Following last month’s implosion of The Denver Post’s politics team, the paper has rebuilt the desk, pulling in hires from Oklahoma, Cincinnati, and elsewhere.

Ben Botkin, formerly of the nonprofit Oklahoma Watch, is already on the beat along with Anna Staver who migrated over from a producer role at KUSA 9news. Cindi Andrews, who comes from The Cincinnati Enquirer, oversees the desk as an editor. The latest to join is Nic Garcia, who spent the past five or so years at Chalkbeat Colorado. “One more hire, and the politics team will be firing on all cylinders once again,” said Jon Murray, who is the city hall reporter on the team.

A couple things to note here. One is that it doesn’t yet look like The Denver Post has hired a new reporter in Washington, D.C. after the departure of Mark K. Matthews. (If it stays that way, we can start calling him the DC bureau angel of death: Matthews was the last D.C. correspondent for The Orlando Sentinel, he told me, and he says he hopes he won’t be the last for The Denver Post.) Another notable aspect of this rebuilding is that since two of the former team — John Frank and Jesse Paul — will still be covering politics at the newly formed Colorado Sun, if the Post team builds all the way back up to six then there would actually be more reporters on the politics beat during this election season then before the Big Collapse. So a contrarian take, ready-made for a #SlatePitch: Alden Global Capital indirectly created more political journalism in Colorado.

Meanwhile, Colorado Public Radio expands…

This station with an annual budget of around $18 million is on a hiring spree, looking to fill nine positions, which will increase the Colorado Public Radio newsroom by a third and swell its news staff to “nearly 40 journalists.” Among the positions are regional reporters based in Colorado Springs and Grand Junction. “We were able to add these nine positions in news this year without having to cut elsewhere,” the station’s executive editor Kevin Dale told me, adding that an increase in listener support allowed it. “We were going to probably add about four positions this year and I just said ‘You know, it’s really important to grow now while other places are struggling.’ And leadership and the board all agreed with that.”

Dale said he hopes to start building an investigative unit and augment CPR’s digital team. “We need to become a 24/7 newsroom, which we’re not right now,” he said. “Our goal is to build this up to a newsroom of — my dream is around 70 or more … that is covering all parts of the state all day every day.”

On freelance journalism in off-the-Front-Range Colorado

Speaking of covering all parts of the state, David O. Williams, a freelance journalist in Eagle County, went off on his Real Vail site this week after seeing his work in the pages of The Denver Post where he used to earn a “pittance” as a far-flung contributor. He recently had a story in the Vail Daily that localized the effects of Trump’s tariffs on Eagle County, he wrote, and then he saw it re-published in the Big City Paper in Denver.

From his post:

Instead of paying me whatever pittance they used to dole out back in the day when I was a regular contributor to the Post from Eagle County, the “Voice of the Rocky Mountain Empire” just strikes reciprocal deals with newspaper chains that are still doling out alms to the poor in places they no longer send staff writers.

Ouch. He says he commends the original paper where he published the piece, however, because “in these darkest of dark times for print journalism, the Daily and its parent company Swift has found a way to survive and still ‘support’ freelancers.” He’s also waiting for a little Sun, too. Read the whole thing here.

Colorado reporter: ‘The background problem is real’

In an effort to “shed more light” on how journalism works, The New York Times has launched a series where it explains some of its practices. Some of its recent pieces include how the paper uses anonymous sources and what “off the record” really means. Here’s the nut, from the Times: “There is no universally agreed-upon meaning for many of these terms — and The Times has no precise descriptions in its own internal guidelines — making it difficult to sketch out even working definitions.” Bingo. So you have to work it out with your sources about how you want to proceed —  “off the record,” “on background,” “not for attribution,” “embargoed,” “for planning purposes only,” etc. —  and do so in clear language so there’s no misunderstanding.

This preamble is to highlight what popped up in some local reporting here in Colorado recently involving the story of an Iraqi immigrant who is accused of shooting a Colorado Springs police officer in the head, leaving him in critical condition. In a solid, triple bylined story, The Gazette, citing court records, reported the suspect, who was “free on bond was known to immigration enforcement officials, yet evaded deportation despite a string of crimes.”

The Aug. 3 story comes with this, (emphasis mine):

El Paso County sheriff’s spokesman Jacqueline Kirby said Al Khammasi was an Iraqi citizen who was born in Iraq. She had previously said Al Khammasi was a refugee, but she later said she was mistaken, and that she wasn’t certain of his immigration status.

Then, on Aug. 6, Blair Miller reported for Denver7:

The man accused of shooting Colorado Springs Police Officer Cem Duzel last week is a refugee from Iraq who has been in the United States since 2012, racking up a host of charges during that time. A Department of Homeland Security (DHS) official told Denver7 Monday that Karrar Noaman Al Khammasi, 31, came from Iraq in December 2012 after receiving a RE-1 refugee status that May. The official only agreed to speak on the condition they not be named. The Associated Press additionally reported Monday that Khammasi was set to be deported before a federal court ruling, though the DHS official did not confirm those details to Denver7. A U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) spokesperson directed Denver7’s questions to DHS.

This is from The AP story:

A refugee from Iraq charged with shooting a Colorado police officer last week was set for deportation before a federal appeals court ruled in 2016 that a portion of immigration law defining violent crime was too vague, according to a Department of Homeland Security official. The DHS official, who was not authorized to discuss the case on the record and spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity, said Monday that federal immigration authorities began deportation proceedings against Karrar Noaman Al Khammasi after he violated probation terms of a felony trespassing plea in 2015.

In tweeting out his story Monday, Miller of Denver7 told his followers:

Also, the “reportedly” part comes because had to source the AP on the deportation bit. Assuming the DHS official who demanded background sourcing for refugee part from me is same official who spoke to AP about the deportation stuff. The “background" problem is real.

— Blair Miller (@blairmiller) August 6, 2018

Miller didn’t seem like the only frustrated Colorado journalist Monday. Earlier in the day, Denver Post editor Lee Ann Colacioppo tweeted:

People in press offices who give information to reporters and then demand anonymity for no good reason are actively hurting the news media's ability to be transparent and show how news was collected. Worst are press people in DC.

— Lee Ann Colacioppo (@LAColacioppo) August 6, 2018

To which Miller replied: “What I was really trying to say about the way political comms shops operate, put much more succinctly”.

Crashes vs. landings: Donna Lynne on press coverage of her campaign for governor

The moderate, Hickenlooper 2.0 campaign of Lt. Gov. Donna Lynne in the Democratic primary for governor never caught fire — and the lite guv has some ideas about why she came in fourth on Election Day. Big Money was clearly a factor, she told Denver’s alt-weekly Westword in a recent debrief, but she also “doesn’t exempt the media from criticism,” wrote Michael Roberts.

Here’s Lynne in her own words from his story:

“For me, it’s very much about a belief that voters should want to know more about the candidates than you can get in a thirty-second commercial, or what you get from some of the mailings, which tended to get a little more inflammatory or dirty, because they were mostly coming from the independent-expenditure side. I never called people names or made up stories, but that wasn’t the case in some of the debates and some of the mailings and ads that I saw. And in the absence of the press or some organization that might say, ‘Is this really his or her position?,’ you can really say anything you want.”

Granted, “some of the press did fact checks,” she notes. “But most people aren’t paying attention to the fact check when they’re getting all these mailings and seeing all these ads. So maybe it’s a combination of the press having a lack of staff or that they weren’t as engaged in the issue. As I always say, some people like to cover the airplane crashes versus the airplane landings. But I would have hoped it would have been more about policy issues.”

Behind the scenes, “we spent a lot of time on our side developing very in-depth policy positions,” she explains. “We assembled people with very diverse interests and put together very thoughtful papers, trying to be very clear about the issues, because that’s what a candidate is supposed to do. But in a campaign, you can say anything. You can say, ‘I’m going to give you free this or free that,’ without any sense of reality about what our voters in Colorado have done with respect to tax increases over the past 25 years. A candidate can appeal to voters by saying they’re going to give them free something. So it’s not only about the way campaigns are financed. Maybe it’s also about how we get our information and how much time reporters can actually spend saying, ‘Here are the real differences in education policy, on marijuana policy, on whatever.’ That’s as much of a concern as the amounts of money that are being spent.”​

Lynne, it should be noted, aired a TV ad in which she got a tattoo as part of her campaign. Because landings not crashes.

The Colorado Sun soft published and got profiled in Poynter

The 10-person digital startup, which just published its first story in its newsletter last week, got some more national ink, this time from Poynter.

From the piece:

To establish the Sun’s presence throughout the state, the editors are exploring partnerships with local outlets and asking readers about their concerns in weekly newsletters. More than a quarter of reader responses to newsletters have come from outside the Denver area and surrounding cities, [editor Dana] Coffield said. The journalists said they don’t see themselves as competitors to the Denver Post, and emphasized that they still appreciate the work the Post is doing. There are plenty of stories going unreported across the state, [Sun reporter John] Ingold said. He’s said he’s looking forward to being part of a more collaborative news environment to serve the people of Colorado.

…

Other Denver media startups like the InDenver Times, the Rocky Mountain Independent and Colorado Public News failed due to lack of interest or subscribers after the Rocky Mountain News folded. Coffield said she thinks the Sun will be different because of the timing. The journalists understand better how audiences consume news digitally, and readers aren’t surprised to hear that the Sun will be online only.

As the team continues to build its website, its journalists are also out in the field reporting. The first published story, in last week’s newsletter, came from Jennifer Brown and was about a federal plan “to remove the ovaries of wild horses as part of a controversial birth-control roundup” with the help of Colorado State University. The format is less on-the-ground narrative than it is digital-news-style explanatory with five subject headings like “The history,” “The problem,” and “What’s next.”

What you missed on the Sunday front pages across Colorado

The Greeley Tribune had a big takeout on a severe shortage of childcare in Weld County. The Longmont Times-Call reported on a potential mill levy for fire districts. The Grand Junction Daily Sentinel reported on a checkered history of a California man connected to a company hired to print ballots for more than a third of Colorado’s counties. The Durango Herald reported a halfway house director has a “history of sexual harassment complaints,” relying on documents leaked to the paper anonymously and acknowledged by the board president. The Loveland Reporter-Herald covered the cutting down of beetle-infested spruces. The Steamboat Pilot reported how water managers are boosting the reservoir flow into the Yampa River. The Pueblo Chieftain covered a national home-made rocketry event. The Coloradoan in Fort Collins reported on how a couple bought a local home for $10,000 under the asking price. The Gazette in Colorado Springs covered a national honor bestowed on a “conductor” of the Underground Railroad who is buried in the city. The Boulder Daily Camera reported on its city considering preemptive moves on oil-and-gas drilling. The Denver Post dug into how police respond to “armed law-abiding citizens.”

The Pueblo Chieftain on past reporting conflicts

A call to the GateHouse-owned Pueblo Chieftain’s editor Steve Henson this week led him to pen a column about what happens when the paper’s reporters run into conflicts of interest. The caller said he believed his wife was unfairly treated during a traffic arrest and he wanted the paper to “‘expose’ the wrongdoing,” Henson wrote. The editor said he wasn’t going to write about it and the caller accused him of having relatives on the police force (Henson says he doesn’t) and therefore covering for the cops. The incident led Henson to recall how his paper dealt with conflicts in the past.

From the column:

A few years back, a city government reporter told me she had a concern. She had begun dating a candidate for the City Council and wanted to disclose that. It was an easy issue to resolve. We took her off the city beat temporarily until the election was over. It turns out her friend didn’t win and she returned to the beat after the election. It was an obvious conflict of interest, and as long as I can remember, we’ve worked hard to disclose and resolve such conflicts. Recently, one of our reporters said he felt he couldn’t cover the controversy at El Pueblo adolescent treatment center as he was friends with an El Pueblo board member. No problem. We assigned El Pueblo coverage to other reporters.
…
Many years ago, we used to publish a list of shoplifting arrests in the misguided belief that would deter such actions and help merchants. One day, the wife of a prominent Puebloan was arrested and the husband called to ask us to keep it out. The big boss said ‘Yes,’ and the newsroom’s response was simple: No more publishing shoplifting arrests then, because, we reasoned, if you don’t publish every arrest, you shouldn’t publish any.

“We make mistakes and things slip through the cracks,” Henson wrote. “But we try very hard to be consistent, fair and to handle conflicts of interest as best we can.”

Letters are flying over the handcuffing of a Colorado journalist

Following the detention and handcuffing of Colorado Independent editor Susan Greene after she took photos of police officers in public, the Colorado Freedom of Information Coalition and other journalist representative groups sent a letter to the Denver Department of Public Safety urging it “to institute intensive First Amendment training for its employees … so that an incident such as that experienced by Ms. Greene … is not repeated.”

The post The Denver Post politics team rebuilds, CPR expands ‘while other places are struggling’ and the ‘background problem’ is real appeared first on The Colorado Independent.

“La Plata and Montezuma counties are among six in Colorado selected to participate in collaboration to create a model for suicide prevention that could be used nationwide,” reports The Durango Herald. “The goal of the Colorado-National Collaborative is to create a suicide-prevention model to reduce suicide 20 percent statewide by 2024, said Jarrod Hindman, deputy chief of the Violence and Injury Prevention-Mental Health Promotion Branch of the state health department. National suicide-prevention groups wanted to work with Colorado because it has one of the highest suicide rates in the nation, 20.3 people per 100,000 in 2016, Hindman said. Across the country, the suicide rate is 13.5 per 100,000, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Colorado also has a high number of suicides, with 1,140 suicide deaths in 2016, according to the Office of Suicide Prevention. This sets it apart from other Western states with lower populations that have high rates but don’t have a high number of deaths by suicide, he said. State leaders are motivated to address the state’s growing problem, which also factored into its selection, he said.”

“A license plate that will be available to Coloradans later this week is connected to Marcus McCauley’s 2,000 chickens that are being raised for meat at the McCauley Family Farm in Longmont,” reports The Longmont Times-Call. “The McCauley chickens are part of a relatively new effort in Colorado called carbon farming. In carbon farming, farmers and ranchers try to mimic the natural cycles of the earth in order to keep carbon out of the air and in the soil, where it can help to grow plants that can neutralize carbon dioxide.”

“On June 28, Cameron Eldridge reported to the United States Naval Academy in Annapolis, Md,” reports The Greeley Tribune. “Sir, yes, sir. Ma’am, yes, ma’am. He sure did. “It was pretty abrupt,” the 19-year-old recent graduate of Johnstown’s Roosevelt High said in a phone interview Saturday. “You walk in and the first words they tell you are, ‘From this point forward, the first and last words out of your mouth will be sir or ma’am.'”

“Before Harold Cressler died in 2015, he told his family he wanted his body donated to science, in the hopes he could help provide a cure for the lung cancer that took his life,” reports The Grand Junction Daily Sentinel. “The former uranium miner from Nucla felt good about having his body used for cancer research and he didn’t want to be buried in the family plot, said his daughter, Judy Williams of Grand Junction. But now the family wonders what, in fact, happened to the 84-year-old man’s body.”

“Kristine Edland bought two pygmy goats in May as pets and to teach her son animal husbandry, thinking that they are legal within the city limits of Loveland as long as they are show animals,” reports The Loveland Reporter-Herald. “Frankie and Ellie May Sue, nearly full grown just below knee-high, have become beloved pets that she cuddles, walks on leash and considers part of her family. But in the three months she has had them, she has not yet shown them. And because of that, the Larimer Humane Society, responding to neighbor complaints, has given her eight weeks to find a new home for her kids, leaving Edland devastated and feeling targeted.”

“If approved, the proposed Black Hills Energy transmission line west of Pueblo would be under construction in the spring 2019 and set to go online in 2021,” reports The Pueblo Chieftain. “The utility, which operates more than 640 miles of transmission line in Colorado, has filed a House Bill 1041 application with Pueblo County, which would allow for the construction of the 39-mile, single-circuit 115 kilovolt transmission line that would travel from Pueblo West toward the Canon City area. The Canon West Reliability Project would cross about 18 miles of land in Pueblo County: 14.8 miles on private land and 3.4 miles on property owned by the Pueblo West Metropolitan District.”

“Schools in Morgan County are getting really close to their start dates,” reports The Fort Morgan Times. “In fact, Weldon Valley School and many of the schools in Fort Morgan are set to begin classes grades yet this week, and Brush and Wiggins will start the following week. For families, that means getting together the school supplies and everything needed for beginning a new school year. At least 550 of the students heading to these classes have new backpacks filled with school supplies after attending the recent Back to School Bash that the Morgan County Interagency Oversight Group and its many partner agencies held at Morgan Community College.”

“George Brauchler stopped by the Logan County Fairgrounds Saturday after participating in the fair parade on a campaign tour of northeast Colorado,” reports The Sterling Journal-Advocate. “Brauchler, the 18th Judicial District Attorney who is seeking to be Colorado’s next Attorney General, grabbed a cheeseburger and eyed the competition at the NJC Young Farmers’ Pedal Tractor Pull, but wasn’t able to get on the tractor before he had to depart. Brauchler touts himself as a “Colorado kid;” he grew up in Lakewood with two working parents and attended public schools, from elementary through law school at the University of Colorado. His wife is a small business owner; his four children, ranging in age from 8 to 15, also attend public school and are involved in Scouting. Brauchler tried his first case 24 years ago, and his prosecutorial experience includes the Columbine School massacre, the Kobe Bryant rape case and the Aurora movie theatre shooting. In 2006, he started a private law practice that grew to five attorneys and three support staff.”

“Every second, one million new nuero connectors are formed in an infant’s brain, said Tami Haverly, executive director of the Discovery Learning Center,” reports The Steamboat Pilot. “And about 90 to 95 percent of brain development occurs by the time a child enters kindergarten. It’s “an amazing time,” she said, when kids learn critical thinking and social-emotional skills and “set the stage for the rest of their lives.” While research leaves no doubt about the magnitude of development in the first five years of life, there is a lack of prioritization nationally, and it remains a persistent challenge locally for families to find affordable, high-quality childcare. It impacts not only families, but the entire economy as parents weigh the cost of working and paying for child care — if they can find it — versus staying at home.”

“Former Denver Mayor Benjamin Stapleton was born the same year Ulysses S. Grant took the presidential oath of office,” The Denver Post reported in a story on the front page of today’s The Cañon Cty Daily Record. “Colorado treasurer and gubernatorial hopeful Walker Stapleton, Benjamin’s great-grandson, was born the same year Gerald Ford became the nation’s 38th president. The sweep of time between both men exceeds a century, and neither strode the earth when the other did. But Benjamin Stapleton’s notorious role as a member of the Ku Klux Klan, while serving five terms as mayor of the Mile High City in the first half of the 20th century, lurks just below the surface of this year’s race for governor and presents pitfalls for the both Stapleton and his Democratic opponent, Jared Polis. Last month, The New York Times published a story titled “Family History Haunts GOP Candidate for Governor in Colorado,” while other news outlets have raised the issue of ancestral roots with Stapleton, who in past political campaigns has lauded his great-grandfather for helping bring the former Stapleton Airport and Red Rocks Amphitheatre to Colorado. Several seasoned election watchers told The Denver Post last week that voters are discerning enough to recognize that the younger Stapleton is not his great-grandfather and grew up in a different time in the state’s history. Still, the dark chapter in his family’s past is an issue that the Republican brushes aside at his own peril, they said.”

