they’ve learned the science ideas that are in the traditional curriculum not instead of teaching and then trying to find an application, they’re learning it really through the application,” he said.

This deeper understanding of sciences does come with a $7 million price tag, but it’s free for all students, like Lewis.

“Putting in the effort and the time and the money and the resources in order to create a curriculum for students for diverse backgrounds is crucial,” she said.

Materials taught in this program meet the Next Generation Science Standards, which is a research-based vision for science learning being put in place in classrooms across the country and allows students to get answers to the questions impacting them the most.

BOULDER, Colo. —

About 2,000 people gathered for a vigil honoring the 10 people killed in the Colorado supermarket shooting Thursday night after attorneys for the shooting suspect asked during his first court appearance that he receive a mental health evaluation before the case against him proceeds.

The memorial at Fairview High School, a half-mile from the scene of the shooting at a King Soopers supermarket, emphasized remembrance and healing. The crowd said aloud the names of those slain this week in Boulder after one resident read the names of the eight people killed in a mass shooting in Georgia just days earlier.

Many held candles and roses while locking arms or embracing each other near the base of the snow-covered Rocky Mountain foothills. After a singer led the crowd in "Amazing Grace," Nicole LiaBraaten, a local leader of the gun-control group Moms Demand Action, asked people to "take a healing breath."

"Our hearts are broken, and our festering wounds are split open once again. And this time it’s for the whole world to see," said Liabraaten, whose group helped organize the vigil.

Democratic U.S. Rep. Joe Neguse, whose district includes Boulder, told the crowd no words could describe how he felt when he heard about the shooting.

"Ten lives. Ten precious lives lost too soon and remembered by so many," he said.

Neguse said he had spoken with some of his colleagues about how to curb gun violence. "It does not have to be this way," he said, prompting cheers.

One woman yelled, "Ban assault weapons." That prompted another woman to scold her for not showing respect. "This is about people who died," she said. "This is a memorial."

Earlier Thursday, an attorney for the accused shooter asked for the mental health evaluation but provided no details about the suspect's mental health. The suspect's next hearing will not be scheduled for two to three months to allow the defense to evaluate his mental state and evidence collected by investigators.

The 21-year-old suspect did not speak except to say "yes" to a question from the judge, who advised him that he is charged with 10 counts of first-degree murder and one count of attempted murder for allegedly shooting at a police officer, who was unhurt.

Boulder officer, 51-year-old Eric Talley, was among those killed. His funeral was set for next Tuesday.

The suspected shooter did not enter a plea, which will come later in the judicial process. He has been jailed without bail.

The suspect entered court in a wheelchair, presumably because of a gunshot wound to the leg that he suffered Monday in a gunbattle with police. He appeared alert and attentive, his eyes darting back and forth from his lawyers to the judge.

Boulder police tweeted Thursday that they used the handcuffs of the slain officer, Talley, to take the suspect from a hospital to jail earlier this week — and told him so.

A law enforcement official briefed on the shooting previously said that the suspect’s family told investigators they believed the suspect was suffering some type of mental illness, including delusions. The official was not authorized to speak publicly and spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity.

His legal team includes public defender Daniel King, who represented Colorado theater gunman James Holmes, as well as Robert Dear, who is accused of killing three people in a 2015 attack on a Planned Parenthood clinic in Colorado Springs, two cases in which mental illness was a factor.

Depending on what they learn from investigators about the suspect's mental health, his lawyers could ask the court to order an examination by a psychiatrist or psychologist to determine whether he is competent to stand trial.

If defendants are unable to understand the proceedings and assist their lawyers, proceedings can be delayed to see if treatment, such as medication, can make them ready for trial.

A mentally ill defendant might eventually plead not guilty by reason of insanity, as Holmes did in the 2012 shooting at an Aurora movie theater that killed 12 people and injured 70. It would be up to a jury to decide whether the defendant knew right from wrong at the time of the crime — the state’s legal definition of insanity.

