Rocky Mountain Voice

Tag: Public Accountability

Governor’s mansion doubles as free soapbox for First Gentleman’s animal agenda
Colorado Accountability Project, Approved, Commentary, State

Governor’s mansion doubles as free soapbox for First Gentleman’s animal agenda

By Cory Gaines | Commentary, Colorado Accountability Project The First Gentleman's lecture series -- who's footing the bill? A couple weeks back, I noticed an article about a talk at the governor's mansion about wolf reintroduction involving the First Gentleman and his guests for the evening. The article is linked first below if you'd like to give it a read.If you know anything about the First Gentleman, you know he is a dedicated animal rights activist. Has been for a while. It should therefore not shock anyone that the guests at this talk were also animal rights/wildlife advocates.I won't go into the details of the talk. I'll leave it to you to read up if you'd like.The First Gentleman has the same First Amendment rights as anyone else. He's welcome to have an opinion and expre...
Colorado Supreme Court to decide if state wrongly denied child abuse hotline data to media orgs
The Colorado Sun, Approved, State

Colorado Supreme Court to decide if state wrongly denied child abuse hotline data to media orgs

By Jennifer Brown | The Colorado Sun The news agencies wanted to know the number of times child residential treatment centers had called the child abuse hotline but were denied by state human services officials A legal battle over child abuse hotline data requested four years ago by The Colorado Sun and 9News has reached the Colorado Supreme Court.  The case centers on the news organizations’ joint request under the Colorado Open Records Act for the number of calls made to the state child abuse hotline from three child residential treatment centers in the Denver area from 2018 to 2021. Journalists sought the information while investigating the safety of children in residential centers, including the death of a 12-year-old boy who ran away from Tennyson Center and...
Jefferson County Sheriff releases timeline of SRO’s location during Evergreen shooting
Fox31, Approved, State

Jefferson County Sheriff releases timeline of SRO’s location during Evergreen shooting

By: Brooke Williams | Fox31 DENVER (KDVR) — The school resource officer assigned to Evergreen High School was not there at the time of the shooting earlier this month, raising questions about their whereabouts throughout the community. After the shooting on Wednesday, Sept. 10, the Jefferson County Sheriff’s Office said during a press conference that the officer assigned to the school had left about two hours before shots were fired. Evergreen High School previously had a full-time School Resource Officer; however, that officer has been on medical leave, and the responsibility was being shared between other deputies. On Monday, the sheriff’s office released more information about the officer’s whereabouts that day. On Sept. 10, the SRO was going between Evergreen a...
Aurora ICE visit leaves Colorado Democrats with more questions than answers
Fox31, Approved, Local

Aurora ICE visit leaves Colorado Democrats with more questions than answers

By Gabrielle Franklin | KDVR.com DENVER (KDVR) — A handful of Democrats in Colorado’s congressional delegation went inside the GEO ICE facility in Aurora on Monday. The visit comes as they try to gain clarity and access from the Trump administration about what is going on there. They spoke with members of the press after the visit to share what they say they saw. Democratic U.S. House members from Colorado visited the ICE facility, saying they left the building with more questions than answers. “When I walked through the facility, it felt like a prison,” Congresswoman Brittany Pettersen said at a press conference following the visit. The Colorado Democratic congressional members said the GEO ICE facility in Aurora has changed since the last time they went inside it. “Afte...
Garbo: Colorado Democrats set the house on fire, then send you the insurance bill
Rocky Mountain Voice, Approved, Commentary, State, Top Stories

Garbo: Colorado Democrats set the house on fire, then send you the insurance bill

By C. J. Garbo | Guest Commentary, Rocky Mountain Voice If you’re a Colorado homeowner staring down another massive insurance premium hike - welcome to the consequences of single-party rule. For over a decade, Democrats have run this state. For the last four years, they’ve enjoyed unchecked supermajorities. And yet, while your coverage hasn’t improved, your bill has exploded. In just two years, my own homeowners insurance jumped 190%: - 2023–24: $3,029 - 2024–25: $5,230 (+72.66%) - 2025–26: $8,768 (+67.65%) I’ve filed zero claims. My house hasn’t changed. But the policies passed under Democratic control have made everything worse. This is what happens when public policy is written by unskilled, untalented, uninformed people who face no meaningful opposition or accountabil...
Gaines: Medicaid bloat is eating Colorado’s budget after a decade of federal expansion
Colorado Accountability Project, Approved, Commentary, State, Top Stories

