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Amendment 74: A Hidden Agenda to Strangle Local Government

Written by Sophia Guerrero-Murphy

This November, our ballots will be full of measures for voters to weigh in on. One of these – Amendment 74 – is an attempt by special interests to turn local decision making on its head.

Official Ballot EnvelopeAmendment 74 would allow any property holder, including corporations, to sue local and state governments over any regulation, from city planning to basic health and safety protections.

For the sake of protecting the Colorado we love, we cannot let this dangerous amendment pass.

What does it do?

The amendment is written to be purposely confusing and dangerously broad. Under the guise of protecting property rights, it would require the government – the taxpayers – to compensate property owners, including corporate interests and industry, for any decrease in the value of their property – including loss of profits – due to any government law or regulation. The cost of paying out the industries and special interests when enforcing codes and laws will eventually make enforcing even the most straightforward regulations too expensive. In short, it destroys the ability of local leaders to make decisions about what their communities look like.

This measure is unnecessary, too extreme, too broad, and was created by and for special interests.

→ It’s unnecessary because the Colorado Constitution already protects private property owners; it doesn’t allow private property to be taken for public use without compensation.

→ This ballot measure would expand part of our Constitution in a way that is incredibly broad and would have sweeping effects on local governments and communities across the state. By requiring local governments to compensate corporate interests, Amendment 74 seeks to make any regulation too expensive to implement.

→ The motive of this measure is clear: it’s paid for by oil and gas companies because it would give them complete freedom over where and how they do business.

Here are three ways that Amendment 74 would hurt Coloradans:

1) Amendment 74 puts industry over people.

An oil rig near residential areaWhile you won’t find any mention of oil and gas in the measure itself, Amendment 74 was written to prevent local governments from limiting oil and gas drilling in any way. Cloaked in language that would have you believe that all Coloradans’ property rights would be strengthened under this measure, Amendment 74 is exclusively backed by oil and gas companies. Protect Colorado, a front group created by the state’s largest oil and gas companies, has raised a staggering $13 million so far in support of 74. Its top three contributors  – Anadarko Petroleum, Extraction Oil and Gas, and Noble Energy – each donated more than $2 million to the cause.

So, what’s in it for them?

If an oil and gas company wanted to drill near a hospital, school, or nursing home but was blocked by zoning laws, the company could sue the government for preventing them from making a profit. If this happened, the government would have to either pay the company or waive the zoning law. In most situations, city, county, and state governments would not be able to afford the payoff, so they would be forced to allow the company to drill wherever it wanted.

The scariest part of Amendment 74 is how broad it is. Far beyond allowing the oil and gas industry to ignore policies designed to protect public health, it could:

  • A sign for a liquor store near a churchAllow gun shops, strip clubs, and marijuana stores to be built near schools despite neighborhood or family concerns;
  • Allow industrial activities to be located right beside nursing homes, daycares, and hospitals;
  • Undo noise regulations that ensure we all get a good night’s sleep;
  • Undermine local decisions on landfills and hazardous waste storage, allowing them to be located virtually anywhere;
  • Get rid of public health standards governing restaurants, tattoo parlors, or hospitals;
  • Hurt safety rules like fire and building codes.

2) Expensive for taxpayers.

Measures similar to Amendment 74 that were passed in other states show just how burdensome it would be to Coloradans. By forcing local governments, like cities and counties, to pay individuals who “suffered any burden” as a result of a regulation, these measures were prohibitively expensive to governments and taxpayers.

Stacks of claims fill an office roomOver a three-year period in Oregon, a measure similar to 74 resulted in the filing of nearly 7,000 claims requesting a total of $19.8 billion in compensation. Faced with such a massive payment, cash-strapped governments were forced to waive rules for nine out of ten claims. This benefited agribusiness, developers, and extractive industries at the expense of taxpayers.

If Amendment 74 passes, the power of our state and local governments will be strangled. We rely on our local governments to listen to community members and plan for the future of our neighborhoods. They do this in open meetings with public input to balance the needs of all residents. That long-held, trusted process would be upended under this measure.

3) Threatens the property rights of most landowners.