“An ambitious plan for development that includes a 55-plus community and a smaller home development on property south of the Eagle County Regional Airport will go before the Gypsum Town Council on Tuesday night, Aug. 14,” reports Vail Daily. “Siena Lake, planned on a 170-acre site that was annexed to the town in 2002 as the former Saddleridge proposal, includes a total of 591 residential units in a mix of housing types. Earlier this summer, the Gypsum Planning Commission unanimously recommended approval of the plan.”

“Longmont’s and Boulder’s chambers of commerce will host separate presentations about the potential local impacts on the funding of area transportation projects if Colorado voters approve either of a pair of competing measures likely to be on November’s statewide ballot,” reports The Longmont Times-Call on the front page of today’s Boulder Daily Camera. “The Colorado Secretary of State’s Office is still counting the petition signatures turned in by backers of the two measures to verify whether enough were submitted to qualify for the ballot.”

“This is a good year to be a Democrat running for state and federal offices in Colorado, campaign finance filings show,” reports The Gazette in Colorado Springs. “‘They have a lot more contributions and a lot more enthusiasm than on the Republican side,’ said Robert Duffy, a political science professor at Colorado State University. The blue wave anticipated by many political experts and pundits is reflected in Democrats’ fundraising for the Nov. 6 election, said Matthew Hitt, another political science professor at CSU. The wave is particularly strong among Democrats facing Republican incumbents, candidates who usually face significant fundraising challenges.”

“A slew of approved and potential tax measures for Denver’s November ballot are poised to test the tax tolerance of one of the state’s friendliest counties for spending measures,” reports The Denver Post. “Campaigns are gearing up to pitch sales tax increases in support of several causes that, on their own, each sound noble. Already approved for the ballot are a City Council-referred sales tax increase to support more parks and an initiative by education, nonprofit and business leaders to fund college scholarships for the city’s youth. Initiative petitions for another tax that would support mental health and drug treatment programs now are under review, and on deck is the filing, in coming days, of petitions for a fourth tax that would raise money for healthy food programs serving at-risk children. Add in an amendment that would raise the state income tax on higher-wage earners for education and a likely statewide tax measure for transportation, and the state’s largest county has the makings of a tax pileup on its Nov. 6 ballot. Will voters flinch?”

The post The Home Front: Six Colorado counties are trying to create a model to prevent suicide ‘that could be used nationwide’ appeared first on The Colorado Independent.

“No matter how Coloradans vote Nov. 6 on whether to change how the state draws congressional district boundaries, the people who draw the lines after the 2020 Census likely will have a little more work to do,” reports The Gazette in Colorado Springs. “Colorado is expected to gain an eighth seat in Congress after the next national headcount, according to the latest census estimates as analyzed by The Washington Post. The Post says Colorado is one of six states projected to gain one or more congressional districts after the next census. If so, the first election for that eighth seat would come in 2022.”

“Smartwool employees are still processing news of the company’s planned move from Steamboat Springs to Denver,” reports The Steamboat Pilot. “‘It’s a very sad day to have to move out of this amazing community that we have here in Steamboat,’ Smartwool President Jen McLaren said. Over the weekend, Smartwool’s parent company, VF Corporation, told company leadership that the brand’s headquarters would be relocating to the Denver metro area within the next two years. Employees and city and county officials learned of the move Monday morning. ‘This was really a VF decision, first and foremost, and it is a strategic decision that was made by the senior leadership team,’ McLaren said. VF Corporation owns the outdoor brands The North Face, Alta, Eagle Creek and JanSport. These companies will relocate with Smartwool to a yet-to-be-identified location in the Denver area. This decision is intended to increase collaboration and connectivity between brands, McLaren said.”

“Boulder County voters in November will be asked to extend an 0.185 percent sales and use tax to fund an alternative sentencing facility and programs as well as improvements to the county jail,” reports The Longmont Times-Call. “County commissioners Tuesday morning are slated to take formal action to advance the issue to the ballot. The tax, if approved, would generate a projected $10 million a year between Jan. 1, 2020 and Dec. 31, 2024. The tax would essentially continue collections of the 0.185 percent sales and use tax Boulder County voters approved in 2014 to fund flood-recovery efforts, although revenues would no longer be spent on flood recovery and mitigation.”

“Trina Kauk spent the bulk of her childhood scampering with her older brother between the buildings of downtown New Raymer, from the tavern that later became a post office to the grocery store where kids picked up the mail and probably some treats on the way home from school,” reports The Greeley Tribune. “She, Bob and her parents, Kenneth and Betty Thompson, lived in the tavern, where, like most businesses on the street, living quarters were set up in the back. It was a busy, flourishing town, serenaded by a train, back in the mid-1950s to the early ’60s as she grew up. As she got older, she sadly realized her childhood wouldn’t last forever. That’s something we all face, of course, but Kauk was forced to come to terms with a more visceral reminder as she watched that train station close, the school move two miles east, the grocery store move to a new building on Colo. 14, and the other businesses die off. She is now 62, and she is one of the founding members of Friends of Raymer, a group of people like her who grew up in the town and don’t want to see their family history crumble down to dust.”

“About 200 Loveland residents took to Facebook last week to share their shock upon opening their most recent city utility bills,” reports The Loveland Reporter-Herald. “Some report that though they feel their households are using less water and energy compared to years past, or at least keeping to the status quo, their bills report meter readings that feel far out of step with their lives. Some customers speculate about what might be changing in how the city assesses utility bills, but city staff say that with the exception of a 9 percent increase in fees over last year, nothing is different — except, perhaps, that it’s an especially hot summer.”

“Grand Junction city councilors asked staff to work with community center campaigners to hash out details on a potential ballot question asking voters to fund the project and possibly develop part of Matchett Park at the same time,” reports The Grand Junction Daily Sentinel. “At a work session Monday night, three councilors also indicated they were in favor of asking voters to consider funding a community center, presumably with a sales-tax increase. Exact numbers have not been determined and no official decision was made, but Phyllis Norris, Duke Wortmann and Bennett Boeschenstein voiced support for putting a referred measure on the April municipal ballot.”

“By 6:30 a.m., they were rolling east down the highway, the familiar yellow buses en route to Pueblo County High School, Vineland Middle School and Avondale Elementary School,” reports The Pueblo Chieftain. “Along the way, sharp-dressed youngsters bearing backpacks and bookbags stood off the side of the road, alertly awaiting the bus that would usher them to the start of a new school year. For students and staff in Pueblo County School District 70, Monday signaled the official beginning of classes and the end of summer break. As children made their way to their respective school — the younger ones by bus and parental transport, many of the “bigger kids” in personal rides — the Mesa was abuzz with the signs of a fresh academic beginning. For Pueblo County High School Principal Brian Dilka, the 2018-19 school year formally started at about 6:45 a.m. Monday, although the personable leader didn’t stray far from his office throughout the summer.”

“Public health officials are reminding northeast Colorado pet owners to ensure their animals are up to date on their rabies vaccinations after confirming a rabid domestic bat in Morgan County,” reports The Sterling Journal-Advocate. “According to a press release from the Northeast Colorado Health Department, a Fort Morgan woman was sleeping and felt something on her upper arm. After swatting at the object, she realized it was a bat when it flew across the room. The woman called the Fort Morgan Police Department, which responded and captured the bat. The police sent the bat in for rabies testing and NCHD confirmed that it had the fatal disease. “Fortunately, all of the pets in the home were current on their rabies vaccinations so they do not need further treatment,” the release states. ‘The victim of the bat encounter immediately started Post-Exposure Prophylaxis to prevent the onset of the rabies virus.'”

“Federal authorities today announced prosecution results from marijuana grows on federal public land last year, as they prepare for this year’s marijuana harvest season,” reports The Fort Morgan Times. “U.S. Attorney Bob Troyer, U.S. Forest Service Special Agent in Charge Kent Delbon, and Bureau of Land Management (BLM) Special Agent in Charge Gary Mannino announced all three agencies are working together with local law enforcement to make public lands safer, to prevent environmental damage, and to combat illegal marijuana trafficking. Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) provided substantial assistance. During 2017, Forest Service agents and BLM officers, in concert with local law enforcement, dismantled marijuana operations on public land throughout the state, with several defendants receiving sentences of up to five years in prison.”

“Eagle County will remain under Stage 2 fire restrictions until weather conditions change,” reports Vail Daily. “Those restrictions essentially ban all outdoor fires, including on private property. Propane-powered stoves are still allowed. The local restrictions were imposed in late June and have applied to the entire county. Despite the county’s varied terrain — from high desert to high alpine — Eagle County Sheriff James van Beek said uniform countywide restrictions make it easier from both an enforcement and user perspective.”

“There is an open seat on the Cañon City School Board after Kristyn Econome resigned during Monday’s meeting to accept a position at Cañon City High School as a Spanish teacher,” reports The Cañon City Daily Record. “‘I thoroughly enjoyed serving on the board the past few years, but this new opportunity is also exciting at the same time so I’m looking forward to getting back in the classroom and working directly with kids,” Econome said. Econome has served three years on the school board as the assistant secretary and treasurer. She has eight years of teaching under her belt and her most recent teaching position was at Cañon City Middle School and Harrison K-8 in 2010 as a Spanish teacher.”

“Summer is winding down, which means it’s almost time for students to return to Boulder,” reports The Boulder Daily Camera. “University of Colorado students are already trickling back into town and freshmen begin their move-in in earnest this weekend, which makes this weekend the best time to avoid U.S. 36, any major artery around campus and the checkout lines at Target. CU officials said they’re continuously tweaking the move-in procedure, and this year is no different. They’ve scheduled more students to move in this weekend to lessen weekday traffic jams, and they’ve changed up the order that students move into their residence halls. They’ve divided the campus into regions, and to ease congestion around any one part of campus students will only move into one residence hall per region per time slot.”

“VF Corporation, the parent company of popular outdoor brands like The North Face, JanSport and Smartwool, announced Monday it will move its global headquarters to Denver, bringing 800 high-paying jobs with it,” reports The Denver Post. “Just how soon all those big earners could be on the ground in the Mile High City is up in the air, VF officials say. If all of those positions are squared away by 2026 there is more than $27 million in tax incentives in it for the company. In a new release issued Monday, VF chairman, president and CEO Steve Rendle called Denver “a great strategic fit for our business.” “We believe that the creation of our new headquarters in the area will help us to unlock collaboration across our outdoor brands, attract and retain talent, and accelerate innovation,” Rendle said. About 85 VF executives are expected to move to Denver next spring. They are the first wave of a relocation and consolidation plan that will see The North Face, JanSport, Eagle Creek and Altra move their headquarters into Colorado from elsewhere and see Steamboat Springs-based Smartwool move its leadership to Denver.”

“The risk of erosion from the Plateau Fire’s burn scar into McPhee Reservoir is considered low, according to a recent hydrology report,” reports The Cortez Journal. “Burn specialists and hydrologists flew over the fire area Saturday, focusing on Plateau and Beaver drainages. Monsoonal rains could push some sediment into channels that feed McPhee Reservoir, but it will not be a significant amount, said San Juan National Forest hydrologist Shauna Jensen.”

The post The Home Front: ‘Colorado is expected to gain an eighth seat in Congress’ after 2020 Census appeared first on The Colorado Independent.

“Six Weld County municipalities were named among Colorado’s 20 safest cities, according to 2016 FBI crime data analyzed by safewise.com,” reports The Greeley Tribune. “Windsor claimed the top spot as the safest community in Colorado with 0.13 violent crimes per 1,000 residents and 10.67 property crimes per 1,000 residents, according to the report released Monday. Violent crimes analyzed include murder, rape, robbery and aggravated assault. Property crimes include burglary, theft and motor vehicle theft. Milliken, Firestone and Erie all cracked the top 10, being named the fourth, fifth and seventh safest cities, respectively.”

“City Council on Tuesday night gave final approval to the first set of major updates to Longmont’s Land Development Code in 17 years,” reports The Longmont Times-Call. “The council made no changes to the ordinance to which they gave initial approval on July 24 — a 300-plus-page set of revisions in a municipal code section that contains regulations, restrictions and conditions for annexing, zoning, subdividing and developing properties. The Land Development Code details what the city considers appropriate uses for specific properties, as well as rules about placement, height and design of buildings, and parking, lighting and landscaping regulations.”

“The city of Grand Junction’s acrimonious divorce with Municipal Judge Caré McInnis was fueled by disagreements over whether McInnis was crossing ethical and legal lines in her handling of both adult and juvenile cases, according to emails obtained by The Daily Sentinel,” the paper in Grand Junction reports. “McInnis was in her second year of a four-year term when she left the city in mid-July by accepting a $165,200 settlement agreement. The settlement offered no details about the nature of the dispute that simmered for months between her and City Attorney John Shaver.”

“Before City Council voted to hire a consulting firm on Monday night that will study the viability of the city ending its pact with Black Hills Energy early, Vance Crocker, the vice president of Colorado electric operations for the utility, gave a presentation to council about changes Black Hills has made to help customers and its commitment to working with the city,” reports The Pueblo Chieftain. “During a work session, Crocker told council members that monthly costs have been lower for most customers effective July 1 as a result of a lower customer charge. The Colorado Public Utilities Commission approved a new rate schedule proposed by the company that lowered the monthly rates for many customers.”

“The Sterling City Council took steps toward annexing the city’s property on the South Platte River bottom Tuesday,” reports The Sterling Journal-Advocate. “At their regular meeting, the council unanimously approved the “findings of fact and conclusion” stating that the property, now known as the River Bottom Flats Addition to the City of Sterling, is eligible for annexation, as the property belongs solely to the city and is contiguous to the city boundary. By doing so, they opened the door to the next two items on their agenda: ordinances annexing the property and zoning it as open space. The council voted 7-0 on first reading of both ordinances, and will take final action on the items at their next meeting on Aug. 28.”

“Drought conditions in the Sand Wash Basin have volunteers hauling an increased amount of water to the wild horses in the area,” reports The Steamboat Pilot. “The Bureau of Land Management, the agency that manages most wild horse herds, has estimated between 650 to 750 horses live in Sand Wash Basin. The BLM has determined the land can support between 163 to 362 horses without detriment to the ecosystem. This overpopulation increases the drought’s impact on vegetation and availability of water for other animals.”

“More than a dozen people of Latino or Hispanic descent from Fort Morgan have represented Morgan County at quite a few state-level ‘Telling Our Story’ forums held by the Latino Community Foundation of Colorado (LCFC) in Denver over the years,” reports The Fort Morgan Times. “But on Tuesday, they did not have to go very far for such an experience because LCFC held a regional forum in Fort Morgan.”

“Boulder voters in November will get the chance to decide for themselves if the city’s tax on sugar-sweetened beverages is helping more than it hurts,” reports The Boulder Daily Camera. “City Council on Tuesday voted unanimously to place on the ballot a measure that, if passed, would allow the city to keep extra revenue raised by the tax, citing its positive impacts in the community. ‘When you’re trying to modify behavior, you do two things,’ said councilmember Sam Weaver: tax the behavior you don’t want and use the money to encourage behavior you do. The soda tax is a ‘shining example’ of that principle at work, he said. A majority of voters (54.7 percent) approved the tax on sugar-sweetened beverages in 2016. Since then, more than $3.2 million has been given to groups working on health and nutrition for Boulder’s low-income residents and those with chronic diseases and illnesses often linked to sugar consumption.”

“The U.S. Forest Service will host an open house Wednesday, Aug. 15, to discuss some new proposals regarding the Berlaimont Estates Road Improvement Project,” reports Vail Daily. “The informational meeting will be held from 5 to 7 p.m. at the Holy Cross Ranger Station located at 24747 U.S. Highway 24 in Minturn. Forest Service and town of Avon staff will be available to answer questions. The purpose of this meeting will be to introduce new changes to the proposed Berlaimont Estates Road Improvement Project. These changes are a result of the most recent public comment period and focus on mitigation of wildlife and recreation impacts.”

“Durango City councilors informally agreed Tuesday to ask voters to approve a property and a sales tax increase in November,” reports The Durango Herald. “The increases could raise about $7.5 million in 2019 for general city services such as street maintenance and police. The additional city revenue would cover projected budget shortfalls and long-term construction needs, including a new police station and $15 million in other facilities costs. The councilors agreed to ask for a 5.4 mill property tax increase and a 0.55 percent increase on sales taxes. The sales tax increase would raise the total sales tax rate in Durango from 7.9 percent to 8.45 percent. If the 5.4 mill increase were approved, homeowners would pay $140 more per year on a home with an assessed value of $400,000, Assistant City Manager Amber Blake said.”

“Alexander Ponton thought it was a bomb,” reports The Denver Post. “Debris smashed into Ponton’s car as he drove east on West 4th Avenue near Santa Fe Drive. The 24-year-old Thornton man got out and heard screams for help coming from a six-unit residence complex.  It had exploded. Ponton jumped into action, assisting a man and woman out of the rubble who had cuts and scrapes on them. “First when I got out of the car, delirious, you don’t really think to help anyone right away, but when they’re crying for help, it doesn’t matter your situation,” Ponton said. “If I was still standing, I could still go help them out, so that’s kind of what I did.” Nine people were injured in the natural gas explosion Tuesday afternoon in Denver’s Baker neighborhood, according to the Denver Fire Department. Two people were hospitalized — one in critical condition.”

“Conduent plans to lay off 410 employees and close its call center at 2424 Garden of the Gods Road on Oct. 12 as it restructures operations,” reports The Gazette in Colorado Springs. “The New Jersey-based outsourcing company sent a notice Friday to the Colorado Department of Labor and Employment that the affected employees are 361 customer care associates, 37 customer care supervisors and managers, 11 workforce administration and training associates and one other manager. Conduent laid off 350 employees from the center in 2016.”

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“As he pledged to do, Henry Solano is lightening his office’s workload in light of what he terms the chronic underfunding of his office,” reports The Pueblo Chieftain. “Solano, the Trinidad-based district attorney for the 3rd Judicial District, told The Pueblo Chieftain that to date, his office has dismissed 11 felony cases — the majority being possession of a controlled substance possession with intent to distribute along with an attempted manslaughter — and 45 misdemeanors and traffic cases, with more likely to follow. Solano contends that the Las Animas County board of commissioners is purposely withholding voter-approved public safety funds, thereby hampering his office’s ability to successfully prosecute a growing cache of cases.”

