Local News – The Journal

Abortion advocates, opponents look to a post-Roe future in Durango and Colorado

State likely to see more women traveling from Texas, Utah and Arizona for procedure

Drone team arrives in Durango: ‘You’ll enjoy it, I promise’

About 140 unmanned vehicles will put on a 12-minute light show Saturday night

DATE: Jul 2, 2022 | CATEGORY: Local News

Woman accused of killing Farmington man in crash has felony charge dismissed

Virginia Cundiff faces 7 misdemeanor charges

DATE: Jul 1, 2022 | CATEGORY: Local News

Catalytic converter thefts reported in La Plata County

Three of the valuable car parts have been stolen in recent weeks

DATE: Jul 1, 2022 | CATEGORY: Local News

Mancos Common Press hosts artist-in-residence

New manager takes helm; expansion project planned

DATE: Jul 1, 2022 | CATEGORY: Local News

Parks and Wildlife warns public to be wary of moose

Mothers will aggressively defend their calves; woman is chased south of Ouray in Ironton Park

DATE: Jul 1, 2022 | CATEGORY: Local News

After Colorado primary, experts discuss strategies as focus shifts to general election

Strategists say something big would need to happen to bump Boebert from path to victory

DATE: Jul 1, 2022 | CATEGORY: Local News

Dolores Town Board appoints two new board members

Candidates submit letters, introduce themselves and field questions from trustees

DATE: Jun 30, 2022 | CATEGORY: Local News

Public land agencies remove fire restrictions ahead of July 4

Rains prompt San Juan National Forest, BLM to rescind Stage 1 measures

DATE: Jun 30, 2022 | CATEGORY: Local News

Grant money seeks to boost workforce development in outdoor industry

State office promotes job creation, infrastructure development

DATE: Jun 30, 2022 | CATEGORY: Local News

Independence Day celebrations set for Southwest Colorado

Fireworks shows are planned in Cortez, Towaoc, Rico, Dove Creek and tentatively in Mancos

DATE: Jun 30, 2022 | CATEGORY: Local News

La Plata County Humane Society in ‘desperate’ need of dog fostering

Durango shelter to undergo renovations beginning next week

DATE: Jun 30, 2022 | CATEGORY: Local News

Biking beyond bordersZambian cyclist featured in TGR film visits Durango

Teton Gravity Research’s latest mountain bike film, Esperanto, mixes “the rock stars of the sport with a cast of unknown and up-and-coming heroes,” according to TGR. “The film explores how we share our dreams through a universal two-wheeled language no matter what our native tongue may be,” TGR says. “The sacred ritual of the ride might sound different all across the world – whether it’s a full-face getting pulled down to drop into a big jump line or wheeling a beat-up bike out of a mud hut to pedal to school – but it’s a universal process no matter what language we speak.”One of the cyclists featured in the film, Gift Puteho, who is from Zambia, was in Durango recently, working with some Devo riders and attending Fort Lewis College’s cycling camp. His coach on the Kansanshi Cycling Team, Nora Richards, is from Durango and a former Devo, Fort Lewis College and University of Colorado rider. Puteho, who is 17 and has two years of school left, said his part in the film is “mostly joy riding and sharing my story.”“Being on a bike is really cool,” he said. “When you go out riding, you get to feel nice. And if you have stress, you can lose it. … It’s addicting.”Puteho is from Livingstone, Zambia, home of Victoria Falls. He started cycling when he was 10 years old and spent two years training with the Livingstone Cycling Club.When he dominated a race, however, he caught Richards’ eye. “He was really fast,” Richards said. “He won by about 10 minutes.”After the two connected and he learned about the Kansanshi team, Puteho called Richards every week for 15 months until a spot on the team opened up. The Kansanshi copper mine started the team, and Richards raced on it before coaching it. “I knew (Puteho) was serious, and I knew as soon as I recruited him he’d be into it,” Richards said.

