Rocky Mountain Voice

Menu

Approved

“YIGBY” bill to let churches build housing on their land fails without Senate support
No Comments
Approved, Colorado Politics, State

“YIGBY” bill to let churches build housing on their land fails without Senate support

By Marianne Goodland | Colorado Politics The campaign known as "YIGBY" - "Yes in God's Backyard" - to allow churches, school districts, colleges, and universities to build affordable housing on their land failed in the waning days of the Colorado legislative session.  House Bill 1169 would have required local governments to allow residential development on land owned by those institutions. The bill has sat in the state Senate, awaiting debate, since it cleared the Senate's Local Government and Housing Committee on March 27.  On Monday, its sponsors, Sens. Tony Exum, D-Colorado Springs, and Julie Gonzales, D-Denver, acknowledged the bill didn't have the votes to pass and asked that it be laid over to May 8, the day after the session's end, which effectively would kill ...
Read More
Judge blocks school board from removing explicit books, saying it’s unconstitutional to follow ‘conservative values’
No Comments
Approved, National, The Daily Signal

Judge blocks school board from removing explicit books, saying it’s unconstitutional to follow ‘conservative values’

By Tyler O'Neil  | Daily Signal A school board in Colorado cannot remove sexually explicit, profane, and “transgender” books from school libraries because the school board is conservative, according to a federal judge touted as the first openly lesbian judge west of the Mississippi. The ACLU’s Colorado chapter filed a suit on behalf of two minors, the NAACP Wyoming State Area Conference, and the Authors Guild, claiming that the school district engaged in viewpoint discrimination when removing the books. The judge granted a preliminary injunction in March, forcing the Elizabeth School District (in Elizabeth, a suburb southeast of Denver) to restore the books. Judge Charlotte Sweeney second-guessed the school district’s objections to the books’ contents, calling the o...
Read More
ICE, FBI, DEA take down fentanyl ring in Colorado tied to Honduran nationals
No Comments
Approved, kdvr.com, State

ICE, FBI, DEA take down fentanyl ring in Colorado tied to Honduran nationals

By Heather Willard | Fox31 DENVER (KDVR) — Five people were indicted by a Colorado grand jury on charges of possessing fentanyl with the intent to distribute, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Colorado. The indictment for the case cites five incidents between June 24, 2024, and April 15, 2025, wherein officials alleged that the defendants had either 400 grams or 40 grams or more of fentanyl and were intending to sell it. The office identified the defendants and their charges in the case as: Exor Omar Villanueva Raudales, aka “Brian, 36 Two counts of distribution and possession with intent to distribute 400 grams or more of fentanyl Two counts of distribution and possession with intent to distribute 40 grams or more of fentanyl Alex Yubini Can...
Read More
Pam Bondi reveals what the holdup is with Epstein file release
No Comments
Approved, National, The Daily Caller

Pam Bondi reveals what the holdup is with Epstein file release

By Harold Hutchison | Daily Caller Attorney General Pam Bondi told reporters Wednesday that the FBI is still reviewing “tens of thousands” of child porn videos that were in the possession of Jeffrey Epstein. Epstein committed suicide while awaiting trial after he was arrested in 2019 on sex charges. Bondi was asked about the delay releasing the documents pertaining to Epstein by a reporter after announcing plans for a press conference Wednesday. “The FBI, they’re reviewing… there are tens of thousands of videos of Epstein with children or child porn and there are hundreds of victims and no one victim will ever get released, it’s just the volume and that’s what they’re going through right now,” Bondi said. “The FBI is diligently going through that… I’ll call him later.” READ THE...
Read More
Hundreds of alleged sex predators arrested by feds — and AG Pam Bondi warns no one will escape justice: ‘We will find you’
No Comments
Approved, National, New York Post

Hundreds of alleged sex predators arrested by feds — and AG Pam Bondi warns no one will escape justice: ‘We will find you’

By Anthony Blair | New York Post More than 200 alleged child sex predators have been arrested in the past week under a new joint operation, Attorney General Pam Bondi and FBI Director Kash Patel announced on Wednesday. The 205 arrests, made as part of “Operation Restore Justice,” saw 115 children rescued across the US as part of the “historic” and “unprecedented” joint Justice Department and FBI operation, Bondi and Patel said. Some of the suspects charged include an illegal immigrant from Mexico, a Minnesota state trooper, and a DC police officer, according to Patel. READ THE FULL STORY AT THE NEW YORK POST
Read More
Trump orders DOJ to take ‘all necessary action’ to secure release of Tina Peters
No Comments
Approved, National, The Post Millennial

