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Hillman: Why Coloradans can’t have good roads
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The Gazette, Approved, State

Hillman: Why Coloradans can’t have good roads

By Mark Hillman | Commentary, The Gazette ’Tis the season when Colorado highways are teeming with summer travelers, all confronted with the inescapable reality that the state government has absolutely failed in its responsibility to maintain our highways. Last month, the American Society of Civil Engineers quantified this dismal state of affairs: Barely one-third of our state roads are in “good” condition, far below the national average. According to the Colorado Department of Transportation’s analysis, 71% of highway miles under state maintenance have less than 10 years of “drivability” remaining, including more than 800 miles where the drivability life is completely exhausted. Drivers in my home of Kit Carson County know those “exhausted” lanes very well. Interstate 70 just i...
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Homeless Crisis Deepens in Colorado Springs With 52 Percent Jump
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Local, Approved, The Gazette

Homeless Crisis Deepens in Colorado Springs With 52 Percent Jump

By Debbie Kelley | The Gazette A record-high spike of people living on the streets and in homeless shelters and supported housing programs in El Paso County is reflected in data released Monday from this year’s federally required Point-in-Time and Housing Inventory Count. The number of people countywide who described themselves as homeless on the night of Jan. 26 ballooned from 1,146 in 2024, to 1,745 people this year, according to the statistics presented by the survey administrator, Pikes Peak Continuum of Care, a group of service providers and other members. That’s a 52% increase year-over-year and tops the county’s 2018 record of 1,551. “This data should be interpreted with context and caution,” Becky Treece, chair of the governing board of the continuum of care said at a p...
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Colorado’s rural-urban divide revealed: 10 takeaways from the Rural Reckoning series
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The Gazette, Approved, State

Colorado’s rural-urban divide revealed: 10 takeaways from the Rural Reckoning series

By Vince Bzdek | The Gazette How bad is the rural/urban divide in Colorado? That’s what a team of reporters at Colorado Politics and The Colorado Network, our statewide collective of freelancers, set out to measure and understand. Through extensive interviews, data analysis and community voices, our journalists have documented the yawning gap between what rural areas contribute to the state through agriculture, energy production, tourism and outdoor recreation, and the attention, money and support they receive in the halls of the Capitol and the governor’s mansion. That gap has resulted in a host of unaddressed problems unique to rural Colorado. Our reporters also have found that culturally, the polarization between rural and urban has deepened so much that when it comes to pol...
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