A bookend for summer in Telluride
TELLURIDE – Summer opened in Telluride with an appearance by Cheryl Strayed, who spoke at Mountainfilm about her book, Wild. The book relates her experience when she was 26 and, coming off a divorce, drug addiction and death of her mother, set out on a backpacking trip of the Pacific Crest Trail to find herself.
Last weekend, Telluride ushered out summer with its more Hollywood-oriented film festival. This time, the actress Reese Witherspoon was in attendance, as she is playing the part of Cheryl Strayed in the movie version of the book.
Telluride moves to limit panhandlers
TELLURIDE – People in Telluride this summer have found panhandlers annoying enough that the Town Council is now considering a law that would limit the legality of panhandling by restricting places, methods and times it can occur.
Kevin Geiger, the town attorney, told the council at a recent meeting that the Supreme Court has, in a variety of recent cases, found that public solicitation, or panhandling, is a constitutionally protected right under the First Amendment, provided that the soliciting occurs in a setting that is viewed as a public forum for the free expression of ideas.
Local governments can, however, limit the “time, place and manner” of soliciting, and in Geiger’s view, New York City, Kalamazoo, Mich., and Longview, Wash., have laws that are both strong and legally defensible.
The Telluride Watch reports a bit of skepticism among council members. Thom Carnevale said he believes the law would be unnecessary and could be used to stigmatize groups of people.
Jim Kolar, the town’s chief marshal, said that the panhandlers that are triggering complaints this year are different from those of previous summers and have lengthy criminal histories.
Mayor Stu Fraser supports the proposed law. Returning from a meeting of mayors in Colorado, he said aggressive panhandling is a common problem – and he believes Telluride can provide an example of how to legally deal with it.
“This exists in small towns, resort communities and non-resort communities across the state, so it’s not just in big cities or other states,” he said, “And the only towns I saw actually dealing with it were trying to do so through aggressive panhandling laws. If we act now and pass an ordinance we will be able to set an example for other towns, who will look to us for guidance and to see whether what we are doing is working.”
A big spat and now a big blue party
CRESTED BUTTE – This weekend, if all goes as planned, three blocks of Crested Butte’s iconic Elk Avenue will turn blue as 1,000 revelers flown in by Budweiser, drinking nothing but Bud Light amid streets, lamp posts and racks for knobby-tired bicycles all sheathed in blue.
For this, the town will get $500,000 in a direct cash payment. It also will fill lodges and restaurants for the first weekend of September, when the town normally turns quiet again.
But Crested Butte had a furious argument for several days before the decision was made. Since spring, town officials had been talking with special-events planners from Anheuser-Busch but had shared little information with the public until a big, blow-up meeting Aug. 25, just 10 days before the winners of Bud Light’s contest were scheduled to arrive.
Even after some steam was vented at the first meeting, the second meeting several days later drew 200 people. But even after seven hours of testimony over the two evenings, reports the Crested Butte News, the Town Council was unanimous in voting to grant the permit.
The News explains that many protesting the plans fretted about sullying Crested Butte’s “brand.” Others resented the clandestine process – which, town officials said was necessary to reduce the number of unwelcome people drawn to the town.
Jim Schmidt, a member of the council for 24 years, acknowledged a “failure” in communicating with the community. But he also pushed back at critics.
“Thus event is not shameful and despicable. What’s happening in Ferguson, Mo., and the Gaza (Strip) is shameful and despicable. I am also offended by accusations of impropriety by the council. That has not happened at all.”
Shaun Matusewicz, another council member, said much of the opposition seemed to be based in fear. “I don’t operate from a place of fear, I operate from a place of facts,” he said. He noted that he had previously worked special events in New York City, and he had one application to shut down Central Park that was all of seven pages long. The application to Crested Butte was hundreds of pages. Budweiser will have 90 of its own security people.
In other words, it looks like Budweiser’s folks have done their homework about how to paint the town blue without leaving it black and blue.
Aaron Huckstep, the mayor, also chided opponents for their conservatism. “The notion is that we have to overcome all possible objections to this isn’t the Crested Butte I know and love,” he said. “If that were the case there would never have been a klunker tour over Pearl Pass or a Chainless (bicycle) Race.”
He and other council members also alluded to reports of people from Budsweiser being treated disrespectfully, contrary to the generally friendly atmosphere of the town.
“We treat guests with respect here. And as for us, let’s remember that we are not just a walkable community, but we are a talkable community. You can speak to your neighbors and your representatives if you have questions or concerns. Now, I too, am ready to have a party.”
Governor Mead talks coal, technology
JACKSON, Wyo. – Wyoming Gov. Matt Mead was born in Jackson Hole but now has a day job that puts him at the state capitol Cheyenne, about seven hours away on good highways.
But Mead gets back to Jackson often. In recent weeks, he was there to sympathize – to an extent –with the coal producers who are bristling at new Environmental Protection Agency regulations. They don’t like the new regulations, which are almost certain to crimp use of coal for production of electricity in the United Sates.
Mead described himself as a skeptic of the theory that greenhouse gases threaten to destabilize the climate, but the Jackson Hole News&Guide says he dismissed a call from the audience for Wyoming to just ignore the regulations. “We are a nation of laws,” he replied.
In Wyoming, 95 percent of all electricity comes from burning of coal. Plus, the state’s Powder River Basin produces nearly half of all the coal in the United States, with mile-long trains forming a virtual conveyor belt to places such as Texas, Mississippi and even Florida.
