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Mesa County counters proposal for 400,000-acre ‘monument’ with 30,000-acre proposal for Dolores River
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Approved, Local, The Colorado Sun

Mesa County counters proposal for 400,000-acre ‘monument’ with 30,000-acre proposal for Dolores River

By Jason Blevins | The Colorado Sun Mesa County has countered the call for a national monument around the Dolores River with plans for a much smaller national conservation area.  The Dolores Canyons National Conservation area would increase protections on 29,806 acres around the Dolores River in Mesa and Montrose counties. The proposal for a national monument around the river in the two counties calls for increased protection on 391,000 acres along the river.  Mesa County commissioners in May adopted a resolution opposing the national monument plan, which was crafted by river and environmental advocates asking President Joe Biden to use the Antiquities Act to create the Dolores Canyons National Monument. The commissioners in May pointed to existing protect...
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Legality of Colorado’s campaign donation limits to be tested by case with Greg Lopez as lead plaintiff
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Approved, State, The Colorado Sun

Legality of Colorado’s campaign donation limits to be tested by case with Greg Lopez as lead plaintiff

By Sandra Fish | The Colorado Sun A federal court judge will decide after the Nov. 5 general election whether Colorado’s state political donation limits for candidates are legal. In a trial that concluded Tuesday, three Republicans are challenging the limits enacted by voters in 2002 claiming they violate the First Amendment by limiting donors’ freedom of speech. They sued Secretary of State Jena Griswold in 2022 seeking to overturn the limits, though Senior U.S. District Court Judge John Kane rejected their attempt to suspend the limits immediately. Kane on Tuesday ordered attorneys for the plaintiffs, who work for the national nonprofit Institute for Free Speech, to file a summary of their case by Sept. 23. The Colorado Attorney General’s Office must file a response by Oct....
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Extreme heat in Colorado may have contributed to an extraordinary outbreak of bird flu in people
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Approved, State, The Colorado Sun

Extreme heat in Colorado may have contributed to an extraordinary outbreak of bird flu in people

By John Ingold | The Colorado Sun The outdoor temperature flirted with 100 degrees and heat advisories blanketed the region earlier this month as workers arrived at a commercial poultry operation in Weld County to start killing chickens. Of the 1.8 million egg-laying hens inside the operation’s barns, at least some were infected with highly pathogenic avian influenza — bird flu. The strain of the virus that is now circling the globe has shown a remarkable ability to infect all kinds of animals, from seals to skunks to mountain lions. But it spreads most rapidly and lethally in wild birds and domestic poultry. When a commercial flock is infected, standard practice is grim but efficient: Kill all the birds at the farm, devastating one operation in the hopes of stopping the virus and...
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Democratic state rep drops reelection bid, may make it harder for party to keep Colorado House supermajority
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Approved, State, The Colorado Sun

Democratic state rep drops reelection bid, may make it harder for party to keep Colorado House supermajority

By Jesse Paul and Sandra Fish | The Colorado Sun A Democratic state representative who was running for reelection in a toss-up district dropped out of the race Friday, which may make it that much harder for her party to maintain its supermajority in the Colorado House of Representative in the November election.  State Rep. Jennifer Parenti, an Erie Democrat who is in her first term, said she is dropping her bid because she “cannot continue to serve while maintaining my own sense of integrity.” “The two are simply incompatible,” she wrote in a statement, blaming personal agendas and special interests for making the job too difficult. READ THE FULL STORY AT THE COLORADO SUN
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Paralyzed mountain lion found in Colorado is first case of “staggering disease” in North America
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Paralyzed mountain lion found in Colorado is first case of “staggering disease” in North America

By Michael Booth | The Colorado Sun In May 2023, a homeowner in Douglas County was astonished to find a partially paralyzed mountain lion taking cover between her basement window well and a spruce tree, dragging itself forward with its front paws. The year-old female couldn’t stand up, a phenomenon clear in the video the owner took while safely inside the house. Wildlife officers tranquilized the debilitated lion, then euthanized her with a gunshot to the chest to protect brain cells for a necropsy.  After a year of studying the animal, researchers are declaring her the first North American case of “staggering disease” in a mountain lion, according to Colorado State University veterinarian and former Colorado Parks and Wildlife pathologist Karen Fox. READ THE FULL STORY AT...
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Invasive, fast-reproducing zebra mussels found in Colorado River near Grand Junction
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Invasive, fast-reproducing zebra mussels found in Colorado River near Grand Junction