Foreclosure sign in front of a houseUnder Amendment 74, Colorado landowners will suffer. Despite what proponents of 74 claim, waiving regulations would weaken, not strengthen, property owners’ rights. Since property values go down when an undesirable development – like a landfill – is planned near a community, one unregulated property owner has the potential to harm the property values of many.

This also happened in Oregon, where property owners could only sit and watch as an 80-acre gravel mine was built next to family ranches, 150 vacation homes were put up in a national monument, and subdivisions tore up agricultural land. As these landowners learned, waiving land-use rules not only generally damaged property values, it pitted neighbor against neighbor and put a stranglehold on local decision making. Two years after it passed, Oregon residents opposed the 74-like measure by nearly two to one.

With all the attacks on our environment occurring at the national level, it’s easy to lose track of the local ballot issues that Coloradans will be voting on this November. But this year, not paying attention could be dangerous.

Amendment 74 is not a measure about protecting private property rights. No, the purpose of this initiative is to bankrupt any local and state government that tries to regulate the oil and gas industry. It poses an unprecedented threat to our communities, our environment, and our way of life.

See Amendment 74 for what it is – a measure to deregulate and debilitate – and vote NO.

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A Thru-Hiker’s Story of Why We Need Conservation

Written by Jenny Gaeng

I was twenty-six years old and standing – just barely – in New Mexico. My backpack was already digging into my shoulders. My feet, wrapped in shiny new trail runners, scratched nervously at the desert sand.

The hot air rippled like a curtain. Brown mountains rose in enormous triangles from the flat expanse; they could have been painted, like the backdrop of a play. Behind me stood a small barbed-wire fence: Mexico.

3,100 miles ahead shone a luminous bullseye: Canada.

There was a monument at the trailhead, a sturdy stone obelisk reading: Southernmost Point, Continental Divide National Scenic Trail. The route was engraved on the side: New Mexico, Colorado, Wyoming, Idaho, Montana. It took seconds to run my fingers from beginning to end; I figured it would take five or six months by foot.

The shuttle to the trailhead had gone, and I was all alone. I was afraid to start hiking, afraid that I was really here and had no one to blame but myself. The path forward was littered with cholla cacti and wiry ocatilla, their tips like red arrowheads pointing at the sky.

I tried to imagine what I could not see: the promise of rivers and peaks, of strength and redemption. I pointed my body north and began to walk.

The Continental Divide Trail was created in 1978 under the National Scenic Trails Act, joining other long-distance hikes such as the Appalachian and Pacific Crest Trails. While those trails attract thousands of “thru-hikers” each year, the Continental Divide Trail only sees a few hundred. This is due in part to the challenges of the trail: remoteness, route-finding, weather, and everyone’s favorite fear, grizzly bears. The trail is also incomplete. Today, 20 percent of the trail is on roads, from bumpy dirt roads to actual highways, where hikers’ feet throb on the scorching pavement as cars whiz by. About a thousand miles in, I started sticking out my thumb.

Future hikers may not have to, thanks to the amazing work of land management agencies, the Continental Divide Trail Coalition, and other partners working to complete the trail. This means fun work like mapping and trail-building, but land acquisition comes first.

The Land and Water Conservation Fund (LWCF) was created in 1964 to repurpose taxes from offshore oil and gas drilling to fund something that virtually every American benefits from: public land. Money from LWCF is used to purchase private land and give it back to the people – and it’s not just trails and forests; every state in the country has used LWCF to pay for parks, bike paths, and more. In this case, purchasing those last remaining parcels along the Continental Divide is instrumental in completing the trail from Mexico to Canada.

But these days, there’s not much that we don’t have to fight for. On September 30, LWCF is set to expire, and it will take an act of Congress to keep it afloat. If Congress doesn’t vote to save it, we could lose our most precious resources to the backlog of defunded yet essential conservation efforts. The Continental Divide Trail could forever remain a trail of broken links along the nation’s spine.

Hiking near Knapsack Col, Wind River Range, Wyoming

September 22 was the first day of fall. It was already bone-cold in Montana, ten miles from the border in Glacier National Park.