“Greeley-Evans School District 6 officials told a group of about 20 parents, children and community members Wednesday night that Extraction Oil and Gas doesn’t plan to drill at its site behind Bella Romero Academy 4-8 campus during the school year,” reports The Greeley Tribune. “The site is 1,350 feet from the school and has sparked several protests and a lawsuit. Deirdre Pilch, superintendent for District 6, told those gathered at Bella Romero Academy on Wednesday the district and its board of education have been clear about their concerns about the facility, and their primary focus is the safety of students. John Gates, the safety and security chief for the district and the mayor of Greeley, said Extraction told both him and Pilch this week production will be stopped at the site through the school year and will begin again next summer.”

“Boulder County will pay about $1.87 million to buy two farming properties west of Longmont and preserve them as open space,” reports The Longmont Times-Call. “In separate actions on Tuesday, commissioners voted to spend $1.4 million to acquire 40 acres of property at 6412 Hygiene Road, and $469,800 to purchase 29 acres of dryland agricultural lands west of 13407 N. 75th St. The Hygiene Road property — which the county staff said the Zapf family bought in 1944 and whose family members have lived there since — was homesteaded in 1861 by George Washington Webster, credited with bringing apple trees to the Longmont area. There once was a stagecoach stop near the southwest corner of the property. There still is a small orchard on the property in which a variety of types of apples are grown, according to a memo to commissioners from Parks and Open Space Department land officer Mel Stonebraker.”

“Voters will be asked to approve a $13.8 million mill levy override and a $149 million bond for the Thompson School District — questions the school board unanimously approved Wednesday,” reports The Loveland Reporter-Herald. “The measures will pay for backlogged maintenance, additions onto Ivy Stockwell and Berthoud Elementary schools, a new school east of Interstate 25, increased salaries, new books and curriculum and safety measures, according to the ballot issues approved at a meeting Wednesday.”

“A steady breeze blows a couple hundred feet up the valley floor over the tawny, undulating terrain,” reports The Grand Junction Daily Sentinel. “To the north, the view unfurls into verdant grapevines and orchards — a stark contrast to the surrounding biscuit-hued hills dotted with scant vegetation. Farther north, at the base of the Bookcliffs, vehicles that look like ants pass each other along Interstate 70. Several dozen residents have made a home in this rugged area of Horse Mountain between 38 and 39 roads, drawn by the views, the wildlife and off-the-grid living only a few minutes south of Palisade.”

“Fleming’s Town Board will hold a public hearing on zoning changes at its Sept. 11 meeting,” reports The Sterling Journal-Advocate. “The issue of zoning in areas on the edges of the town came up last month when Trustee Stefan Betley pointed out that there are parcels within the town limits that aren’t zoned. During discussion Mayor Sue Einspahr said she agreed all property within the town should be zoned, but she wanted to make sure there was as little disruption as possible in the updating. Einspahr was especially concerned about landowners who, for instance, were actually farming on property inside the town limits because that property abutted farmland. She said it would be unfair to suddenly zone that property in a way that would make farming it suddenly impossible. The solution, as revealed at Tuesday night’s regular meeting, was to zone those parcels “Transitional,” meaning the current use could be continued at least until the property changed hands or the current use was no longer feasible.”

“From an economic perspective, the silver lining in Smartwool’s move to Denver is that the company is staying in Colorado,” reports The Steamboat Pilot. “VF Corporation, the company that owns Smartwool, is splitting into two publicly traded companies. VF will continue to operate its outdoor, active wear and work wear brands. A new company will be formed to operate VF’s jeans wear, which includes Lee and Wrangler jeans. This change left VF with no brand ties to the company’s headquarters in North Carolina. The company began to seek a new location for its outdoor brands, Smartwool, Altra, The North Face, Eagle Creek and JanSport.”

“Suzanne Ely is sick of the trains causing excessive delays in the middle of Brush and is looking for answers,” reports The Fort Morgan Times. “On Saturday, Ely and her husband were trying to get from one side of Brush to another when they were stopped by a train for more than two hours. Ely has been a resident of the area for 20 years and noticed that the train delays don’t maintain a specific schedule. After her outrage on Saturday, she tried reaching out to the train company, Burlington Northern Santa Fe Railway Company (BNSF), and received no reply. “One phone call isn’t going to do anything,” said Ely. “I’m trying to get everyone to call.” She explained that she also tried reaching out to local government agencies to address the train situation, but to no avail. According to Ely, the train got halfway across the road on Main Street and allowed for a single lane of traffic to move through, but it was still a sizable delay.”

“Local businesses seem ready for Vail’s stages of the Colorado Classic on Thursday, Aug. 16, and Friday Aug. 17,” reports Vail Daily. “But this effort to bring big-time cycle racing to Vail will have some challenges. The biggest challenge will be getting into and out of town. Thursday’s circuit race through town will close much of Vail on the south side of Interstate 70 between 9 a.m. and 3 p.m. Through the bulk of the day, no vehicles will be allowed on any town streets between the Vail Golf Club and the Matterhorn neighborhood. Only emergency vehicles will be allowed on the streets.”

“The Bull Draw fire near the western border grew about 1,180 acres in the last day and continues to climb the list of the largest wildfires in Colorado’s history,” reports The Cañon City Daily Record. “The fire, about 12 miles northwest of Nucla, covered 26,370 acres on Wednesday morning, making it the 17th largest fire in state hsitory. Five of the 20 largest fires ignited this year. Winds are expected to help push the fire up Deep Canyon in the afternoon. The fire was ignited by lightning on July 29. Crews continue to mop up scattered pockets of heat around the Campbell Point homes, where fires are creeping up through the vegetation below the houses. A 17-mile section of a Forest Service road called Divide Road remains closed.”

“The dissolution of a public-private partnership is putting a planned Boulder Junction project at the former Pollard Motors site in jeopardy,” reports The Boulder Daily Camera. “Facing a tight deadline and uncertain funding, the city and its remaining partner are unsure if the deal can be pulled off in time to save 179 affordable homes and cost-limited retail space meant to boost local small businesses. A joint development agreement between the city and Denver-based Zocalo Community Development has been abandoned “following (a) mutual decision,” according to both parties. Zocalo felt the ambitious project — which includes 119 affordable rentals, 48 co-op rooms and 12 affordable and 153 market-rate townhomes for purchase, plus commercial space — could not make it through Boulder’s planning process in time to qualify for $4 million in federal funding.”

“Tolls on the planned Interstate 25 “Gap” Express Lanes between Monument and Castle Rock could be the lowest in the state and among the cheapest in the country, the Colorado Department of Transportation said on Wednesday,” reports The Gazette in Colorado Springs. “A traffic and revenue study commissioned by the agency’s High-Performance Transportation Enterprise recommended a rate of about 15 cents per mile — around $2.25 per one-way trip. That is expected to cover the cost of operating and maintaining the lanes, maximize the number of drivers using the toll lane and reduce traffic in all lanes. Maximum per-mile toll rates vary widely on Express Lanes across the country. Drivers can pay up to $4 per mile on I-66 in the Washington, D.C., area. On Utah’s I-15 Express Lanes in the Salt Lake City area, the maximum is just 10 cents a mile.”

“The Colorado River is so strained amid population growth and a climate shift to hotter, drier conditions that federal water managers may declare an unprecedented ‘shortage’ and cut releases from reservoirs,” reports The Denver Post. “The feds are imploring Western states to do more now to cut water use. A U.S. Bureau of Reclamation forecast issued Wednesday for water in the Colorado River — an over-subscribed lifeline for 40 million people — anticipates declaration of a shortage in September 2019 that would trigger the reduced water releases from federal reservoirs in “lower basin” states including Nevada and Arizona. Colorado and other “upper basin” states Utah, Wyoming and New Mexico would face increased scrutiny of flows from headwaters into the Lake Powell reservoir. On Wednesday, Lake Powell measured 49 percent full and Lake Mead measured 38 percent full.”

The post The Home Front: A district attorney in Colorado is dismissing cases because of ‘what he terms the chronic underfunding of his office’ appeared first on The Colorado Independent.

“Colorado residents grew accustomed to the sight of smoke this summer as a faint haze from wildfires across the state formed an ominous backdrop against the mountains on the Western Slope,” reports Summit Daily. “More than 175,000 acres of the state have burned this season, including three blazes — the Spring Creek Fire (108,045 acres) near Ft. Garland, the 416 Fire (54,129) near Durango and the Mile Marker 117 Fire (42,795) near Pueblo — that all ranks within the top 10 most destructive fires in Colorado history by acres burned. It may be easy to chalk 2018 up as a fluky year, with less than average snowpack and droughts throughout the state, but some local scientists have a different theory: This is the new norm. …  Korb was one of three scientists who participated in a teleconferenced panel on wildfires held Thursday morning and hosted by the Environmental Colorado Research & Policy Center. The panel, which also included Dr. Deborah Kennard of Colorado Mesa University and Dr. Heidi Stelzer of Fort Lewis College, focused on the links between wildfires and climate change in Colorado, exploring issues such as snowmelt, fuels mitigation and the potential for change.”

“In the six months leading up to the June 26 primary election, in which El Paso County Sheriff Bill Elder was vying for the Republican nomination, the county relentlessly touted its marijuana eradication efforts,” reports The Gazette in Colorado Springs. “Records show the office put out releases about its busts up to four times a month. A crackdown on black market marijuana growers was a pillar of Elder’s re-election campaign — he appeared at many of the busts to give interviews.”

“As of April 2018, 69,662 Puebloans were enrolled in Medicaid, with the majority — 42,346 — being 21 and older,” reports The Pueblo Chieftain. “Based on a county population of 166,000-plus, that means more than 42 percent of Puebloans use Medicaid, a health insurance program based on income. The 69,662 figure is slightly lower than 2017’s year-end mark, when Pueblo County saw 70,851 people enrolled in Medicaid. Local officials credit this in part to an improving economy. Statewide through the end of April, there were 1.2 million Medicaid users, or nearly 22 percent of the state’s population.”

“Lafayette’s eventual choice for a new city councilmember will draw from a candidate pool reflective of the city’s varying identities: Oil and gas activists, a sitting planning commissioner and multiple committee leaders are among the 10 vying for the seat,” reports The Longmont Times-Call. “Applicants include Jonathan Bent, Ralph Frid, Mary Henry, Patricia Kelly, Shaun LaBarre, Jennifer Belle Lake, JD Mangat, Julie Marshall, Andrew J. O’Connor and DL Thomas, the city announced Friday. Whoever is appointed to fill the seat left vacant by Gustavo Reyna’s exit last month will be charged with helping steer decisions on two of the city’s most pressing issues: staving off oil and gas development without the cover of Boulder County’s now-expired drilling moratorium and creating “affordable” housing options that don’t automatically preclude a large portion of its residents.”

“The Rev. Jack Stapleton Saturday morning looked out over the packed Trinity Episcopal Church at the Celebration of Life for Mary Margaret Cox, the founder and long-time executive director of Meals on Wheels of Greeley and Weld County,” reports The Greeley Tribune. “He was not at a pulpit. Stapleton came down from the altar, stood at the opening between the two rows of pews and spoke from the heart, not the Liturgy, in a tribute involving both pathos and humor.”

“The trail’s opening is so near, some cyclists can taste it,” reports The Grand Junction Daily Sentinel. “Actually, some cyclists have done more than tasting. Fruita officials were forced to fix a fence cyclists have broken down to access the final connection of the Kokopelli Trail segment of the Colorado Riverfront Trail.”

“Rainfall provided some respite from the haze in the Yampa Valley on Saturday, but wildfire smoke and dry skies returned to the area Sunday,” reports The Steamboat Pilot. “Rainfall collects smoke particles and carries them to the ground, clearing them from the air, according to Scott Stearns, a meteorologist at the National Weather Service in Grand Junction. Smoke is expected to remain in the area until Monday afternoon. The Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment said some of this smoke is from out-of-state fires, but smoke from the Silver Creek Fire is also contributing to the haze.”

“Erika Crespin thought it would be fun that her daughter would be born on 8/18/18, but she had no idea the little one would throw in two more 18s,” reports The Loveland Reporter-Herald. “Luciana Catstillo was born Saturday at exactly 6:18 p.m., which in military time is 18:18, at Medical Center of the Rockies. “She cooperated quite well,” Crespin said, according to a press release. The daughter of Crespin and Derrick Castillo of Greeley made her appearance at the Loveland hospital on a palindrome day, which means that the numbers associated are the same both forward and backward. Though every day of the past week was a palindrome, Luciana was born on the 18th — a number that is considered to bring luck and prosperity in many cultures and on a day that was described as the busiest wedding date of 2018 for just that reason. (The wedding website, The Knot, reported 28,000 couples would marry on that Saturday.)”

“The Cañon City Council will conduct a discussion regarding recreational marijuana sales in the city during its regular meeting at 6 p.m. Monday at John D. Havens City Hall, located at 128 Main St,” reports The Cañon City Daily Record. “According to the meeting agenda, the discussion stems from a request by “a group of interested citizens.” The name of the group and any associated citizens is not identified in the packet materials. The request is to approve zoning regulations and special use conditions to allow retail marijuana sales in commercial and industrial zoned areas but not the central business district.”

“Police use of force, body camera footage, unconscious jury bias and domestic violence are at the forefront as the trial of a CSU student accused of misdemeanor resisting arrest and obstructing a peace officer is set to begin — again,” reports The Coloradoan in Fort Collins. “Michaella Surat’s arrest gained notoriety last year after a 9-second video clip in which she can be seen being forced to the ground by a Fort Collins police officer went viral in April 2017. Police say officer Randy Klamser, who was cleared of wrongdoing in the incident, was employing a standard arrest technique on someone who was not complying with directives.”

“Eyebrows shot up across the area recently when a photo and video surfaced showing a mountain lion that broke into a home near downtown Boulder and killed the family’s domestic cat before being discovered and scared from the residence, back into the wild,” reports The Boulder Daily Camera. “Few know as much about the majestic and enigmatic animal — it’s the mammal with the widest distribution in North America, other than humans — than mammals researcher Mat Alldredge, who led a 10-year study of mountain lions on the Front Range for Colorado Parks and Wildlife.”

“The Aurora Police Department officer who twice fatally shot people this summer, including an armed homeowner who had defended his family against an intruder, will return to work Monday, although it may be some time before he is behind the wheel of a patrol car,” reports The Denver Post. “That decision will not come lightly as the officer and his commanders evaluate everything from his mental state to the findings of two pending investigations into the those shootings. Already, Aurora Police Chief Nick Metz has had to defend his department’s decision to place the officer back on the graveyard shift 18 days after the first fatal shooting. While Aurora cannot discuss the psychological services that specific officer is receiving and which benchmarks he must achieve, experts say there is not a one-size-fits-all answer to when an officer who has shot a suspect is ready to return to duty. Lots of factors are involved, including whether the officer himself was injured, input from district attorneys investigating the case and an officer’s own feelings about his readiness.”

“As election season nears and the Denver Broncos prepare for the regular season, residents in Southwest Colorado will be subjected to another year of television from the Land of Enchantment, featuring Albuquerque crime, New Mexico political campaigns and perhaps a Dallas Cowboys game instead of the home team in orange and blue,” reports The Durango Herald. “Such is life as an “orphan county,” a term used to describe counties that receive television programing from a neighboring state. Montezuma and La Plata counties are in Colorado but receive broadcasting from New Mexico. La Plata County commissioners hoped to change its “orphan” status by filing a petition to the Federal Communications Commission in October 2016 that would allow satellite providers – including DirecTV and DISH Network – to partner with local television companies in Denver to broadcast in La Plata County.”

The post The Home Front: ‘Links between wildfires and climate change in Colorado’ appeared first on The Colorado Independent.

“Megan McGee Bonta, of Catholic Charities in Eagle County, has numerous heart-wrenching tales of local working families stiffed on pay and forced into near insolvency by unscrupulous employers,” reports Vail Daily. “It’s called wage theft, and Bonta says that despite the booming local economy and record-low unemployment, it’s on the rise in 2018. The community integration services coordinator for Catholic Charities in Eagle County, Bonta says the number of individual cases of wage theft reported to her organization is up 66 percent so far in 2018 compared to all of 2017, and that the dollar amount reported is up 41 percent. Catholic Charities tries to help workers recover unpaid wages, either by directly contacting and negotiating with employers or helping workers file small-claims court actions or complaints with the Colorado Department of Labor and Employment.”

“Teller County Sheriff Jason Mikesell may continue jailing suspected undocumented immigrants if federal immigration authorities ask them to do so, a judge ruled Sunday in tossing out a motion by the American Civil Liberties Union of Colorado,” reports The Gazette in Colorado Springs. “The ruling by 4th Judicial District Judge Lin Billings-Vela frees the Sheriff’s Office to continue to comply with the requests from the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement pending the outcome of an ACLU lawsuit filed over the practice last month. “We won the right to continue to protect our citizens,” Mikesell said at a news conference in Woodland Park on Monday, adding that the decision lets his agency continue cooperating with ‘federal partners.’ The ACLU had petitioned for a preliminary injunction this month, asking that the jail be barred from holding inmates on ICE requests if they’re otherwise eligible for release.”

“Attorneys representing environmental groups argue the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service neglected federal environmental regulations while evaluating the Rocky Flats Wildlife Refuge ahead of its planned opening next month, according to arguments filed late Friday with the U.S. District Court in Denver,” reports The Boulder Daily Camera. “‘We are seeking to have the Fish and Wildlife Service conduct environmental reviews that have not been conducted since 2004, despite new information that could impact the environment and safety of the refuge,’ Boulder attorney Randall Weiner said Monday. Since 2004 , planned trail routes have been amended and now cover “an area with greater levels of wind-blown plutonium dust and other dangerous chemicals,” plaintiffs argue. The refuge — a controversial parcel surrounding the former Cold War era Rocky Flats nuclear weapons facility — spans more than 5,000 acres. A $7.7 billion cleanup effort wrapped in 2005, though the plant’s remaining plutonium reserves and the condition of the soil have been the subject of far-reaching criticism from environmentalists and surrounding neighbors in the years since. Friday’s filing came just days after U.S. District Court Judge Philip A. Brimmer rejected a request for a preliminary injunction that would have barred the site’s planned Sept. 15 opening.”

“In the affidavit for his arrest, Christopher Watts claims he killed his pregnant wife after discovering she had strangled their two daughters,” reports The Greeley Tribune. “The affidavit, made public Monday following the filing of formal charges against the Frederick man and a news conference by the Weld District Attorney’s Office, states when Watts’ wife, Shanann, returned home early Aug. 13 from a business trip to Arizona, Watts had a conversation with her about wanting to initiate separation proceedings. During the investigation, evidence surfaced Watts was actively involved in an affair with a coworker, according to court records. After the two cried about it for a few minutes, Watts went downstairs. When he returned a short while later to continue talking, he saw on a baby monitor 4-year-old Bella sprawled out on her bed and blue, and Shanann actively strangling 3-year-old Celeste, according to court records.”