By Michael Booth | The Colorado Sun Voracious zebra mussels appear to be spreading into the Colorado River near Grand Junction and infesting the Government Highline canal watering Mesa County farms, less than two years after the invasive species first appeared in a Western Slope lake, wildlife officials said Tuesday.  Western Slope officials called the news “devastating,” and are warning downstream water conservation partners beginning with Utah that the fast-reproducing mussels are likely on the way. Colorado Parks and Wildlife had led the charge to combat zebra mussels after finding the first lake infestation at nearby Highline Lake State Park in September 2022.  The zebra mussels strip plankton from the water en masse, depriving native species of vital food. The ...
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Poll: Colorado’s delegates to the Democratic National Convention are still backing Joe Biden
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Approved, National, The Colorado Sun

Poll: Colorado’s delegates to the Democratic National Convention are still backing Joe Biden

By Jesse Paul and Sandra Fish | The Colorado Sun They’re still ridin’ with Biden. For now.  The Colorado Sun on Thursday polled nearly 20 of the state’s delegates to the Democratic National Convention in Chicago next month, and none said they planned on not backing Joe Biden to be the Democratic nominee for president.  However, some said they didn’t think Biden is the best option amid questions about his mental fitness and ability to beat Donald Trump, while others declined to comment. Colorado will have 87 delegates to the Aug. 19-22 convention, including the state’s two U.S. senators and five U.S. House members. And while they are instructed to vote in “good conscience” to back Biden since he won the Democratic presidential primaries this year in a landslide, t...
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Political nonprofit tied to Jared Polis admits to violating state’s campaign finance laws, will pay $18K fine, reveal donors
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Approved, State, The Colorado Sun

Political nonprofit tied to Jared Polis admits to violating state’s campaign finance laws, will pay $18K fine, reveal donors

By Sandra Fish | The Colorado Sun A political nonprofit linked to Gov. Jared Polis has admitted to violating Colorado’s campaign finance laws and will pay an $18,000 fine and disclose its donors under a settlement agreement with state election officials. Boldly Forward Colorado, created in 2018 to pay for Polis’ transition team, donated nearly $352,000 last year to Property Tax Relief Now. That issue committee spent close to $3 million to promote Proposition HH, a ballot measure backed by Polis that would have overhauled Colorado’s property tax system and made big changes to state spending.  Voters overwhelmingly rejected the measure in the November 2023 election.  The Public Trust Institute, a conservative political nonprofit, filed the complaint against Boldly ...
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Colorado’s 11-foot tall, 27-foot-long stegosaurus to be auctioned by Sotheby’s July 17
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Colorado’s 11-foot tall, 27-foot-long stegosaurus to be auctioned by Sotheby’s July 17

By The Associated Press (via The Colorado Sun) The nearly complete fossilized remains of a 161-million-year-old stegosaurus discovered in Colorado in 2022 will be auctioned by Sotheby’s in New York next week, auction house officials said. The dinosaur that Sotheby’s calls Apex stands 11 feet tall and measures 27 feet nose to tail, according to Cassandra Hatton, Sotheby’s global head of science and popular culture. The stegosaurus, with its distinctive pointy dorsal plates, is one of the world’s most recognizable dinosaurs. Apex, which Hatton called “a coloring book dinosaur,” was discovered in May 2022 on private land near the town of Dinosaur. The excavation was completed in October 2023, Sotheby’s said. READ THE FULL STORY AT THE COLORADO SUN
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Southern Ute Indian Tribe sues Colorado governor, gaming division over sports betting
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Approved, State, The Colorado Sun

Southern Ute Indian Tribe sues Colorado governor, gaming division over sports betting

By Shannon Mullane | The Colorado Sun The Southern Ute Indian Tribe is suing Gov. Jared Polis and the director of the Colorado Division of Gaming, Christopher Schroder, saying the administration is illegally freezing tribes out of the online sports betting market, in part, to maximize state tax collections.  The federal lawsuit, filed Tuesday in U.S. District Court in Denver, alleges the state sought to exclude the tribe from internet sports betting by acting in bad faith, using delay tactics and belatedly making legal arguments that conflict with federal law and a state gaming compact with the tribe.  “Enough is enough,” Southern Ute Chairman Melvin Baker told Colorado lawmakers during an American Indian Affairs Interim Study Committee meeting Monday. “Litigation is not...
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