Trump orders DOJ to take ‘all necessary action’ to secure release of Tina Peters

By Hannah Nightingale | The Post Millennial President Donald Trump on Monday called for Tina Peters, a former Colorado county clerk who was sentenced to nine years in jail in October over charges related to the 2020 election, to be freed. He said that he has directed the Department of Justice to take "all necessary action" to secure her release. "Radical Left Colorado Attorney General Phil Weiser ignores Illegals committing Violent Crimes like Rape and Murder in his State and, instead, jailed Tina Peters, a 69-year-old Gold Star mother who worked to expose and document Democrat Election Fraud," Trump wrote. "Tina is an innocent Political Prisoner being horribly and unjustly punished in the form of Cruel and Unusual Punishment." "This is a Communist persecution by the Radical ...
Read More
Cardinals enter Sistine Chapel for papal conclave under total digital lockdown
No Comments
Approved, National, Washington Examiner

Cardinals enter Sistine Chapel for papal conclave under total digital lockdown

By Timothy Nerozzi | Washington Examiner VATICAN CITY — On Wednesday afternoon, red-hatted clerics who carry the same weight and dignity as princes within the Catholic Church entered the Sistine Chapel for the papal conclave to choose Pope Francis‘s successor. At 5:46 p.m. local time, the doors were sealed.The 133 cardinals will remain in total seclusion within the chapel and its adjoining buildings until they choose from among themselves the next bishop of Rome, the servant of the servants of God and Vicar of Christ on Earth. As the clock struck 4:30 p.m. in Rome, the screens in St Peter’s Square came to life, and the booming Latin remarks of Cardinal Secretary of State Pietro Parolin rang out through Vatican City. READ THE FULL STORY AT TH...
Read More
“Burn it to the ground”: Rep. Keltie’s political metaphor for a Phoenix to rise from Capitol corruption
No Comments
Approved, Colorado Times Recorder, State

“Burn it to the ground”: Rep. Keltie’s political metaphor for a Phoenix to rise from Capitol corruption

By Erik Maulbetsch | Colorado Times Recorder As the legislative session comes down to its final days, one freshman Republican has harsh words for her Democratic colleagues. State Rep. Rebecca Keltie (R-Colorado Springs) in a Sunday evening interview on a libertarian podcast called her fellow legislators evil, soulless, and corrupt, before saying she thinks Colorado needs to be burned to the ground so Republicans can rise from the ashes. “I’ve never seen a group of people that are so … for lack of a better term, evil. I feel it when I come in there. I pray as soon as I enter the building. As soon as I enter that room, I pray. While I’m in there, I’m praying. I’ve never prayed so much in my life. … I went in there with an open mind of respect,” said Keltie. “I have lost — for almos...
Read More
Colorado gives $8 million tax credit to fuel “clean iron” plant in Jefferson County
No Comments
Approved, Local, The Colorado Sun

Colorado gives $8 million tax credit to fuel “clean iron” plant in Jefferson County

By Michael Booth | Colorado Sun A Boulder company with a patented method to take most of the carbon emissions out of the energy-intensive iron and steelmaking process will use $8 million from the inaugural state industrial tax credit to build a manufacturing plant in Jefferson County, officials said Tuesday.  The patented process produces “clean” industrial iron at the temperature of a cup of coffee, rather than the 1,200-degree Fahrenheit furnaces traditionally used in iron and steelmaking, according to Electrasteel Inc, known as Electra. Currently employing more than 130 people, Electra uses an electrochemical process and hopes to cut 30% or more of the carbon emissions from traditional production.  “We founded Electra here in Colorado to decarbonize a carbon-heavy industri...
Read More
Sturm: Wisdom gained after debating a Pronoun Policy as a theater company board member
No Comments
Approved, Commentary, State, Substack

Sturm: Wisdom gained after debating a Pronoun Policy as a theater company board member

By Melanie Sturm | Commentary, Substack What would you do if the state called you an unfit parent — not for hurting your child, but for refusing to pretend your daughter is your son? That’s the reality Colorado families could soon face under a bill advancing in the state legislature. And in Maryland, the Supreme Court is now weighing whether parents have any say at all over LGBTQ content taught in elementary school. Policies once dismissed as fringe are ubiquitous. Silence shouldn’t become complicity. Two summers ago, I saw where this leads — not while in a courtroom, but around a boardroom table. I’d served on the board of a beloved theater company for over two decades. Then one day, a concerned parent forwarded me the children’s program Pronoun Policy, which required kids ...
Read More