“The statewide group that wants Colorado voters to create a new way to redraw congressional and legislative district lines every 10 years kicked off its campaign in Grand Junction on Monday,” reports The Grand Junction Daily Sentinel. “The group, Fair Maps Colorado, says it’s time to create two new commissions — both made up of an even number of Republicans, Democrats and unaffiliated voters — to redraw those district lines after each U.S. Census.”

“Lafayette leaders are poised to approve an emergency six-month extension to the city’s drilling moratorium, delaying any potential extraction plans until after a statewide referendum on 2,500-foot oil and gas setbacks is decided,” reports The Longmont Times-Call. “Officials sanctioned the current embargo last November at the height of fears that operators were training their eyes on Lafayette for large-scale energy development. The moratorium was first extended in May, when officials said they needed time to overhaul the city’s oil and gas codes.”

“Electric bikes are nothing new for Steamboat Ski & Bike Kare general manager Jake Ehrlick,” reports The Steamboat Pilot. “We have actually been doing e-bikes for 10 to 12 years, on and off,” Ehrlick said. “One year they would do well, and the next year they wouldn’t. It was really up and down, but I would say last year it really started taking off. This year, they are flying out the door.” Ehrlick said the popularity of e-bikes could be due to the constantly improving technology or because the bikes are proving to be a great way to get around town.”

“Poverty in Pueblo isn’t necessarily the cause of gangs and there is no direct correlation, but there is a relation because gangs do tend to be based in lower-income neighborhoods, according to a Pueblo Police Department detective,” reports The Pueblo Chieftain. ‘Most gang members typically don’t finish school and, even if they do finish school, they don’t actively go out to look for legitimate work,’ Detective Chad Jeffries said. ‘A street gangster’s life is to do crime. They do it to make money. Whether it be stealing stuff, selling drugs or trading stolen items, that’s their business. Is there a direct correlation to the poverty? I am not sure about that.'”

“The city of Loveland’s new Unified Development Code, an update two years in the making that aims to clarify processes and expand the city’s housing options and affordability, is nearing completion,” reports The Loveland Reporter-Herald. “The Planning Commission, five members of City Council and members of the Title 18 zoning commission met Monday night for a meeting to review the third draft of the new code, set to go before City Council on Oct. 2. Mayor Jacki Marsh was present, along with councilors Leah Johnson and Kathi Wright of Ward II, Don Overcash of Ward IV, and Jeremy Jersvig of Ward I. The new code seeks to give developers more leeway with the size and type of homes they build, and to make sure there are enough rules to keep things safe and meet community standards, said Special Projects Manager Greg George.”

“Plans for prescribed burns – intentionally set fires on the landscape aimed at reducing the risk of larger, more devastating wildfires – have been temporarily put on hold this fall as wildfires rage across the country,” reports The Cortez Journal. “Every year, the U.S. Forest Service’s three ranger districts across the San Juan National Forest in Southwest Colorado – Dolores, Columbine (Bayfield and Durango) and Pagosa Springs – put together a list of burns they would like to conduct. On average, these three districts ignite about six to 10 prescribed burns, said Richard Bustamante, San Juan National Forest fire manager. This fall, the Forest Service had planned to conduct prescribed burns on about 12,000 acres in the Saul’s Creek and Yellow Jacket area, east of Bayfield.”

“Jacob Durand said a silent prayer and made peace moments before his friend allegedly shot him in the face and left him for dead. Durand, 22, detailed the execution-style shooting that happened in the early morning hours of June 28, 2017, during the second day of testimony in the jury trial for Matthew Smith, 27, who is accused of the shooting,” reports The Cañon City Daily Record. “Durand said he met Smith, also known as “Mississippi” by family and friends, in jail about six months prior to the alleged incident. He said Smith told him and Jeremy Jackson, 27, a mutual friend, to leave their cell phones at home before driving to Rockvale together to pick up Smith’s girlfriend, Kandice Hamilton. Durand, who testified to having used heroin and methamphetamines earlier that day, said he complied with Smith’s order without question and left his cell phone behind. ‘He had a handgun and some guy just got smoked,’ Durand said.”

“The University of Colorado’s Anschutz Medical Campus on Tuesday announced a $120 million gift that school leaders say will help them recruit more physicians and scientists to the growing Aurora campus,” reports The Denver Post. “CU officials said the gift, which is the largest private commitment in the medical campus’s history, came from The Anschutz Foundation and its founder and chair, Philip Anschutz. With the pledge, the foundation has invested nearly $300 million in the medical campus since 2000, according to the university.”

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“Colorado lawmakers are making a second bid to get local water utilities reimbursed for cleaning up toxins tied to the Air Force after failing to get their provision in the National Defense Authorization Act,” reports The Gazette in Colorado Springs. “U.S. Sens. Michael Bennet and Cory Gardner this time are working to get an amendment to a defense spending bill that would reimburse $9 million to water providers in Security, Widefield and Fountain for their emergency actions in 2016 after tests found that the Widefield aquifer carried dangerous levels of perfluorinated compounds — chemicals tied to firefighting foam used at Peterson Air Force Base.”

“It’s not that often, Greeley Assistant City Manager Becky Safarik said, that local governments open new offices, let alone ones that are designed specifically for the departments that work in them,” reports The Greeley Tribune. “So, she said, officials are excited about the Greeley’s new $21.4 million City Center, 1001 11th Ave., which was designed to house the city’s information technology and water and sewer departments, municipal court, GTV8 studios and the Greeley City Council chambers. It’s the first time in decades officials can say that With a vault in the basement and underground tunnels that connect to teller stations to prove it, Greeley’s current City Hall originally operated as United Bank of Greeley. The City Hall Annex, located across the street, was supposed to be used as space for business offices.”

“Sears at the Mesa Mall will close in November as the department store continues to shutter locations across the country,” reports The Grand Junction Daily Sentinel. “The Sears Holding Company announced Wednesday that it will shut down 46 Kmart and Sears locations. The Mesa Mall Sears is the only Colorado store on the list.”

“The ‘Fix Our Damn Roads’ proposal to sell $3.5 billion in bonds to finance state road and bridge projects has made the ballot, Colorado Secretary of State Wayne Williams announced Wednesday,” reports The Longmont Times-Call. “A random sampling of the measure’s petition signatures showed backers of Initiative 167 had submitted enough to exceed the 98,492 needed to qualify for the November election, Williams stated in a news release.”

“When Pueblo citizens have large items lying around that need to be disposed of, it can be a costly endeavor,” reports The Pueblo Chieftain. “Some citizens will keep that trash around and pile it up instead of getting rid of it. That, in turn, may lead to lead to illegal dumping. The problem is getting worse and city and county leaders are trying to fix it. To that end, the city of Pueblo was proactive in opening up a large item trash drop-off site earlier this year at the old animal shelter site on Stockyard Road. There residents are able to dispose of large, bulky items at the cost of a $10 voucher that are limited to two per city address.”

“Fall is landing in Summit County with chill and raindrops, and focus is starting to shift from the stress of a dry, fiery summer to hopes for a snow-packed winter,” reports Summit Daily. “While it is far too soon to accurately guess what kind of snow the High Country will wind up getting, there’s at least hope for average snow in Summit based on predictions for the 2018-2019 climate pattern. El Niño is a term originating from the 1600s from the Spanish “El Niño de Navidad,” or child of the nativity, as the pattern usually occurs around Christmas time. The importance of the climate pattern, which alternates with a neutral or La Niña pattern every two to seven years, can’t be overstated. It can affect the livelihoods of fishermen in Central and South America, cause severe droughts in South Asia, and cause major and minor disruptions to typical climate patterns all over the planet.”

“Developers and Steamboat Springs City Council found common ground on an annexation agreement that would lay the foundation for three neighborhoods in West Steamboat to be built and annexed into the city limits,” reports The Steamboat Pilot. “Council will review the final annexation agreement at its regular meeting on Tuesday, Sept. 18. Should the annexation agreement be approved, it would then be reviewed by the city planning department and city clerk’s office.”

“Though finance staff have been at work on the 2019 budget process since last December, the public-facing portion of the budgeting season began Wednesday with a review of the new budget book by the Citizens’ Finance Advisory Commission,” reports The Loveland Reporter-Herald. “The commissioners discussed their likes and dislikes about the new and improved budget book, which they will communicate to the City Council at the council’s first budget study session Sept. 11. This year, by council direction, city staff led by Budget Manager Theresa Wilson moved deadlines forward in the budgeting process to give council more time to consider the budget, and changed some aspects of the budget presentation to make it more understandable to people without a finance background.”

“When local kids head back to their classrooms this fall, a new mental health support system is being mobilized on their behalf,” reports Vail Daily. “On Tuesday, Aug. 21, the Eagle County commissioners allocated $400,000 from the 1A marijuana tax proposals that passed last fall to fund four new school-based counselors — three for the buildings in the Eagle River Valley and one for the Roaring Fork Valley School District. The proposal marks the first recommendation from the county’s Mental Health Advisory Committee.”

“With several hospitals, an airport and a few Air Force bases around and near Northern Colorado, it’s not uncommon to hear a helicopter buzzing overhead,” reports The Coloradoan in Fort Collins. “One of the most frequent questions Coloradoan reporters field on a daily basis is finding out the origin of helicopters spotted above Fort Collins. The short answer: It could be a variety of things, most of which are mundane. Hospitals have four of the seven helipads in Northern Colorado.”

“The defense attorney for Matthew Smith made a motion Wednesday to acquit him on charges of attempted first-degree murder, stating that there is not sufficient evidence to give the jury in support of the charges,” reports The Cañon City Daily Record. “Smith, 27, is accused of ordering Jeremy Jackson, 27, and Jacob Durand, 22, out of a pickup truck at gunpoint and then attempting an execution-style shooting in the early morning hours of June 28, 2017, in the Chandler area. Smith is facing charges of attempted first-degree murder, first-degree assault, felony menacing and possession of a weapon by a previous offender.”

“Boulder City Council on Tuesday night voted to move forward with a flood mitigation plan that ignored expert advice, objections from a key project partner, and the preferences of the public and a city advisory board,” reports The Boulder Daily Camera. “The 6-3 vote to advance the plan known as Variant 1, taken around 11:30 p.m., was to a mostly empty chamber: Residents of Frasier Meadows retirement community left earlier after a failed vote for the Variant 2 plan, which received the most support during a public feedback process, best met the nine identified project criteria, was preferred by the University of Colorado (the property owner) and the Water Resources Advisory Board and is the most easily adaptable for larger storms brought about by climate change.”

“Colorado’s 6th Congressional District will be ground zero this fall in the fight over control of the U.S. House,” reports The Denver Post. “Technically, it’s a race between Democratic challenger Jason Crow, an attorney and former Army Ranger, and Republican incumbent Mike Coffman for the district that traces a half circle around Denver’s east side. But nationally, it’s seen as a key indicator of whether Democrats can take Congress. “I think the odds are high — not certain, but high — that whichever party wins this district will control Congress come January,” said Eric Sondermann, an independent political analyst. “If Crow pulls this off, you can easily imagine the Democrats having a very good night come November and taking back the House.” The Cook Political Report rates the race as one of 27 tossup seats that are now in Republican hands. Just two Democratic seats are considered tossups.”

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“The number of highway deaths involving Colorado drivers who had marijuana in their system grew again in 2017, a new state study shows,” reports The Gazette in Colorado Springs. “At the same time, traffic fatalities in which drivers had enough marijuana in their bloodstream to be deemed legally impaired dropped sharply, from 52 in 2016 to 35 last year. The reason for this seeming contradiction: Marijuana can remain in the bloodstream for weeks, so a positive blood test may not mean a driver was stoned at the time of a deadly crash. As the Colorado Department of Transportation study notes, ‘The presence of a cannabinoid does not necessarily indicate recent use of marijuana or impairment.’ Overall, the number of fatalities involving positive tests for marijuana has nearly doubled since recreational legalization in 2014, from 75 that year to 125 in 2016 and 139 last year. Colorado law specifies that drivers with five nanograms of active tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) in a milliliter of their blood can be prosecuted for driving under the influence of marijuana.”

“A Greeley recycling company will purchase a large wood grinder to help cut down on wood waste, thanks in part to a state grant,” reported The Greeley Tribune. “The Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment awarded Go Green Pallet and Recycling Co., 937 A St. in Greeley, the $160,000 grant to help the company as it expands its recycling program and bring more green-sector jobs to the state, according to a news release from the company. The grant was awarded through the Recycling Resources Economic Opportunity competitive grant program.”

“Three people with criminal convictions out of Boulder County stand among the 26 Coloradans to whom Gov. John Hickenlooper granted pardons on Thursday,” reports The Longmont Times-Call. “Jeffrey Swedlund, who lives in Broomfield, pleaded guilty to misdemeanor assault in 1994 in Boulder County Court. Stephen Richards, who lives in Boulder, pleaded guilty to a felony drug possession charge in 1993. Justin M. Gourley, who lives in Lafayette, pleaded guilty to a felony harassment by stalking charge in 1999. The 26 people convicted on Thursday received a letter from Hickenlooper and a grant of clemency, which dictates that they have received a “full and unconditional pardon.” The pardon means that all rights of citizenship, including voting, jury duty, holding public office and firearms privileges are restored and all ‘civil disabilities and public sufferings associated with this conviction are removed.'”

“Loveland, get ready to be a-maized. Because another shucking good time is heading our way,” reports The Loveland Reporter-Herald. “Advertisement The annual Loveland Corn Roast festival is back this weekend and bringing with it the annual hubbub of the classic cornhole tournament, beloved duck race and more roasted corn than you can shake a cob at. But you probably already knew that. After all, the Corn Roast Festival is a Loveland mainstay that is being held for the 37th consecutive year (though the festival’s history actually extends back more than 100 years).”

“More than 190 responses to a town-issued survey indicate Silverthorne voters have little taste to start paying a property tax, even if it means new parks, trails or quality-of-life improvements in town will crawl to a standstill,” reports Summit Daily. “Going into the survey, town officials had contended the rate at which new public amenities come online would slow dramatically without a new source of funding. Also, a property tax could help diversify the town’s coffers with a less volatile revenue stream than sale taxes, which Silverthorne depends on for its primary source of funding. Over half of respondents said they think Silverthorne is headed in the right direction, but the survey also found that 60 percent were unlikely to support a property tax measure on November’s ballot.”

“Steamboat Springs City Council rejected a resolution that would have placed a 5 percent tax on all marijuana sales in the city before voters,” reports The Steamboat Pilot. “Council rejected the measure 5 to 2, with council members Sonja Macys and Kathi Meyer voting in favor of it. The 5 percent tax was expected to generate up to $720,000 for the city’s community support budget and city youth programs in 2019. It would have sunseted after 10 years if not renewed. In creating a dedicated funding source for community support, council hoped to maintain funding for those services and free up the money the city currently spends on community support and youth programs for other uses.”

“It’s that time of year again. The Colorado State Fair — one of Pueblo’s most anticipated events of the year — gets rolling today for the first of its 11-day run,” reports The Pueblo Chieftain. “This is the 146th edition of the expo, which has been held in Pueblo from Day 1. Crews were making last-minute preparations and getting things in place at the Fairgrounds on Thursday to get ready for the first rush of crowds that will sweep through today.”

“Earlier this month, Morgan Stanley analysis told its clients that it had grossly underestimated its previous valuation of Google’s driverless car division, Waymo,” reports Vail Daily. “Our previous work has shown how Waymo’s autonomous robotaxi taxi business could be worth (approximately) $75 billion,” a team of analysts led by Brian Nowak noted to investors. “But that is likely just the beginning, as there are two other business models — logistics/delivery and licensing — now coming into view … which we see leading to a total (approximately) $175 billion potential Waymo valuation.” The $175 billion valuation puts Waymo ahead of GM, Ford and Tesla combined.”

“A Cañon City man is facing nine charges after allegedly driving recklessly through town and causing a traffic accident Aug. 11 in the 2300 block of Central Avenue,” reports The Cañon City Daily Record.

“Sterling Regional MedCenter is pleased to welcome two new residents, Cameron Scranton, MD and Benjamin Bosen, DO to the Sterling Rural Training Program,” reports The Sterling Journal-Advocate. “The Banner Health North Colorado Family Medicine (NCFM) Residency program offers only two residents a position in the Sterling Rural Training Program every year. After beginning their training at NCFM in Greeley, residents move to Sterling for the remainder of their training to specialize in rural family medicine.”

“While on routine patrol around 10:30 p.m. Tuesday, Log Lane Village Dep. Marshal Josh Katz knew there was something off when he spotted a 2009 white Honda Civic parked on the wrong side of the street facing the wrong direction,” reports The Fort Morgan Times. “What he did not know was that what he thought would be a routine traffic stop would lead to him pursuing the vehicle at speeds of up to 130 miles per hour on eastbound Interstate 76, ultimately making an arrest and recovering a large quantity of prescription pills and other illegal drugs.”

“A group of east county residents have filed a lawsuit against a Boulder County Commission decision to expand a floodway onto their properties, alleging the process’ execution amounted to a violation of their due process rights,” reports The Boulder Daily Camera. “The litigation — which seeks to reverse the decision — aligns slightly with the interests of the Denver-based extraction firm, Crestone Peak Resources, whose efforts to develop a nearby site with a host of oil and gas wells has been complicated by the same re-mapping decision. The company levies the decision to rezone the area was done in part to subvert its plans. According to the complaint filed this week, commissioners approved the floodway expansion over the resistance of local residents, who said the re-mapping would limit development on their private properties — some of which are functioning farms — and cause their flood insurance rates to skyrocket.”

“Three big projects in Adams County will lead to the hiring of around 3,400 workers in a four-month window in the coming weeks,” reports The Denver Post. “But with the metro area’s unemployment rate scratching historic lows, there’s a risk those efforts could devolve into a scavenger hunt. “I can’t recall a time where we had so many large employers moving into the area at the same time seeking such a large number of employees,” said Tricia Allen, a senior vice president and 18-year veteran at Adams County Economic Development. Amazon has built a new robotic fulfillment center at I-25 and 144th Avenue in Thornton, but it still needs 1,500 humans to help get online orders into boxes for shipping. Hiring started in July for an opening later this month. The fulfillment center, spanning 855,000 square feet and four levels, needs to be game-day ready for the holiday rush.”

“State and federal officials visited La Plata County earlier this week to do a joint, preliminary damage assessment on areas affected by flooding near the 416 Fire’s burn scar,” reports The Durango Herald. “Local officials guided members from the Colorado Office of Homeland Security and Emergency Management and Federal Emergency Management Agency around places severely hit by flood damage north of Durango, including Honeyville, the Hermosa Hills Condominiums and the KOA Campground. On Tuesday, the team met with private homeowners to assess the need for individual assistance from FEMA. On Wednesday, representatives met with local officials about damage to public infrastructure, including road repairs, sewer damage and power lines.”