But then Mead was back in Jackson soon after, this time for a meeting about technology. One stream of thought is that Wyoming can swivel its economy from hydrocarbon production to businesses that cash in on its proximity to public lands, including Yellowstone and Grand Teton national parks.
Square One Systems Designs, an existing tech business in Jackson, is focused on robotics primarily for use by the scientific community.
The company’s founder, Bob Viola, told the News&Guide that he wanted to emphasize how important government aid is for companies such as his to get started. He had a $5,000 grant from the state of Wyoming eight years ago.
Locating a new technology business in Jackson has several advantages, one of them being the employment pool. “There’s a reservoir of well-educated, talented people here in town that are maybe undersubscribed in what they’re doing,” he said.
Art tortoises moved to warmer climate
ASPEN – In early August, the new Aspen Art Museum opened with an exhibit that somehow had to do with the old ghost mining towns of Colorado. In this display, African tortoises with iPads strapped to their backs bearing images of these ghost towns, were let loose in the exhibit, located outdoors on the top floor of the new building.
They were, the museum announced at the time, to remain until October. But as snow starts to dust the highest mountains and nighttime temperatures in Aspen chilled to 44 in late August, the museum was directed by its veterinarian advisor to get the tortoises to some place warmer.
The Aspen Daily News, in its story, seemed to ask whatever were they thinking? These are creatures from equatorial Africa, on the southern edge of the Sahara, with temperatures commonly 80 to 100 degrees.
Whatever they were thinking, the tortoises are gone but the exhibit is still up. If art museums are supposed to incite discussion, this one was certainly succeeded.
Health professionals fret about use of pot
ASPEN – For decades, Aspen and Pitkin County have been tolerant of marijuana and, to an extent, other drugs. But a recent presentation of health-care professions there reported much that makes them uncomfortable.
The Aspen Daily News reports speakers fretted about overdoses of marijuana from edible products, drugged driving and increased use by youth, to name just a few of their concerns.
“It was my position then and it still is now as your advocate … (that) we must aggressively educate the public about a substance that is possibly causing physical and mental harm,” said Tom Dunlop, a former environmental health director for Pitkin County.
“In the past we’ve appeared before (the county commissioners) regarding smoking and obesity. Today’s it’s recreational use of marijuana,” Dunlop added.
The Daily News says speakers did acknowledge precise medical benefits of cannabis, such as for children suffering from pediatric seizures, and as an appetite stimulant for cancer and AIDS patients.
County Commissioner George Newsman agreed that the absence of long-term empirical study of marijuana’s effects has left “more questions than answers.” The industry, he said, is way ahead of the community.
But Joe DiSalvo, the Pitkin County sheriff, disagreed strongly with many statements. The dispensaries, he said, are working in a responsible manner and many of the concerns about marijuana labeling and keeping the drug out of the hands of children are being addressed.
Not the end of snow, but likely more rain
BOULDER – The end of snow? While that’s the title of one book about climate change, that’s not necessarily the takeaway from a new report called “Climate Change in Colorado.”
An update to a similar report published in 2008, this new synthesis about effects of climate change on water finds that nearly all computer-modeled projections indicate increasing winter precipitation by 2050.
This does not mean more snow, of course. It will almost certainly get warmer, and that is almost certain to increase the amount of precip that falls as rain, not snow.
The report also finds that statewide average annual temperatures have increased by 2.0 degrees Fahrenheit over the past 30 years. Increased heat has been more evident at night than in the daytime.
Just how much warmer mountain towns will get depends upon the extent of atmospheric accumulations of greenhouse gases. Under a medium-low emissions scenario, we’ll have reached 475 ppm by mid-century. It’s now at about 400 ppm.
Assuming this medium-low emissions scenario, typical summer temperatures will be similar to the hottest summers that have occurred in the past 100 years. Those three hottest years were 2012, 1955 and 1934.
Another consequence of warmer temperatures will be an earlier arrival of spring runoff, one to three weeks earlier by mid-century, according to the report. But peak runoff has already accelerated anywhere from one to four weeks, depending upon location.
Whistler reports torrent of tourism
WHISTLER, B.C. – Reports continue to roll in about record-busting summers in many mountain towns, this coming after a record season last year and, for some, the year before that.
Whistler plays into that pattern. Pique reports that Tourism Whistler has confirmed July as the busiest in the resort’s history. Not only are hotel rooms full, visitors are spending more money. Part of this is due to a major growth in long-haul visitors, especially from the United States. That market was up 16 percent in July.
But then, summer’s not quite the same. The newspaper also observed that what used to be Decker Glacier now looks more like Decker Lake. It’s a global pattern, of course. While Whistler has actually increased its snowfall in recent decades, it doesn’t last the summer. As such, the glaciers above the resort and in nearby Garibaldi Park have been retreating.
Wildlife “occurrences” rise briskly in Banff
BANFF, Alberta – For whatever reason, what is called “wildlife occurrences” has surged past 1,000 in Banff National Park. The Rocky Mountain Outlook explains that occurrences range from elk lumbering along the shoulder of the highway to bears nosing through garbage cans.
No terrible things have come of these occurrences, although many younger grizzly bears were out on their own for the first time this summer. Like youngsters everywhere, they have a habit of testing limits. They bluff-charged people and, from a human perspective, got uncomfortably close to campsites.
– Allen Best
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