Schlossberg: Prop. 137’s backers also fund the outlets covering it

By Josh Schlossberg | Guest Commentary, Rocky Mountain Voice

Some Colorado media outlets conducting usually unbalanced, often counterfactual, and/or frequently censorious reporting on the Proposition 137 land grab are funded by the same corporate interests backing the ballot measure, its sponsors, and/or public lands extraction.

Colorado Sun, Colorado Newsline, and Colorado Politics have promoted a mostly one-sided and sometimes inaccurate view of a state ballot measure that could finance tens of thousands of acres per year of public lands logging under the 100 percent scientifically debunked guise of “wildfire prevention.”

Eco-Integrity Alliance is calling for media watchdog organizations such as FAIR, Columbia Journalism Review, and AllSides to launch investigations into media coverage that may be influencing Colorado voters leading up to an election.

Colorado Sun has received funding from Walmart/Walton family (Catena Foundation) and Gates Family Foundation.

Walmart money funds both Prop. 137 and ballot measure sponsors The Nature Conservancy, Western Resource Advocates, and Conservation Colorado, along with several of the measure’s NGO backers, including Trust for Public Land and Environmental Defense Fund.

Gates Family Foundation finances Colorado’s logging industry, “fuel reduction” logging which Prop. 137 would finance, as well as Prop. 137 sponsors The Nature Conservancy, Western Resource Advocates, and Conservation Colorado along with the measure’s NGO backers, including Trust for Public Land and National Wildlife Federation.

Gates Family Foundation also funds Colorado Media Project, which finances numerous media outlets that have for years conducted skewed reporting on forests, wildfire, and “fuel reduction” logging, including Boulder Reporting Lab.

Colorado Newsline is run by States Newsroom, which merged with Pew Charitable Trusts’ Stateline news service in 2023, receiving millions for the transition.

Pew Charitable Trusts, founded through Sun Oil/Sunoco fossil-fuel money, has long been notorious for funding NGOs that allow and/or promote public lands extraction, often under the guise of scientifically contested “fuel reduction” logging. Pew is backing Prop. 137 while funding measure sponsor Conservation Colorado.

Colorado Politics is run by Clarity Media Group, owned by conservative billionaire Phil Anschutz, who operates Anschutz Exploration Company, which extracts natural resources from public lands.

Eco-Integrity Alliance alleges that these and other Colorado media outlets are responsible for the following.

Publishing obviously false claims about Prop. 137—such as impossible “wildfire prevention” through logging—without any fact-checking or questioning.

Running stories promoting talking points of Prop. 137 backers without any opposing viewpoints or even wrongly insisting “no opposition” exists.

Refusing to report on or run opinion pieces documenting the overwhelming financial conflicts of interest of Prop. 137 sponsors and backers in terms of: government public lands extraction contracts or testifying against previous bills that would’ve actually protected communities from wildfire through scientifically proven home hardening (by rerouting some of the backers’ logging money).

Ignoring how the State Title Board allowed Prop. 137 to violate the Colorado State Constitution’s “Single Subject Rule” by lumping together three different categories (recreation, “conservation,” and logging) and how the Legislative Council refused to publish any “against” arguments in the voters’ Blue Book that mention science or ecological impacts.

Publishing opinion primarily in support of Prop. 137 (including from former U.S. Senator Mark Udall, neglecting to mention he’s the uncle of the measure’s registered agent) while rejecting dozens of opinion submissions from scientists, forest management analysts, and taxpayer advocates, with only one small media outlet in the state running a single opinion piece from the official ballot issue committee in opposition.

Even those media entities choosing not to run any news or opinion on the ballot measure have for years published a usually one-sided and often inaccurate narrative about wildfire and forests while promoting logging as a (false) “solution” despite the consensus of science showing it to be usually ineffective or even counterproductive for community protection.

Such outlets have done so while ignoring scores of press releases including direct quotes from peer-reviewed studies and photos of “fuel reduction” clearcutting and logging and sale of large-diameter trees by logging contractors, while refusing dozens of invitations from conservationists to tour logging sites or threatened forests.

Josh Schlossberg is with Eco-Integrity Alliance, a Colorado forest and wildfire watchdog group. The group’s reporting is at eco-integrityalliance.org and coloradosmokescreen.org.

Editor’s note: Opinions expressed in commentary pieces are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of the management of the Rocky Mountain Voice, but even so we support the constitutional right of the author to express those opinions.