I woke up to water dripping through the seams of my tent. Everything was soaked: my clothes, my pad, my sleeping bag. I didn’t care. “Squirrel!” I yelled to my buddy, who had joined me for the last few days. “Wake up. Let’s get the heck to Canada!”

The trail had turned into a river of mud, two steps forward and big slides back. The rain made it worse. We followed a creek up, up, over a hill, gritting our teeth until finally-

Squirrel was ahead, and I heard him start to whoop. “Oh my god,” I whispered. I opened my throat to join in, but only air came out. I braced myself to feel – what was I supposed to feel?

A bleary parking lot emerged from the fog: a pit toilet, two flags, and a few lonely cars. Squirrel was staring up at the sign and shielding his face from the rain.

“This is anticlimactic,” he said.

“No!” I cried. This was the punctuation mark at the end of a very long sentence. It had started five months and two days ago at the barbed-wire fence, or maybe earlier – the first time I scaled a mountain, or saw the Milky Way, or sat in the city listening to sirens howl and thinking, I wish I was far away.

Wherever it began, it snaked here over five million footsteps. Ten for the sirens, one hundred for an illness, one thousand for a broken heart – and all the rest for the people who told me I wouldn’t make it. The Continental Divide Trail was every oozing blister, every misstep that sent me face-first into the dirt. It was every time someone asked, Are you alone? and their tone said, You shouldn’t be here. It was every basin that drained my breath, all the mountains that washed over me and carried everything else away.

The Land and Water Conservation Fund isn’t just about land or water. It’s the currency of the human spirit, of challenge and healing. It keeps us alive and free.

“I knew the trail wouldn’t let us down easy,” Squirrel groaned.

My nose was numb from the rain. I scraped my teeth against the my peeling lower lip and looked out at the fog. I didn’t know how to get home or even where home would be. But I knew that I could keep moving, even if it took another five million steps to get there.

I said, “This is perfect.”

Read more from Jenny Gaeng, Field Organizer at Conservation Colorado, and her outdoor exploits at adventuresofcloud.com. Next week she will begin a traverse of the Sangre de Cristo range, a wild area currently under threat from oil and gas drilling. Her blogs will explore the Sangres’ history, geology, and the intersection of indigenous activism and environmentalism.

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Conservation Colorado Announces Kelly Nordini as New Executive Director

After conducting a nationwide search, Conservation Colorado today announced Kelly Nordini will be its new Executive Director. Nordini is an experienced conservationist, political strategist, and policy expert. Her decades of experience at the intersection of Colorado politics and conservation policy and her vision for the future of Conservation Colorado distinguished her from an extraordinary field of more than 100 candidates.

Nordini has extensive experience in public policy, political strategy and campaigns, and community organizing, as well as a background in management. She was previously a partner at Hilltop Public Solutions, where she led efforts to advance clean energy policies in Colorado. She has also held leadership positions at Western Conservation Foundation and Project New America, and she served as Deputy Chief of Staff for Governor Bill Ritter.

“Kelly is the leader we need to build on our legacy of advocacy and help mobilize the growing population of conservation-minded Coloradans to achieve even greater public policy success across the state,” said Diane Carman, Conservation Colorado board chair. “The fast-moving political environment demands that we are continuously adapting to meet our goals—protecting public lands, conserving water, and ensuring a healthy future for all Coloradans. Kelly will bring political savvy, strong relationships, and a deep commitment to organizing to lead Conservation Colorado into this new chapter.”

“I am so excited to join the exceptional team at Conservation Colorado, and I can’t wait to get started,” said Kelly Nordini. “We have so much to do in the next three months to ensure a pro-conservation Governor and state legislature. The organization is growing and in an incredibly strong position to advocate for bold policies that ensure we protect the Colorado we all love. I’m thrilled to be able to take on these challenges with such smart, thoughtful colleagues.”

Nordini has a deep history in Colorado, and the announcement of her new role was praised by leaders from across the state.

