Headlines — December 22, 2022

December 22, 2022

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Boulder Seeking Task Force Members For Input To The City’s Design Of A Guaranteed Income Pilot Project

The City of Boulder is seeking community members to be part of a Community Task Force that will help guide the structure and implementation of a Guaranteed Income Pilot Project. 

Boulder’s Guaranteed Income Pilot Project will use federal COVID-19 relief funds to provide monthly, unrestricted cash assistance to low-income community members. 

The city will be asking task force members to provide input on the project’s elements such as who to target, how long they should get support, who should qualify and the project’s goals.

The city says staff and the project’s consultants, Impact Charitable, will select task force members based on a range of criteria including low-income lived experience as well as participants from historically underrepresented communities. 

As part of the obligations of those who the city selects, participants will need to attend three mandatory meetings for three evenings in January as well as additional activities through April. 

The Daily Camera reports the city will provide a stipend, meals, language interpretation, and transportation assistance for those selected to participate.

The U-S Forest Service and the Bureau of Land Management are starting outreach

The U-S Forest Service and the Bureau of Land Management are starting outreach on the proposal to withdraw nearly 225 thousand acres of federal land in the Thompson Divide from mineral leasing. It’s located in Garfield, Pitkin, and Gunnison Counties, starting northwest of Carbondale.

The meeting is a part of an initial 90-day comment period, before the Forest Service and the B-L-M begin an environmental analysis. If approved, the withdrawal will prevent oil and gas and mineral leases for 20 years. Tony Edwards with the Forest Service says this is another way to protect public lands. “So this abuts a lot of wilderness, so by removing those oil and gas operations, we’ll continue those wilderness characteristics a little further out, is what’s happening.”The majority of attendees were supportive of the withdrawal proposal.

Will Roush, executive director of local nonprofit advocacy group Wilderness Workshop, says the community wants to see this process done right. There will be more opportunities for public feedback during the environmental analysis process.

Ute Mountain Ute Chairman Manuel Heart is calling on the federal government to designate a 20,000 acre ranch in Gunnison as reservation land.

The Ute Mountain Ute tribe owns seven ranches in Colorado and Utah that tribal members use for cattle grazing and hunting. Currently, those ranches have “unrestricted fee land status,” which means they’re subject to taxes.

The Cortez Journal reports that the tribe wants the 20,000 acre-Pinecrest Ranch in Gunnison to be designated as Ute Mountain Ute reservation trust land. The ranch is some 200 miles from the Ute Mountain Ute Reservation.

According to Heart, trespassing on the ranch is an issue. And he said that local law enforcement officers have told the tribe they lack jurisdiction to enforce the law on tribal land.

To add the Pinecrest ranch land to the reservation, the tribe must complete an application with the Bureau of Indian Affairs, and complete a survey of the land’s boundaries.

State GOP Chair Will Not Seek Another Term

Colorado GOP chairperson Kristi Burton Brown announced Monday she will not seek another two-year term as chair of the state’s Republican Party.  Burton Brown is the party’s third chair in six years. 

Colorado Republicans lost every statewide office in the most recent election. The party also experienced significant losses in 2018 and 2020. Burton Brown, an anti-abortion advocate, and lawyer who started her post in 2021, said she will remain active in politics and concentrate on education policy going forward. Colorado Republicans will select their new leader in March.

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