Public Comments

Thank you for your work on this difficult task. I have been a resident of the front range, from Littleton to Fort Collins, Golden to Boulder most of my life. I now reside on the western slope for the past six years. We speak of nurturing diversity in all manners and yet this new map would attempt to muddle the exquisite uniqueness of the western slope with the inexperienced influence from the eastern. - and vice versa. From water, land management, infrastructure needs, the wants and needs of supporting cultures and industries; the diversity is extraordinary. People live, work and play on the western slope for specific reasons different from communities such as Boulder. To expect representatives to be able to understand and help constituents in this district as currently drawn, appears like a political obstacle of purpose. I support the Club 20 redistricting maps that were previously submitted and respectfully ask you to reconsider this new proposal.

Karen Artell- representing myself. I live in Fort Collins. Carving Fort Collins from Larimer County and District 2 does not preserve the whole community of Larimer County and Fort Collins or the communities of interest that Fort Collins is a part of. The northeastern counties of the state are mostly rural and agricultural in nature. The area is also home to the DJ Basin and is the largest producer of oil and gas in the State. Fort Collins is located up against the foothills with interests in protecting the foothill open spaces and recreational areas that many Coloradans enjoy. Cities along the foothills in the north front range ozone non-attainment area are plagued by high ozone levels during the summer months. https://raqc.org/current-8-hour-ozone-summary/ The FRAPPE (FRONT RANGE AIR POLLUTION AND PHOTOCHEMISTRY ÉXPERIMENT) study out of National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) https://ncar.ucar.edu/ showed that VOCs and nitrogen oxides produced by oil and gas drilling from the eastern plains and transportation emissions are carried up against the foothills and produce ozone which affects our health. This is a serious issue and unites these communities in advocating for enhanced emissions monitoring and improved air quality. Which brings me to climate change. Fort Collins and Larimer County are actively engaged in restoration projects of the forests and mountain watersheds of the Poudre and Big Thompson Rivers which run through Fort Collins and Loveland respectively, after 2 of largest fires in Colorado history in 2020. Both rivers provide drinking water for County residents and irrigation for county farmers and ranchers. These forest fire recovery efforts are essential to water quality and quantity for the needs of Fort Collins and County residents. CSU, CU and many more are actively engaged in public policy related to addressing our climate crisis. Cohesive congressional representation is essential to this issue. The geographic areas and features important to the Fort Collins and Larimer County communities are the mountains to the west, Rocky Mountain National Park, the USFS Arapahoe and Roosevelts National Forest, the Poudre and Big Thompson River headwaters and watersheds. Again, cohesive congressional representation is essential. Fort Collins is the seat of Larimer County government and the largest city in the County. It doesn’t make sense to place the seat of County government in a separate congressional district than the rest of the County which makes representation and funding issuers from the federal government confusing and inefficient for the local governments and residents alike. Preserve the whole communities of interest for Fort Collins and the whole political subdivision of Larimer County. Keep Fort Collins in District 2.

Thanks for keeping Park Co whole! That’s democracy- I approve of this map 100%

Hello Commissioners. Thank you so much for being here today and continuing to hear the communities across Colorado and taking there input on this very important part of redistricting. My name is Elizabet García and I am from Greeley Colorado. Thank you so much for placing Greeley in the 8th congressional district. It represents that the shared interest of the Adams County and Weld County community. A thriving Latino community that is represented at the national level will keep our state moving forward. I just wanted to say that Staff Map 1 should be the map that commissioners continue to work on. It is a great start and represents what many voices expressed in this process.

I have been a resident of Northern CO for over sixty years & have seen the change in political representation from the more balanced rural versus urban to the present urban advantage,due to the huge population growth in urban areas of the state. Several of the present districts leave a lot to be desired in the balance of urban versus rural in voting numbers which definitely do not always have the same concerns, yet are represented by the same elected person, this results in a total inequity. Agriculture is a huge part of the rural make up & is frequently impacted by this imbalance. Some of the proposed districts increase this problem. In particular the district that combines counties from Western CO to the Eastern CO, these areas have few of the same issues especially when the large city-urban areas of the Front Range are included. I can vouch for this, because living & ranching in Larimer County, we already are very much negatively impacted by the present district arrangement. In my view, this is a very poor choice for a district. There is very little that parts of this proposed area have in common. Thank You, Ed Hansen, Circle Ranches, Inc.

This is a summary the testimony I provided the commission at the September 10 public comment hearing: I am Lindsay Wert, a resident of rural Routt County near Steamboat Springs. When I saw the recently released First Staff Plan for Congressional districting, I was both disappointed and confused that this plan was so widely divergent from the preliminary plan that was released in June. I do not believe the commission appropriately considered the importance of common interests in this First Staff Plan. I have read many of the comments provided to the commission and I attended the session in Steamboat Springs. The great majority of those comments and testimony pointed out the vast differences between interests of Western Slope and Front Range parts of Colorado. Regardless of political affiliation, almost all stated a strong recommendation for separate representation for these regions. The First Staff Plan does exactly the opposite. Some of the issues where Western Slope and Front Range populations have drastically different interests are: • Water –Use of water for agricultural, industrial, and recreational purposes on the Western Slope is key to our economy. In addition, about 80% of the water leaving Colorado exits through the Western Slope. We need independent representation of these interests. • Transportation – The density of the Front Range when compared with the open spaces of the Western Slope require a substantially different approach to transportation. Our representative must advocate for our needs in this area. • Rural vs Urban – The vast open space of the Western Slope when compared with the density of the Front Range means that grouping the two in a single district will effectively disenfranchise the rural residents of the Western Slope. • Public lands – About 55% of Western Slope land is Federally owned, and management of these lands falls largely on the shoulders of Western Slope residents. Given the magnitude of this ownership, an individual representative is warranted. I ask the commission to adopt a districting plan closely resembling the preliminary plan that was released in June. Thank you for all of your work on the commission.

The map looks fabulous! Thanks so much for keeping Park County with neighboring districts that face similar issues.

I live in Fort Collins Colorado. Our area is a North Front Range urban area that is home to high tech companies, a tier one research university, and a robust Multi Modal Transportation system that includes transit, EV infrastructure, and Bus Rapid Transit. We have very little in common with neighbors to the East, and especially those in the extreme Southeast Corner of our state. Fort Collins is over 300 miles away from Campo in Baca county, and our needs as communities are so very different, as indicated by our concerns about high population growth, and urban issues such as homelessness. In addition we are dealing with wildfire mitigation and watershed restoration, all of which does not apply to the southeast corner of our state. Fort Collins has much more in common with areas like Boulder County. I cannot imagine how we could ever have someone who could represent our interests as well as those in the southeast part of the state. Please reconsider the current proposal of redistricting.

Please oppose the proposed restricting map as it is drawn. The proposed map continues to take away the little representation that rural Colorado currently has. Rural Colorado continues to feed and provide energy to the state. Urban Colorado continues to try to take away our quality of life that we love. Piecing out areas of rural Colorado and lumping in with more populous urban areas simply continues to mute any voice we may have left.

To Whom it May Concern, As a citizen of the westren slope I have never felt that my voice or vote has been heard at the state level. Living in Grand Junction I don't feel I know what someone in Cortez needs or wants to vote for, we are over 200 miles away from each other. District 3 is way too big. District 2 is just rude. Boulder county would take all of the votes away from everyone else in the district. Everyone deserves a right to have their vote and voices to be heard, even if they dont agree with the governor. Thak you for your time. Angela