Jim Shmerling will step down as CEO of Children's Hospital Colorado in January to focus on leading the entire Children's Hospital Colorado Health System. Jena Hausmann will become the interim CEO of the hospital. Shmerling has been with the system for eight years and will focus on initiatives to improve care and increase funding for programs and research. Denver home values increased $26 billion in 2014, a 9.5% rise. Denver had the fifth largest home value increase among major U.S. cities. The increase was due to low inventory as the number of homes for sale dropped nearly 30% over the last year. Paul Volcker criticized the Federal Reserve's decision to delay full implementation of the Volcker

1. SHMERLING TO LEAD
CHILDREN’S HOSPITAL
HEALTH SYSTEM
BUSINESS
By Tamara Chuang
The Denver Post
Children’s Hospital Colorado’s Jim
Shmerling will step away from his
day-to-day role as CEO in January to
focus on overseeing the entire hospi-
tal system.
Shmerling has held dual CEO jobs
for the hospital and
the Children’s Hospi-
tal Colorado Health
System, which in-
cludes the 16 loca-
tions and the Chil-
dren’s Hospital Colo-
rado Foundation.
As CEO of just the
parent company,
Shmerling will focus
on regional and na-
tional policy issues
and funding for the
organization.
Jena Hausmann, who is the hospi-
tal’s president and chief operating
officer, takes over as interim CEO of
Children’s Hospital. She will report
to the board of directors, which will
launch a national search for a perma-
nent CEO next month.
The leadership changes go into
effect Jan. 1.
Shmerling, who has been with the
hospital system for eight years, said he
plans to spend more time on initia-
tives to improve care. He called fund-
ing programs and research critical.
The foundation reported revenues
of $37 million last year from contribu-
tions and events. In 2012, revenues
were $23 million.
By Howard Pankratz
The Denver Post
Homes in the Denver area gained $26
billion of total value in 2014, a 9.5 per-
cent increase from last year, accord-
ing to a Zillow report released Friday.
Denver logged the fifth-largest gain
among the 35 top metro areas ana-
lyzed. Houston ranked first among the
metro cities, reporting an 11.5 percent
increase, followed by Atlanta at 10.5
percent, San Jose, Calif., at 10.2 per-
cent, and Austin, Texas, at 9.9 percent.
The cumulative value of all metro
Denver homes is $302 billion.
The total cumulative value of U.S.
homes rose more than $1.7 trillion in
2014, or 6.7 percent, the third straight
year of overall home value gains.
The report said metro Denver
home values were up 11 percent in
November, compared with Novem-
ber 2013, rising to a median home
value of $274,200 and median rent of
$1,801.
The jump reflected a shortage of
for-sale homes. Metro Denver invento-
ry dropped 29.7 percent in the 12-
month period that ended in November.
B B B
Jim
Shmerling
will focus on
national poli-
cy issues.
B B B
Former Federal Reserve Chair-
man Paul Volcker on Friday
criticized a decision to delay
full implementation of a rule
that bears his name and aims to
curb banks’ risky investments.
The Fed said Thursday it
would delay until July 2017 the
deadline by which U.S. banks
will have to sell off potentially
volatile holdings in private
equity, venture capital and
hedge funds.
“It is striking that the world’s
leading investment bankers,
noted for their cleverness and
agility in advising clients on
how to restructure companies
and even industries, ... apparent-
ly can’t manage the orderly reor-
ganization of their own activi-
ties in more than five years,”
Volcker said in a statement.
Congress passed the Volcker
Rule in 2010 as part of
the Dodd-Frank
Act.
The Associated
Press
investment tools: A-Z stock list, market movers and
stock and fund “quickrank.” »denverpost.com
DENVER HOMES GAIN
$26B IN VALUE IN 2014
VOLCKER CRITICAL
OF DELAYS IN RULE
Country music legend Willie Nelson appears during the 2004 Country Music Association Awards at the Grand Ole Opry
House in Nashville, Tenn. A guitar Nelson used while recording at Nederland’s Caribou Ranch is up for auction. Getty Images file
Who
wants
Willie’s
guitar?
Pieces of Caribou
Ranch music recording
history are headed for
auction block
T
he 1910 Steinway &
Sons grand piano used
to record Elton John’s
“Don’t Let the Sun Go
Down on Me” is one of
400 pieces of music history memo-
rabilia from the legendary Caribou
Ranch that will be auctioned next
monthbyLeslieHindmanAuction-
eers in Denver.
Objects and instruments from
the collection of music producer
Jim Guercio will be on display
from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Jan. 19-23 at
the Denver Design Center East
Building and from 10 a.m. until the
auction begins at 3 p.m. Jan. 24.
