Public Comments

A district such as the proposed District 2, which includes Northwest Colorado and Boulder, will silence the western slope's voice and that is unacceptable. I will request that the western slope be in one congressional district so that our communities have true representation.

By looking at the proposed map it appears that the only thing you are trying to do is create another Democrat controlled district. By adding the highly populated Boulder and Larimer counties which are heavily Democrat counties to the sparsely populated counties of North Central and North West Colorado you are effectively creating another Democrat controlled district, as a conservative I am very much against this.

Please do not move grand county to district 3! We do not want to be represented by Lauren boebert whatsoever. Ew

I appreciate the opportunity to thank you for all you are doing in the process of redistricting. And for making an attempt to unite communities that have shared public policy concerns. However I feel if you attach our section of Fort Collins to another district you will completely destroy the very concerns of a "community of interest" you are attempting to create. Our area is one of all new homes with many of us moving across the country and across the world to be in this particular urban area of Colorado because of its excellent schools, higher education, transportation, fine hospitals etc. My husband & I moved here from Chicago to be near our only daughter. We were willing to come because of the very similar "community of interest" we saw to the way we lived in Chicago. My husband & I worked hard in Chicago to improve conditions of the homeless, educational availability, employment opportunities and minority inclusion. We are also willing to do the same in Fort Collins in addition to other needs of this fine city. Most of the people I have met in this very new section of Fort Collins are similar to us. Please don't cut us off from "urban" Fort Collins.

It appears that in drawing the re-districting maps, the Commission has prioritized the populous Front Range which disadvantaging and disenfranchising the rural areas of multi-generational Coloradans with very different concerns than city-dwellers. Please consider re-drawing to give areas outside of the front range their own voice, not overwhelmed by Front Range interests.

It is very obvious to me that the reason this redistricting is being done is to combine smaller conservative populated areas with the much larger progressive populated areas to assure that progressives will be able to win all the seats. I assume you are going to try and jam this through as soon as possible. And don’t try to tell me this is a bi-partisan effort.

We are 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 would have very little in common with neighbors to the East, and especially those in the extreme Southeast Corner of our state. Therefore I hope you will reconsider and put Fort Collins back into Larimer County.

I am a resident of Meeker, which is in one of the least populated counties in Colorado. I work in the electrical power industry and have a first-hand view of how the politics on the Front Range impacts the oil and gas, power generation, coal, and agricultural industries that have been a way of life in northwest Colorado for generations. To combine rural northwest Colorado with the heavily populated and left-leaning counties on the Front Range is nothing but an attempt to extinguish the voice of western Colorado. Boulder and Larimer counties each have a population more than 300,000, more than the sum total of all the north-central and northwest Colorado counties combined. Rio Blanco County, in which I reside, has only a little over 6,000 residents. We feel like we have no voice right now and it will be much worse under this new map. It seems this map was not produced in good faith by a commission that intends to be bipartisan but rather is an example of covert gerrymandering to stamp out the views of rural Colorado. Just remember that the state’s tax base is largely supported by rural Colorado industries. To fail to listen to your rural constituents is to cut your own throat. Please redraw the lines in such a manner as to give rural western Colorado a voice and a fair seat at the table.

I would like to thank the members and the staff of the Colorado Independent Redistricting Commission for all the time and hard work that has already been put in to this effort of redrawing Congressional district lines in Colorado. This is a very tough task but one that is definitely needed for our state. Thank you. I currently sit on the board of directors for Colorado Farm Bureau and I represent Farm Bureau members in Mesa, Delta, Montrose, Ouray, San Miguel and Gunnison counties. All of these counties are on the western slope and are rural counties. All of these counties have one major thing in common: Agriculture. Rural Colorado is a huge part of our state and one of the biggest communities of interest that our state has and agriculture is the driving force in these rural communities. It is not only right, but necessary to keep these rural communities together in Congressional districts. There are so many different ways to draw these district lines but there are two things that must happen; 1. Keep rural communities together in rural districts and do not include large metro area communities with rural communities. 2. Keep entire counties wholly represented in one district. It makes zero sense to include high population communities on the Front Range with rural western slope communities (Boulder and Moffat County for example). These communities are different in so many ways and to have them in the same Congressional district is simply unacceptable. Including Baca County in the southeast corner of the state with Fort Collins on the north end of the state is mind boggling. It makes no sense at all and it makes me question why this is proposed. The only thing Baca County and Fort Collins have in common are that they are both in the state of Colorado, no other glaring similarities come to mind when comparing these two communities. Colorado Farm Bureau submitted maps for this process for the Commission to review and I support these maps and urge the Commission to support these maps. These proposed maps accomplish the two main points I highlighted above; keep rural communities together and keep entire counties in one district. I believe that having a rural district on the east side of the state and having a rural district on the west side of the state is important. This keeps rural communities together with other rural communities and leaves higher populated areas out. Western Colorado is very unique in its own way as is the eastern side of the state. Communities on the western half of the state do not need to be included in the same district as communities on the eastern half of the state. Similarly, communities of highly populated areas do not need to be included in the same districts as these rural communities. Again, your job is not easy, however it is extremely important. Thank you for your efforts and thank you for taking the time to review these comments. Zandon Bray

As a Coloradoan from Larimer County, I am dismayed by the choices for mapping districts. I wish to make the following suggestions/comments. 1. The farmland is in one district. I hear many farmers are dismayed with "never being heard". I would suggest it be broken into 3 or 4 separate districts that go with the towns/cities west of each district For instance, Larimer (and possibly Weld , or Boulder counties) be connected to the northern farm areas to the east. ElPaso could be connected with the middle third of the eastern part of the state. And Pueblo and the south could be put in the district with the farms in the southeast. I realize you have to get them of equal population. Then, maybe there can be meetings on occasion, between cities and farm areas, for people to be heard and helped. 2. Arapahoe and Denver districts obviously have the big populations for the state so probably cannot be changed. 3. The three big areas in the western part probably cannot be changed very much, for population reasons. But, if Larimer comes out of the big northern are, Eagle could maybe go north. 4. Please keep Larimer County together. It is an entity that works together. Gerrymandering Ft. Collins out of Larimer County is a BAD IDEA, for me and many other people in this area. Thank you for listening.