The team’s 13 elite riders get their education, housing and travel paid for, as well as a salary and bikes to ride.“It was really exciting,” Puteho said about making the team, adding that it eased some of the struggles he had finding food.The team also coaches roughly 100 community riders from about seven different schools.“It’s a beautiful country, and the culture is really compatible with Colorado and Durango,” Richards said. “It’s outdoor oriented. They have had a bike scene for about 10 years. Since then, it’s grown into one of the most popular sports.” Cross-country mountain biking, she said, has the most opportunities for the Kansanshi team. TGR, meanwhile, heard about Puteho from a friend of a friend of a friend. His film part was shot in Zambia on terrain near Victoria Falls and a nearby national park. Puteho attended the premiere of Esperanto in Salt Lake City. Unfortunately, he broke his wrist while riding bikes in Utah, meaning he was unable to ride for most of his trip. Puteho will head back to Zambia, which is about a 32-hour flight away, on Monday.“Durango is really cool,” Puteho said. “It’s cold, and the altitude is different. It was a great opportunity to come here, but I would love to come back when I can ride my bike.”Before getting injured, however, he got to meet some of the film’s stars and ride with them in Utah, including Carson Storch, Johny Salido and Sophie Gregory.

“It was really fun, until I got into that crash in Salt Lake City,” he said. Brandon Semenuk, Cam Zink and Darren Barrecloth are a few other pros featured in the film. Esperanto will premiere in Durango on July 29 at the Durango Arts Center. In English, the word Esperanto means “one who hopes.” Today, Esperanto might remain elusive, TGR said, but the dream of a shared language spoken worldwide still flourishes. And biking is a shared language.

Zambian cyclist featured in TGR film visits Durango

Why the millions of dollars Democrats spent in Colorado’s Republican primaries didn’t workAll of the more extreme GOP candidates Democrats wanted to see win on Tuesday lost

Democrats have little to show for the millions of dollars they spent over the past month on TV ads, mailers and text messages seeking to influence the outcome of Colorado’s Republican primaries for U.S. Senate, governor and in the hotly contested new 8th Congressional District.All of the more extreme GOP candidates Democrats wanted to see win on Tuesday lost, most by significant margins.The spending strategy has worked before in Colorado for Democrats, and it was successful for the party in Illinois, where they were able to help a far-right Republican gubernatorial candidate win his primary over a more moderate opponent backed by the GOP establishment. So what happened in Colorado this year that made all that spending and the deluge of messaging it paid for so ineffective?“The messages were confusing to me,” said Ted Trimpa, a longtime Democratic lobbyist and strategist in Colorado who worked on a successful Democratic effort to affect the outcome of the state’s 2010 Republican gubernatorial primary. “And I don’t think (the spending) took into account unaffiliateds voting in this primary.He added: “We’ve got to give voters credit. They’re smarter than you think. Trying to manipulate only goes so far.”In 2010, Trimpa was among a group of Democrats who ran TV ads to block former-U.S. Rep. Scott McInnis from securing the GOP gubernatorial nomination. The plan worked, as voters advanced tea party Republican and entrepreneur Dan Maes to the general election, where he lost to Democrat John Hickenlooper.“Playing in a primary like that is a one-trick pony,” Trimpa told The Colorado Sun. “We did it to Scott McInnis and it worked. One, it was new. Two, it went to a character issue. Our message in that primary was really, really simple. You could have had an eye popped out and an ear missing and you would understand what the message was.”The ads run against McInnis criticized him over plagiarism allegations.

The ads run by Democrats in this year’s Republican primaries mostly sought to boost the name ID of further right and more controversial GOP candidates, including state Rep. Ron Hanks in the U.S. Senate race, former Parker Mayor Greg Lopez in the gubernatorial contest and Weld County Commissioner Lori Saine in the 8th District. All three fell well short of winning.Democrats signaled that they thought Hanks, Lopez and Saine would be easier to beat in the general election because of their more conservative views. Hanks and Lopez, for instance, claimed that Donald Trump was the true winner of the 2020 presidential election, a claim that’s unfounded.One difference between the Democratic spending in Republican primaries in 2010 and 2022 was that in 2010 Democrats were simply amplifying an existing story about McInnis rather than trying to shape voter opinion. The ads run this year tried to make the case that Hanks, Lopez and Saine were “too conservative” as a way to make them more attractive to Republican primary voters.

Alan Salazar, who worked on Hickenlooper’s 2010 campaign, said there had been a big lead-up, including intense media coverage, to the Democrats ads criticizing McInnis, now a Mesa County commissioner, in the GOP primary.“It was a thing,” said Salazar, who is now Denver Mayor Michael Hancock’s chief of staff. “This was a problem for him. I think it worked in large part because it was based on a real problem.”A lot has also changed in Colorado’s voting system since 2010.Voters, each of whom are now sent a ballot in the mail, can now cast their votes early, and unaffiliated voters can decide whether they want to vote in the Democratic or Republican primary for just the third election cycle.With so few primary races on the Democratic side, many more unaffiliated voters opted to cast GOP primary ballots this year than in 2018 and 2022.Where the money was spent, and how much of itMost of the Democratic spending in the GOP primaries this year was in the U.S. Senate race, where Democrats made it clear that they didn’t want to face first-time candidate Joe O’Dea, a moderate Republican who owns a Denver construction company.Federal political action committee Democratic Colorado spent $4.1 million on TV ads trying to raise Hanks’ profile and attacking O’Dea. Other Democratic groups spent thousands on mailers with the same intent.