“The last two days of Michaella Surat’s trial highlighted the crux of the case: Was the CSU student resisting arrest and obstructing a police officer when she was taken into custody on April 6, 2017, or were her actions a response to unreasonable force by a police officer?” reports The Coloradoan in Fort Collins. “Surat’s arrest gained international notoriety after a bystander at Bondi Beach Bar in Old Town Fort Collins caught a portion of her interaction with Fort Collins Police Officer Randall Klamser on video. The 9-second clip shows Klamser forcing Surat to the ground on the pavement outside the bar. The jury went into deliberations Thursday afternoon and is expected to reach a verdict Friday on the misdemeanor resisting arrest and obstructing a peace officer charges Surat faces.”

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“Two of northwest Colorado’s bigger and more remote wildfires, the Cabin Lake and Cache Creek fires burning north and south of Rifle, respectively, are on their way to containment after a month-long battle with a variety of firefighting crews,” reports The Glenwood Springs Post-Independent. “Meanwhile, the costs to fight those fires, which started a day apart in late July, has mounted. White River National Forest public information officer Kate Jerman said the cost to date of fighting the two fires, combined, is over $16 million.”

“As of the 5 p.m. deadline Monday for mayoral candidates to submit valid signatures for inclusion on the November ballot, 12 individuals have had their signatures certified and are officially on the ballot,” reports The Pueblo Chieftain. “Ten others have submitted signatures that still are awaiting verification, according to the Pueblo City Clerk’s Office. The candidates who have made the ballot after having their nominating petitions OK’d are: Larry Atencio, Gary Lee Clark, Thomas Croshal, Larry Fancher, Dennis Flores, Nick Gradisar, Ted Lopez, Steve Nawrocki, Chris Nicoll, Randy Thurston, Lori Winner and Jody Voss.”

“Prairie Heights Middle School jumped to the highest rating on the state’s school accountability system, ending a seven-year streak of low performance on testing, according to preliminary ratings released Monday by the Colorado Department of Education,” reports The Greeley Tribune. “The school, which was directed last year by the state board of education to enter innovation status to help implement programs to improve performance, jumped from priority improvement status, the second-lowest rating, to performance, the highest. Along with Billie Martinez Elementary and Centennial Elementary School, Prairie Heights was one of three schools in Greeley-Evans School District 6 to leap from one of the state’s lowest ratings to the highest.”

“Federal prosecutors believe a Grand Junction man indicted in connection with a fatal fentanyl overdose in Carbondale in December may be linked to “multiple” other fatal overdoses in western Colorado, most of which occurred in Mesa County,” reports The Grand Junction Daily Sentinel.

“The Boulder Valley School District jumped up a level to earn the state’s highest accreditation rating — accredited with distinction — based on preliminary ratings released Monday by the state,” reports The Longmont Times-Call. “BVSD is being recognized for high achievement at all levels, strong growth at the elementary and high school levels, and how well our students are prepared for post-secondary success,” said Jonathan Dings, Boulder valley’s Executive Director of Student Assessment.”

“Multinational investment company J.P. Morgan will underwrite the city of Loveland’s municipal broadband network, if the City Council votes in October to move forward with its creation,” reports The Loveland Reporter-Herald. “Broadband project manager Brieana Reed-Harmel said that while the city received 15 well-qualified proposals from companies such as Bank of America, Merrill Lynch and the Royal Bank of Canada, J.P. Morgan stood out due to the company’s experience with both power and telecommunications utilities.”

“Mountain bikers will soon have a downhill only trail on upper Spring Creek,” reports The Steamboat Pilot. “Now, hikers could also be getting their own path. The Steamboat Springs Parks and Recreation Commission approved the construction of a hikers-only trail adjacent to the Spring Creek Trail, which is intended to replace an unsanctioned social trail that frequently sees foot traffic on private property.”

“The Colorado Division of Criminal Justice published a report earlier this month analyzing more than 27,000 driving under the influence (DUI) cases filed in Colorado in 2016,” reports The Steamboat Pilot. “The report, the first of its kind in the nation, dives into a number of data points including offender demographics, toxicology reports, and subsequent charges and court proceedings. The report comes as a result of House Bill 1315 passed in the Colorado General Assembly in 2017, directing the Colorado Department of Safety, Division of Criminal Justice to analyze types of DUI offenses being committed, and to issue an annual report. The results are backlogged one year to allow time for cases to be adjudicated.”

“The investigation continues as officials try to determine exactly how a Saturday morning, Aug. 25, fire started in Avon’s Beaver Bench Condominiums,” reports Vail Daily. “However, until a structural engineer says the building is safe to enter, no one will be poking around inside, including investigators, said Tracy LeClair, community risk manager with the Eagle River Fire Protection District.”

“Stickers displaying the logo of a white supremacist group were placed on light poles in downtown Loveland before they were removed Friday evening,” reports The Coloradoan in Fort Collins. “It’s unclear how long the stickers on two poles at Cleveland Avenue and Fifth Street had been up. They displayed Identity Evropa’s white-and-teal logo, similar to other stickers popping up across the Front Range in the past month, according to the Denver Post. The group, which helped plan the Unite the Right Rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, is considered one of 21 hate groups in Colorado by the Southern Poverty Law Center. Clashes at the white supremacist rally last year left one counter-protester and two law enforcement officers dead.”

“A former Fremont County Sheriff’s deputy pleaded guilty Monday to three counts in connection to an alleged theft from a crime scene earlier this year,” reports The Cañon City Daily Record. “Christopher Pape, 30, who is free on a $1,000 personal recognizance bond, pleaded guilty to theft, a Class 2 misdemeanor; official misconduct, also a Class 2 misdemeanor; and tampering with physical evidence, a Class 6 felony. Deputy District Attorney Thom LeDoux said the plea agreement calls for Pape to concede to aggravated circumstances. Also as part of the plea deal, initial charges of attempting to influence a public servant and abuse of public records were dropped. The sentencing range for the charges could be probation to three years in the Department of Corrections.”

“As one of the most influential alpinists of his generation, Jeff Lowe, a former Boulder County resident, came alive as a creative genius on frozen waterfalls, vertical rock walls and steep snow slopes in the Rockies, the Alps and the Himalayas,” reports The Boulder Daily Camera. “When the time came for him to die — which he regarded with deep curiosity as yet another adventure — he wanted to be outside for that, too. Lowe, who grew up in Utah but spent much of his adult life in Colorado, became the youngest to climb the Grand Teton at age 7. By his 20s he was renowned for his athleticism, grace and audacity while chalking up more than 1,000 first ascents. He had a reputation for climbs that others not only could not do but could not even imagine.”

“Health care ranks among the top issues in Colorado’s race for governor,” reports The Gazette in Colorado Springs. “But to hear the campaigns and their allies describe it, voters in November will be choosing between Democrat Jared Polis’ and Republican Walker Stapleton’s competing health scare policies. Both candidates say it’s a top priority to expand Coloradans’ access to health care and control costs, but Republican Stapleton and his supporters warn that Democrat Polis’ plans will impoverish the state and its residents, while the Polis camp argues Coloradans will lose coverage and financial protections under Stapleton’s proposals.”

“As a growing number of Colorado public safety agencies launch drones to help firefighting efforts, rescue lost hikers and take pictures of crime scenes, Denver’s police and fire departments are debating the merits of using unmanned aircraft,” reports The Denver Post. “For now, the Denver Police Department has shelved a consumer-grade drone recently purchased for nearly $3,000 after the administration nixed the crime lab’s plan to use it to photograph crime scenes. ‘We are not going to move forward with the drone program at this time,’ said Sonny Jackson, a department spokesman. ‘If we do, we will move forward with community input.'”

“The Montezuma County sheriff on Friday night said that a deputy faces dismissal or reassignment after he reportedly entered a classroom in Dolores during a security check and, using his hand to simulate a gun, pointed a finger at the teacher and said, ‘You’re dead,'” reports The Cortez Journal. “Sheriff Steve Nowlin responded to The Journal’s telephone calls on Friday evening, about three hours after Phil Kasper, superintendent of Dolores School District Re-4A, emailed a letter to parents and staff to update them about the Aug. 17 incident. Parents emailed copies of the letter to The Journal.”

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“The Colorado chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union is demanding 31 towns and cities across the state repeal ordinances restricting panhandling, seeking to capitalize on a 2015 federal district court ruling that struck down of the city of Grand Junction’s ordinance,” reports The Grand Junction Daily Sentinel. “The ACLU on Tuesday sent individualized letters to the municipalities — including Palisade, De Beque, New Castle, Ouray, Paonia and Rangely — asking them to repeal anti-panhandling laws. The ACLU emailed letters in coordination with an effort by the National Center on Homelessness and Poverty and 18 other organizations in 12 states seeking the reversal of more than 240 panhandling bans.”

“A recent death and near deaths from carbon monoxide poisoning in Routt County has shocked the real estate industry into action,” reports The Steamboat Pilot. “Joan Conroy of Steamboat Sotheby’s International Realty had a client living in the Waterside Village Condos in Steamboat Springs when an elderly woman accidentally left her car running in an attached garage in January. Conroy’s client and other condo owners had CO detectors, which alerted emergency responders to the danger. Though the woman passed out from CO poisoning, she did survive.”

“UCHealth announced Tuesday its participation in a nationwide research collaboration working to transform the way cancer is treated,” reports The Greeley Tribune. “UCHealth Poudre Valley Hospital is among the first community hospitals to join the personalized medicine consortium, according to the release. The Oncology Research Information Exchange Network, with the Total Cancer Care protocol, gathers data from patients with different cancers over the course of their treatments, with the goal of matching patients with the best treatment options available. Partners in the Oncology Research Information Exchange Network have access to data from more than 216,000 patients from 18 participating U.S. cancer centers. The patients who enrolled have been diagnosed with cancer or are at a high risk of developing cancer.”

“Boulder County biologists studying Preble’s meadow jumping mouse and fish populations along the St. Vrain Creek have been encouraged this summer by signs of species rejuvenating since their habitats were altered by the 2013 flood,” reports The Longmont Times-Call. “Preble’s mouse researchers hesitate to say the flood caused the mammal’s decline in prevalence along the South Boulder Creek and its seeming disappearance from the Rocky Flats National Wildlife Refuge over the last five years. But flood recovery restoration work by local governments along the St. Vrain — especially west of Longmont, downstream from Lyons — has created conditions conducive to a comeback for the Preble’s mouse.”

“Rosemarie Romeo was rushed to Glenwood Medical Center in December 2015, after accidentally misusing her anxiety medication,” reports The Glenwood Springs Post-Independent. “She says she scheduled a follow-up visit and a geriatric psychiatrist gave her a list with names for local mental-health care providers. ‘Many of the counselors weren’t even in practice anymore or their numbers didn’t work,’ Romeo said. ‘Not one person mentioned Mind Springs,’ a major mental health organization that comprises 12 locations across the Western Slope. Romeo, a 77-year-old Medicare and Medicaid recipient, says she continued to struggle with finding a mental health counselor as well as other affordable services in the area.”

“Seven of the 10 mayoral candidates who have turned in their signatures to get on the November ballot will have to wait a bit longer to see if they made it,” reports The Pueblo Chieftain. “That’s because the signatures on their nominating petitions were still going through the verification process as of Tuesday night, according to Brenda Armijo, the acting city clerk. One of the 10 candidates, Janet Wilson, saw her nominating petition verified Tuesday and she will be on the ballot. Two potential candidates did not collect enough signatures to make the ballot, according to Armijo. They were identified as Xavier Quintana and Anthony Pemberton.”

“The Loveland City Council wants to have more data behind its budgeting decisions, and a project to help with that has hit its midway point, staff told council Tuesday,” reports The Loveland Reporter-Herald. “Following a 2.5-hour executive session to confidentially discuss the sale of property and city-involved litigation, council heard a presentation from special projects consultant Leah Browder on the project’s progress.”

“Eagle County will ease back to Stage 1 fire restrictions as of 12:01 a.m. Friday, Aug. 31. But it’s still really dry, reports Vail Daily. “Eagle County Sheriff James van Beek, the county’s lead fire official, said the decision to ease away from the current, more restrictive Stage 2 fire restrictions was made during the weekly conference call among fire officials throughout the Upper Colorado River watershed.”

“Boulder Community Health’s cardiology team recently became the first in Boulder County to implant patients with the world’s smallest pacemaker,” reports The Boulder Daily Camera. “The device, known as a Micra Transcatheter Pacing System, is about the size of a vitamin capsule and weighs about as much as a dime, according to BCH Boulder Heart’s Dr. Sameer Oza. This summer Oza and his team have implanted two patients with the tiny pacemaker system.”

“A jury took just over two hours to rule CSU did not violate the law in its dealings with a former professor who sued for retaliation after she complained she was sexually harassed,” reports The Coloradoan in Fort Collins. “The jury of two women and four men unanimously ruled computer science professor Christina Boucher engaged in protected action when she complained about sexual harassment and the culture for women in the computer sciences department and filed a complaint with the university’s Office of Equal Opportunity.”

“Former Fremont County Undersheriff Ty Martin will dust off his gun and badge and come out of retirement to serve as the county’s interim sheriff,” reports The Cañon City Daily Record. “Martin was appointed to the office during Tuesday’s Fremont County Board of Commissioners meeting, replacing Jim Beicker whose term was set to expire in January. Beicker decided to step down early in order to have some downtime and be with his wife. Martin and Beicker both received a standing ovation from a packed board room during Tuesday’s meeting. Beicker was presented with a proclamation by the commissioners, recognizing him for his more than 30 years of law enforcement service in Fremont County, nearly 16 of those years as sheriff.”

“If America’s enemies launch a cyber attack, a Colorado senator’s bill would give them something new: guaranteed consequences,” reports The Gazette in Colorado Springs. “Republican U.S. Sen. Cory Gardner penned a measure that would label hackers attacking the U.S. as “critical cyber threat” actors, giving the White House a menu of sanctions that can target individuals, foreign agencies or nations. “We know the threat of cyber attacks is increasing each and every day,” said Gardner, who is pushing the bill with the help of U.S. Sen. Chris Coons, D-Del.”

“The most action-packed summer blockbuster in Colorado isn’t playing out on the silver screen, but around a rosebud’s roots: predatory wasp versus invasive Japanese beetle,” reports The Denver Post. “The unwelcome beetle — a six-legged, flying insect no bigger than a fingernail — haunts gardeners’ psyches with its ability to make healthy leaves look like Swiss cheese. Its chilling presence on plants across Colorado’s Front Range has been felt, and seen, particularly hard this year, prompting drastic measures from local horticulturists and entomologists who just want the beetle to croak. With that in mind, shipments of live predatory wasps were mailed this year from North Carolina to Colorado researchers, who released them into the wild with an assassin’s mission: Sniff out Japanese beetle larvae known as white grubs, burrow underground and lay eggs on the grubs that will eventually hatch, eating the infant beetles.”

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“If the Weld County District Attorney makes the call, a jury could decide if the Colorado man accused of killing his pregnant wife and two daughters faces the death penalty if convicted of the crimes,” reports The Coloradoan in Fort Collins. “Christopher Watts, 33, is accused of killing his wife, 34-year-old Shanann, and daughters, 4-year-old Bella and 3-year-old Celeste. He has been formally charged with nine felonies: three counts of first-degree murder, two counts of first-degree murder of a person under the age of 12 while being in a position of trust, one count of unlawful termination of a pregnancy and three counts of tampering with a deceased body.”

“At 80 and 83, respectively, Steamboat Springs residents Elaine and Win Dermody defy their age in physical appearance, spirit and spunk and active lifestyle,” reports The Steamboat Pilot. “From retirees skiing to ranchers wrangling well into their golden years, the Yampa Valley is home to a significant percentage of actively aging people. According to a senior population trends analysis published by Newgeogrphy in February, Steamboat Springs ranked first in the nation when it came to the biggest gains in its senior population, which increased nearly 80 percent from 2010 to 2016. So with our population graying at such a fast rate, what is the secret to living a long and healthy life?”

“The former owner of Waterfowl Haven Outfitters faces probation after being convicted earlier this year of menacing, a class-five felony,” reports The Greeley Tribune. “Jim Arnold, now 39, was sentenced in Weld District Court on Wednesday. He was charged with two counts of menacing in May 2017 after shooting at hunters near his property east of Kersey and yelling racial slurs at them in April 2017. After about an hour and a half of deliberation, Judge Timothy Kerns sentenced Arnold to three years of supervised probation, saying he cannot possess a firearm or have access to one.”

“Beckie Diehl paused this week during a walk across a field close to the rim of the Book Cliffs overlooking Grand Junction and kicked a foot toward a lone, sprouting tuft of grass,” reports The Grand Junction Daily Sentinel. “‘There is virtually no grass out here,’ she said, the small green growth only accentuating the brown, barren conditions surrounding it.”

“Longmont’s City Council has endorsed several proposed revisions to the city Fair Campaign Practices Act’s contribution and spending reporting requirements,” reports The Longmont Times-Call. “One of the changes, recommended by City Clerk Valeria Skitt after the council called on her to review the current campaign reporting code, would remove the current requirement that candidates for mayor or council seats file electioneering reports — documents they now must file whenever they incur a cumulative expense of $250 or more for campaign-related materials such as flyers, stickers, handouts, banners, mailings and advertising. That requirement resulted in $16,000 in total fines imposed on Sarah Levison for four violations in missing deadlines for filing electioneering reports during her unsuccessful 2017 mayoral campaign.”

“In Summit County, it’s hard to miss the forest for the trees when half the trees are dead,” reports Summit Daily. “The mountain pine beetle outbreak devastated pine forests in the High Country and across North America the past couple of decades, with ashen-grey blight running through forests all over North and Central Colorado. Back in 2007, a study was done in nine communities — Breckenridge, Dillon, Frisco, Silverthorne, Granby, Kremmling, Steamboat Springs, Vail and Walden — to explore resident’s perceptions of the forest, attitudes toward forest management and changes in behavior influenced by the beetle outbreak.”

“The hard-fought battle to put increased setbacks for new oil and gas drilling on the ballot has succeeded. Now, the fight for votes begins between environmentalists who want oil and gas wells farther away from occupied buildings and Colorado’s influential petroleum lobby, which has warned that mandatory minimum 2,500-foot setbacks would devastate the state’s oil and natural gas industry,” reports The Denver Post on the front page of today’s Loveland Reporter-Herald. “The proposed setback is an increase from current limits of 500 feet for homes and 1,000 feet for schools. The organizers for Initiative 97 submitted 172,834 signatures. The Colorado Secretary of State’s Office said Wednesday that the initiative has qualified for the ballot with an estimated 123,195 valid signatures based on a random sample reviewed.”