This summer, Guercio and his
family sold the 1,600-acre Caribou
Ranch property near Nederland to
Indian Peaks Holdings LLC for
$32.5 million.
In its heyday, Caribou Ranch at-
tracted a long list of stars to its stu-
dio, including Chicago, Michael
Jackson, Earth Wind and Fire, and
Stevie Wonder.
Thetheauctionestimatestheval-
ue of the piano Elton John used on
his “Caribou” album at $10,000 to
$15,000.
Other instruments offered for
sale include a Burton acoustic gui-
tar left at the ranch by Willie Nel-
son that then became the “camp
guitar,” used by other artists when
they played around the campfire
during their stays at the ranch, auc-
tion house spokeswoman Maron
Hindman said. The sale also in-
cludes a Wm. Knabe & Co. baby
grand piano that was used by Elton
John, Billy Joel, Michael Jackson,
Frank Zappa and others.
The catalog includes Western
furniture and saddles, as well as
the Hammond B3 organ used by
nearly every artist who recorded at
Caribou, a Gibson Thunderbird
bass played by Terry Kath of Chi-
cago, a Bosendorfer grand piano
used on albums by Chick Corea
and Al Di Meola, and even a 1985
black Corvette with personalized
Caribou license plates.
A portion of the proceeds from
the auction will go to The Colora-
do Music Hall of Fame, which Car-
ibou Ranch will be inducted into
this year.
At the time the ranch sold, Jim
Guerico’s son Will told The Den-
ver Post that about half of the
memorabilia from the ranch would
be given to the Colorado Music
Hall of Fame to be displayed at the
Trading Post at Red Rocks Amphi-
theatre.
E The Burton
Acoustic Guitar that
Willie Nelson left at
Caribou Ranch. It
was used by several
musicians.
The Steinway grand piano used by
Elton John and others in Caribou
Ranch recording sessions. C
F A gold record
award for Dan
Fogelberg’s 1984
“Windows and
Walls” album.
What’s up for auction
Among the 400 pieces of Caribou Ranch memo-
rabilia to be auctioned next month:
By Matt Miller The Denver Post
State sees 2nd month
in row of job losses
Despite November statistics, unemployment rate falls to 4.1 percent
By Howard Pankratz The Denver Post
Colorado in November registered its sec-
ond consecutive month of job losses, but
the state unemployment rate continued to
drop, falling to 4.1 percent from 4.3 percent
in October.
About 2,500 nonfarm payroll jobs were
shed in November, and October’s gain of
300 jobs was revised to a loss of 1,600 jobs.
Prior to the revision, Colorado’s over-
the-month job increases extended 35
months, attributed mostly to the northern
Colorado oil boom.
There is nothing in the job-loss data to
suggest the drop in oil prices is weakening
job growth, according to Colorado Depart-
ment of Labor and Employment chief econ-
omist Alexandra Hall.
Benchmark U.S. crude hit a peak of $107 a
barrel in June and has been on the decline
since then. It closed Friday on the New York
Mercantile Exchange at $56.51, up $2.41.
“Colorado is a much different state than it
was during the oil bust experience in the
1980s,” Hall said. “We have a greatly diver-
sified economy, and much of the oil and gas
activity is occurring around Greeley rather
than Grand Junction.”
Hall said the oil and gas sector actually
added jobs from October to November.
“The most significant over-the-month
declines in October were in professional
and business services, trade, transporta-
tion, utilities and information,” she said.
If oil field workers are let go as supply of
crude continues to exceed demand, they
likely will have easy access to work in other
JOBS»18A
Colorado personal income growth slows in third quarter
By Aldo Svaldi The Denver Post
Colorado personal income growth
moved into a slower lane in the third quar-
ter, falling below the national pace, accord-
ing to a report Friday from the Bureau of
Economic Analysis.
Personal incomes rose 0.9 percent in the
third quarter from the second quarter in
Colorado. That’s below the U.S. average of 1
percent in the same period and the 1.7 per-
cent pace of gains the state enjoyed in the
two previous quarter-over-quarter periods.
The state is still on track to beat the 3.4
percent increase seen in 2013 and the 3.9
percent gain in 2012 even at the slower rate
of increase seen in the third quarter.
For 2013, the state ranked sixth for per-
sonal income gains, but in the third quarter
it ranked only 22nd.
Personal income consists primarily of
wages from employment and sole propri-
etor incomes. It also includes dividends, in-
terest and rents, as well as government pay-
ments for Social Security, disability and so-
cial welfare programs.
INCOME»18A
6 the denver post B denverpost.com • saturday, december 20, 2014 BUSINESS «17A