O’Dea, who spent hundreds of thousands of dollars to counter the Democrats’ strategy, crushed Hanks in the primary. He was winning by 10 percentage points as of Wednesday afternoon.Republican consultant Tyler Sandberg said the Democratic strategy may have backfired.“Yes, they trolled some people into voting for” Hanks, he said. “But they also lit up moderate and liberal unaffiliated voters to choose a Republican ballot and vote against him.”

Alvina Vasquez, a spokeswoman for Democratic Colorado, defended the group’s spending.“We know that Democratic Colorado’s efforts to educate voters on O’Dea’s record and expose his hypocrisy have laid the groundwork to defeat him in November,” she said.O’Dea will run against Democratic U.S. Sen Michael Bennet in November.In the governor’s race, Colorado Information Network, a state-level super PAC funded primarily by the Democratic Governors Association, spent $1.5 million on ads benefiting Lopez. A group affiliated with the liberal nonprofit ProgressNow Colorado spent another $467,000 on mailers contrasting Lopez with Democratic Gov. Jared Polis, painting Lopez as ultraconservative.But University of Colorado Regent Heidi Ganahl was beating Lopez by 6 percentage points on Wednesday afternoon.

Democratic interests also appear to be behind mailers in the new 8th District contrasting Saine with Democratic nominee Yadira Caraveo, a state representative, painting Saine as highly conservative. Additionally, national Democratic super PACs, including one affiliated with House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, spent nearly $300,000 on TV and digital ads in the 8th District promoting Saine and attacking her opponent, state Sen. Barbara Kirkmeyer.Kirkmeyer won the GOP nomination in the district by a wide margin.Kristi Burton Brown, chairwoman of the Colorado GOP, trolled Democrats in a tweet she posted Wednesday morning featuring a gif of a man dropping cash into a fire.She joked that the gif was “live footage” of Colorado Democrats.Republican outside groups, plus better-funded candidates, winO’Dea, Lopez and Kirkmeyer also outraised their Republican primary opponents and benefited from significant spending by GOP outside groups.American Policy Fund, a super PAC funded by several Colorado contractors, spent $1.1 million supporting O’Dea, much of it on TV ads. O’Dea’s wife, Celeste, gave a shout-out to “the contractors association that also made this possible” during the couple’s victory speech Tuesday night.O’Dea’s campaign significantly outspent Hanks’ campaign, dropping at least $618,000 on TV ads alone. As for Hanks, his entire campaign’s overhead through June 8 was just 17% of the amount O’Dea spent on TV airtime, according to Federal Election Commission filings.Kirkmeyer received support from Americans for Prosperity Action and Let America Work, including canvassing, TV ads and mailers. Her campaign also outspent Saine’s campaign by a significant margin, $276,00 to $183,000, through June 8.Ganahl benefited from spending by state-level super PACs Defend Colorado and Make Colorado Affordable Again. And her campaign spent $1.1 million through June 22, compared to Lopez’s $135,000 in spending during that period.The Republican primary in Colorado’s 7th Congressional District was one race where the candidate whose campaign raised and spent the most money didn’t win.Erik Aadland, an Army veteran from Pine, won the contest despite being outspent by multimillionaire economist Tim Reichert, of Golden.But Aadland also was aided by For Colorado’s Future, a federal super PAC that supported him with nearly three times as much money as Reichert received from a federal super PAC that supported him, Conservative Leadership for Colorado.Mainstream GOP, progressive Democratic candidates prevail with outside helpMore than $2.7 million was spent by outside groups in Colorado’s legislative primaries, almost evenly split between Republican and Democratic races.