Gaines: Medicaid bloat is eating Colorado’s budget after a decade of federal expansion

By Cory Gaines | Commentary, Colorado Accountability Project Colorado's Medicaid bloat under Obamacare In the first post of this series, I briefly went over Colorado's Medicaid financing (how much and on what). If you want or need that context, it's the first link below. In the second part of the series, I want to talk about how Medicaid got expanded by the Feds--allowing more people to get on government-funded healthcare-- and how Colorado leapt at the expansion like a shot. There were two recent (and big) expansions of Medicaid: the first was the Affordable Care Act (Obamacare) which expanded Medicaid coverage to people (including those without any disability or children)making up to 138% of the Federal Poverty wage. Screenshot 1 is a summary of the changes, it comes from...
Colorado Communities Kept in the Dark About New ICE Detention Plans
State, Approved, The Colorado Sun

Colorado Communities Kept in the Dark About New ICE Detention Plans

By Taylor Dolven | The Colorado Sun All Walsenburg Interim City Administrator John Galusha knows about the plans for the long-closed private prison in the city he oversees is what he’s read in the news: Immigration and Customs Enforcement is considering reopening it to detain immigrants. And he’s not alone. Huerfano County Administrator Carl Young doesn’t know if the prison will reopen. And Colorado Springs Mayor Yemi Mobolade and Hudson Town Manager Bryce Lange are similarly in the dark about proposed plans to reopen detention facilities in their communities. Most local government leaders reached for this story said the private prison companies that own the facilities wouldn’t need local government approval to reopen them as-is. But they would need local resources, like water ...
Pete Buttigieg’s DOT blew $80B on DEI while air traffic upgrades stalled
New York Post, Approved, National

Pete Buttigieg’s DOT blew $80B on DEI while air traffic upgrades stalled

By Josh Christenson | New York Post WASHINGTON — Former Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg failed to replace outdated air traffic control systems while in office — with his agency instead shelling out tens of billions of dollars on a DEI agenda, according to federal spending records and airline industry insiders. In one meeting, Buttigieg — who is said to be eyeing a 2028 presidential run — told industry executives that air traffic control upgrades would just allow them to fly more planes, “and so why would that be in his interest?” sources said. What his department was really interested in was handing out hundreds of diversity, equity and inclusion grants totaling more than $80 billion over four years — at least half of the DOT’s entire budget for a typical fi...
Gaines: Colorado’s unelected boards hold the real power—and it’s hurting rural counties
Colorado Accountability Project, Approved, Commentary, State, Substack

Gaines: Colorado’s unelected boards hold the real power—and it’s hurting rural counties

By Cory Gaines | Commentary, Colorado Accountability Project Regulatory Capture and Colorado's Unelected Boards I wrote a bit back (see the first link below) about how our state is increasingly turfing what ought to be legislative control to a series of unelected boards, how legislative laziness has effectively handed over control of our state to them.Rulemaking and regulation might make things more efficient, it might enable higher policy output with less time, but it is not without cost. It's one of those costs I want to cover today: policy by unelected board opens us up to control, not by the people, but by industry and (increasingly in Colorado) advocates.This is due to cronyism in board appointments and also what might loosely be termed a form of "regulatory capture" (if you wil...
‘Congressional inquiry’ triggers $250K legal tab for Denver’s sanctuary city stance
Approved, Denverite, Local

‘Congressional inquiry’ triggers $250K legal tab for Denver’s sanctuary city stance

By Andrew Kenney | Denverite A high-powered Washington law firm helped Mayor Mike Johnston and the city prepare for a Congressional hearing. The legal bill is coming due for Denver's response to a congressional inquiry. The city recently received an invoice for $250,000 from Covington & Burling, the high-powered Washington law firm the city hired as it faced federal scrutiny over its immigration policies. The city has been represented by Dana Remus, who previously was the White House counsel for former president Joe Biden. The contract began Feb. 1 as Mayor Mike Johnston was preparing to testify before the Republican-led U.S. House Oversight Committee. Over the next two months, the city incurred $250,000 in legal fees with the firm, according to an invoice submitted...

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