At least seven of Colorado’s largest newspapers carried the news of Republican U.S. President Donald Trump’s news conference with Rusian President Vladimir Putin under bold headlines on their front pages this morning.
“Trump embraces Russia,” was the headline in The Longmont Times-Call and Loveland Reporter-Herald. “Trump embraces U.S. foe Putin,” blared The Pueblo Chieftain while The Cañon City Daily Record went with “Trump slams Russia Probe.” In liberal Boulder, the Daily Camera’s headline was “Trump embraces longtime U.S. foe Putin.” Colorado’s largest newspaper, The Denver Post, had “Trump embraces Putin, doubts U.S. agencies” above the fold, and the state’s second-largest paper, The Gazette in Colorado Springs, published, “Trump sides with Putin.” In Trump-friendly Grand Junction, The Daily Sentinel’s front page read, “Wave of condemnation hits after Trump-Putin summit.”
Here is what else made the front pages across Colorado this morning:
“The Fort Collins city attorney’s warning to other staff regarding an Old Town church’s plan to install lockers for homeless people to use has drawn scrutiny from the American Civil Liberties Union,” reports The Coloradoan in Fort Collins. “Fort Collins City Attorney Carrie Daggett issued the emailed warning on May 31, when the city postponed a hearing regarding the proposed lockers that was originally scheduled to happen later the same day. “Please be sure to coordinate with us regarding any further dialogue with the public or with (church pastor) Steve Ramer about this,” Daggett wrote to other city staff. “Because the approach being taken is not quite the same as our usual process, and because the special discussions amongst staff could be used as a basis for arguing that we are treating the Church less favorably than other applicants based on the Church’s religious practices (ministering to the homeless), we need to take special care in how we communicate about it.”
“Arvada mother Elizabeth Panzer says she fears radioactive plutonium in the dirt whenever wind blows at the former Rocky Flats nuclear bomb factory, now a federal wildlife refuge, 2.3 miles northwest of her house,” reports The Denver Post. “But she also wants to avoid alarming her three sons. One son was diagnosed in 2014 with heart cancer that she suspects was caused by breathing dust churned by big yellow trucks at house-building sites near Rocky Flats. A neighbor died in his 50s of a similar cancer, she said. Panzer will be among those testifying Tuesday before U.S. District Court Judge Philip Brimmer, asking him to block the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service’s planned opening of the refuge for recreational hiking, horseback riding and biking.”
“Key members of Congress from both parties, including some from Colorado, are criticizing President Donald Trump’s performance at a press conference with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Finland,” reports The Gazette in Colorado Springs. “Trump told reporters Monday that Putin said American investigators who have charged 12 Russian hackers with hacking the 2016 presidential election can come work with Russian investigators on the case. Trump called that an ‘incredible offer.’ A spokesman for special counsel Robert Mueller, whose office on Friday charged the hackers, declined to comment. Calling Putin an “adversary to the United States” and Russia a “state sponsor of terror,” Sen. Cory Gardner, R-Yuma, issued a press release Monday encouraging Trump’s administration to avoid ‘normalizing relations with Russia at zero cost to Putin and his regime.'”
“Members of an oversight board for Weld County’s elected officials declined to discuss the job performance of their secretary at Monday’s meeting, which came in the wake of a complaint filed by the secretary with the Colorado Division of Civil Rights,” reports The Greeley Tribune. “Board secretary Linda Kane, who publicly expressed multiple concerns about the council while speaking in opposition of a potential Weld County Council whistleblower program at a June meeting, originally was on the council’s agenda to be discussed in a closed-door executive session. But during Monday’s meeting, board members declined to make a motion to discuss her employment, instead moving on to other business.”
“In front of a standing room-only crowd Monday night, the Grand Junction City Council agreed to consider referring to the April 2019 ballot a proposed sales tax increase to fund a $40 million to $50 million community center,” reports The Grand Junction Daily Sentinel. “More than 150 people packed the City Hall auditorium for the unveiling of a feasibility study for a community center, a project spearheaded by the grassroots group People for Local Activities & Community Enrichment and the city’s Parks and Recreation Department.”