Ready Colorado Action, which is run by Sandberg, the GOP political operative, was the top spender on the Republican side, dropping $530,000 on contests. The group was followed by Make Colorado Affordable Again, which spent nearly $200,000 trying to influence the outcome of contests.Both of those conservative super PACs were funded primarily by nonprofit Ready Colorado, which advocates for conservative education policies.On the Democratic side, liberal super PACs backed by labor unions spent more money than in past election cycles and were successful in several contests.The top-spending progressive group was Colorado Labor Action, which was funded by the Service Employees International Union. The group spent about $530,000 on primary contests this year, including in the House District 42 Democratic primary in Aurora, where their candidate – Rep. Mandy Lindsay – won.Colorado Labor Action also successfully backed Thornton City Councilwoman Jenny Willford in her House District 34 Democratic primary in the northern Denver suburbs.Colorado Working Families Party’s state-level super PAC, which was also funded by the Service Employees International Union, was the third top Democratic spender. It supported criminal justice activist Elisabeth Epps in her House District 6 Democratic primary against Katie March, a former legislative aide. The race was still too close to call Wednesday.National nonprofit Education Reform Now Advocacy was the primary funder of a state-level super PAC called Raising Colorado. Raising Colorado gave money to another state-level super PAC, We Mean Business, which gave money to another group that backed March and opposed Epps in the House District 6 primary.The Colorado Sun is a reader-supported, nonpartisan news organization dedicated to covering Colorado issues. To learn more, go to coloradosun.com.

All of the more extreme GOP candidates Democrats wanted to see win on Tuesday lost

Photos: BurroFest in Mancos

Fun times at the Ute Mountain Roundup rodeo in Cortez

TEMPE, Ariz. – Three Tempe police officers are under non-disciplinary administrative paid leave afte...

133rd annual Ute Mountain Ute Bear Dance starts FridayAnnual dance celebrates renewal of life, spirit of the bearThe Ute Mountain Ute Tribe will hold its 133rd annual Bear Dance Friday through Monday in Towaoc.The Bear Dance kicks off an eventful weekend at 10:30 a.m. Friday.The dance is a yearly tradition of the tribe that dates to the 15th century. Held in spring, the dance shows respect for the spirit, celebrates the renewal of live, and relieves tension after the cold of winter.Traditionally, when the first thunder of spring was heard, it was time for the Bear Dance to commence.

The event was closed to nontribal members last year because of the COVID-19 pandemic, but parts of the dance will be open to the public this year. Observers are asked to adhere to the tribe’s COVID guidelines. A vaccination card or negative COVID test is required for entrance. Masks are optional.While nontribal members are invited to join the festivities, photography and videos are prohibited unless there is permission from the chief.Bear Dance chiefs are Terry Knight Sr., Mark Wing, Austin Jacket, Farley Ketchum Sr., and Terry Knight Jr.

In addition to the Bear Dance Friday morning, the tribe plans an open hand game tournament and a co-ed softball tournament. A powwow wraps up the day’s activities at 7 p.m. Registration for the softball tournament has closed.Saturday, the co-ed softball tournament starts at 8 a.m. The Bear Dance and powwow takes place all day. A Bear Dance walk is scheduled for 8:30 a.m. Saturday; and a parade, for 10 a.m. Registration for the walk is at 8 a.m. in front of the recreation center in Towaoc.Registration for the hand game tournament is noon to 2 p.m. at the Bear Dance grounds, about 11½ miles south of Cortez off U.S. Highway 160/491. The tournament begins at 2:30 p.m. sharp.Sunday and Monday, the Bear Dance again takes place all day. A feast at 6 p.m. Monday concludes the events.

Annual dance celebrates renewal of life, spirit of the bear

Iron Horse Bicycle Classic Hobby Horse Community Bike Ride

Gloves come off in first debate between congressional candidates Don Coram and Lauren BoebertRepublican primary opponents offered voters a glimpse of their different approaches to legislating

IGNACIO – Sparks flew during Thursday’s debate between state Sen. Don Coram and U.S. Rep. Lauren Boebert as they jousted ahead of next month’s Republican primary.The two met Thursday morning at the Sky Ute Casino Resort in Ignacio in a crowded event center filled with about 150 people split down the middle, literally; Coram supporters on left and Boebert supporters on the right.It was the first of two debates scheduled for the candidates.Moderated by Dave Woodruff, general manager for El Moro Tavern and the Durango chapter president for the Colorado Restaurant Association, the two began by discussing gun control in the wake of the Uvalde, Texas, school shooting that left 21 people dead earlier this week before moving to more local topics such as public land management, wildfires, worker shortages and water.

