Compiled by Eric Lubbers, eric@coloradosun.com
CTO/Newsletter Wrangler, @brofax
Good morning and good Monday! We’re going to get straight to business today, but first, I have to talk about a party.
We’re celebrating The Colorado Sun’s first anniversary next month at Wynkoop Brewery in Denver and we’d love for you to join us. Tickets are $10 for non-members (details here), but members get in free, so if you’ve been holding off on joining our community — but want to try our special limited-edition Colorado Sun beer — now is the time to head to coloradosun.com/join to become a member (members, keep an eye on your inbox for your invite).
Now that we’re in a partying mood, let’s pack this lunch already, shall we?
UNDERWRITTEN BY
AARP is urging Colorado lawmakers to cut prescription drug prices. Coloradans shouldn’t have to choose between buying medication and buying food for our families. Learn more at aarp.org/rx.
TALK TO US ABOUT UNDERWRITING.
The Latest from The Sun
Deep mountain snow raised Lake Mead, Lake Powell water lines. But for the first time, supply cuts loom downstream.
The Gunnison River flows at 4,030 cubic feet per second as it passes through the Gunnison River whitewater park on July 2, 2019. The Gunnison is the fifth largest tributary to the Colorado River. (Dean Krakel, Special to The Colorado Sun)
It’s a new era in the Colorado River basin, where even one of the most bountiful winters in recent memory won’t prevent mandatory water usage cuts in states that draw from the river.
With objections from Canada and drug companies, Colorado’s plan to import prescription medicines could be in trouble
“We are done being ripped off.”
— Gov. Jared Polis in a statement earlier this month
“The government needs to pull up its socks and figure out how to protect Canadians from having our supply hoovered by Florida.”
— John Adams, the chair of Best Medicines Coalition
Colorado’s ambitious plan to import cheaper drugs from Canada could implode before it even has a chance to launch. John Ingold looks at the myriad issues piling up as roadblocks to the plan.
>> Read the whole story — including how the Trump administration figures into the plan — here.
Fearing Tri-State could duck clean-energy goals, Colorado utilities commission files unprecedented protest
“This is a fairly aggressive stand by the Colorado PUC. It will definitely leave a mark on the [Federal Energy Regulatory Commission] commissioners.”
— Ellen Kutzer, a utility attorney with the environmental group Western Resource Advocates
Tri-State Generation has spent the last year feeling pressure from its members to switch to renewable energy faster than scheduled as rural co-ops in its network continue to leave — even fending off a bold, half-billion-dollar offer to replace three of its coal plants with renewables and gas. But as Tri-State attempts to move from oversight by the state of Colorado to oversight by the federal government, state regulators are doing something they haven’t done in at least 25 years.
A campaign shake-up and wage complaint rattle Democratic candidate for U.S. Senate
Stephany Rose Spaulding, a Democratic candidate for U.S. Senate, speaks at an Indivisible Denver forum at Barnum Park in Denver on June 9, 2019. (Eric Lubbers, The Colorado Sun)
In the crowded primary race to face Sen. Cory Gardner next November, Stephany Rose Spaulding of Colorado Springs was just starting to get some national attention — thanks to a billboard paid for by Republicans attempting to paint her as “too liberal for Colorado” — when two of her top aides resigned.
>> Read more from John Frank’s report on the Spaulding campaign, from finances to staff grievances.
More from The Sun
- An astonishing array of animals and habitats are flourishing on six obsolete nuclear and chemical weapons complexes — including Rocky Flats — because rules banned public and private intrusions for decades. This is a really fascinating story from The Associated Press.
- ICYMI: On Friday the Colorado Air Quality Control Commission voted to adopt a zero-emissions vehicle mandate after three days of hearing.
