Swampiness in wildlife policy and land conservation in the Polis administration: how some (not you silly) have outsized influence.

Who gets access on wildlife policy and who doesn't?

After posting on the First Gentleman's special access to Polis' wildlife advisor, I had a reader ask who the advisor was.  This was the advisor that wouldn't dream of holding a meeting on wolf/wildlife policy without Mr. Reis present.

I linked to that day's newsletter first below if you want/need the context.

Took a bit, but I got an answer to that question.  I got a whole lot more to share in the process. I have a whole web of connections among the wealthy and politically-connected to share, a story swampier than my armpit after a summer's day working outside in a 3 piece suit.

The picture at the top of this post gives the story.  The First Gentleman has the ear of the governor's wildlife advisor.  That advisor is Nicole -Rosmarino, a well-to-do advocate of "rewilding".

Rosmarino works with one of Polis' CPW commissioners, Jay Tutchon (himself an advocate of rewilding) at the Southern Plains Land Trust (SPLT), an organization working to buy up tracts in the Southern Plains of CO in order to rewild the area.  

I attached the profiles (from both SPLT and CPW) for Rosmarino and Tutchon as screenshot 1.  The source links for the profiles are listed second and third below if you want to read more.

In turn, SPLT gets gobs and gobs of money from Great Outdoors CO (GOCO).  If you want to see the most recent grants SPLT got from GOCO, check out screenshot 2 with the source links listed fourth and fifth below.  If you want to what SPLT has gotten in the past from GOCO (2017 to 2022) see the post that follows this one on conservation easements. 

Nice work if you can get it.  Oh and guess what?  Head of the Department of Natural Resources (which houses CPW) Dan Gibbs and CPW Commissioner Tutchon sit on GOCO's Board.  

Meantime, Tutchon, Reis, and Rosmarino all have a hand in wolf policy in this state because they're connected tightly to our governor, who is likely directing wolf policy from the comfort of the same backroom where he made deals with tobacco giants and big oil/big environmental groups.  It's the backroom neither you nor the press are allowed in.

This is typified by reading the governor's statements in screenshot 3 and knowing that with Polis, it's as much what is said as what is NOT said.  The source link for this series of non-contiguous quotes is linked sixth below.

Lastly, I want to call your attention to what State Senator Roberts said in that same article.  It's in the screenshot, but I'll excerpt:

"'I think there’s a concern that the commission is being filled with people who are more interested in changing the direction of the agency rather than preserving the statutory vision of (Parks and Wildlife),' Roberts said to The Aspen Times this week."

To help flesh out the concerns of Sen Roberts and others, to help you better understand the concerns, I present you the seventh link below.  This is an essay written by Rosmarino and Tutchon.  

Put what you see there next to their SPLT profiles in screenshot 1.  Put all that next to the fact that Tutchon is Polis' wildlife advisor and Tutchon sits on the CPW board.  Is it at least reasonable to be concerned that rewilding advocates might be trying to change how things work?  To make radical changes to wildlife policy (among others) in this state?

To change things now from a (theoretically) non-political board that is supposed to use science to balance the needs of nature and man to one that wants to gobble up land, exclude humans from it, and return to a state where nothing is managed except by nature's hand (human concerns be damned)?

A nice vision if you have money enough to avoid the consequences of such policy perhaps.  Not so good for others whose lives or jobs put them in contact with wildlife.  Not so good for people who are realistic enough to realize that the idea of completely untouched wilderness in this state is going to have to be balanced with concerns about feeding ourselves and keeping our cars going and houses heated.

None of what you see here was secret.  None of it is illegal.  As you'll see in many of the resources, no one is hiding these connections (save for perhaps Mr. Reis' involvement).  You don't hear it because most in the media are paying attention to other things.

The fact that it's not illegal doesn't make any of it okay, however.  While you get your two minutes in front of the CPW commissioners to talk about wolves, the First Gentleman gets assurances from one of the two people in Polis' direct orbit (both of whom work for a land trust that gets lots of government grants) that they'll make sure he gets to be at the meetings to discuss wolf policy.  