“New Eagle County Schools Superintendent Dr. Carlos Ramirez was shopping at Costco in Gypsum the other night when he ran into a group of teachers getting ready for the school year, which kicks off next week,” reports Vail Daily. ‘They were shopping for their classroom supplies. A teacher had a big bundle of tissue for her class,” Ramirez said. “It’s just astounding to me that Colorado educators have been able to do the work that’s needed with the (current) amount of funding. They’re at a point where they’ve squeezed every ounce of energy they have to provide the resources and services our kids need.'”

“New information about the criminal charges against a former investigator in the Pueblo District Attorney’s office shows he allegedly was part of a nationwide bookmaking ring and using the office to help run the illegal gambling,” reports The Pueblo Chieftain. “The information is in the indictment against Charles ‘Chuck’ Widup, which lists 21 counts of 8 state laws he is accused of violating. Widup was deputy chief investigator in the DA’s office during the period of the alleged crimes: June 1, 2016, until July 5, 2017. The Pueblo Chieftain obtained a copy of the 11-page indictment Wednesday. It had been under seal since January, when a grand jury issued it.”

“An attorney for a consortium of groups opposed to the United States Fish and Wildlife opening the Rock Flats National Wildlife Refuge to the public sent a letter to the agency on Monday demanding it close the refuge because at least one entrance has improper signs,” reports The Boulder Daily Camera. “[You’re] agency’s failure to comply with the Signage Plans and (National Environmental Protection Act) demonstrates your continuing inattention to legal requirements regarding the Refuge, and a carelessness that does the public a grave disservice,” attorney Randal Weiner wrote in a demand letter to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service dated Monday.”

“As Richard Krochta headed to the Cripple Creek Gold Mine before dawn Wednesday, he noticed smoke rising along U.S. 24,” reports The Gazette in Colorado Springs. “Backing up the company tractor-trailer he drives for Savage Services, he saw what was causing it: a sport utility vehicle that caught fire after going off the road and crashing into a tree a few miles west of the Teller County town . ‘I grabbed my fire extinguisher and called 911 right away, then started spraying the fire,’ said Krochta.”

“There is a new face at the forefront of City Hall. Cindy Foster Owens was sworn in as Cañon City’s new city clerk during the Aug. 20 city council meeting,” reports The Cañon City Daily Record. “I think the opportunity to be City Clerk is a chance to work in a capacity to make a positive impact on the community that I am proud to be a part,” Foster Owens said. “Helping address the challenges that our community faces is something that I look forward to.” Foster Owens is a fourth generation Coloradoan. She was born and raised in Fremont County, and she graduated from Florence High School in 1989.”

“Darlene Apodaca’s two young granddaughters didn’t go to school Wednesday,” reports The Denver Post. “With a 9-year-old boy from Denver’s Shoemaker Elementary School dying by suicide last week, and Tuesday’s shooting outside the DSST Cole Middle School that her granddaughters attend, Apodaca said it was all too much. “They weren’t up for it,” Apodaca said. “And neither was I. It’s only two weeks in, and I’m terrified.” A day after the shooting outside Cole left a juvenile male in critical condition, a person was stabbed a couple of blocks away, prompting the DSST campus — which houses middle, high and elementary schools — to go on lockout. Unlike the day before, when parents sobbed outside not knowing whether their children were safe because school officials hadn’t contacted them, Denver Public Schools notified families about Wednesday’s police activity.”

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“The city’s decision to close a homeless camp near Greenmount Cemetery last week has left some homeless residents feeling angry and exasperated with nowhere to sleep overnight,” reports The Durango Herald. “‘They are violating our civil rights,” said Micheal ‘Raven’ Cooper, a six-year homeless resident. The American Civil Liberties Union of Colorado sent a strongly worded letter to the city last week asking officials to suspend enforcement of the camping ban. The temporary camp near Greenmount closed Aug. 24. The letter said it was cruel and unconstitutional to punish residents for camping in public places when they have nowhere else to go. Some people have started sleeping during the day because of the camping bans said A.J. Singh, a homeless resident.”

“Hoping to additionally strengthen its stature among cancer care facilities in Colorado, Banner Health’s North Colorado Medical Center on Thursday announced a collaboration with the world-renowned University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston,” reports The Greeley Tribune. “The Greeley hospital’s cancer care unit now will be known as Banner MD Anderson Cancer Center at North Colorado Medical Center. The partnership went into effect Aug. 1, but the official announcement came Thursday night at a news conference and celebration at NCMC. A similar function was hosted earlier in the day to announce a Banner-MD Anderson collaboration at what now will be known as Banner MD Anderson Cancer Center at McKee Medical Center in Loveland.”

“School District 51 Board of Education members did not release an investigative report into the cost of an administration reorganization as originally planned on Thursday night, postponing discussion and any official action until tonight,” reports The Grand Junction Daily Sentinel. “The board initially called a special meeting for Thursday to discuss “the nature and cause or causes of the reported discrepancy between the actual cost of the superintendent’s reorganization of the district’s administrative and support staff and the cost information previously provided to the Board of Education regarding such reorganization” and “personnel matters regarding the superintendent in light of the aforementioned investigation.”

“Construction started this week on a new 20-mile, $44 million steel pipeline that will deliver water from Carter Lake in Larimer County to the city of Boulder, town of Berthoud, and Left Hand and Longs Peak water districts,” reports The Longmont Times-Call. “Work on the pipeline, known as phase two of the Southern Water Supply Project, is being overseen by Northern Water, which manages Carter Lake as part of the Colorado Big-Thompson Project. Once complete, the pipeline will improve water quality and delivery reliability compared to the open, above-ground Boulder Feeder Canal that currently brings water from Carter Lake to Boulder Reservoir.”

“The voluntary fishing closure on the Yampa River from Chuck Lewis State Wildlife Area through Steamboat Springs is now an all-day closure,” reports The Steamboat Pilot. “Colorado Parks and Wildlife is asking anglers to explore other fishing holes to protect trout and other aquatic life in the stream as flows in the Yampa fall. Kris Middledorf, area wildlife manager for Parks and Wildlife, said trout have evolved to function best in 50 to 60 degree Fahrenheit waters. Higher temperatures slow feeding and make the fish more susceptible to disease.”

“When a mental health advisory committee with representation from the Roaring Fork and Eagle River valleys was formed, its members discussed numerous issues pertaining to the topic of mental health, which has already generated a national discussion,” reports The Glenwood Springs Post-Independent. “The committee, which includes health professionals, parents and those who have been affected by mental health, identified many pertinent concerns for schools in the neighboring valleys, but highlighted one in particular. ‘School-based counselors was the overwhelming need,’ Eagle County Commissioner Jeanne McQueeney said. ‘Schools are really in charge of educating our children. They’re not really experts in mental health, and what they needed was people who could respond when kids are in crisis.'”

“Call ’em the final 16,” reports The Pueblo Chieftain. “Sixteen candidates have been certified to run for Pueblo mayor by the city clerk’s office, which notified the final two qualifiers Thursday. Those two are Alex Lucero-Mugatu and Z. Marie Martinez. That’s a smaller field than the 22 candidates who turned in voter petitions, which needed 100 valid signatures from city voters to get on the ballot. Six were disqualified during petition verification. All the candidates will gather Thursday to draw for their name’s position on the ballot and the City Council will have a special meeting at 5:30 p.m. to approve the ballot.”

“The possibility of a municipal broadband network connecting Loveland internet users faster and cheaper has people asking a lot of questions, especially: how?” reports The Loveland Reporter-Herald. “Loveland locals had the opportunity to ask their questions of city staff members and community members of the Loveland Communications Advisory Board Thursday evening during a public meeting at the Loveland Chamber of Commerce, 5400 Stone Creek Circle. But, only two community members — including the Reporter-Herald — attended. The following is a summary of answers to questions experts say they think the public might still have about what is proposed.”

“City Council voted unanimously late Wednesday night to move forward with new rules for accessory dwelling units in Boulder that will allow less parking and bigger structures in exchange for limited rent, in an attempt to provide housing for the city’s middle-income earners,” reports The Boulder Daily Camera. “Most of the 11 regulation changes — including expanding occupancy and allowing ADUs in more zones — will apply to either market-rate or rent-restricted units. But key changing in parking requirements and size will only apply to affordable dwellings. The compromise comes from a proposal by councilmen Sam Weaver and Bob Yates advancing the arguments of community members that the hoped-for proliferation of ADUs should provide affordable housing. Capping rents provides much-needed middle-income housing, Weaver said. “It keeps it in the target range of the people we claim to be trying to serve.”

“After more than 360 days in a dark, top-secret storage facility somewhere in Silverthorne, thousands of rubber ducks are reportedly rearing to hit the water this weekend in Breckenridge,” reports Summit Daily. “‘They definitely are,’ said Elisabeth Lawrence, director of community relations for The Summit Foundation, two days ahead of the nonprofit’s biggest fundraising event of the year. ‘These ducks are ready to go.’ A longstanding Summit County tradition, the Great Rubber Duck Race has supported the community for over three decades now with Saturday marking the 31st running of the rubber ducks in Breckenridge.”

“Fremont County Economic Development’s TechSTART is opening the door for students who want to get some valuable hands-on learning in the fields of science, technology, engineering and math,” reports The Cañon City Daily Record. “Yumi Sakamoto, 18, is a tech intern with a dream to one day be a video game programmer. She graduated from Cañon City High School in May and has spent the summer as an unpaid intern with math instructor and computer programmer Gregory Carlson, who is based at FEDC TechSTART.”

“Despite a summer of drought and fire, the season’s fall colors appear to be on schedule — maybe,” reports Vail Daily. “In this part of the state, peak leaf season hits between roughly the last week in September and the first week in October. Thanks mainly to cooling temperatures and declining sunlight, northern areas can put on their fall displays a little earlier, while the south’s colors may peak a bit later. Colorado State Forest Service Entomology Program Specialist Dan West said it’s hard to tell with any precision just how one leaf season may change from another. There’s a lot at play, from geography to elevation to weather to whether a hillside gets more or less daylight.”

“U.S. Rep. Doug Lamborn on Thursday called on the U.S. Department of Justice to investigate the Colorado Civil Rights Commission for what he calls its ‘anti-religious’ bias in its dealings with Masterpiece Cakeshop baker Jack Phillips of Lakewood,” reports The Gazette in Colorado Springs. “The Colorado Springs Republican accused state civil rights officials of “an attempt to discredit (Phillips’) religious beliefs and destroy his business” in a pair of cases targeting the baker, both of which sparked ire among religious conservatives. In the earlier case, Phillips refused in 2012 to make a custom wedding cake for two gay men, Charlie Craig and David Mullins. The state Civil Rights Commission determined that Phillips’ refusal violated anti-discrimination laws. The Colorado Court of Appeals upheld the determination; the state Supreme Court declined to hear the case.”

“U.S. Sen. Michael Bennet attacked the Trump administration’s “incoherent and backward-looking” marijuana policy following a news report that the White House formed a committee to push a negative narrative about the drug,” reports The Coloradoan in Fort Collins. “According to BuzzFeed News, the White House formed the Marijuana Policy Coordination Committee and instructed federal departments to provide “the most significant data demonstrating negative trends, with a statement describing the implications of such trends.'”

“Ten-year-old Roane Nitta drifts into another realm when he reads a good book, something that doesn’t happen when he watches television or plays video games,” reports The Denver Post. “When I find a book that I like, I’m not even aware of the world around me,” said Roane, a fifth-grader at Sierra Elementary School in Arvada. He’s pulled mostly toward science fiction, but he also reads about ancient mythology or any other books that spark an interest. A schoolwide culture of letting students at Sierra read what they want while earning good grades doing it is one of the reasons educators believe boys at the Jefferson County K-5 are catching up to girls on English language arts exams. This year, Sierra’s boys even surpassed girls in combined grades fourth-through-sixth on the statewide reading and writing test.”

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“Xcel Energy’s plan to turn away from coal-fired energy by decommissioning two units at its Comanche Station is being watched by energy-industry observers as a potentially landmark judgement about changing the U.S. power grid towards renewable energy,” reports The Pueblo Chieftain. “When the Colorado Public Utilities Commission voted last week to approve Xcel’s Colorado Energy Plan, the story immediately spread across energy news sites and put the national spotlight on Xcel and Pueblo. Renewable energy supporters immediately celebrated the PUC’s approval for Xcel to replace 660 megawatts of coal-fired power with 1,100 megawatts of wind power, 700 megawatts of solar and 275 megawatts of battery storage — as well as purchasing another 360 megawatts of gas-fired power.”

“The idea to melt a gun down and remake it into a gardening tool came from Sandy Hook, when 20 kids aged 6-7 and six adults were killed in the 2012 school shooting,” reports The Greeley Tribune. “Yet the idea also came decades ago from perhaps the most important core belief of the Mennonite church. “We work to ensure that we practice peace every day in our lives,” said Zach Martinez, the pastor of the Sojourn Mennonite Church, which has about 25 members in Greeley, as well as up to 50 in Fort Collins. “The question is, what does that peace look like?” Martinez will host a RAWtools event in Greeley at 11 a.m. Saturday at the First Congregational Church parking lot. He and the founder of RAWtools, Mike Martin, will reforge a gun into a garden tool, probably something that looks like a hoe.”

“Lafayette City Council will convene a discussion today on the city’s prairie dog policy, according to an agenda for the meeting,” reports The Longmont Times-Call. “Though it’s unclear if city leaders plan to make any changes, or even discuss the policy itself. According to spokeswoman Debbie Wilmot, officials will most likely decide what to do with two potential relocation efforts: a pending removal of a colony near a city-owned water utility property that was scuttled earlier this summer and a potential relocation near the city’s future solar garden site. In July, officials were forced to halt the removal of a colony — located south of Baseline Road and west of Rowena Place, near a water utility property — and release the trapped rodents after residents complained the caged animals were left sitting out in the scorching sun.”

“Firefighters worked to contain the Irwin Fire south of Hayden on Monday as officials expected to reach full containment on the Murphy Fire northwest of Hayden late Monday,” reports The Steamboat Pilot. “‘It was a team effort,’ Routt County Emergency Operations Director David “Mo” DeMorat said. All five fire protection districts in Routt County fought the fire along with firefighters from neighboring Craig Rural Fire Protection District and federal partners. ‘We appreciate all the help that we got from our partners.'”

“Despite efforts to save the program, a long-standing addiction recovery program run by The Salvation Army in Grand Junction will close later this month,” reports The Grand Junction Daily Sentinel. “The nonprofit agency suffered several setbacks this year that led to the demise of the already overextended recovery program that has helped hundreds of Western Slope residents break free of drug and alcohol addictions during its 40-year run. A fire in mid-March at the men’s home at 903 Grand Ave. displaced 16 men who had been living there, but the agency later found housing closer to The Salvation Army’s headquarters, 1235 N. Fourth St. The program, which costs about $500,000 a year to operate, was on track to sink the nonprofit agency $1 million in debt by next year, said Salvation Army Capt. Steve Stan-eart.”

“Author Anthony Doerr wraps a larger message about the power of technology into two smaller worlds, those of a blind French girl and of a German orphan pressed into service, during World War II in his Pulitzer prize-winning novel, “All the Light We Cannot see,'” reports The Loveland Reporter-Herald. “Advertisement The children’s experiences in the war that had far-reaching impacts around the globe are connected by the cutting-edge technology of the time — radio. Though the novel takes place about seven decades ago, the message about the power of technology is pertinent still today, and in fact, it was today’s technology that inspired the book, said Doerr, who will talk about his novel in Loveland on Sept. 24 as part of the communitywide Loveland Loves to Read.”

“Just 63 days separate you and the end to all the horrible political advertisements that are about to take over your televisions, mailboxes and social media accounts. But during these two months of uninterrupted noise, Colorado voters will make decisions that are sure to shape Colorado — and the nation — for years to come,” reports The Denver Post. “Will Colorado elect its first Republican governor in 12 years by choosing Walker Stapleton, or will the state take a step closer to becoming a Democratic stronghold by selecting Jared Polis? Is this the year a Democrat knocks off U.S. Rep. Mike Coffman? Or are Coffman’s retail politics — a campaign style of selling oneself and one’s policies by talking to as many voters as possible — strong enough to rebuff the so-called “blue wave” that Jason Crow hopes will help him secure a seat in Congress? These are a few of the questions The Denver Post is asking this election season — questions only you can answer by voting.”

“Back in November 2016 when local voters approved school construction projects up and down the valley, completion seemed to fall in the distant future,” reports Vail Daily. “The future is now. Opening ceremonies and receptions are scheduled for Wednesday, Sept. 5, for Eagle Valley Elementary School ($23.1 million) and Eagle Valley Middle School ($25 million) and Thursday, Sept. 6, for Eagle Valley High School ($31.2 million). “I’m excited for the students and staff to return to school and invite the entire community to visit our beautiful new campus on Third Street and the significant addition at the high school on Sept. 5 and 6. These are wonderful legacy assets for the community,” Eagle County Schools Superintendent Dr. Carlos Ramirez said.”

“Fears regarding youth football participants suffering long-term brain damage are changing the way the game is played and raising questions about the sport’s future,” reports The Coloradoan in Fort Collins. “Participation in the city of Fort Collins’ football program for children in grades 3-6 dropped 40 percent in one year and 73 percent over the past 10 years, recreation supervisor Marc Rademacher said Wednesday. And the Northern Colorado Pop Warner Association program, which had eight teams a half-dozen years ago, only has enough players to field one team this season, a league spokesman said.”

“Authorities captured two escaped inmates Monday who somehow scaled the walls of Territorial Correctional Facility,” reports The Cañon City Daily Record. “According to a press release from the Cañon City Police Department, George Roloff, 41, and Luke Tanner, 61, escaped from Territorial on Monday morning and attempted to elude officers. The CCPD responded to Territorial at 10:30 a.m. after a report that the two men had escaped from the prison. Authorities were able to locate Tanner, who attempted to run from officers, according to the press release. He was detained and transported to Fremont County Jail.”

“The University of Colorado’s Board of Regents has scheduled a special meeting to discuss for the first time the official search for President Bruce Benson’s replacement,” reports The Boulder Daily Camera. “The meeting will be Wednesday in Denver. In July, Benson announced he would retire effective July 2019. On Wednesday, the regents will recess into executive session to discuss the presidential search, after which they’ll convene a public session and potentially take formal action, such as electing a search committee chair and vice chair from their ranks. “What I expect is the board will be discussing some of the immediate tasks in front of them, including selection of a chair of the search committee, selection of a search firm and composition of the search committee,” CU spokesman Ken McConnellogue said.”