From the Opinion Page
- “Colorado has run out of excuses for its decades-long failure to support education” — Diane Carman
- “With TABOR in their crosshairs, progressives seek to fundamentally change Colorado’s political identity” — Mario Nicolais
- “For domestic violence victims, the price of immigration-related fears may be nothing short of death” — University of Denver Prof. Anne P. DePrince, Rocky Mountain Victim Law Center executive director Emily Tofte Nestaval and University of Denver graduate student Naomi Wright
- “Health care is a right, not just for the privileged” — Democratic candidate for U.S. Senate and psychologist Diana Bray
- “‘Never again’ must be more than just words” — Crisanta Duran, 1st Congressional District Candidate and former Colorado House Speaker
// Two employees of the GEO Group for-profit immigration detention center in Aurora contracted mumps earlier this year. Also in this detailed report from Kara Mason at The Sentinel: GEO Group does not require its 270 staff members to receive MMR vaccinations, despite the fact that many of the detainees in the center come from countries with lower vaccination rates. // Sentinel Colorado
// Up in northern Colorado’s still-hot housing market, any home under $300,000 usually sells within two days. Statewide, smaller starter homes are in demand for both first-time buyers (aka millennials like me) and the state’s aging population who are looking to downsize. Ben Markus has more on who is actually buying homes in Colorado. // Greeley Tribune, CPR News
// In just the last seven months, nearly three dozen Aurora cops and firefighters have left their departments for jobs in Denver, what a city council member is calling a “mass exodus.” // Sentinel Colorado
// Last week, I was very jealous of these joyously insane highliners. This week, my jealousy is aimed at the high-speed downhill skateboarders that took over Georgetown. (I think I may need to get a little more excitement in my life). // The Colorado Sun, Summit Daily News
// Sure, we had a wet winter and a surprisingly wet summer so far. But if you think the state is completely free of fire danger, a blaze sparked by fireworks at the Palisade Peach Festival will disabuse you of that notion in a hurry. // 9News
// Denver residents are protesting the green 5G poles popping up all over town, with one resident planting a tree in the location a pole was set to be installed. // Westword
// “On Dec. 8, 1985, ski instructor and suspected drug kingpin Steve Grabow was killed by a pipe bomb after playing a round of tennis.” I cannot recommend enough this story about the rise and fall of the iconic Aspen Club. // The Aspen Times
// Jack Healy, a New York Times reporter based here in Colorado, has a piece about a surprising battleground in the fight against white supremacy: An Indiana farmer’s market where some growers have started handing out buttons reading “Don’t Buy Veggies From Nazis.” // New York Times
// Sometimes living in the future feels like a nightmare: Summer camps are now using facial recognition software to automatically upload photos of smiling(?) kids to an app so parents can keep a watchful eye on them. // Washington Post
Today’s Thing
The Thing: 1619 Project (New York Times Magazine)
Why You Might Like It: Before I was bitten by the journalism bug, my first career choice was history (and I have 45 hours of a graduate degree to prove it!). What really intrigued me was the idea that history — something most take for granted as a set of facts and dates in a textbook — is actually a living document, a set of raw materials subject to the interpretation of each new generation of historians. In the incredibly ambitious “1619 Project” dozens of writers and scholars start with a simple premise — that August of 1619, when the first ship carrying enslaved Africans landed in Virginia, is as historically important as 1776 in the creation and ongoing story of America — and turn out some of the most eye-opening works of historical interpretation I’ve ever read.
Here’s the thing: This is not light reading. It’s not easy and it’s not comforting. But to be truly dedicated to the values of the United States of America, you can’t just cling to the good parts of history. You have to reckon with the brutality and inequality of the past to have any chance at creating a just future.
What’s your thing? Send us an email at things@coloradosun.com and you could be published in a future Sunriser!
Top five ways you can support The Sun:
- Get a membership, starting at just $5/month.
- Sign up for our newsletters (or get a friend/coworker/neighbor signed up).
- Visit our store to pick up some cool Colorado Sun merch.
- Share a link on your social media feed (or even screenshot a headline for Instagram) and tag us — @ColoradoSun on Twitter, @TheColoradoSun on Facebook and Instagram).
- Already a member? You can now buy gift memberships!
Every dollar you give goes right back into supporting journalism.
As we near our first anniversary of publishing, it’s as good a time as any to thank everyone who has been making our work possible. This is truly a community-supported effort, and each and every person who has contributed has made stories like the ones today in The Sun possible.
To keep it all going, keep encouraging your friends and family to head over to coloradosun.com/join and become a part of our growing community of members.
See you back here on Wednesday.
— Eric