Swampy as hell.  Not fair.

And a direct consequence of the big money Democrat political machine in this state that was set up years and years ago through big money donors, dark money, and NGO non profits.**

In posts 2 and 3 below, we'll look at land conservation easements (which SPLT uses to great effect), and the symbiotic relationship between the Democrat-run state government and NGO's. 

**If you've not yet, read "The Blueprint"

https://open.substack.com/pub/coloradoaccountabilityproject/p/how-high-would-taxes-have-to-be-to?r=15ij6n&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web

https://southernplains.org/en/meet-the-team/

https://cpw.state.co.us/committees/colorado-parks-and-wildlife-commission

https://goco.org/news/releases/goco-board-awards-7m-in-grants-for-planning-and-capacity-recreation-facilities-land

https://goco.org/news/releases/goco-board-awards-81m-in-grants-for-land-conservation-outdoor-recreation-and

https://www.postindependent.com/news/colorado-gray-wolf-reintroduction-lawmakers-question/

https://rewilding.ecologicalcitizen.net/2023/01/11/rewilding-the-southern-great-plains/

Want to do something about what you’ve read?

Before moving on to the details, I thought it would be good to pop in here and tell you what you can do if what you found above was not to your liking.

Don't bother emailing or calling Polis, that will do nothing.  He's made his choice and clearly has no issues there.

I think speaking up in front of the Senate Ag committee would be worth your time.  I know the Republicans on the committee would be receptive, but the chair (Sen Roberts, an outspoken critic of many things relating to wolves and CPW) would be as well.  That committee's webpage is linked below.

If you don't like what you've seen here, contact any or all of the legislators below and share your thoughts.

Another option is to provide comment to the Great Outdoors Colorado Board.  They are the ones giving out the grants to help with the land acquisition process.  After contacting them, I learned that their board meetings are public and you can either attend and offer comment or you can send in written content.  In either case you would email info@goco.org (asking to be signed up to deliver comment at a meeting or sending in your written thoughts and asking them to be sent to the board).

https://leg.colorado.gov/committees/agriculture-natural-resources/2024-regular-session#:~:text=The%20Senate%20Agriculture%20and%20Natural,of%20Agriculture%20and%20Natural%20Resources

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Conservation Easements

In the previous post I talked a fair bit about both the Southern Plains Land Trust (SPLT) and also about rewilding.  Rewilding has many definitions, but the essence is that the land is returned to the wild free of human interference of any kind (often including any wildlife management).  Rewilding sometimes also includes reintroduction of native species that were formerly there:  the reintroduction of wolves and of bison being a couple examples. 

One thing that necessarily lies underneath rewilding efforts is the need for land which can be returned to its "original" state.  I put that in quotes here because, as with many things, simply pulling up fence posts and stopping cultivation/irrigation doesn't automatically revert things to the way they were before humans came here.

Here I want to reinforce post 1 by showing you how SPLT (run by Polis' friends and with connections to CPW) are taking good advantage of programs Colorado has set up to keep land free from human activity--conservations easements.

What is a conservation easement?  Like many easements, it's an agreement with a landowner and some other entity.  

I have an easement on my land with Xcel because their power poles run along the back fence and their wires run under the ground up to my meter.  This easement allows Xcel to come on to my land to maintain their property and tells me that I can't move or change them.  I get electrical power to my house in exchange.

A conservation easement is similar.  It spells out some sort of conservation activity that will go on in the property and the rights/responsibilities of the landowner and easement holder.  

As an example, take the first link below.  There the conservation easement states the landowner must retire some of his wells to conserve water in the San Luis Valley.  Other kinds might state that a landowner could still raise cattle, but cannot sell the land for development or build anything new on it.  Still others might say that no activity of any kind can happen on the land and that the easement holder will build trails and maintain them so the public can come in and walk around.  

Whatever the details, the broad strokes are the same.  The landowner surrenders some of his or her property rights and the easement holder picks up some sort of responsibility.  The agreement is usually thought of as beneficial to both.

