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The Hidden Trust Weapon: Olly, Olly, Oxen Free!
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Rocky Mountain Voice, Commentary, Top Stories

The Hidden Trust Weapon: Olly, Olly, Oxen Free!

By Drake Hunter | Commentary, Rocky Mountain Voice "Olly, olly, oxen free!" If you're smiling right now, you're probably remembering the same thing I am. Long before smartphones, video games, and streaming television, neighborhood kids had an amazing ability to entertain themselves. We'd ride our bikes until the streetlights came on, play baseball in empty lots, build forts out of scrap lumber, and, when the evening shadows grew just a little longer, someone would shout, "Let's play hide-and-seek!" The seeker would cover his eyes and begin counting while the rest of us scattered in every direction—behind bushes, under porches, between parked cars, anywhere we thought no one would ever find us. Of course, we weren't nearly as hidden as we imagined. Looking back, I can still ...
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Xcel says it has no affordability crisis. Its customers and regulatory filings tell another story.
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Rocky Mountain Voice, State, Top Stories

Xcel says it has no affordability crisis. Its customers and regulatory filings tell another story.

By Jen Schumann | Rocky Mountain Voice Every week, Carlos H. sits down with his bills and works out what his family can go without. Some weeks it is dinner. “I just opt out to say, hey, okay, maybe won’t be cooking up something tonight, so we can just make ends meet,” the Denver father said. Some weeks it is gas—a quarter tank instead of a full one, and the math of whether that gets him to the next payday. He has a 14-year-old daughter and a baby due in February. His electric bill runs $120 to $150 a month. A proposed Xcel settlement could push it higher. “We don’t have an affordability crisis,” Robert Kenney, president of Xcel Energy Colorado, told the House Energy and Environment Committee on April 23, arguing against a proposal to give regulators more power over how util...
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The rise of DSA, and a platform to rewrite the Constitution.
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National, Rocky Mountain Voice, Top Stories

The rise of DSA, and a platform to rewrite the Constitution.

By Shaina Cole | Contributing Writer, Rocky Mountain Voice Six thousand people started the Democratic Socialists of America in 1982. The number didn't move much for thirty years. Then, around 2016, it did. By July 4, 2026, DSA had 120,000 members, more than the Socialist Party of America ever had under Eugene Debs, whose dues-paying membership peaked back in 1912. Four days before that count came out, one of the new members, Melat Kiros of Denver, won a primary against a congresswoman first elected in 1996. The growth is one story. What the organization actually wants is the more important one. From 6,000 to 120,000 DSA was born from a merger, not a single founding moment. In 1982, the Democratic Socialist Organizing Committee, founded in 1973, joined with the New ...
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The case for Flock cameras: A proven tool Colorado shouldn’t abandon
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Rocky Mountain Voice, Commentary, State, Top Stories

The case for Flock cameras: A proven tool Colorado shouldn’t abandon

By Booker Lightman | Guest Commentary, Rocky Mountain Voice Police departments across Colorado have installed AI-powered Flock cameras to help them catch criminals. Not everyone is grateful. The fiercest opposition has come from the political Left, often driven by fears the cameras will aid ICE. These concerns led Denver to drop its contract with Flock, while a bill in the state legislature that would have required warrants for most searches of license plate data died in April after pushback from law enforcement.  Some on the Right have joined the anti-Flock crusade, concerned about the cameras’ supposed threat to privacy. Flock critics often claim the cameras are unnecessary and that the proper solution to crime is to hire more police officers. The people best placed to ...
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Colorado’s dirty voter roll: Final observations
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Rocky Mountain Voice, State, Top Stories

Colorado’s dirty voter roll: Final observations

By Mike O’Donnell | Guest Commentary, Rocky Mountain Voice  After six installments examining Colorado's voter registration system, Mike O'Donnell closes his series with additional observations from his review of the public voter roll and his final thoughts on what he believes should change to strengthen election integrity in Colorado. Errata By wandering through the public Colorado voter roll and grouping registrants by addresses OR by accessing the powerful (and free) ELLY program to identify potential anomalies, there are plenty of things that need to be fixed or cleaned up on Colorado’s voter roll.  And although the Secretary of State makes it more than challenging than it needs to be to clean up the voter roll, it doesn’t hurt to ask questions of county clerks or pu...
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Colorado’s primary audit is underway. Here’s what it checks—and what it doesn’t
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Rocky Mountain Voice, State, Top Stories

Colorado’s primary audit is underway. Here’s what it checks—and what it doesn’t

By Jen Schumann | Rocky Mountain Voice Before Colorado's June 30 primary results become official, counties across Colorado must complete one of the final steps required by state election law: a post-election risk-limiting audit. Mesa County completed its audit Tuesday. "Mesa pulled 115 with zero discrepancies," Mesa County Clerk Bobbie Gross told RMV. The audit compares randomly selected paper ballot cards with how the voting system recorded the votes on them. It does not review every part of the election. What the audit checks Colorado law requires a risk-limiting audit after every primary, general, coordinated, recall and congressional vacancy election. State law describes it as a statistical audit intended to reduce the risk of certifying an incorrect election outc...
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Polis’s auto insurance roadmap is working. It’s also avoiding the hard part.
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Rocky Mountain Voice, State, Top Stories

Polis’s auto insurance roadmap is working. It’s also avoiding the hard part.

By Shaina Cole | Contributing Writer, Rocky Mountain Voice Last November, Governor Jared Polis stood before cameras and announced a Roadmap to Reduce Auto Insurance Premiums. Colorado had the fifth-highest auto insurance rates in the nation. His administration had a plan. Eight months later, the state has hit most of its targets — and Colorado is still fifth. Polis built the roadmap around enforcement, education and infrastructure — plus legislation he had already signed. What it doesn't do is ask the legislature for anything new. There would be a public dashboard so Coloradans could watch it happen. Most targets were met. The ranking hasn't moved. What the roadmap doesn't address is a separate question, one that insurance industry analysts say explains why Colorado pays more ...
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The Tina Peters trial became a fight over whether the system could withstand public inspection.
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Rocky Mountain Voice, Commentary, State, Top Stories

The Tina Peters trial became a fight over whether the system could withstand public inspection.

By Joe Oltmann | Guest Commentary, Rocky Mountain Voice The American people have been told, over and over, to trust institutions that have not earned that trust. Not Republican institutions. Not Democratic institutions. Not federal agencies. Not state bureaucracies. Not corporate vendors. Not partisan prosecutors. Not judges who hide behind procedure while the public asks basic questions. Not media outlets that decide in advance who the villain is and then write every story backward from that conclusion. That is the frame through which the Tina Peters case should be understood. The establishment version says Tina Peters is an “election denier” who let an unauthorized person access Mesa County, Colorado election equipment. That is the sanitized institutional story. The people’s...
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Colorado’s dirty voter roll: The curious case of Apartment A503
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Rocky Mountain Voice, State, Top Stories

Colorado’s dirty voter roll: The curious case of Apartment A503

By Mike O’Donnell | Guest Commentary, Rocky Mountain Voice Questions about who belongs on Colorado's voter rolls extend beyond duplicate registrations. In Part 6, Mike O'Donnell examines how citizenship verification works, why he believes outside review is limited and how one Aurora apartment address became the most unusual pattern he encountered while reviewing Colorado's public voter roll. Noncitizen Registrants The very first question on the Colorado Voter Registration Form asks whether an application is a U.S. citizen or not. The answer to this first question is required, although if someone “forgets” to answer it, then because they also sign the declaration at the bottom of page 1, they are nonetheless presumed to be a U.S. citizen. An AI...
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