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This metro district charges 115 mills and is still behind on its bonds. A state audit found it isn’t alone.
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Rocky Mountain Voice, State, Top Stories

This metro district charges 115 mills and is still behind on its bonds. A state audit found it isn’t alone.

By Shaina Cole | Contributing Writer, Rocky Mountain Voice Homeowners inside the Riverdale Peaks II Metropolitan District pay one of the highest tax rates of any special district in Colorado. Their metro district levied 115.019 mills in 2024, good for fifth place on a list of eleven districts statewide charging 100 mills or more. That levy pulled in $428,566 in property taxes for the year. Riverdale Peaks II is one of 19 districts that told the state, in their own financial filings, that they have been or will be unable to make principal or interest payments on their debt as those payments come due.  It taxes its residents at more than 100 mills and still reports to the state that it can't keep up with the full payments on its bonds. That combination is the core finding o...
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Cherry Creek, Poudre among Colorado districts flagged for draining reserves
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Rocky Mountain Voice, State, Top Stories

Cherry Creek, Poudre among Colorado districts flagged for draining reserves

By Shaina Cole | Contributing Writer, Rocky Mountain Voice For years, the story of a Colorado school district in fiscal trouble has looked the same. Small. Rural. A few hundred students on the plains or up a mountain valley, squeezed by declining enrollment and a thin local tax base. This year the Office of the State Auditor put three very different names on that list: Cherry Creek, Colorado Springs 11, and Poudre. Three of the largest, most visible districts in the state, each newly flagged after missing two benchmarks tied to operating margins and a shrinking fund balance. The report, dated July 30, tracks the financial health of all 178 Colorado school districts across the three years ending June 30, 2025. It runs six ratios against each district. Miss two or more and you l...
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Davidson: The lockdown was an assault on the Bill of Rights
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Rocky Mountain Voice, Commentary, National

Davidson: The lockdown was an assault on the Bill of Rights

By Jay Davidson | Guest Commentary, Rocky Mountain Voice Fauci's testimony is evidence of how the Bill of Rights works now. In this referenced article, Jeff Tucker points out that the personification of the lockdown, Fauci, successfully used the Fifth Amendment to protect his freedom, writing, "It's actually quite inspiring to see how the Bill of Rights works in a case of such significance." But how did the breakdown in individual rights manifest? Was intent behind the panic or did certain people in power jump at the chance to use a crisis to gain control? Perhaps it was simply mass hysteria and no one was behind it and no one amplified it. The fact is much simpler: The pandemic led to massive loss of individual rights and enormous disruption of business transactions. Jeff ...
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The Discernment Weapon: Three Blind Mice
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Rocky Mountain Voice, Commentary, Devotional, Top Stories

The Discernment Weapon: Three Blind Mice

By Drake Hunter | Commentary, Rocky Mountain Voice Three blind mice! Three blind mice! See how they run! See how they run! I don't know about three blind mice, but I do know one thing: if three mice ever came running through our house, Sherrie might suddenly experience a miraculous recovery. I've never met anyone more afraid of mice than my wife. And I mean afraid. Sherrie has been confined to bed since last November, and these days it takes quite a bit of help to get her up and moving. But I'm fairly convinced that if a mouse scampered across the foot of her bed, she'd leap out, run downstairs, and leave me behind to deal with the mouse. I'm not recommending this as a therapeutic technique, mind you. But it does make me smile when I think about those three blind mice!  ...
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Federal vaccine rules just changed. Colorado’s school requirements didn’t.
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Rocky Mountain Voice, State, Top Stories, Uncategorized

Federal vaccine rules just changed. Colorado’s school requirements didn’t.