It's natural to ask, then, what the benefits would be?  Why would anyone enter into a conservation easement?

The first and easiest thing to point to is the tax and/or income benefits.  Colorado is hugely generous with tax incentives for such easements (adding a state write off to an existing federal one on top of allowing the easement to transfer seamlessly to any new landowners--whether inheritors or purchasers).  These tax benefits can be used by both landowner and easement holder.

The income coming in can be (in some cases though by no means all) something like carbon credits (climate indulgences) that the easement holder can trade on the open market, but it can also be fundraising dollars for allowing the public in to tour a wild area and hitting them up for donations.  

Other benefits are as real, if not as tangible.  If conservation is important to you as either easement holder or landowner, you get the warm feeling of that.  For example, the landholder in the San Luis Valley that retired his wells, felt as though he was helping his neighbors. Quoting from that first link below, 

"Landowner Ron Bowman [the one who has the conservation easement on his wells] approached COL [Colorado Open Lands is a private, nonprofit land trust] to explore how a groundwater conservation easement might work on the farm he owns with his wife, Gail. Ron said, 'If by discontinuing irrigation on my farm, it means that my neighbors may be able to keep their multigenerational farms in their families, then it feels like the right thing to do.'"

And, as you'll see in the next post, groups like the Southern Plains Land Trust make clear that future easements they hope to get (or land they want to purchase outright) are to be used as educational areas (where I'm sure they'll have no compunctions about asking repeatedly for donations).

To help flesh this out some, I put a bunch of resources at the bottom.  Links 2 and 3 offer more detail on easements.  The first is an article by the Colorado Cattleman's Agricultural Land Trust, the second is Great Outdoors Colorado's (GOCO) page on the topic.**  Links 4 and 5 are both Sun articles.  They delve into tax policy of conservation easements (and also how generous Colorado has been).

Let's wrap up by showing you how SPLT is capitalizing on land trusts in this state.  

If you go to GOCO's list of projects that they've funded and look specifically at who GOCO is giving grants to, you will arrive at link 6 below.  Go further into that page and look up the projects by county, specifically, Bent County.

SPLT is all over Bent County with grants.  By my count about $2.63 million in GOCO grants from 2017 to 2022.  Most of this money went into "open space" and "land restoration".

SPLT was the only private entity on the list of projects GOCO funded in BentCo.  Their $2.63 million represents about 28% of the total amount of grant money that GOCO handed out up to 2022.

There's more.  This 28% given to SPLT is ONLY between 2017 and 2022.  The other grants stretch from 1997 to 2022.  SPLT has been busy:  they've managed to nab 28% of the total grant money in only 5 years.  They are clearly applying a lot and getting awarded a lot. 

Still, SPLT wants more.  Link 7 below is to SPLT's newsletters page. Look in the August 2024 edition to see the latest project SPLT is trying to fund:  a 458 acre piece of riverfront property South of Las Animas.  They hope to rewild this parcel too, with a twist. 

Screenshot 1 shows a couple non-contiguous quotes from that newsletter.  Looks like GOCO is chipping in tons of money on this project too (along with the Gates Family).

As I mentioned in post 1 on this topic, none of this is illegal, but legal doesn't automatically equate to okay. 

Do you suppose that a group unaffiliated with our governor would be as successful in getting government money to buy up and rewild land here?  SPLT has members on CPW's board of commissioners and in Polis' inner circle of advisors.  If they are not getting a "good word" put in for them from the governor's office when they submit grants, I'd be much surprised.  

Beyond that, you must also remember that the well-connected often get things outsiders don't.  Think about jobs.  If you have a friend in a place you want to work at, does that friend not tell you about openings and give you an inside scoop?  Would it be any different for the insiders who work in the government and run SPLT?

Exactly.  As a friend told me, this is all dirty.  Just writing about this makes me want a shower.