Screenshots of what was believed to be the suspected shooter's Facebook page hint of fears that he was secretly being tracked on his phone and reflect his interest in Islamic teachings, immigration and martial arts. The screenshots and dozens of postings were captured by the online extremist tracking firm SITE Intelligence Group.

"There was no indication on his Facebook account that suggested radical views of any kind, whether it be Islamist, anti-Trump, or anything else," said Rita Katz, executive director of SITE, which analyzed the postings. "He did mention Islam on his Facebook, but never to any extremity."

"In July 2019, [he] wrote that his phone was being hacked by racist islamophobic people." At another point, he wrote that his old high school had likely gotten access to his phone, asking Facebook followers for advice on how to stop it.

After a white supremacist killed 51 people in the 2019 New Zealand mosque massacre, the Boulder suspect called the dead "victims of the entire Islamophobia industry that vilified them."

"What Islam is really about," he wrote in one post that referred to a list of teachings from the Koran, including to "be good to others" and "restrain anger."

According to two law enforcement officials, the suspected shooter was born in Syria in 1999, emigrated to the U.S. as a toddler and later became a U.S. citizen. He would need to be a citizen to buy a gun. The officials were not authorized to speak publicly and spoke to the AP on condition of anonymity.

An AR-15-style gun recovered inside the supermarket was believed to have been used in the attack, said a law enforcement official briefed on the shooting who was not authorized to speak publicly and spoke to the AP on condition of anonymity.

—

Associated Press writers Jim Anderson in Denver, Patty Nieberg in Boulder, Bernard Condon in New York, Michael Balsamo and Colleen Long in Washington and AP staff members from around the U.S. contributed to this report. Nieberg is a corps member for the Associated Press/Report for America Statehouse News Initiative. Report for America is a nonprofit national service program that places journalists in local newsrooms to report on undercovered issues.

CNN —

Eric Talley, the first police officer to arrive at the scene of the Boulder supermarket shooting last week, was the last of the gunman's 10 victims.

To honor his bravery, the nonprofit Tunnel to Towers Foundation, set up to support the families of fallen first responders and service members, announced Saturday it will pay off the mortgage on Talley's home.

Talley, 51, is survived by his wife and seven children.

The community came together to grieve him

Hundreds flooded the streets in the days after Talley's death, watching as a hearse transferred his body to an Aurora funeral home.

His patrol vehicle, parked in front of the police station, was adorned with flowers, cards and other tokens of grief and gratitude.

Talley was the first Boulder officer to be killed in the line of duty since 1994, and the sixth on-duty death in the department's history, according to the National Law Enforcement Officers Memorial Fund.

His bravery was known to his friends and colleagues well before his death.

"Didn't surprise me he was the first one there," his father, Homer Talley, told CNN affiliate KUSA.

Talley had been a member of the Boulder police force since 2010.

He was aware of the danger he faced as a police officer. His father told KUSA he recently looked into becoming a drone operator because he thought it would be safer.

Police Chief Maris Herold said at a news conference that Talley was "willing to die to protect others" and embodied "everything policing deserves and needs."

Within 30 seconds of arriving at the King Soopers store, Talley led a team of officers inside to engage the shooter, the Boulder Police Department wrote in a tweet. After Talley, no one else was shot.

A non-profit for first responders is responding to Talley's death

The Tunnel to Towers Foundation was created in honor of New York firefighter Stephen Siller, who died responding to the 9/11 terrorist attacks.

The organization builds mortgage-free smart homes for catastrophically injured veterans and first responders, and pays off the mortgages of first responders and military servicemembers who are killed in the line of duty and leave behind young children.

The foundation also provides mortgage-free homes to surviving military spouses with young children.

The nonprofit's mission to honor fallen first responders prompted the effort to pay Talley's mortgage.

"It's so important because Eric gave his life and left behind a wife and seven children, and for him to rush in and go toward ... the danger to save people is just incredible," foundation CEO Frank Siller, Stephen Siller's brother, told "Fox & Friends" on Saturday.