The blistering pace of real estate sales is continuing in Colorado’s high country, with every resort community setting new records in each month this year. “It’s been crazy,” Crested Butte broker Frank Konsella said, “way past everything in 2019 and 2020.” Last year saw record numbers of home buyers paying highest-ever prices for properties in […]
San Miguel County
Posted inBusiness, News, Politics and Government
Ethics complaints from mountain counties spur probe of state Division of Property Taxation
The Department of Local Affairs will hire a law firm to investigate the Colorado Division of Property Taxation after Eagle, La Plata and San Miguel counties made ethics complaints against the state agency’s top two directors. The move averted a call for state auditors to probe the claim that a too-cozy relationship between the state […]
Posted inCOVID, Health, News
Behind Wyoming and Colorado’s anomalous twin COVID-19 spikes despite their political differences
By Rae Ellen Bichelle, Kaiser Health News WHEATLAND, Wyo. — Brandon Graves said covid-19 arrived in Wheatland the way new movies do in this High Plains farming town: months after hitting the big cities and without much fanfare. “It kind of trickled in and it never really exploded here,” said Graves, a lifelong resident and […]
Posted inBusiness, Housing, News
Survey of Colorado’s high-country residents a “wake-up call” on the devastating implications of the affordable housing crisis
A first-of-its-kind survey of thousands of Colorado mountain town residents has delivered the clearest look at the impact of the pandemic on housing, rentals and lifestyles in the high country to date. And the news is not good. Wealthy newcomers are displacing locals. Businesses are struggling to hire staff. The crowds are growing in the […]
Posted inBusiness, Crime and Courts, News, Newsletters, Politics and Government, The Outsider
State tax official who is required to be neutral advised luxury resort owners on how to minimize property taxes
A state tax official required to be a neutral arbiter is instead advising Colorado luxury resort hotel owners on how to minimize their property taxes, according to leaders in the counties who have lost millions of dollars in revenue. A batch of personal emails uncovered by Eagle, San Miguel and La Plata counties detail a […]
Posted inOpinion, Opinion Columns
Opinion: As county commissioners, we see smart ways to close Colorado’s digital divide
Colorado’s digital divide spans both rural and urban areas of our state, but it’s two different divides and two different challenges. The Rural Divide is primarily an infrastructure problem: At least 100,000 Coloradans don’t have connectivity to high-speed broadband networks. In urban areas, it’s an Adoption Divide – world-class networks are available almost everywhere, but […]
Posted inBusiness, Growth, Housing, News, Newsletters, The Outsider
Record-breaking real estate frenzy is changing the culture of Colorado’s mountain towns as locals are priced out
Brianna Anthony and her boyfriend, Keenan Montague, have lived in three homes over the past six months in Telluride. The five-bedroom house that the local bartenders rented with friends sold last fall, and the new owner, an East Coast doctor with a home in nearby Mountain Village, launched a major renovation. They moved into another […]
Posted inClimate, Coloradans, Economy, Environment, News, Outdoors, Politics and Government
Hard-right rooted group has made inroads in Colorado opposing Biden’s vision for public lands
Land grab or precious-resource preservation? The battle over where the truth ̶ and where Westerners’ hearts ̶ lie on that matter is rumbling through Colorado counties as a federal government initiative nicknamed 30×30 gains momentum, and opposition. Colorado has become the beachhead in a Texas-based group’s efforts to use local governments to thwart the Biden […]
Posted inOpinion, Opinion Columns
Opinion: Boulder’s climate lawsuit would be costly for consumers
Climate change is a pressing challenge shared by every person, business and government around the world. How we choose to address this crisis — whether we unite behind a common purpose or let it become yet one more pawn in the politics of division — will define our generation and our success. The common-purpose approach […]
Posted inBusiness, Economy, Housing, News, Newsletters, Outdoors, The Outsider
Coronavirus drives blistering sales of Colorado mountain homes, sets 2020 as historic high mark
Prices are at record highs. Supplies of mountain homes for sale have never been lower. Across Colorado’s high country, resort community real estate sales have set records since July. Through October, the total real estate sales from six Colorado resort counties are nearly $1 billion greater than all sales last year. “It’s Biblical,” George Harvey, […]