Dennis Apuan may be best known in Colorado Springs as an organizer of demonstrations against the Iraq war, but he isn't fond of labels, especially ones he doesn't think truly describe the scope of his activities.

"There's more to my existence than being an anti-war protester," El Paso County's newest state lawmaker said recently. "I think it's too extreme for a description of my career."

Apuan sees himself as a community organizer.

That a man with anti-war activism in his background has been elected to the state House of Representatives from a district that includes Fort Carson makes him one of the more remarkable stories of the Nov. 4 election.

The Republican candidate, Catherine "Kit" Roupe, seemed to have most of the advantages.

House District 17 was an open seat but has been in Republican hands for 14 years. Roupe was once a soldier stationed at Fort Carson and has a son serving in Iraq. She campaigned for more jobs, less taxes and affordable health care. She had the full support of the local Republican establishment; City Councilman Bernie Herpin was her campaign treasurer and state Rep. Larry Liston of Colorado Springs campaigned for her.

Her opponent was a man who speaks softly and earnestly of the possibility of world peace and his belief that "what is required of me is to do justice, to love kindness and to walk humbly with God."

Apuan won by 542 votes out of 15,014 counted. When he takes office in January, Apuan, 44, will be the third El Paso County Democrat in the General Assembly, the largest contingent since the post-Watergate era.

Enthusiasm for President-elect Barack Obama's candidacy may have helped Apuan, and the number of votes cast in the District 17 contest rose by 1,279 - 9 percent - from 2004, the last presidential election year. That extra turnout could easily have given Apuan the victory.

But he credited his victory to "perseverance and hard work," not to Obama's coattails. In any event, it's not as if he surfed a Democratic tsunami that swept the state House of Representatives. The Republicans had a net gain of two seats there.

House District 17 includes most of the area east of Interstate 25 and west of the Colorado Springs Airport, plus Fort Carson and the unincorporated Stratmoor Hills and Stratmoor Valley areas. It's a mix of middle-class and blue-collar neighborhoods.

"There's a lot of racial diversity," Apuan said of the district. "About 20 to 25 percent of the population are communities of color. People from low- to middle-income status."

Since 2006, Democrats have overtaken Republicans in voter registration in the district, but the largest group of voters is unaffiliated.

Uncle Sam and its contractors are a major employer. Many residents of the district work at the Army post, or at Peterson Air Force Base, or in industries serving the military. Many families have loved ones serving in Iraq, and must balance their worries against the cold reality that war helps pay the bills.

So how come they elected a former organizer at the Pikes Peak Justice and Peace Commission?

Called to the front lines

Apuan's accent hints at his upbringing in the Philippines, where he lived until his early 20s.

"I think this House District 17 victory possibly represents the first Filipino-American to serve at the Colorado Legislature," he said, sitting amid stacks of unused lawn signs at the El Paso County Democratic Party headquarters on Iowa Street.

Apuan (pronounced ah-pwahn) said that when he moved to Colorado Springs from Los Angeles in 1997, his first job was as a janitor at the Broadmoor Community Church, which is part of the United Church of Christ. He became the church's business administrator the next year.

"That exposure led me to working with different nonprofit organizations and mission-oriented groups," he said.

Along the way he discovered "a calling to be on the front lines for social change" - first as program director for the Pikes Peak Justice and Peace Commission and later as a regional director for the Colorado Progressive Coalition. Both are leftist grass-roots organizations championing civil rights, voting rights and expanded access to health care for minorities and the poor.

"I really believe that a better world is possible," he said. "A world of peace with justice, fairness and equality."

Apuan is also completing his fourth year as vice chairman of the El Paso County Democrats. But it was his role in organizing anti-war demonstrations for the Justice and Peace Commission that became an issue in his contest with Roupe.

"She called me violent, a violent person," Apuan said. "One who is anti-military. One who believes in big government.

"That is just not me," he said. "I don't believe government is the answer to all the problems that we face in the community and in the state."

As for the "anti-military" charge, Apuan said his legislative agenda includes protection from home foreclosure for those serving in the military in Iraq and Afghanistan, free tuition to Colorado state schools when they return, and forgiveness of state income taxes for the immediate families of those who do not.

"This ‘we support our troops' chanting is really empty rhetoric if we don't do something that shows that we honor them," he said. "I support the warriors, but I don't support the war."

Invited to revisit the issue in a post-election interview, Roupe did not back down. "I think he is anti-military," she said.

The goal, Roupe said, is to provide the troops and their families a safe and nurturing community. Anti-war protests sour the atmosphere, she said, adding, "I don't think that that's in any way, shape or form supportive of our troops."

Steve Saint, director of the Pikes Peak Justice and Peace Commission, said that as a resident of District 17 he was "a little surprised" by Apuan's victory. But he noted that Roupe campaigned on a "traditional patriotic" platform, supporting the troops and their mission with equal enthusiasm.

"The people that I know in the military, they're really tired of Iraq," Saint said. "Maybe that's what Dennis' election is saying: supporting the troops means ending the war."

Apuan said he was well-received by the military families he encountered while campaigning in the district. But he said they were no different than the rest of the community: Iraq was not the top concern.

"Economy was No. 1," he said. "It was the far most resonating issue that I've heard from voters."

A different perspective

Apuan had never run for public office, but said he was persuaded to commit on the eve of the county Democrats' meeting in February, when the party's slate was to be finalized and it still had no candidate for House District 17.

"There must have been a dozen calls that I received from members of the community wanting me to consider running for office," he said, "and so I saw that in terms of the voice of the people being the voice of God."

Apuan may have been an atypical candidate, but he waged a campaign with all the traditional trappings: mailings, volunteers working phone banks, door-to-door canvassing, computer databases. The campaign cost more than $40,000, he said, raised from small donors and union locals.

He described himself as "a community leader who offered a different perspective," whom voters saw as "somebody whose voice is more attuned to the values that we share."

Roupe said she lost not because of her stand on the issues, but because a lot of people were fed up with the Republican Party.

"Even though they might have liked me, they were thinking, ‘She's still a part of that party that we can't agree with,'" she said. "I hope people are happy with the outcomes, and if they're not happy they'll look to me in 2010."

In the meantime, Apuan will be bringing a redistributive, activist social change agenda to Denver.

"I have this passion of sorting out what belongs to others and returning it to them, whether that's in terms of affordable housing or education or things that really provide for our needs," Apuan said.

"Those are the kinds of things that really make me excited. And so I am looking forward to working at the Legislature and really finding ways where Coloradans have the wherewithal for economic prosperity."

Apuan said he had been "very warmly received" by the rest of the House Democratic caucus.

"I don't think Dennis will be any more difficult than anyone else," said Terrance Carroll, who as speaker of the House will be herding the majority in the 67th General Assembly. "We all share a common purpose and common values in terms of our beliefs as Democrats, our progressive beliefs."

Carroll said Apuan's work as a community organizer was no impediment to success in the nuts-and-bolts work of lawmaking.

"I can even point you to the ultimate in community organizers that we know of nowadays, President-elect Obama," Carroll said.

"I think Dennis will do well. He knows how to work with people and reach across the aisle and be pragmatic, which is what community organizers have to do."

CONTACT THE WRITER: 476-1654 or dean.toda@gazette.com