“Veloy and Michael Montano, who have fallen victim to two roofing scams in the past five years, say they feel robbed of more than just their money,” reports The Gazette in Colorado Springs. “One of those botched jobs left carbon monoxide steadily leaking into their home for months. The leak led to chemical poisoning that’s unraveled some of Michael’s basic cognitive abilities and left him unable to work, according to a lawsuit the couple filed in 2015 against the now-defunct roofing company that did the repairs. These days, Michael’s movements are slow and his speech is soft. He no longer can drive, enjoy 3- to 5-mile runs several times a week, or play the guitar while singing along with Veloy, whom he met while performing in a band when they were young. “I did have an active life. And I’d love to have it back,” he said. The Montanos, Security-Widefield residents who are in their 70s, are among the many households that have been targeted by “storm chasers” — companies that invade an area after extreme hail and weather events. The Pikes Peak region has been battered by several such storms this summer.”

“Southwest Memorial Hospital is struggling financially, but a robust recovery plan has been implemented to right the ship, top managers told a crowd of 50 concerned citizens and staff at a recent board meeting,” reports The Cortez Journal. “Two organizations – the public Montezuma County Hospital District and the private nonprofit Southwest Health System – are responsible for hospital management.”

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“The oil and gas boom could soon make its first mark on northeast Denver — or, rather, beneath it,” The Denver Post reports. “Several drilling companies have submitted plans in recent months for operations near Denver International Airport and along the eastern border of Aurora. Pads with dozens of wells would be clustered along the open fields of Adams County, including one proposal about 4,000 feet northeast of Green Valley Ranch. Oil drillers are racing for opportunities even as the eastern metro booms with new suburban neighborhoods. Axis Exploration, the company that’s proposing some of the wells closest to Denver, wasn’t immediately available for comment. However, Matt Samelson, an environmental law attorney who works on oil and gas issues for municipal governments, said the industry’s interest will force Denver and its neighbors to face some big questions.”

“Garfield County’s seniors are an active lot — and it’s not just walking to the supermarket or playing bridge. Colorado ranks second in the nation in physical activity by people over age 65, and Garfield County’s forever youngsters are contributing to that impressive ranking,” reports The Glenwood Springs Post-Independent. “Hal Sundin, 92, long-time member of the skiing, hiking and biking “100 Club,” will finish out this hiking season clocking over 100 miles. Sundin, who has climbed all of Colorado’s 14ers (14,000-foot peaks), leads the club’s hiking group with a total 7,200 miles.”

“Longmont City Council on Tuesday night began scrutinizing the $87.92 million in additions, repairs and upgrades to the city’s infrastructure staff has recommended be included in the proposed 2019 budget,” reports The Longmont Times-Call. “No one spoke at the study session’s public comment period about the proposed capital improvements package for next year or suggestions for a five-year, 2019-2023 Capital Improvement Program that has a projected $217.75 million price tag.”

“Every iconic Steamboat Springs tradition — each now a familiar staple on the local calendar — began as a first event,” reports The Steamboat Pilot. “And this weekend, Bike Town USA gets to bear witness to its newest first event, the inaugural Steamboat Bike Fest. Bike Fest is a celebration of two-wheeled activity and culture that kicks off Thursday, Sept. 6 and rolls on through Sunday, Sept. 9. It’s all inclusive of bike type and skill level, with events highlighting Steamboat’s most popular trails and most striking mountain and ranch landscapes. The festival is hosted by Bike Town USA, a nonprofit organization with the mission to stimulate economic growth through cycling, engage the community in cycling culture and promote safe cycling. Bike Fest, which is supported by more than a dozen local sponsors, is set to become the group’s most significant fundraiser of the year.”

“On Saturday and Sunday, Frisco will host Fall Fest, a celebration of the town’s restaurant scene and art community at the Frisco Historic Park and on Main Street,” reports Summit Daily. “In its fifth year, the “Flavors of Frisco” on Saturday from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. will highlight Frisco’s food scene with samples of signature dishes from more than 12 Frisco restaurants. Saturday’s activities will also include concerts with Salem Acoustic and Burn It Blue, a free art project for children and adults and other children’s activities. There will also be a beer garden featuring Germany’s Ayinger and Weihanstephan beers, and Coyote Gold will be on hand serving up Colorado’s own “Microbrew of Margaritas.” The beer and margarita garden will benefit the Friends of the Dillon Ranger District.”

“Preliminary 2018 ratings and performance frameworks released by the Colorado Department of Education indicate that Pueblo City Schools (D60) now has more schools operating on the Performance level — the state’s highest accountability rating — than ever before,” reports The Pueblo Chieftain. “And as a district, D60 retained its Accredited with Improvement Plan rating, with 47.9 percent out of a possible 100. (Last year, the district’s percentage was 48.2).”

“Police have arrested an 18-year-old Loveland man in the shooting death early Tuesday morning of a 17-year-old man at a north Loveland home,” reports The Loveland Reporter-Herald.

“Local schools started classes the Tuesday after Labor Day, Sept. 4,” reports Vail Daily. “With tens of millions of dollars of new and renovated buildings opening to students for the first time, about the only glitch was the bells in a middle school, which might be the most First World problem local students will deal with through the entire 2018-19 school year. OK, and construction crews ruptured a gas main at Eagle Valley Middle School on Tuesday afternoon. Students were evacuated to the Eagle United Methodist Church on Second Street. All students and staff were safe, school district officials said.”

“Fremont Adventure Recreation will host two upcoming trail workdays and needs the community’s help,” reports The Cañon City Daily Record. “The first workday will be from 5:30 to 7:30 p.m. Friday and will focus on trail cleanup in the South Cañon Trails area. Last month’s heavy storms have eroded and deposited debris in some areas. Individuals will meet at the Ecology Park trailhead at 5:30 p.m. and will hike in to the affected areas. Participants will meet afterward at Cañon City Brews & Bikes for a free beer and appetizers. Interested parties must sign up online in order to ensure that enough tools and group leaders are available.”

“A rare river restoration project in the Upper Colorado River Basin near Grand Lake is in danger of being stopped because of a lawsuit by environmentalists,” reports The Boulder Daily Camera. “The restoration project has been proposed to compensate the West Slope for environmental damages to the Upper Colorado River caused by a large Front Range water storage project known as Windy Gap Firming. Sponsored by the Northern Colorado Water Conservancy District, the new storage project would bring more Colorado River water from Grand County to rapidly growing, water-short towns on the Front Range, including Lafayette, Longmont, Louisville and Broomfield, among others.”

“Just before Kevin Rudnicki, 20, left for a Sunday morning hike on Mount Herman, his mother said, she reminded him about slain cyclist Tim Watkins,” reports The Gazette in Colorado Springs. “Watkins, 60, was shot last September during a routine ride on that mountain. ‘It was the last thing I said to (Rudnicki) before he left,’ Melissa Reynolds said. ‘I said, ‘Make sure you have your pocketknife with you, because this is where Tim died a year ago. It’s not safe. Just be aware.’ Rudnicki, a junior at the University of Wyoming who grew up in Palmer Lake, has not returned. At least 80 people were searching Tuesday, said Brian Kinsey, incident commander, with 20 search and rescue volunteers and at least 60 community volunteers.”

“The Ignacio School District improved its rating from the Colorado Department of Education for 2018, one of six low-performing districts in the state to earn an upgrade,” reports The Durango Herald. “The ratings come in part based on students’ performance on the Colorado Measures for Academic Success tests.”

“Northern Colorado is poised for a winter weather switch-up. Odds are increasing for an El Niño winter, and maybe an El Niño fall, too,” reports The Coloradoan in Fort Collins. “We haven’t had an El Niño winter, when waters warm near the equatorial Pacific, since 2015-16. That means this winter could be markedly different from our last two La Niña winters, which brought Fort Collins mostly mild temperatures and sporadic, lighter-than-average snowfall. Our last El Niño winter offered about-average temperatures and ample snowfall.”

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“One year after the Trump administration rescinded the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, many young Coloradans who relied on it to attend school, apply for work permits and pay taxes without fear of deportation are now living court case to court case as they wait to learn their fate, according to immigration experts,” reports The Denver Post. “DACA, the Obama-era program that has allowed 17,000 Coloradans and hundreds of thousands of Americans brought to the United States illegally as children to have a legal presence in this country, was rescinded on Sept. 5, 2017. Since then, a series of lawsuits have attempted to determine the legality of the program, leaving many recipients scrambling to renew their applications while they still can — and shutting out those who wanted to apply for the first time.”

“Months-long fire restrictions are falling like timber across Summit County as the Board Of County Commissioners decided on Tuesday to remove the Stage 1 restrictions in unincorporated areas of the county,” reports Summit Daily. “The county’s decision to remove Stage 1 fire restrictions, announced on Wednesday, maintains consistency with other local jurisdictions in and around Summit County, including U.S. Forest Service lands. Shortly after the county’s decision, Breckenridge announced that Mayor Eric Mamula signed a proclamation Wednesday, also removing the town’s Stage 1 fire restrictions. Soon after, officials in Frisco, Silverthorne and Dillon confirmed they too have all lifted the restrictions.”

“It took 8-year-old Brycen Zerby a while to catch up with his sisters as they walked out of Frontier Academy one day during the first week of school this year,” reports The Greeley Tribune. “His pastor, Eric Ebbinghaus, who was picking his own kids up from school, noticed that he was taking a while. So when he finally came out of the school, Ebbinghaus asked him, “Hey, dude, what happened? Your parents have been waiting.” Brycen, a redhead remembered for being outgoing and occasionally ornery, looked at him and replied with this: “I was having an important conversation.”

“The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission has set itself a target deadline of late-November 2019 to decide on the application for the Jordan Cove liquefied natural gas project in Oregon and an associated pipeline,” reports The Grand Junction Daily Sentinel. “The agency and its chairman, Kevin McIntyre, say in a news release that it has established environmental schedules for reviewing 12 LNG projects, reflecting its efforts to streamline its review process for applications for such projects as the number of applications grows along with their complexity. “These efforts have helped to ensure that FERC will be equipped to process applications in a timely and expedient manner without compromising its statutory obligation to ensure safety and environmental protection,” FERC said in its release.”

“A private oil and gas industry group views a lawsuit filed jointly last week by the Boulder County Commissioners and the city of Lafayette against a state commission and a drilling operator as ignorant of property rights,” reports The Longmont Times-Call. “The suit, filed in Denver District Court, names the Colorado Oil and Gas Conservation Commission — which reviews applications to drill wells across the state — and drilling operator 8 North as defendants, and is centered around the former giving a green light to the company to horizontally drill 52 wells through 4,000 acres in east Boulder County. While the county and Lafayette allege the state commission failed to hold 8 North to the proper standard of proving it owns enough mineral rights in the proposed drilling areas, the Colorado Oil and Gas Association industry group claims no current rule requires drilling applicants to show mineral rights title opinions.”

“Don Gore, 87, plans to continue working as a Steamboat Resort ski instructor at least until he is 100, and he hopes to be skiing even longer,” reports The Steamboat Pilot. “There’s a man on the East Coast who is still skiing at 104, Gore has heard, and he’s determined to beat that record. Since Gore first tried skiing in 1955, it’s all he ever wanted to do. He’s been working full-time on the mountain for 28 years, after moving here from a ski resort in Washington where he worked for 25 years.”

“Nearly 80 percent of schools in Pueblo County School District 70 are performing at the highest level established by the state,” reports The Pueblo Chieftain. “That’s according to the recently released Colorado Department of Education’s preliminary ratings and performance frameworks for 2018, which show that 18 of 23 D70 schools have attained the level of Performance, the highest of four tiers. The district also retained its Accredited status — the second highest rating — with a 58.8 percent out of 100. This is an improvement from 2017’s percentile mark of 55.9 percent.”

“Residents of Loveland discussed their thoughts on how the city should be prioritizing spending with members of City Council at an open public meeting Wednesday,” reports The Loveland Reporter-Herald. “Councilors Don Overcash and Dave Clark of Ward IV and Steve Olson of Ward III hosted the meeting at the Lakes at Centerra Clubhouse, 4555 Long Pine Lake Drive as part of a series of Ward IV councilor town halls. Topics raised included controlling growth, incentivizing businesses to town that provide good jobs, lessening dense traffic, a new recreation center, encouraging self-generatingsolar, preserving parks and open spaces and closing gaps in the Recreation Trail.”

“After nearly a full summer of fire restrictions, Eagle County will drop all fire restrictions as of 12:01 a.m. Friday, Sept. 7,” reports Vail Daily. “The move comes thanks to cooler days and nights, a bit more rainfall and higher relative humidity and moisture levels in grasses and trees. Still, it’s very dry. The decision to drop all of Eagle County’s fire restrictions came following a weekly regional conference call among fire officials throughout this part of the Colorado River basin.”

“The Boulder Valley school board is supporting a statewide ballot initiative that would raise an estimated $1.6 billion for the state’s 178 school districts,” reports The Boulder Daily Camera. “Supporters say Amendment 73 will both increase revenue to cash-strapped school districts and create a more sustainable funding model. The money would increase the base funding for school districts, as well as pay for full-day kindergarten and more preschool seats while giving districts more money for special education, second language and gifted students.”

“Some of the largest proposed housing developments in Fort Collins are ‘absolutely’ jeopardized by a potentially yearlong delay on a key funding mechanism,” reports The Coloradoan in Fort Collins. “Among the projects is the 4,400-unit Montava development that was expected to include affordable housing and is proposed on one of the city’s last developable tracts of land. The Fort Collins City Council on Tuesday delayed voting on resolutions to create metro districts for three developments representing about 6,000 total proposed housing units in the northeast of the city. The districts add an extra layer of property tax on eventual home buyers and property owners to pay for public infrastructure.”

“A task force meant to tackle rising auto thefts in the Pikes Peak region was winging it when they followed a stolen vehicle to an east Colorado Springs apartment complex where an El Paso County deputy was killed in a shootout, according to a 907-page report police released Wednesday,” reports The Gazette in Colorado Springs. “The Beat Auto Theft Through Law Enforcement task force, comprised of officers from the El Paso County Sheriff’s Office, Colorado Springs Police Department and Colorado State Patrol, had encountered the suspect car thief, Manuel Zetina, by chance, task force members’ accounts showed. The officers had gathered for a briefing Feb. 5, as they did most Mondays, before setting out on their usual routine search for stolen vehicles. Sometimes they search for specific vehicles; other times they check theft hot spots and use a license plate reader to scan for stolen cars.”

“To the eye, things look pretty normal on Birch Street, south of Elm Avenue, but many residents are saying their noses are detecting a different story,” reports The Cañon City Daily Record.
“Since Aug. 1, residents in the Lincoln Park neighborhood have noticed an odor that they say is causing some to fall ill, and others to send their children to live temporarily elsewhere. Josh Hinton moved to his home on Birch Street with his wife and children two years ago. It was about a month ago when he smelled a potentially toxic odor. “It was definitely a very chemical smell,” he said. “I feel that I knew exactly what it was — that it was a meth lab.” He called law enforcement and learned that others in the neighborhood also had made the same call that evening, so deputies were already in the neighborhood.”

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“As in most cities, jaywalking is a common sight in Colorado Springs. Even the most law-abiding citizens do it from time to time,” reports The Gazette in Colorado Springs. “But Colorado Springs police are warning that jaywalking also is one of the most frequent causes of fatal crashes in the city — along with aggressive driving, impaired driving and street racing. Of the 35 fatalities reported to police through Wednesday, seven of them have involved pedestrians. In previous years, there have been as many as 11.”

“The use of body cameras by Durango Police Department officers is slated to begin in early November with a 30-day trial, and public comment on policies that will guide their use began with a town hall meeting,” reports The Durango Herald. “‘In a meeting with officers, the main question we got was: When are we going to get one,’ said Cmdr. Ray Shupe at the town hall held Wednesday at the Durango Community Recreation Center and attended by a half dozen residents.”

“School District 51’s Board of Education selected three finalists for the post of interim superintendent on Thursday, picking a former District 51 administrator and two former superintendents from the Roaring Fork Valley and Colorado Springs,” reports The Grand Junction Daily Sentinel. “Matt Diers, the former executive director of high schools and academic options for District 51, Norman Ridder, a former Colorado Springs superintendent, and Diana Sirko, a former Roaring Fork School District superintendent were all selected as finalists for the interim job.”

“Boulder County in July struck an agreement with the owner of the deserted and crumbling former Great Western Sugar Factory just southeast of Longmont that mandates upkeep of the property’s fencing and signage to deter trespassers,” reports The Longmont Times-Call. “But county officials this week said the unsafe building remains uncompliant. The county’s focus on preventing people from entering the building sprung from two fires in the structure since 2016, including most recently on Dec. 25 last year. While firefighters determined the building was too unsafe to enter for investigating the cause of either blaze, Dick Thomas, the sugar factory’s owner since 1980, believes kids sparked them.”

“Two Ohio banks are out $15,800 after someone cashed four bad checks containing account information belonging to an account managed by the Routt County Treasurer’s Office,” reports The Steamboat Pilot. “‘The banks who cashed them are the ones that are out the money,’ Chief Deputy Treasurer Patrick Karschner said. On Aug. 29, three checks totaling $10,800 were cashed at Park National Bank. The next day, a fourth check for $5,000 was cashed at HTM Area Credit Union.”

“Following a full summer of stringent fire restrictions, Garfield County fire districts and the White River National Forest have decided to lift all restrictions for unincorporated private lands and area public lands starting Friday,” reports The Glenwood Springs Post-Independent. “Fire restrictions will no longer be in effect for unincorporated areas of the county, as well as municipalities and all lands within the Colorado River Valley Field office of the Bureau of Land Management. Other area counties and municipalities have also announced that restrictions have been lifted. According to the Garfield County Sheriff’s Office, the joint decision was made by the county and public lands officials, along with the six fire districts serving Garfield County — Carbondale & Rural Fire Protection District, the Glenwood Springs Fire Department, Colorado River Fire Rescue, Grand Valley Fire, Gypsum Fire and the De Beque and Lower Valley Fire.”

“Mayoral candidate Larry Fancher will appear first on the November general election ballot and candidate Dennis Flores will appear in the 16th slot,” reports The Pueblo Chieftain. “The order in which the 16 mayoral candidates will appear on the ballot was determined Thursday morning at City Hall where the candidates each picked a number out of a box to see where their names would be listed. Before they picked their ballot position number, another drawing was held in which the candidates also chose numbers to determine in what order they would select their ballot position.”

“Kindergartner Justin Creque marched up to volunteer Cindy Gray and exclaimed, ‘I get a bike,’ then wrapped his arms around her neck,” reports The Loveland Reporter-Herald. “Justin was one of 200 students at Winona Elementary School who received brand new bikes and helmets Thursday through the nonprofit Wish for Wheels. Everyone enrolled in kindergarten, first and second grades at the school chose a shiny set of black and green wheels to take home. ‘It’s amazing,’ said Janesa Murray, whose daughter Amaia, a kindergartner, received a bike. ‘We are feeling very blessed. … Having a brand new bike is like Christmas.'”

