The past year was marked by hard times for young people, an ongoing focus on our water supply, local budgets, schools and more.
Sadly, 2016 will be remembered for both overdoses and suicides — some made public in an attempt to raise awareness and some mourned privately. When young people die, community members are made aware that strangers are not the only victims of addiction, bullying (especially in the age of social media), hopelessness and other harsh and intractable forces. These problems hurt our own children, loved and raised by well-respected families. We all benefit from talking more openly, and from recognizing that adults do not always see what is going on. Let’s resolve to do better in the new year.
Despite what seems to be shaping up as the new pattern of blizzards in December and early January and then some scary dry months before spring rains, McPhee Reservoir still holds plenty of water as 2017 begins. Last year’s bounty allowed for a stop-and-start rafting spill below the dam, a boon for rafters who complained that it could have been managed better. The fishery below the dam has languished because of low flows and high temperatures. If this year’s runoff produces big spills, anglers will question why some of a few more cubic feet per second could not have been sent downriver when the fish might have benefited.
Water managers throughout the west are refining their forecasting models, and the Dolores Water Conservancy District is no different.
Because Kinder-Morgan, long a mainstay of property tax revenue in Montezuma County, has reduced production, Montezuma County recently announced no raises and 10 percent departmental cuts amounting to $1.3 million. The across-the-board reductions suggest that the commissioners could not identify fat to trim.
Other entities that depend on property tax, including Montezuma-Cortez School District Re-1, also are looking at decreased revenue. “Doing more with less” is not a viable option year after year.
Re-1 also faces pressure from the Colorado Department of Education after scores on standardized tests failed to improve enough to lift the district from the state’s list of schools that are not performing adequately. The district staff believes that the low number of students’ tested provided insufficient data to make that determination.
On the bright side, Kemper elementary has jumped from the state’s lowest rating to the highest. Congratulations to Kemper’s faculty and staff, students and parents.
A group of Kemper students had the experience of a lifetime when they traveled to Washington not once but twice to participate in the planting and harvesting of the White House kitchen garden with First Lady Michelle Obama and two celebrity chefs. The Montezuma School to Farm Project facilitated their trips.
The district is moving closer to unloading at least one real-estate burden. Plans to demolish the retired high school building received a boost when a recent inspection found that asbestos abatement might cost less than originally estimated.
In other news, the McElmo flume east of Cortez has been preserved and a new pullout constructed, highlighting local history. Efforts continue to create a trail between Cortez and the Mesa Verde entrance. And Boutique Air took over service to Denver from the Cortez airport, bringing lower prices and a promise of greater reliability.
A lot happened in 2016. We expect no less from 2017.
