Public Comments

My name is Martin Spann and I’m a resident of Greeley, originally from Southern California. Rapid growth led me to Colorado from California and, unfortunately, it’s catching up to me one more time. It’s beginning to feel a lot like deja vu all over again. The citizens of the Northern I-25 corridor are my community and my Community of Interest. The lesson I learned from my experience in sustained extreme population growth is that when the state, county, city, and congressional district plan together, a superior people-friendly livable product is produced. I’ve read that Weld County is the fastest-growing county in the state and Greeley/Weld the 3rd fastest-growing metro region in the country. Greeley, Ft. Collins, Loveland, and Longmont are rapidly becoming one large metropolitan district. A new congressional district could bridge the divide between communities no longer cooperating on regional growth concerns including water, air, rivers electricity, roads, and broadband. These efforts cannot be stalled for any length of time without incurring critical problems in the near future. I view the addition of a new congressional district in our state as an opportunity for well-managed state and regional growth. A benefit to the whole state. As an example, the Thornton I-25 choke point needs to be relieved of traffic by implementing a fast road from Fort Collins to DIA through Weld County. Giving the people of Fort Collins a quicker route to the airport. Strangely, a majority of the Road has been built and is currently underutilized. And I suspect that Larimer and Weld County are responsible for this stoppage. A congresswoman or a congressman, generating DC infrastructure monies for his or her district could move this and other important growth projects along.

All Commissioners: Please read the attached pdf document. There are compelling reason why you should create a Congressional District for South-Central Colorado and why El Paso County should be the emphasis of forming two separate Congressional Districts. Thoans McKenna on behalf of the Citizens for True Southern Colorado

Dear Congressional Redistricting Commission, Thank you for allowing me to comment on the preliminary map for Colorado’s 8 congressional districts and on my community of interest, Aurora. My name is Beth Strimpel, and I am a resident of Aurora since 2015. I am a public health and occupational health nurse, and was the past President of the DelMar Neighborhoods United, a neighborhood group. I moved to Original Aurora because I was working at the Anschutz campus, and one of my colleagues at the Community Campus Partnership informed me about a bus tour being given . I wanted to learn more about the community I worked in, so I attended. We were able to take an unplanned tour of Stanley Marketplace before it was open, and I was hooked. It was then after the tour and learning about Aurora and all the services available, i decided to buy a house in the community I worked. I love being a resident of Aurora. I am advocating for Aurora to stay whole on the primary map - do not divide us. The diversity of the city is what attracted me to live here. Aurora Public Schools has students from over 130 countries who speak over 160 languages. 74% of the total student population receive free or reduced lunch. These students and residents of Aurora need to be able to receive all the benefits of federal legislation as a whole. We need to have fair and effective representation for all Aurora residents. The only way to do that , as I see it, is to keep us together as one district. The community campus partnership(CCP) was developed in order to assist residents of Aurora to obtain a job on campus, and have a voice. There was a huge divide between individuals doing research or working in the medical field, students and the community surrounding the campus.The CCP is educating and advocating for our residents and is one example of a group dedicated to community inclusion. In these times of greater focus on the issues of health disparities in communities of color, I hope you will take time to consider my comments, and to vote to keep Aurora as one district on the preliminary map. Thank you for your time and service. With warm regards, Beth A. Strimpel, RN 965 Newark St. Aurora, CO 80010

Chaffee County should be assigned to districts with counties that share interests with our Western mountain culture and rural character. Please reassign Chaffee County to Congressional District 3 and State House District 61. We share rural culture, production agriculture, tourist economy (powered primarily by outdoor recreation), and a challenging housing market with other communities in CD3 and HD61. These characteristics are very different than those within the 5th Congressional District (CD5) or House District 60 (HD60). Consequently, our intergovernmental and regional organizations are organized around the rural central mountains and Western Slope. The connections we have with communities to the east and southeast, such as the Upper Arkansas Area Council of Governments (UAACOG), the Southern Colorado Economic Development District (SCEDD) often include more CD3 and even CD4 counties. Our CDOT relationships are with CDOT Region 5 and the San Luis Valley Transportation Planning Region (SLV TPR) and Transportation Commission District 7 with Lake, Eagle, Summit, Pitkin, and other mountain and Western Slope counties. Housing resources that exist in some of the CD5 and HD 60 counties, such as the Balance of State Continuum of Care resources, do not exist in Chaffee County, making us much more like our neighboring counties of Saguache, Gunnison, and Lake as well as others in CD3 and HD61. In fact, the housing market in Chaffee County is far more aligned with the housing market in other CD3 and HD61 counties, where many lower income wage earners must travel great distances to find any available housing, much less find affordable housing. The public policy concern of rapidly growing housing costs coupled with a shrinking long-term rental market and growing short-term rental and investment markets are shared with other counties in CD3 and HD61, and we frequently coordinate through the Colorado Mountain Housing Coalition and other coalitions to identify policies, systems, and resources to address these struggles. Chaffee County should remain in Senate District 5 for all the reasons stated above; our economy, culture, terrain and ecosystems, and housing market challenges are shared with the other communities in SD5.