In the strictly cast event with no signs and no cheering after questions, Boebert supporters broke out multiple times in applause while Coram supporters laughed at statements the congresswoman made, prompting Boebert at one point to shout “order.”The debate was relatively civil at the beginning with both candidates answering Woodruff’s questions and trading barbs, but it quickly devolved into attacks during the approximately 10 minutes of cross examination when each candidate was allowed to ask a question of the other and then respond.Boebert’s first attempt was less a question than a comment.“Don, I want you to hear this directly from me,” she said. “The information proposed about you at corruptcoram.com is absolutely facts, facts, facts. You are corrupt sir. You use your political office to pass legislation to line your own pockets.”When Woodruff interjected and asked the Rifle Republican to ask a question, she said: “Any comments?”Throughout her primary campaign, Boebert has taken to calling her opponent “Corrupt Coram,” alleging that he used his time in the Colorado Legislature to pass legislation that would benefit his hemp operation and citing the website “corruptcoram.com” and an editorial by The Gazette in Colorado Springs.Boebert’s campaign runs corruptcoram.com, and The Gazette editorial board endorsed Boebert in the 2020 election.

Coram, a Montrose Republican, returned the jab, noting the Federal Election Commission’s investigation into Boebert’s personal use of campaign funds and her failure to disclose her husband’s income from the energy industry.“You are absolutely false, and if you want to talk about corruption, let’s talk about you,” he said.During the debate, Coram positioned himself as a moderate who could work across the aisle. He relied heavily on his track record as a state representative and a senator in arguing for voters’ support.Boebert also touted her work in the U.S. House over the last year and a half, often answering Woodruff’s question by highlighting legislation she has introduced.

Coram finished his opening statement by challenging Boebert’s work, comparing her time in Congress to a football player who throws many passes but completes few.“You are introducing, introducing, introducing, but passing is the word,” he said.Both candidates hit on conservative policies, including border security, stopping fentanyl, reining in spending and a limited role for the federal government. However, Boebert attacked Coram’s Republican credentials throughout the debate.

She questioned Coram’s 2017 vote to fund the Healthy Kids Colorado Survey, a voluntary and anonymous survey that asks middle and high schoolers about topics including sexual activity, drug and alcohol use, and suicide.Coram was one of two Republicans who voted to renew funding for the survey, which in recent years has become a target of conservatives.Boebert also targeted Coram’s vote for a 2019 bill that made less than 4 grams of fentanyl a misdemeanor, a vote Coram said he regretted.“I certainly stand by my votes and don’t regret them because I read the bills and understand them,” Boebert said.Though the candidates’ differed in their approaches to the debate – Boebert fiery and charismatic and Coram calm and reasoned – the starkest difference between the two was in their responses to Woodruff’s question about election integrity.Toeing the line of former President Donald Trump’s false election claims, Boebert said hundreds of thousands of votes were cast illegally and that the “Fauci-funded China virus” (coronavirus) interfered with the 2020 election, a statement that was met with guffaws from Coram’s supporters.Coram did not reject that voter fraud may have occurred during the last election, but he said there was no evidence to support Boebert’s claims, later telling reporters that every election has some degree of voter fraud but that it does not make a difference in the outcome.

“I’ve heard all these talks about all this evidence, but I’ve never seen it in a court of law,” Coram said during the debate.The responses from both candidates oscillated between addressing local and national issues as they sought to appeal to the Republican and unaffiliated voters in Colorado’s 3rd Congressional District who will decide the June 28 Republican primary.The 3rd Congressional District covers the Western Slope of Colorado and extends to Pueblo County in the southern half of the state.Boebert often approached her responses through a national lens, assailing federal policies for Colorado’s workforce shortages and depicting immigration into a local issue.“Every state is a border state when you have 3 million illegal aliens invading our country,” she said.When asked by Woodruff after she discussed her vocal opposition to pandemic shutdowns why she voted no on the Restaurant Revitalization Fund Replenishment Act, which would put $42 billion toward supporting restaurants and small businesses affected by the pandemic, Boebert put her platform succinctly.“I would have to look at that bill specifically, but I’m sure that there was something with too much spending, not the proper role of government or not going through the proper order,” she said.Coram reiterated his background in agriculture and his time representing the Western Slope throughout the debate. He attempted to keep his answers focused on local issues relevant to the voters of the 3rd Congressional District, portraying Boebert as out of touch with the issues voters in the district face.

