Rocky Mountain Voice

Menu

Commentary

Speak up or step back: Why critics say Coloradans must engage with CPW now
No Comments
Colorado Accountability Project, Approved, Commentary, State

Speak up or step back: Why critics say Coloradans must engage with CPW now

By Cory Gaines | Commentary, Colorado Accountability Project Depending on where you get your news, you are probably by now aware that the CPW Commissioners, in a meeting that I’ve heard referred to as a “shit-show” by more than one person, voted to accept a petition by a monied, out of state group. If you missed it or want to hit the high spots again, I put a FencePost article on the meeting. That is the first link below.This vote came over the recommendations against the petition by their own director and other CPW employees.Why? From where I stand the reason’s pretty simple: the CPW Commissioners have been (by design from the governor’s office) “captured” by animal rights and environmental groups.This is not just an impression I have pulled out of thin air. Over and over w...
Read More
Denver’s growth dilemma: More housing, less breathing room
No Comments
Rocky Mountain Voice, Approved, Commentary, Top Stories

Denver’s growth dilemma: More housing, less breathing room

Neil Wolkodoff | Guest Commentary, Rocky Mountain Voice In the past, residents enjoyed Denver for a positive lifestyle and outdoor recreational activities. That was the past; is the push to control housing changing that for the worse? Regrettably, the answer is yes. Let’s start with the overzealous and yet misplaced idea that affordable housing, which increases density, is positive. You are correct: large, four-story apartment complexes now occupy nearly every large, vacant lot or former grocery store. The first issue is that adding density to a climate with limited airflow because of being in a basin is bad for health. More people, increased density and personal greenhouse gases, heat and waste increase. Has this made a difference? The health issue is that air quality affec...
Read More
Colorado Medicaid Crunch Leaves The Most Vulnerable Disabled Residents Facing Deep Cuts
No Comments
Complete Colorado, Approved, Commentary, State

Colorado Medicaid Crunch Leaves The Most Vulnerable Disabled Residents Facing Deep Cuts

By Jon Caldara | Commentary, Complete Colorado This is a selfish column. The legislature is about to hurt my disabled son. My son, Chance, has Down syndrome and a few years ago would have been labeled “retarded.” Then “developmentally delayed.” Now the hypersensitive prefer “intellectually disabled.” Whatever the term is this week, the reality hasn’t changed. This 21-year-old man cannot consistently count to five, can’t read and can’t write his own name. He needs constant supervision for choking risks. He still needs help toileting. And that’s just the start. Medicaid was designed for people like him, our most vulnerable. And I am grateful for it. In between passing laws barring misgendering and expanding tax credits to buy electric bicycles, the s...
Read More
Critics Question Why States Share Voter Data With Leftist Groups But Not DHS
No Comments
The Federalist, Approved, Commentary, National

Critics Question Why States Share Voter Data With Leftist Groups But Not DHS

By: Breccan F. Thies | Commentary, The Federalist ERIC has 25 member states and the District of Columbia — only three are run by Republicans. Each of the Democrat-run states has senators arguing against passing the SAVE America Act. Democrat senators claim it is an unconstitutional invasion of privacy that the SAVE America Act requires states to share voter rolls and requisite identifying information with the federal government in order to check for noncitizens, but many of their states already share the same data with left-wing third party organizations. Sen. Jack Reed, D-R.I., argued against the bill on the Senate floor, stating, “States would be required to report their full voter rolls to Department of Homeland Security and certify that there are no non-citi...
Read More
Colorado Legislative Malpractice
No Comments
Rocky Mountain Voice, Commentary, State, Top Stories

Colorado Legislative Malpractice

By Michael Hancock | Guest Commentary, Rocky Mountain Voice When Ideology Replaces Stewardship, the Patient Doesn’t Recover — It Declines There is a reason malpractice carries such moral weight in medicine. A physician is entrusted with the care of a patient. When that trust is violated—through negligence, arrogance, or ideological blindness—the consequences are not abstract. They are physical, measurable, and often irreversible. What we are witnessing in Colorado today is a different form of malpractice. Not medical, but legislative. The patient is the state itself—its economy, its infrastructure, its fiscal health, and ultimately, its people. And the pattern is becoming increasingly difficult to ignore: policies enacted not in service of long-term stability, but i...
Read More
What’s missing: Questions raised about immigration details in Colorado crime coverage
No Comments
Colorado Accountability Project, Approved, Commentary, State

