Wolf Reintroduction Laws, Someone is pulling my leg about Crested Butte's forced electrification, and you have a chance to speak up in favor of affordability in CO
Wolf reintroduction bills coming from the Assembly...
A trio of bills (at least as of this writing) are coming before the Assembly (see the CPR article linked first below).
I'll leave it to you to read up on them, but as a summary, it's pretty straightforward.
The first two bills deal roughly with how to fund compensation to livestock owners for losses incurred by wolves.
As it stands now, Colorado Parks and Wildlife (CPW--whose revenue comes mainly from selling licenses to hunt and fish) would have to fund the payments.
The first bill takes tax money and diverts it to CPW. The second makes yet another specialty license plate whose revenue would do same.
For my tastes, these seem like okay ideas. I wonder how much impact would it have for the folks who will get the brunt of the trouble from wolves. That to me is the most important metric here (and I don't know that, other than making it easier to get money to compensate them, it will).
The one that does have my eye is the one linked second below. It would prevent any (see the attached screenshot from the bill's fiscal note) introduction of wolves until the Feds have analyzed wolf reintroduction and until the wolves are listed as an experimental population in accordance with the 10(j) rule.
If you didn't know already, the designation of the wolves as experimental allows for the potential to use lethal means on wolves that are predating livestock.
There are some other subtleties about the 10(j) rule too, you will find those in the Colorado Politics article linked third below.
As I alluded to above the first two bills I'm lukewarm on. The third, however, is one I think I want to support and so have added it to my list.
One last quick note, this one about the politics here. Governor Polis has expressed his support for having a 10(j) review as well.
I can't read his mind, but I can't also help but think this is yet another example of a practiced and savvy career politician making a move here: he can appear to support ranchers, appear to buck his party (and thus help his "independent-minded" and "non-absolutely-dyed-in-the-wool-progressive" image), and let someone else bear responsibility for a decision (thus enabling him to say to the animal rights people he likes that it wasn't him that allowed those cute little wolves to be killed).
https://www.cpr.org/2023/03/28/colorado-wolf-reintroduction-legislation/
https://leg.colorado.gov/bills/sb23-256
https://www.coloradopolitics.com/legislature/jared-polis-supports-10j-rule-colorado-legislation/article_cf6ee4fe-ce7a-11ed-944a-b3c5588046db.html
An update on Crested Butte going all in on forced electrification, someone is pulling my leg I think.
When I originally posted about Crested Butte undergoing forced electrification a few days back I said I was going to dig into just what kind of surveys were used and what the public's response actually was.
Turned out to be an interesting story and one that leaves me scratching my head as to who said what to whom. I thought I'd share.
First, a quick look back. The original Sun article is linked first below and the bit that caught my eye is in screenshot 1.
When the Marshall Fire roared through several neighborhoods up near Boulder, many of the residents up there got a nasty surprise when they saw the building codes that the liberal municipal governments had put in place. There was a lot of uproar about it.
Therefore, when I see "surveys" and absolute statements like those in screenshot 1, I have to be honest, I viewed them with some skepticism. After all, I'm sure that if you asked the municipal governments in, say, Superior prior to the Marshall Fire, they'd likely have told you their citizenry was fully informed and on board with the code changes.
I contacted the City of Crested Butte to see if I could CORA the surveys and/or public comment on the new code. What I got back was interesting.
There were no surveys. None. There was a process describing the path the government took (see the second link below) and how they planned to engage the community, but no community-wide survey asking residents. In fact, one of the city officials, in the chain of emails from the records custodian, told me that the Sun article was "misleading" in that sense.
As for public feedback expressing their alignment with the values of the community, there was a grand total of one public comment submitted to the City in favor of its new code.
One.
It's in screenshot 2 (note that, per my usual habit and even though it is public record, I've not included the commenter's name because I want you to focus on the words and not the person).
When I turned next to the reporter to ask him whether or not he had surveys outside of what the city offered, he said that he was using the word "survey" in the sense that of outreach by the government, not a poll of the public.
Further, he indicated that the people he talked to at the city (and there were several) pointed him to stakeholder meetings and community outreach events over the course of a year, along with "idea walls" at city hall where people put post-its showing what they thought.
Do you know what this whole thing looks like to an outsider? One group pointing at another who then points right back. Given what I've written above about the Marshall Fire, I think someone is pulling my leg here about just how much the community knows and how jazzed they are about electrification.
By this point you know as much as I do, so I'll leave it to you to come to your own decision. As for me I think we have a combination of things here: we have a city officials (elected and otherwise) who are blowing smoke about their process and how many in the town support/know of their efforts, and we have a reporter who took their word for it without going out into the community to ask random people.
The people in Crested Butte have the right to decide for themselves how they prefer to live; I don't agree with forced electrification, but it's their choice. I think if we're going to have articles about such things, however, I think there needs to be care taken to make sure that what we see and here is accurate. I question how accurate the claims are in this article. I question how accurate the reporting is.
https://coloradosun.com/2023/03/27/crested-butte-all-electric-construction/
https://www.crestedbutte-co.gov/vertical/Sites/%7B6058FFBB-CB06-4864-B42F-B476F794BE07%7D/uploads/FINAL_Compass_document_11-7-22.pdf
Do you want to speak up in favor of affordability in this state?
Do you own or know someone who does a commercial or multifamily building that is 50000 sq ft or bigger?
The State, per a 2021 bill, is going to start clamping down on multifamily and commercial buildings (see the attached screengrab from the link below) in an effort to get them to reduce their greenhouse gases in order to meet the law's arbitrary targets.
They will be holding a listening session and it's your chance to speak up and provide your comment about the process and the proposed rules.
**I hope I have shown and convinced you with what I do on this page that you needn't be an expert and nor do you need to be immediately and directly affected by things like this to speak up.
Remember that as go rules against landlords, so they go against tenants. If you have a small business in a larger building. If you rent. If you know someone that does either, these rules will sooner or later effect you with higher costs.
If you don't fall into any of the groups above, but see the wisdom in speaking up BEFORE the state regulators get around to you, you should speak up now.
The Listening Session is on Saturday the 8th and registration to attend (and/or directions of how to provide written comment) are in the link below.
If I can help you in some way, please ask.
https://cdphe.colorado.gov/air-pollution/building-performance-standard-rule)