During the cross examination, Coram asked Boebert about her stance on water as a public trust.Public trust doctrine holds that water can never be privately controlled, a departure from Colorado’s system of prior appropriation, which essentially allows water to be possessed and sold by private individuals.Boebert dodged the question, leading Coram to ask it again.“I think that’s a great answer, but it doesn’t answer the question,” Coram said.The debate began awkwardly when Boebert met Coram on stage and Coram questioned why his opponent had notes, saying he believed the candidates’ campaigns had agreed to not allow them.Boebert, who referred to her notes throughout the debate, replied that the campaigns had agreed to allow paper.Speaking to reporters after the debate, Coram said he and his campaign felt good about the race, noting that unaffiliated voters, a growing subset of the district’s voters, will be able to cast a ballot in the primary. Boebert did not speak with reporters, instead engaging with her supporters after the event.A second debate between the two Republican candidates will be held in Pueblo ahead of the June primary, but a date and time has yet to be determined.Both candidates professed Thursday to offer voters their own approach to legislating.“I’ve been very effective in getting things done because I know how to work together and create coalitions,” Coram said. “We have a nation in D.C. that is so divided that they couldn’t agree on buying ice cream and that needs to change.”Boebert made a different pitch.“I ran as a conservative and I won as a conservative. I legislate as a conservative because I am one, and I will win this primary because I’m the only conservative in this race,” she said.ahannon@durangoherald.com

Republican primary opponents offered voters a glimpse of their different approaches to legislating

Students come from PCC sites in Mancos, Durango and Bayfield

Fort Lewis College featured on PBS NewsHour for efforts to reckon with its pastBoarding school stripped Native Americans of language, culture and identity

Fort Lewis College was featured this week on PBS NewsHour as part of a national segment about the United States’ history of removing Native American children from their families and placing them in boarding schools, where they were forced to give up their language and culture.The eight-minute segment, titled “Colorado college reckons with a troubling legacy of erasing Indigenous culture,” includes interviews with FLC President Tom Stritikus, faculty members and a student. It also features several shots of the college, the Old Fort campus in Hesperus and footage of a powwow held at FLC.“There has been a huge reckoning in this country to say that institutions must take a look at their own racialized history and understand the implications of that racialized history,” Stritikus told PBS NewsHour. “For Fort Lewis College, that racialized history is embedded in the fact that we started as an Indian boarding school.”The college offers a Native American tuition waiver as part of a land agreement struck more than 100 years ago. Indigenous students make up about 45% of the student body, from 185 nations, tribes and villages, according to the college.FLC is engaged in an effort to explore its history, acknowledge its past and provide a “more supportive learning environment” for Indigenous students, the PBS NewsHour narrator explains. “It's actually connected to the fact that the students who are attending today potentially had ancestors who were abused and traumatized by Native American boarding schools,” Stritikus tells PBS NewsHour. “Those things are connected. Indigenous communities paid a tremendous price because of federal Indian boarding schools.”Thousands of Native American children attended school at the Old Fort campus 15 miles west of Durango where they were “stripped of their language, their culture and, frankly, their identity,” he says.Majel Boxer, an associate professor in the department of Native American and Indigenous Studies at FLC, had grandparents who attended boarding schools around the country. Her father didn’t learn the Dakota language, she told PBS NewsHour, because his parents determined he would be better served to learn English without any accent.The news segment also speaks with Joslynn Lee, a former student and current assistant professor of chemistry at the college, who helped lead an effort to update the language used on panels under the college clock tower explaining the school’s boarding school history. One of the panels read: “The children are well-clothed and happy.”Lee told PBS NewsHour it was an inappropriate representation.She sent an email to Stritikus in August 2019, and the college formed a History Committee to re-evaluate the school’s history. The panels were removed last year.Noah Shadlow, a senior, told PBS NewsHour he has seen a change in campus culture since the reconciliation efforts began.“I feel more recognized. I feel more acknowledged on this campus, rather than how it was before, where it’s just like, ‘Oh, there’s just some Indian kids over there,’” he said.But he said more needs to be done, including hiring more Indigenous staff members, including a counselor.And the college is working to improve its graduation rate among Native American students, which is about 30%, slightly below the national rate, according to PBS NewsHour.The school’s effort to recognize its history and learn from it has been meaningful, according to those interviewed.“I think this has opened up a lot of discussion on how we can start to learn more about each other’s culture,” Lee said.shane@durangoherald.com

Boarding school stripped Native Americans of language, culture and identity

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