By RMV Staff | Rocky Mountain Voice When President Donald Trump signed an executive order establishing a new federal "Gold Standard" childhood vaccine schedule this week, it marked a major shift in federal vaccine recommendations. The administration's new framework reduces the number of diseases for which vaccines are routinely recommended for all children, moves several vaccines into high-risk or shared clinical decision-making categories, and encourages greater parental involvement in vaccination decisions. But for Colorado families, the announcement raised an immediate question: If the federal government has changed its recommendations, why haven't Colorado's school vaccine requirements changed? The answer lies in Senate Bill 26-032, legislation passed earlier this year ...
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Kids run the booths at two Front Range markets this month
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Rocky Mountain Voice, Local, Top Stories

Kids run the booths at two Front Range markets this month

By Shaina Cole | Contributing Writer, Rocky Mountain Voice Pricing a product. Pitching a stranger. Making change and counting the take at the end of the night. It is the kind of thing that rattles plenty of adults, and this month Colorado kids will line up to do it on purpose. Two Front Range markets give them the chance. The first runs Friday, Aug. 14, from 6 to 9 p.m. at Piney Creek Hollow Park on South Tower Road in Centennial. A second follows Saturday, Aug. 22, from 8 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. at the Douglas County Fairgrounds in Castle Rock, set up next to the Castle Rock Farmers Market. Both are open to young vendors ages 5 to 17. They are run by Kids Markets, the program formerly known as the Children's Entrepreneur Market. The pitch is simple. Kids build a real business and ...
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Weiser’s Blueprint: More offices, in the name of streamlining
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Rocky Mountain Voice, State, Top Stories

Weiser’s Blueprint: More offices, in the name of streamlining

By Shaina Cole | Contributing Writer, Rocky Mountain Voice Phil Weiser's plan for Colorado runs 109 pages. It promises, throughout the document, to make state government simpler, faster, and less tangled in its own rules. It also proposes a new set of offices, officers, and coordinating teams to carry it out. The Colorado Blueprint, the platform Weiser is running on for governor, tells voters he will cut red tape and streamline how the state operates.  Alongside those promises, he would appoint a Chief Innovation Officer, a Chief Housing Officer, a Chief Resilience Officer, a Director of Rural Affairs and Collaboration, and a new Office for Safe Communities to coordinate the agencies that already handle public safety.  Reading the document, the same theme shows up...
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Colorado law already protects Douglas County teachers. Why a union contract?
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Rocky Mountain Voice, Commentary, Local

Colorado law already protects Douglas County teachers. Why a union contract?

By Martha Carver | Guest Commentary, Rocky Mountain Voice You may be aware that the Douglas County Federation (DCF), the teachers’ union, is asking the Douglas County School District to engage in Collective Bargaining.  Before making a major shift in school governance, district leaders should recognize the protections already in place and require clear support from a majority of teachers.  But the most important question is what does this proposal actually mean for teachers? Collective bargaining agreements (CBA) are contracts between the union and administrators that cover teacher pay, benefits, seniority rules, transfer rights, evaluations, and grievance procedures.  Currently, teachers have the option to join the union, and this will not change if the S...
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Denver ballot measure would drop citizenship rule for police-fire oversight board
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Rocky Mountain Voice, Local, Top Stories

Denver ballot measure would drop citizenship rule for police-fire oversight board

By Shaina Cole | Contributing Writer, Rocky Mountain Voice This November, Denver voters will decide whether to change the city charter with a ballot question that never mentions the word "citizenship." The question they'll see asks whether the charter should be "amended to modernize the Civil Service Commission and Department of Safety by removing outdated language, giving City Council the ability to add duties via code, and providing for an extension of probation when required for medical, military, or other approved leave." Nothing in that sentence tells a voter that one of the things being removed is the requirement that the people who oversee the hiring of every Denver police officer and firefighter be United States citizens. But that is what the measure does. What the ...
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Colorado utilities said a regional grid would strengthen reliability. July 20 tested it.
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Rocky Mountain Voice, State, Top Stories

Colorado utilities said a regional grid would strengthen reliability. July 20 tested it.

By Shaina Cole | Contributing Writer, Rocky Mountain Voice On April 1, Colorado Springs Utilities and Platte River Power Authority, two of the utilities that initiated SPP's western expansion effort, joined other Colorado utilities in the Southwest Power Pool, a regional grid operator headquartered in Little Rock, Arkansas. Neither utility was legally required to join. Both chose to. Jason Frisbie, Platte River's general manager and CEO, said the move would help his utility "maintain the reliability and affordability that our communities and their customers expect." One hundred and ten days later, Frisbie was asking those same communities to hold off on running their dishwashers. "We are monitoring conditions and working closely with SPP regarding this emergency alert," Fri...
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