My name is Elle Carpenter-Hockett.  In 2015 I founded a circus school in Durango, CO called Durango Aerial Arts & Acrobatics (DAAA for short).  As a school, we offer a range of circus classes.  I specialize in pre-professional training, and one aspect of DAAA which makes us stand apart from other circus schools is that we put on high quality circus theatre shows for the community here in Durango.  We are known as The Durango Circus for our live shows.  I have been told by many that the shows I direct are unlike anything Durango has ever seen.

We operate out of a public location: Durango Gymnastics, owned by the City of Durango.  We have enjoyed working with the City for the 6 years that we've been open, and up until the pandemic, our business has grown quite consistently with each passing year.  However, on Sunday April 11, 2021, something happened that tempted me to close the school temporarily, for the safety of the business.

On Sunday afternoon, two City employees - while on city property - defamed DAAA by means of an email to a list of our past and present clientele.  As part of their actions, they used DAAA’s intellectual property as if it was their own, and one of them impersonated them-self as a part owner of DAAA, in order to gain clientele for an upcoming circus program they want to start, through the City of Durango.  There is absolutely no doubt that they broke the City of Durango’s ethics code.  I have notified their immediate manager, the Parks & Recreation manager, and I even submitted a letter to the ethics board of the City of Durango.  Because of their actions, I am not comfortable working in the same space as these employees because I don’t believe it is guaranteed that they will not defame the company further.  

One of these people has been my employee for 2.5 years.  I trained this person in circus & performance techniques purely to teach for DAAA, (they had never taken a class or taught any area of circus prior to being hired by DAAA) and they have now walked away from the company with a curriculum that I developed through my 25 years as a circus performer and my 16 years working as a circus coach for other circus schools around the country.  I had truly believed until one week ago, that this person was going to join DAAA as a partner; in fact, I had offered them a non-cash option to buy in.  Instead, they chose to break federal PII law and to promote a City-owned program which, as of now, does not exist.

There was no way for my employees, who are also City of Durango employees, to have gotten our clients' personally identifiable information without using a City computer to retrieve it.  In the email that they sent:

1) They shared confidential information with our clients, that they had been told in confidence and that we were not planning to make public.

2) They criticized DAAA's prices, and told our clientele that they were going to start teaching their own circus classes at Durango Gymnastics, through the City of Durango.  They told our clientele that they would be charging much less than what DAAA normally charges.

3) They gave the impression that we had knowledge of this decision, which is false.

4) They told our clients that they hoped DAAA's students would switch from our program to their program.

Here are the immediate repercussions of the actions of these two City employees:

1) A few days ago, I was in the process of bringing on new partners to the corporation. My goal for quite some time has been to grow the business after bringing on partners, to keep holding classes in Durango while starting to expand to neighboring cities, (we have particularly considered building a circus school in Farmington, NM to supplement our Durango classes & there has been talk of opening a circus school in Albuquerque as well).  At least two of my potential partners received the email from the employees in question, and it no longer seems in their interest to buy in. The loss that the company has suffered from this situation is already tremendous.  It is still possible to grow the school someday, but at this point we will have to wait until our air has cleared from all the defamatory words and action.  We have already had clients who received the email asking for refunds for the month of April.  

2) If the City of Durango starts offering circus classes at majorly discounted rates, it will hurt the entire circus community here in Durango.  DAAA doesn't charge ridiculously high prices.  In fact, our prices are considerably lower than most major cities.  We also have a scholarship program, and before the pandemic started we had just started holding free classes to promote the school and to include the community.  We have done our best to accommodate our clientele during the pandemic, and as a result, we have remained open. 

To be clear, if the employees in question had told me that they wanted to go off and start their own circus school, while I may have my own opinions about their qualifications and despite my displeasure that they have stolen my curriculum, I would've accepted it.  But because of the instant ramifications which DAAA has suffered as a result of the employees illegal actions, I have no choice but to fight for DAAA.

It feels incredibly sad to be going through this, after making it through a pandemic and when we were in the process of such major growth.  I love the school I built and I hope this situation can be rectified without having to take legal action.  The City of Durango has information about the incident but they have informed me that,

1) A solution might take a very long time to reach, and

2) They cannot guarantee that they will not start a competing circus program, using my ex-employee who is still the City’s employee, who now possesses the curriculum that I have developed.  Since my contract with the City (as an independent contractor) states that I cannot offer any program which the City already offers, it is probable that the City could phase out DAAA, by starting their own circus program.  

Please sign my petition to tell the City of Durango that you support DAAA over a cheaper government program, that you believe their two employees (also my employees as of Sunday April 11th) should be held accountable for their actions, and that you believe circus to be a valuable asset which should not be undersold.

Thank you, with all my heart.

-Elle Carpenter-Hockett, founder of Durango Aerial Arts & Acrobatics, Inc