“This is a great move for Conservation Colorado. Kelly has a successful record of bringing people together to find creative solutions. With her at the helm, I have no doubt they will continue fighting to ensure Colorado has the cleanest air and water possible,” said Governor John Hickenlooper.

“Protecting our air, land, and water is critical to our state’s future, especially to the diverse communities that call Colorado home. I know Kelly will continue the transformational work of Conservation Colorado to ensure that it remains a model for conservation efforts across the country,” said Speaker of the House Crisanta Duran.

“Conservation Colorado’s work for our state is invaluable. I am confident in Kelly’s ability to continue moving our state forward. I look forward to continuing our strong partnership and protecting our public lands, clean water, and clean air,” said Senate Minority Leader Leroy M. Garcia.

“Ever since my time with Governor Owens, I have appreciated Kelly’s desire and ability to work across the aisle and with a variety of Colorado interest groups,” said Mike Beasley, Former Legislative Director for Gov. Owens and President of 5280 Strategies. “I look forward to working with her to ensure that we protect the environment and create economic prosperity across the state.”

Conservation Colorado is the largest state-based environmental organization in the country with nearly 40 staff in Denver and four field offices as well as 40,000 members across the state. The organization spent $1.3 million in the 2016 elections and had a 90 percent win rate of its endorsed candidates.

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Trump Administration Rolls Back National Clean Car Standards that Save Money, Reduce Smog

The Trump administration today released a rollback of national clean car and vehicle efficiency standards. These widely-supported standards save Coloradans money at the gas pump, cut greenhouse gas emissions, and reduce smog and toxic pollution.

“Make no mistake: these rollbacks will hurt Coloradans,” said Sophia Mayott-Guerrero, transportation and energy advocate at Conservation Colorado. “Less efficient motor vehicles are a significant contributor to air pollution and climate change, and the Trump administration is putting more of them on the road to appease industry interests. Colorado must take bold action now to protect our health and environment.”

In anticipation of these federal rollbacks, Governor John Hickenlooper in June issued an executive order directing Colorado air quality officials to begin a process to adopt state clean car standards. Colorado could join 13 other states and the District of Columbia as leaders in clean car technology and clean air. Through this process, environmental, public health, and consumer groups will encourage the Colorado Air Quality Control Commission (AQCC) to explore Colorado clean car standards that include both low emissions and zero emissions components. The AQCC will begin consideration of the clean car standards on August 16.

“Trump’s proposed rollback of vehicle pollution standards is yet another move to satisfy corporate interests at the expense of Coloradans,” said Zach Pierce, Senior Campaign Representative for Sierra Club’s Beyond Coal Campaign in Colorado. “Here in Colorado, rolling back the standards means more air pollution and more money spent at the gas pump. Since the White House isn’t looking out for Coloradans, Governor Hickenlooper is defending clean air and family budgets with our own strong policies.”

This rollback will increase carbon emissions in Colorado by 3.9 million tons per year, undercutting Governor Hickenlooper’s goals to address our changing climate. Emissions of smog-causing air pollutants from vehicles would increase by about 15 percent, making it harder for places like Colorado’s Front Range to meet federal ozone standards that protect our health. For Coloradans, especially the 343,000 people who are living with asthma, more air pollution means more coughing and wheezing, increased risk of infection, and permanent damage to lung tissue.

“Coloradans must now protect their own clean air,” said Noah Long, senior attorney for the Natural Resources Defense Council. “It’s outrageous that the Trump administration is trying to not only roll back basic health and environmental safeguards, but also remove the ability of states like Colorado to cut pollution.”

Coloradans have saved $550 million at the pump since the federal government set standards in 2012 to double fuel efficiency for cars and light trucks by 2025. Under these standards, the average Colorado household would have seen $2,700 in savings by 2030 – savings that won’t happen with this rollback.

“Inefficient cars are just wasteful – they cost consumers every time we go to the pump, and they hurt our health when they produce unnecessary pollution,” said Danny Katz, director of CoPIRG. “As technology continues to advance, we need to take advantage of even cleaner, more fuel efficient cars. That’s why we applaud Governor Hickenlooper’s action to make Colorado a leader around fuel efficient, cleaner cars.”

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