Good Morning, Colorado, and welcome to the Daily Sun-Up. It’s Friday September 25th, and we’re feeling lucky to start the day with you. Monday through Friday we’re sharing an in-depth look at one of our top stories, followed by a quick summary of important things happening in our state. Today we’re discussing Proposition 114, and what’s at stake with the effort to reintroduce gray wolves in Colorado.
But before we begin, let’s go back in time with some Colorado history adapted from historian Derek R Everett’s book “Colorado Day by Day”:
Today, we take you back to September 25th, 1919 when President Woodrow Wilson delivered one of the most impressive public addresses of his career in Pueblo. It also proved to be his last.
He had set out on a national speaking tour hoping to inspire crowds to demand the ratification of the Treaty of Versailles.
Now, our feature story.
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There are gray wolves to the north and gray wolves to the south.
And in November Colorado voters will decide whether the roaming predators should have a home in the middle of the country.
Proposition 114 asks voters to direct Colorado Parks and Wildlife to reintroduce wolves in western Colorado beginning in 2023.
The idea is that connecting wolf populations in the Northern Rockies with packs in the south will enable recovery of a species that was nearly hunted to extinction in the early 1900s. Wolf advocates see Colorado as the critical final step in a 40-year effort to return wolves to the Lower 48.
In those four decades gray wolf populations have grown in Montana, Wyoming, Idaho, Oregon and Washington. Mexican wolves are thriving in New Mexico and Arizona. And in the Great Lakes region, reintroduction efforts have fostered a population of more than 6,000 gray wolves.
Reintroduction work has been guided in all of those states by recovery plans under the Endangered Species Act, which has protected gray wolves since 1978. State wildlife managers in the Northern Rockies, Southwest and Great Lakes region followed federal laws that required reintroduction of the threatened species.
So why has the wolf question ended up on the Colorado ballot?
Colorado Sun reporter Jason Blevins joins us today to explain.
Thanks, Jason.
So who is behind the ballot campaign?
The Rocky Mountain Wolf Action Fund, an issue committee formed to push the ballot measure’s passage, has raised more than $1.7 million in the past two years. It has spent most of that haul and had only about $19,000 heading into the campaign’s final stretch.
One donor, Richard Pritzlaff, has given more than $254,000 to the issue committee. He’s the president of the Biophilia Foundation, which operates out of New Mexico and Maryland.
Timothy Ferriss, an entrepreneur and media personality who lives in Texas, has donated about $122,000 to the committee.
California’s Tides Center, which supports progressive causes, donated $381,000 to the campaign.
And others involved in the effort to pass Proposition 114 include the Sierra Club, the Center for Biological Diversity, the National Resources Defense Council, Rocky Mountain Wild and the Association of Zoos and Aquariums.
On the other side,
Ranchers have been among the loudest opponents of Proposition 114, worried about how wolf reintroduction could impact their bottom lines.
Stop The Wolf PAC, which is working to prevent the Proposition from passing, has raised more than $70,000 and spent about half that amount.
Unlike the Rocky Mountain Wolf Action Fund, its donors are mostly individuals who have given smaller sums.
The largest individual donor has been R. Stan Marek Jr., who is listed as the CEO of Houston-based Marek Brothers Systems, a drywall, plaster and insulation company. He gave $5,000.
Other donors include The Center for Organizational Research and Education gave the issue committee $17,000.
The Elk Creek Ranch Owners Association, based in Meeker, gave $15,000.
Adding fire to the debate was the discovery of a pack of wolves in northwestern Colorado in January, possibly the first to roam into Colorado since the last wolf was shot in the state in the 1920s. Opponents of the initiative argue that if wolves are already migrating south into Colorado there’s no reason to spend over $500,000 a year during the implementation phase of reintroduction.
But supporters point to legal wolf hunting in Wyoming, saying wolves have to roam through dangerous territory to reach Colorado and the chance of building a self-sustaining population of about 80-100 wolves is impossible without reintroducing the predators.
The issue has seen emotional arguments from both sides in the past year. Colorado State University examined the debate and found “a diversity of beliefs” about wolves, some supported by science and some not.
Thanks for listening. Before we go here are a few stories you should know about today:
Colorado’s splintered mental health system has had tragic failures. And the state is taking the first step to fix it. A task force ordered by Gov. Jared Polis calls for creating a new Behavioral Health Administration, but the plan has no new funding.
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The start of school has been chaotic for districts amid the coronavirus crisis. Educators fear that without more support, students will be left behind.
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There have been nearly 1,400 confirmed or probable coronavirus cases among University of Colorado Boulder students since Aug. 24 so Boulder has banned all gatherings among 18 to 22 year olds until Oct. 8
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Oil and gas companies must monitor fracking emissions as Colorado adopts first-in-the-nation rules to reduce air pollution.
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Lt. Gen. Richard Clark is The U.S. Air Force Academy new superintendent, and he will be the first Black officer to lead the military institution.
For more information on all of these stories, visit our website, www.coloradosun.com.
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