Just 45 miles apart, Durango and Cortez might as well be on opposite shores of an ocean in the eyes of some residents of those cities.
Cortez has the ancient silence of Mesa Verde. Durango has the elated screams of whitewater rafters.
Durango has a college and a large professional labor force that Cortez lacks.
Steve Wilkerson of Cortez only visits Durango two or three times a year.
Its too busy, too crowded for me, he said after firing up a chile roaster for the years first batch of peppers from Palisade at his roadside stand on West Main Street.
Gregg Leighton, a 48-year resident of Cortez, agrees.
I go to Durango and get road rage. Its so busy there, he said.
But its the crowds that keep Durango interesting for many of its residents.
Without sounding like Im judging, Durangos prettier. Its got more sophistication in its downtown, said Dr. Stephanie Harris, who was offering free chiropractic consultations Friday outside Natures Oasis.
Fort Lewis makes a huge difference, Harris said.
In other words, Cortez is a little bit country. Durangos a little bit rock n roll.
Most importantly for Denver-based politicos, Cortez votes Republican, while Durango elects Democrats.
The difference has not escaped the notice of Democratic leaders, who want to put Durango in a House district with Telluride and attach Cortez to Montrose when they draw new maps this fall.
The process is called reapportionment, and it happens every 10 years, after the census, in order to keep districts balanced in population.
Each of the 65 House districts needs to have about 77,000 people, and each of the 35 Senate districts should have about 144,000 people.
The law imposes all sorts of requirements on the maps, but theres still plenty of room to gerrymander.
Districts have to be as compact as possible and should avoid splitting cities and counties. Minority voting blocs cant be broken up. And districts should reflect communities of interest.
Politicians have spent weeks debating exactly what communities of interest means, and the concept is behind the map submitted by Rep. Matt Jones, D-Louisville.
You can make a strong case from a community-of-interest standpoint that you can make a district thats more resort-oriented and a district thats more agriculture-oriented, Jones said.
His idea would anchor the resort district around Durango, Telluride and Pagosa Springs. Cortez would join Montrose in the agriculture district.
The plan means trouble for Rep. J. Paul Brown, R-Ignacio, or any other Republican who wants to represent House District 59, which currently includes Cortez, Durango and Pagosa Springs, but not Telluride.
Brown thinks Jones idea is bad for residents because it would require the representative to traverse Red Mountain Pass.
Its over the mountain. Its hard to represent, Brown said. It goes both ways. Say we had somebody running from Telluride, and they were trying to represent us.
The decision lies with an 11-person committee appointed by the governor, legislative leaders and the chief justice of the state Supreme Court. The commission is perfectly balanced, with five from each party and an unaffiliated chairman.
The committee already rejected the Durango-Telluride idea once. When the panel drew draft maps this summer, the five Republicans and Chairman Mario Carrera voted for the GOP map, which keeps Durango paired with Cortez and keeps Telluride in the Montrose district.
The current plan puts the Ute Mountain and Southern Ute Indian tribes in the same district. But tribal leaders testified at a public hearing that they want separate districts, like they have now.
The committee will meet again in Denver next month to redraw and finalize maps after spending August in public hearings around the state.
Politicos look at all sorts of ways to predict how their candidates will do in the new districts. One way is to look at voting results from low-profile races such as the 2010 University of Colorado regent race between Republican Steve Bosley and Democrat Melissa Hart.
Chances are most voters had never heard of either candidate before they filled out their ballots. So the contest gives map-drawers an idea of how a generic Republican will fare against a generic Democrat.
In the GOPs proposed district for Southwest Colorado, Bosley would have won by 11 points. In the Democrats Durango-Telluride idea, he would have won by just four points.
In other words, swapping Cortez for Telluride would give a seven percentage point boost to a generic Democratic candidate.
Brown won by 10 percentage points, but he benefitted from a Republican wave that might not be so strong or present at all in 2012.
La Plata County Commissioner Wally White, a Democrat, has not followed the process closely, but hes familiar with the Durango-Telluride idea and likes it.
Just thinking about how the political distribution is, I think Durango has more in common with Telluride than it does with Cortez or Montezuma County, White said.
The Four Corners flap will be a sidelight to the main fight over the Denver suburbs. Democrats think Republicans are getting the better deal with the House map, and Republicans think theyre losing out with the Senate map.
I think for the most part, Republicans are coming out on top, said Senate Majority Leader John Morse, D-Colorado Springs. But there are still some battles to be fought.
Committee member Mario Nicolais, a GOP elections lawyer, said the House map is fair, with 34 districts drawn by Republicans and 31 by Democrats.
It has a large number of swing seats, Nicolais said.
No changes are proposed for Southwest Colorados Senate District 6. Both parties agreed to keep it like it is - an eight-county district anchored by Durango and Montrose.
The committee has to turn in a map to the state Supreme Court by Oct. 7. The court will hold a brief hearing in the fall and either approve or reject the map.