“A Regional Transportation District board member, a Longmont City Council member and a former Longmont council member are encouraging people to urge their local elected officials to lobby to include FasTracks’ Northwest commuter rail to a list of transportation projects that could get shares of funds from a proposed statewide tax hike,” reports The Longmont Times-Call. “At issue is a projects priority list being considered for future funding from revenues from a 0.62 percent tax that would be added to Colorado’s current 2.9 percent state sales tax if backers of that proposal are able to petition it onto November’s ballot and convince voters to approve the tax increase.”
“The Steamboat Springs City Council will consider vacating several easements at the site of the RiverView development project,” reports The Steamboat Pilot. “The project is slated to include duplexes, a hotel and other commercial spaces surrounding a pedestrian plaza in the area near Third and Fifth streets at the east end of Yampa Avenue. Council will vote on the second reading of an ordinance vacating the easements at Tuesday’s City Council meeting, which starts at 5:30 p.m. in Centennial Hall.”
“In a special meeting Monday evening, the Glenwood Springs City Council, for the first time, heard from their constituents in an open, public setting following the controversial release of bid estimates associated with the Seventh Street beautification project,” reports The Glenwood Springs Post-Independent. “The meeting came following a lengthy, contentious discussion by council at its June 7 session and a 4-3 vote not to release the project bid estimates.”
“With the signature-gathering part of the student-led recall drive of three Pueblo City Schools (D60) school board members now complete, the petitions are now in the hands of Pueblo County Clerk and Recorder Gilbert “Bo” Ortiz,” reports The Pueblo Chieftain. “Ortiz has 15 days to deem the petitions sufficient, allowing the process to move forward. If Ortiz finds a petition(s) insufficient, the proponents have 15 days to collect more signatures, or cure deficiencies, and resubmit the petition. The three targeted school board members are President Barb Clementi, Vice President Frank Latino and board member Bobby Gonzales. Per state statute, the number of signatures required to bring a recall question before voters must reflect 40 percent of the ballots cast for each in the 2015 election.”
“Campers, boaters and picnickers at Boyd Lake State Park are enjoying about $1.6 million in improvements at the state park in Loveland this year,” reports The Loveland Reporter-Herald. “Just before the busy summer season started, crews finished a major roads project at the park, which cost $1.5 million total, from the Colorado Parks and Wildlife capital budget. This includes an extension of the road at the entrance and a reconfiguration so visitors can access the offices and the park from the same pull-in off the main road instead of two driveways.”
“Walls that took weeks to build came down in moments as demolition began on Eagle Valley Elementary School,” reports Vail Daily. “As they did, memories flooded in and flooded out, as memories do, to make room for new memories in a new building a few dozen yards away.”
“Hank Holloway wore many different types and varieties of hats while performing with his band, but the one that was constant was the one that branded him a loyal and steadfast community champion, promoter and supporter,” reports The Cañon City Daily Record. “The service he gave to his hometown, and the joy he wished to share with everyone around him, is likely what will be treasured by those who knew him.”
“University of Colorado President Bruce Benson’s salary ranks well below the median of public university leaders, new survey data shows,” reports The Boulder Daily Camera. “Benson’s salary for fiscal year 2016-17 places him at 191 out of 251 public university and system chief executives, according to a Chronicle of Higher Education survey released Sunday. Benson repeatedly has declined raises and took a five percent pay cut during the recession, so he is making less than when he started in the university’s top spot 10 years ago. He has made $359,100 per year in recent years. Based on the chronicle’s methodology, the publication calculated his base pay as $324,312.”
“Colorado U.S. Rep. Scott Tipton recommended during a congressional hearing last week that the government enlist help from ranchers and farmers to better protect federal lands. Congress is considering legislation that would open hundreds of thousands of additional acres of federal land to grazing by livestock,” reports ColoradoPolitics, published in The Cortez Journal. “Much of Western Colorado is federally-administered public land. Livestock grazing already is permitted across large stretches of federal lands in the West. The U.S. Bureau of Land Management authorizes livestock grazing on 155 million acres, more than half of the acreage it administers. The U.S. Forest Service and U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service also already permit grazing on some of their lands.”