The San Luis Valley and Pueblo have historically been recognized as a community of interest in Colorado. There is significant legal precedent that has consistently noted the importance of this community of interest in redistricting. It should be preserved as part of your redistricting work. Do not split our historical community of interest up in the preliminary or final plan. I urge you to learn more about the unique issues we face that makes us a community of interest, specifically the hispanic community that has called the San Luis Valley and Pueblo home for hundreds of years.

Independent Congressional Redistricting Commissioners and Staff: as a resident of Pueblo, I understand the deep ties in Southern Colorado between Pueblo and to the San Luis Valley. I encourage you to consider the Latino community here a community of interest. Not doing so risks cracking our community in a way that dilutes our voices and erases the generational ties our communities share. Please represent the San Luis Valley and Pueblo as a singular community of interest. Pueblo is often the closest economic and cultural hub for many in the Valley, and they access many resources here. Many of our non- profit entities deliver services across this region and know how important it is to continue to support these historic ties. I’m sure you will hear more about this as you begin holding hearings in our communities. Thank you for your consideration.

Congressional redistricting commissioners, During the hearings, the parties went back and forth about which district Pueblo[164] should be placed in.[165] The court relied on the lack of shared communities of interest between Pueblo and El Paso County (Pueblo was industrial, while El Paso County contained a more technical community; both counties also had different housing growth rates) to find that Pueblo should not be included in the same district as El Paso County.[166] The court found that it was more appropriate for Pueblo to be included with the San Luis Valley (part of the western slope district) because together they constituted a community of interest due to the strong traditional ethnic, cultural, and religious similarities, and shared trade, employment, education, and health resources and facilities.

As a resident of Routt County, I strongly encourage the Congressional redistricting commission to form a Congressional district that incorporates what we in Colorado call "Ski Country USA". The Counties of Colorado that are home to the 12 month of the year recreational backbone of the state- literally and figuratively- share economic interests, public policy concerns, and geographic similarity and continuity. Specifically, the counties with the larger destination ski areas share the same marketing issues, issues dealing with federal lands, water issues, housing and affordability issues, work force issues, tourism issues, agricultural issues, transportation issues and many more. The counties of Routt, Grand, Eagle (which should not be a divided county for its Congressional District), Summit and Pitkin should be together in a Congressional District. Jackson county, with its small population, but growing agri-tourism and fishing and hunting economies and proximity to Rocky Mountain National Park, could be joined with the core ski counties or placed with Larimer, with which they share a judicial district, back country recreation interests and similar agricultural interests. Depending on the population apportionment, the counties of Gunnison, Ouray, Lake, Chaffee and Park could also be added as they share many of the same public policy concerns and issues as the core ski counties and are also home to ski resorts and recreation based economies, and would fit well as a contiguous Congressional District without creating odd geographic divisions, as all of these counties are part of the backbone of the Rockies. Routt County is in the process of updating their Master Plan. The citizen input throughout the county supports that the county's economic base is recreation, location neutral business and agriculture. Hayden and Oak Creek, the next two largest communities after Steamboat Springs are leaving the energy extraction economy, and are actively working to become communities that are attractive to location neutral development economies while maintaining their support for recreation based and agricultural based economies. For all of these reasons, Routt and Eagle Counties are well suited to continue as a Legislative District, and I would strongly support that the Legislative redistricting commission keep this district intact.

Dear Congressional Redistricting Commission Members: Thank you so much for your service to our state. The eyes of the nation are upon Colorado to see if Amendments Y and Z can succeed in reforming redistricting and ending gerrymandering. Colorado Rising Action strongly supported the passage of Y and Z and submits the following map for your consideration: https://davesredistricting.org/join/6bc5b5d0-21bd-4faa-9f41-29643e0474a8 This map attempts to comply with the constitutional requirements – minimizing splits to cities, counties and communities of interests while maximizing compactness. It also draws 2 competitive congressional districts (CDs 6 and 8). Thank you for your consideration - and best wishes in your efforts. Best Regards, Michael Fields Executive Director, Colorado Rising Action

Hello redistricting staff and commissioners. My family has lived in the San Luis Valley and Pueblo since before this was United States Territory. Generation after generation, these two communities have been inextricably tied because of our culture, heritage, and rich hispanic history. Those historical ties are significant and continue to this day in how we exist between San Luis Valley and Pueblo. Our families are spread across both regions, and many times, critical private and public resources that we access are in Pueblo. Please continue to recognize us as a community of interest as you develop a preliminary map.