“About two years ago, Ty Starks and his dozens of teammates on the Greeley West football team were each tasked with raising $1,700 in two years for a trip to Florida,” reports The Greeley Tribune. “How does a high school sophomore raise that kind of money? While raising money for last week’s season opener, this collection of mostly 16- and 17-year-olds did everything from collect old Christmas trees and turn them into mulch to babysitting for couples during Valentine’s Day. But for Starks — and no doubt many of his cohorts — the most gratifying, and perhaps the most fruitful, of the odd jobs was working with injured horses over the summer at a farm northwest of Greeley near Severance.”

“Nederland Town Marshal Larry Johns glanced outside his window earlier this week to look at the aspen — and noticed they seemed ‘more grey-black than green,'” reports The Boulder Daily Camera. “Welcome to the onset of foliage season 2018, which in some areas appears to be starting early, but might not be quite the stuff of picture postcards, at least as compared to some other years. ‘We are seeing some yellowing, but not any real change,’ Johns said. ‘It looks like, to me, we are seeing drying of the leaf ends. I don’t think it’s going to be a good leaf season.'”

“Breckenridge’s parking ambassadors — the people who write the tickets — have issued more than twice the number of citations over previous years, even though the vast majority of those won’t ever get paid,” reports Summit Daily. “Contracting with a private company, Breckenridge turned over parking enforcement responsibilities to Interstate Parking in November. A couple positions were eliminated from the town’s community service department in the transition, though no workers were laid off thanks to reassignments and attrition.”

“Financing options for a proposed stormwater capital improvement plan were discussed during Wednesday’s General Government meeting. With three council members absent and two culvert studies pending, the committee agreed to meet again in mid-October to review the study results for the Hydraulic Ditch and Dawson Ranch, as well as to resume talks on financing options and potential projects,” reports The Cañon City Daily Record. “The total estimated amount to take care of all the city’s stormwater system improvements is about $75 million. City Administrator Tony O’Rourke said in order to take care of the problem without financing, stormwater fees would have to increase by 2,000 percent. To jumpstart the program, City Finance Director Harry Patel presented the option of investing $8 million in stormwater projects in 2019, 2020 and 2021 with incremental stormwater fee increases.”

“A magistrate set a $125,000 bond for an 18-year-old accused of killing another teen in Loveland, despite pleas from his stepfather for a lower amount,” reports The Coloradoan in Fort Collins. “Gabriel Jesus Romero Ventura is accused of shooting and killing 17-year-old Aric Whaley in the early morning hours of Tuesday in the 3000 block of North Duffield Avenue in Loveland. He appeared via video conference from the Larimer County Jail. Whaley died from a gunshot wound to the chest, according to Larimer County Coroner’s Office.”

“Michael Browning was a professor at the University of Colorado Health Sciences Center when he started producing antibodies to use for his research in neuroscience,” reports The Denver Post. “The National Institutes of Health, which had provided funding, suggested he start commercial production so other scientists would have tools to study proteins and their connection to diseases. In the late 1980s, Browning’s inventory of antibodies was small enough to fit on one shelf of a freezer. Now, his company, PhosphoSolutions, produces more than 350 types of antibodies. The small vials are shipped to labs around the world. And instead of one shelf in one freezer, vials in stacks of metal boxes fill huge chest freezers in his company’s lab. Browning credits the Fitzsimons Innovation Community, a biosciences facility on the University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus in Aurora, for allowing him to build the company while continuing to teach and conduct his research.”

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“Methamphetamine use made a deadly comeback in El Paso County and across Colorado last year while festering in the shadow of the nation’s opioid epidemic,” reports The Gazette in Colorado Springs. “Meth-related deaths in the county nearly doubled from 2016 to 2017, from 36 to 67, while meth ranked among the fastest-growing drugs in fatalities elsewhere in the state. The rise in meth deaths helped push Colorado’s drug fatalities above 1,000 in 2017 for the first time on record — hundreds more than the state’s traffic death toll for the year.”

“A national nonprofit that bills itself as boosting public support for law enforcement is fundraising off of Fort Collins’ supposed sanctuary city status,” reports The Coloradoan in Fort Collins. “The problem: Fort Collins has not formally declared itself a sanctuary city. ‘The City of Fort Collins does not have policies or procedures to shelter illegal immigrants, nor does Fort Collins Police Services have restrictive policies in regard to prosecuting illegal immigrants,’ a letter from Mayor Wade Troxell and City Manager Darin Atteberry to the National Police Association reads. ‘Fort Collins Police Services cooperates with the enforcement of federal immigration law.’ A sanctuary city generally limits its cooperation with federal immigration authorities. Fort Collins Police Services policy prohibits officers from asking about immigration status of crime victims and witnesses or taking action against them based on immigration status. The policy does not prohibit cooperation with federal, state or local law enforcement and government agencies.”

“Erie’s leadership may soon hand over the reins of oil and gas reform to its citizens,” reports The Boulder Daily Camera. “Two months after enacting a moratorium on all new drilling through the rest of the year, trustees on Tuesday will convene a discussion on the possible formation of an oil and gas ad-hoc citizen group to address certain aspects of the issue moving forward, officials say. The criteria for how such a committee would be formed, how it would operate, or what specific issues it would advise on and what weight it would carry has yet to be decided; Town spokeswoman Katie Hansen said Tuesday’s discussion would likely center around those questions.”

“State health officials are discouraging people living in areas of oil and gas development from getting their blood tested for possibly related pollutants, saying environmental monitoring is the better way to respond to such concerns,” reports The Grand Junction Daily Sentinel. “Air monitoring around those oil and gas sites really is the best approach,” Sean Hackett, oil and gas liaison for the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment, said at a recent Garfield County Energy Advisory Board meeting.”

“Longmont’s city staff last week posted an incorrect version of a ‘Firearms Awareness and Safety Day’ proclamation that its mayor plans to read Tuesday night, he said Sunday,” reports The Longmont Times-Call. “The version of the proclamation the city posted as an attachment to the agenda item for Tuesday night’s council meeting ‘is not the document I approved,’ Mayor Brian Bagley said. Bagley said the proclamation he intends to issue emphasizes the need for responsible gun ownership and the safe storage and use of firearms, a proclamation Bagley said he did not want to stir up renewed arguments between gun control activists and gun ownership rights advocates. Bagley said he, as Longmont’s mayor, has the final say on any proclamation he reads at council meetings. He said he thought the original version presented to him “would cause too much potential drama” in the midst of ongoing local and national debates over gun ownership and gun control. The proclamation the city posted online last week — one that Bagley said did not contain his revisions — still contained some of the original language the mayor said was submitted by Longmont resident Jerry Britton, with co-sponsors identified by Britton as Rod Brandenburg, owner of Grandpa’s Pawn & Gun shop in Longmont, and Rally for Our Rights, a Second Amendment advocacy organization.”

“When the Honor Flight Northern Colorado trip to Washington D.C. began Sunday morning with the boarding of buses at the Embassy Suites in Loveland, then a ride to Denver International Airport, the lineup of veterans was scheduled to be: 113 who served during the Vietnam War. 7 who served during the Korean War. 3 who served during World War II,” reports The Greeley Tribune. “Let that last number sink in. Three. For many years, we’ve heard and said it about American World War II veterans. We’re losing them. Those who served and fought against the forces of Germany and Japan. Before we know it, they will be gone.”

“Bessemer Park was transformed into a medieval realm of lords, ladies, barons, baronesses and knights this weekend as the small park on Northern Avenue hosted the 2018 Outlands Fall Crown Tournament,” reports The Pueblo Chieftain. “The two-day event saw more than 300 people from the Kingdom of the Outlands – a region of the Society for Creative Anachronism (SCA) that spans as far north as Wyoming and as far south as Texas – feasting, frolicking, dancing and sword fighting in an event resembling a medieval combat tournament.”

“A handful of Summit County citizens are emerging as advocates for an indoor athletics facility — also called a field house — that they say would be a great benefit for a wide range of players,” reports Summit Daily. “The timing of the latest push for a field house comes as an intergovernmental group comprised of the county and towns of Breckenridge, Frisco and Silverthorne is gathering information about the need, programming, feasibility, funding options and possible locations for such a facility.”

“A body recovered on Emerald Mountain on Sunday morning is believed to be the body of a Steamboat Springs man who was reported missing on Saturday, Sept. 8,” reports The Steamboat Pilot. “Authorities believe the deceased is 64-year-old Marc Sehler, who was last seen at about 9 p.m. Friday, Sept. 7, according to a news release issued by the city of Steamboat Springs. Sehler’s wife, Gretchen, reported him missing around noon Saturday. Steamboat Springs Police Department officers opened an investigation and requested assistance from Routt County Search and Rescue.”

“On Sept. 13, 2013, Joyce Kilmer lost her home, nearly all her belongings and — most importantly — her neighbor and friend, Evelyn Starner, when floodwaters rushed through their small canyon community of Cedar Cove,” reports The Loveland Reporter-Herald. “Kilmer and Starner had been trying to get to safety when Starner returned to her house to get something just before it split apart.”

“Suicide does not discriminate. It affects people of all ages, races and genders from all walks of life, statuses and religions,” reports The Cañon City Daily Record. “About 200 participated in the second annual Out of the Darkness Fremont County Walk on Saturday along the Arkansas Riverwalk in an effort to bring awareness to suicide prevention and to honor those they’ve lost to suicide.”

“When the votes are tallied in the Avon Town Council election in November, the four winning candidates could set the town’s direction for years to come,” reports Vail Daily. “The Avon Town Council is a seven-member body, and issues that come before the council are decided upon based on a four-person majority. Four seats are up for grabs, with eight candidates hoping to fill them. Two of the candidates are incumbents seeking re-election.”

“Laureen Gutierrez was part of the last-stand attempt to block Donald Trump from earning the party’s nomination at the Republican National Convention in Cleveland,” reports The Denver Post. “Now, nearly two years into President Trump’s first term, the chairwoman of the Mesa County party can be spotted with a life-size cutout of him at GOP events around this Western Slope town. “Everybody is really pleased with what he’s accomplished in such a short time,” Gutierrez said as Grand Junction bustled with visitors in town for the annual Club 20 gathering of statewide politicians and regional leaders. “I think he’s doing fantastic.” Gutierrez’s growing admiration for the president — including his active Twitter account — holds true for many Grand Junction residents. Voters in the state’s 11th-largest county overwhelmingly supported Trump during the general election: 64 percent checked his name on the ballot. He lost statewide by about 5 points.”

“An 8-mile natural gas pipeline and a handful of wells are being proposed in the Fosset Gulch area, east of Bayfield,” reports The Durango Herald. “The project – the Northern Extension Pipeline and associated Fruitland Coal Gas Horizontal Drilling Project – is proposed by Petrox Resources Inc. and is up for public comment until Sept. 28. Because much of the proposed development would occur on National Forest land, the U.S. Forest Service is preparing an environmental analysis, which includes a list of preferred actions and alternatives, and opportunity for public comment. According to the Forest Service’s preferred action, the project would consist of a 16-inch natural gas pipeline and a 4-inch pipeline to carry produced water that would be buried across National Forest, state and private land near the HD Mountains. The project would be mostly located in Archuleta County, just east of the La Plata County line.”

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“Ahead of meetings that could lead to changes in how the U.S. Olympic Committee governs individual sports, the organization on Monday announced big changes in its board of directors,” reports The Gazette in Colorado Springs. “The top board post goes to Susanne Lyons, who filled in as CEO this year after a scandal-driven shake-up at the Colorado Springs headquarters. With Lyons heading the board and new CEO Sarah Hirshland on the job, the USOC will be led by women for the first time.”

“The thing is, Jeff Eyser knows some, maybe even more than some, of the shows he works on are trash,” reports The Greeley Tribune. “He worked on “Bad Girls Club,” for 15 of the 17 seasons of it, and the show was about as classy as the title suggests. Eyser, who was raised here and graduated from Greeley Central High School in 2002, now does a lot of work for MTV. MTV does good things, but it’s also the channel that produces “Jersey Shore,” a huge hit but not exactly Masterpiece Theater. The thing is, Eyser doesn’t necessarily like reality shows, but he does like working on them. They allow him the most creativity for what he does. They also give him a way to show off what he does. And he’s good at what he does. He’s successful at it, and it’s a good, fun way to make a living.”

“A federal judge dismissed the case of a lawsuit an energy company brought over the government’s cancellation of oil and gas leases in the Thompson Divide area, about two and a half months after a settlement was reached in the case,” reports The Grand Junction Daily Sentinel. “Wilderness Workshop staff attorney Peter Hart said in a news release that the dismissal of the case in a Sept. 4 order by U.S. District Court Judge Robert E. Blackburn ‘is another day to celebrate in our long campaign to protect the Divide.'”

“Holli Stetson helped cement her late father Gerry Boland’s memory Monday as she and three elected officials, including Gov. John Hickenlooper, shoveled the final scoops of dirt to secure a newly planted crab apple tree’s roots in the ground in Lyons,” reports The Longmont Times-Call. “The ceremonial planting in Boland’s honor capped a memorial to the 2013 flood, hosted by one of the hardest-hit towns. The event both celebrated progresses made and commemorated losses suffered across Colorado, including Boland’s death. About 100 people, including about a dozen high school students who were permitted to attend, gathered in the rehabilitated Bohn Park to reflect on the disaster and the ensuing recovery five years later. Before he and Sen. Michael Bennet and Lyons Mayor Connie Sullivan helped plant the tree, Hickenlooper joined several officials from local governments and state and federal agencies that funded the recovery efforts in Colorado — including more than $300 million in Boulder County — in addressing the gathering.”

“1North’s vegetables are fueled by the sun — and some fish poo converted into aquaponic fertilizer,” reports The Steamboat Pilot. “At the new solar aquaponic farm in north Hayden, garden operator and CEO Jay Hirschfeld hopes to sell his tilapia, microgreens, herbs and vegetables to restaurants in Steamboat Springs. Soon, he also wants to sell some tree fruits, but, first, his olive, fig, lime and other fruit trees need to mature.”

“The Roaring Fork Valley lost an icon last Tuesday when writer, historian and western personality Anita Witt took her final ride into the sunset,” reports The Glenwood Springs Post-Independent. “Witt was a true cowgirl, from her upbringing in Wichita, Kansas, to her five decades living on her ranch in Missouri Heights outside of Carbondale. A graduate of Oklahoma State University, Witt taught physical education for two years before riding after her dream of being an entertainer.”

“In the days that followed the fateful events of Sept. 11, 2001, Capt. David Bentley, a firefighter and EMT with the Freeport (NY) Emergency Rescue Company 9, was dispatched to lower Manhattan,” reports The Pueblo Chieftain. “We did not respond on the 11th,” Bentley said. “We were held in quarters, not knowing if there be would other attacks surrounding New York City. We had to be ready to respond to wherever. Armed U.S. fighter jets would be patrolling the skies, even over the suburbs of Long Island.” Bentley, along with Assistant Fire Chief John Wensley and four fellow crewmen, joined 21 heavy duty rescue rigs from Long Island, with an objective to provide support and lighting for a mission that was, tragically, more recovery than rescue.”

“A sculpture titled ‘Shimmering Hues to Solar Muse,’ scheduled to be placed on the side of Loveland’s new parking garage at The Foundry, had to be canceled due to metal price increases brought on by import tariffs and commodity speculation, city manager Steve Adams told the Loveland City Council via memo Friday,” reports The Loveland Reporter-Herald. “The sculpture was to feature the sun with a human face and wavy flames along two sides of the new garage, which is now open to the public. The sculpting team Michael Stutz and James Dinh of Los Angeles, Calif., notified the city of Loveland earlier this month that the higher prices meant the project scope needed to be shrunk by half, perhaps by installing art on only one of the two walls planned, scaling the sculpture smaller, or eliminating the lighting elements.”

“Streamflows in the Upper Eagle River Valley are approaching record lows this summer, the result of a continuing drought and summer monsoon rains that never came,” reports Vail Daily. “According to Diane Johnson, communications and public affairs manager for the Eagle River Water & Sanitation District, this year’s late-summer streamflows are currently below those recorded in 2002, the previous record-low year. In an email, Johnson wrote that September rains in that year boosted streamflows to near-normal levels. Those rains haven’t come this year.”

“The University of Colorado Board of Regents is set to vote Friday on policies defining academic freedom and freedom of expression,” reports The Boulder Daily Camera. “The regents are scheduled for a two-day board meeting Thursday and Friday at the Anschutz Medical Campus, which will include presentations from potential executive search firms for President Bruce Benson’s replacement Thursday and a vote on the policy changes Friday. The new policies, if approved, will take effect Jan. 1 and will outline for the first time how CU defines and differentiates between academic freedom and freedom of expression. ‘There has been a fair amount of dispute around the country about freedom of speech on college campuses and a misunderstanding about how it is that freedom of expression occurs on a college campus versus in a classroom,’ said Patrick O’Rourke, CU vice president of university counsel and secretary to the Board of Regents. ‘We recognized that there was enough going on nationally that it made sense for us to address this before we had a dispute.'”

“The Summit County commissioners are scheduled on Tuesday to take up a request from Vail Resorts seeking to keep 102 additional bunk beds for employee housing at Keystone Ski Resort for up to two more winters,” reports Summit Daily. “The county previously agreed to the company’s request to allow 102 additional beds, creating dorm-like accommodations, at the Tenderfoot housing project starting with the 2015-16 ski season. In the agreement, the resort was given permission to keep the bunk beds for up to three ski seasons, ending with the 2017-18 season. Vail Resorts is now looking to extend that agreement for up to two more years, but the county may be less than agreeable with officials previously warning the resort they would not allow the beds to become permanent.”

“The Cañon City School Board approved a resolution in support of Amendment 73 during Monday’s school board meeting,” reports The Cañon City Daily Record. “‘It’s an issue that touches both rural and urban (schools) throughout the state,’ Superintendent George Welsh said. Amendment 73 is a statewide school funding initiative that will increase income taxes for certain tax filers and business in order to stabilize and increase funding. Amendment 73 also will lower property taxes for business property owners, farmers and ranchers. The passing of Amendment 73 would increase Colorado’s total investment in public education by $1.6 billion annually and would grant $6 million to Cañon City School District each school year.”

“Denver made history in 1972, when its voters decided to reject the Winter Olympic Games that had been scheduled for the city in 1976,” reports The Denver Post. “Now, the spirit of ’76 is in the air again: A group of political organizers, including former Gov. Dick Lamm, are launching a campaign that could give Denver voters the ultimate decision on the city’s financial involvement in a potential bid for the Games. ‘Denver voters need a voice, especially when there’s more abundant resources,’ said Tony Pigford, an organizer of the new campaign and a candidate for Denver City Council. “Let them decide if they want to spend it on a really risky mega project.

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