What’s missing: Questions raised about immigration details in Colorado crime coverage

By Cory Gaines | Commentary, Colorado Accountability Project Free State Colorado: our local media ignores the fact that a sex offender is here illegally In a funny coincidence I noticed a couple of stories, one national and one local, about essentially the same topic. They’re both about how the media has a problem with selective attention.* In particular to the two different stories, it’s how the lefty media ignore the illegal immigrants do in this country. The first link below is to a Fox News op ed about this topic, spurred (though not limited to) the murder of Sheridan Gorman in Chicago by an illegal immigrant. Especially noteworthy was just how little—see the image heading this post—time the big networks devoted to her murder and the man committing it. Closer...
Read More
The Plain Truth Behind Voter ID, the SAVE America Act and Election Integrity
No Comments
Rocky Mountain Voice, Commentary, National, Top Stories

The Plain Truth Behind Voter ID, the SAVE America Act and Election Integrity

By Russ Minary | Guest Commentary, Rocky Mountain Voice “People who love sausage and respect the law should never watch either being made.” (Mark Twain) Congress has been dithering on a number of issues that impact legal, law-abiding US citizens and taxpayers. House and Senate reps from both parties are dragging their feet for various reasons. One issue under consideration is the Safeguard American Voter Eligibility Act or the SAVE America Act. If passed, this bill would require two major things: 1) that individuals must provide documentary proof of U.S. citizenship when registering to vote in federal elections, and 2) states must remove noncitizens from their official lists of eligible voters. FACT: Members of Congress routinely provide a valid form of ID before they can vote....
Read More
When “Protecting Seniors” Meets Fiscal Reality: A Self-Inflicted Crisis
No Comments
Rocky Mountain Voice, Commentary, State, Top Stories

When “Protecting Seniors” Meets Fiscal Reality: A Self-Inflicted Crisis

By Rep. Ken DeGraaf | Guest Commentary, Rocky Mountain Voice Any legislator who has opened their inbox lately has seen the urgent appeals: AARP warning that Colorado’s Senior Homestead Property Tax Exemption is under threat. The message is emotionally compelling—and fundamentally correct. Eliminating or weakening the exemption would amount to a tax increase on seniors, many of whom live on fixed incomes after decades of contributing to their communities. But what those emails don’t say is just as important as what they do. Because the current threat to the exemption did not emerge in a vacuum. It is the predictable result of a broader shift in Colorado’s fiscal philosophy—one that AARP itself has helped advance. A Record of Priorities—And Who Gets Left Behind If the curr...
Read More
As climate costs rise, will Colorado follow New York’s “breathing room” playbook?
No Comments
Colorado Accountability Project, Approved, Commentary, State

As climate costs rise, will Colorado follow New York’s “breathing room” playbook?

By Cory Gaines | Commentary, Colorado Accountability Project NY’s narrative on “breathing room” for climate mandates here in Colorado? I got the issue of Sarah Montalbano's energy newsletter about a week ago.** In it, Ms. Montalbano details how New York Governor Hochul recently mentioned how that state needs some "breathing room" on its self-imposed climate mandates. This is a site/newsletter dedicated to Colorado issues, so I will leave the rest of her newsletter there, save for one quote which will be relevant for us here. Quoting with links left intact: "Hochul blamed factors such as a 'global pandemic,' and 'some of the highest inflation we had seen in years,' for rattling supply chains, as well as a 'hostile' administration in Washington eli...
Read More
Denver in Decline
No Comments
Rocky Mountain Voice, Commentary, Local, Top Stories

Denver in Decline

By Tom Anthony | Guest Commentary, Rocky Mountain Voice My great grandpa excavated Federal Blvd and Colfax with mules and a scraper, his dad having been on the third wagon train into Denver in 1858. For many years I owned and developed Denver property out of the commitment: "Sustainable Cities People Love," my company motto.   On that purpose line I also took on the fight to remove the Shattuck Radioactive Site from south Bannock Street and get I-70 buried through the Elyria neighborhood, next to Swansea Elementary School. These were multi-year volunteer projects seen by many as impossible, and I made enemies. The City took targeted zoning actions against me that bankrupted my company and took my home.  Since I left Denver, a city that consistently vot...
Read More