**The picture at the top of this post is a map of Colorado's "protected lands" (lands with a conservation easement).  It's from the GOCO page, linked near the bottom.

https://arkvalleyvoice.com/first-in-the-nation-conservation-easement-partnership-to-protect-san-luis-valley-groundwater/

https://ccalt.org/2024/03/25/buying-property-in-colorado-consider-a-conservation-easement/

https://goco.org/news/blog/what-is-conservation-easement

https://coloradosun.com/2022/02/03/colorado-conservation-easements-water-land-prices/

https://coloradosun.com/2023/11/28/colorado-conservaiton-easement-tax-incentives/

https://goco.org/programs-projects/funded-projects

https://southernplains.org/en/grassland-gazette/

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NGO's are the Democrat's camp followers

I want to wrap today's series by touching on NGO's (non-governmental organizations) and how they are the modern equivalent of camp followers:  NGO's make their living by following behind governmental agencies providing services in exchange for benefits handed down.

They either do this directly by contracting out to the government to do a job, such as Connect for Health CO which gets a hefty contract from the state and was sure to repay that favor by helping support a fundraiser for Democrat candidates.  If you want a refresher on that, check out the first link below.

NGO's can also help forward the state's policy goals by taking grant money to do the state's bidding.  The Southern Plains Land Trust (SPLT) we've been discussing is just one of many groups working to get government money so they can put land in conservation easements.  Efforts like these are actively pursued by those in the government.  They pursue it not by direct action but by handing out grants to NGOs who then do the work. 

As I noted before, none of this is a secret.  Nobody's hiding the ball on the desired outcome.  
Screenshot 1 attached (from the second link below) describes GOCO's rationale in pursuing grants to foster land acquisition.

Some quick context before moving on.  GOCO is a (my words, not an official definition) quasi-governmental group:  their board is made up of appointees from the governor's office who are approved by the Senate.  Their money comes not from taxes (thus the quasi) but from lottery proceeds.  

So while they may not necessarily be using public money to achieve their goals, I think it's fair to assume that their goals are directly in line with what those running the state want.

Back to grants and land policy.  I bet that if you just walked up to someone off the street and asked them whether taking lottery proceeds to help conserve lands and preserve nature was an okay thing to do, my guess is that almost everyone would nod in agreement.  

Who wouldn't want to preserve the beauty of nature, especially if it came at the cost of those who play the lottery.  

But revisit the highlighting in screenshot 1 if you missed it.  Note what is left out.  Energy exploration.  Any development.  Any activity that (I suppose) GOCO or its grantees determine would "fundamentally change the land's ability to deliver the resources that Coloradans value so much".

Do you suppose the answer to my hypothetical above would be different if people knew about the intended effect of this conservation, to exclude some uses they might think have value?

Might not some in Colorado tolerate some oil and gas infrastructure on reserve land if it meant lower energy prices and more energy security?  Might they not be okay with grazing if it meant food security and help to their fellow Coloradans working in Ag?

To give you a NON hypothetical comparator, policymakers in the Front Range think that wind turbines and solar are not a serious enough impact on life out on the Plains to make trading pristine landscapes for renewables and powerlines.  Balancing other interests with environmental interests is not unheard of.  

Wouldn't this interest balancing be better done by a group of people who were accountable to Coloradans?  Wouldn't their decisions regarding what to do with money and land be more representative of the diverse opinions and values of all Coloradans if this were the case?

Instead, I believe what we get is a version of the Good Ole Boys network, with boards awarding money to their friends and connections to do the things that they want to be done.

To give you a sense of why I say that, I'll point you to a couple of familiar faces on GOCO's board.  Screenshot 2 (from the third link below)  has SPLT's and CPW's own Tutchon along with the head of the Department of Natural Resources' Dan Gibbs (the department being, of course, the one that houses CPW).

Now isn't that convenient for SPLT and those that think like them.

https://open.substack.com/pub/coloradoaccountabilityproject/p/businesses-in-denver-vote-with-their?r=15ij6n&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web

https://goco.org/programs-projects/grant-programs/land-acquisition

https://goco.org/about/our-board