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Just last year, Colorado was leading the Mountain West in the transition from dirty coal plants to clean energy. Federal funding was assisting on rural clean energy while coal plant retirement dates were on track to meet the state’s critical climate goals.

How quickly things change.

This year the Trump administration is resisting coal’s decline with unprecedented executive orders and by actively canceling and stalling clean energy projects meant to bring down energy prices, killing thousands of renewable energy jobs.

Unfortunately, some Pueblo County leaders and Congressman Jeff Hurd joined in and informed Colorado regulators that they intend to ask President Trump to keep coal-fired operations at  Pueblo’s Comanche 2 and 3 coal units continuing indefinitely.

The sudden push to keep coal burning is a slap in the face to Colorado voters who have supported renewable energy, more affordable bills, and who are demanding cleaner air. Surely they could expect Gov. Polis to step in to defend the state’s critical climate goals, right?

Apparently not. In a shocking twist, the state of Colorado just sided with Xcel Energy and petitioned regulators to keep the Comanche 2 unit open past its retirement date scheduled for the end of the year to cover for Comanche 3’s most recent, massive outage.

In effect, this agreement would allow Xcel Energy to charge customers for its own mistakes. If approved, Xcel Energy can run Comanche 2 for an additional year without clear guidelines to restrict pollution. This means the company could run Comanche 2 past its retirement date in addition to Comanche 3 once it’s repaired. Instead of one coal unit burning in 2026, there could be two — a full abandonment of previous commitments, which could increase air pollution and potentially raise energy costs for Coloradans.

Comanche 3 has been a reliability disaster and its pollution contributes to disease and cancer.  Given its high cost–both financially and in its toll on public health–and its frequent outages, backtracking on coal retirements has nothing but downsides for Pueblo and Xcel ratepayers.

As a local environmental justice policy advocate, I’ve participated in an enormous amount of debates over what to do about Comanche 3 and have talked to countless people in the community. People want clean energy and good-paying jobs.

Xcel’s motivations are clear. Coal is expensive and they have a captive customer base allowing them to send big profits to their shareholders and CEOs. These profits are earned off the backs of workers while pollution costs the public millions in healthcare bills.

A truly “just” transition should include treating Pueblo with respect, addressing historical inequities like those experienced by the Pueblo community, and giving back to the community for helping to power Colorado for decades at the expense of its own public health.

A recent study found an advanced Renewable Energy Park could replace $40 million in lost annual tax revenue and provide 300 permanent jobs. That’s more money and more jobs than Comanche 3 is providing now. Pueblo could continue exporting power in Colorado, but this time with cleaner air and lower costs. Instead of only gratifying profits, we can advocate for utilities like Xcel to prioritize massive buildouts of rooftop solar to help reduce energy bills for families and businesses.

In Colorado, jobs in the clean energy sector are already outpacing jobs in fossil fuel industries and wages in renewable energy are outpacing the national average which could benefit Pueblo’s economic future while also protecting workers, public health, and the environment.

If you agree that Colorado needs to move past coal and embrace our renewable energy future, I encourage you to contact the Public Utilities Commission and tell them we don’t need federal and corporate interference in already settled matters. Let them know that you believe a just energy transition should address the historic inequities resulting from Xcel’s coal plant as well as our current climate realities with the implementation of a renewable energy park that can provide jobs and tax revenues with little or no pollution.

Jamie Valdez is a community advocate from Pueblo and works with GreenLatinos as a Colorado Transportation and Energy Advocate.

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My first Thanksgiving at my beau’s family table, I hid in the bathroom a half-dozen times to check my watch. Can we leave yet?

Despite the lifelong ache to have my own regular family, with generations of happy family gatherings, and despite the steady, routine absence of all that — thank you addiction, suicides, and estrangements — I resolve to not let my dread of others’ family holiday gatherings show.

“Go where the happiness is,” the therapists chant. And I have. For decades. But the reality is that there is a muscle necessary to steel one’s heart so we can keep walking in and smiling at other people’s families. That muscle keeps getting trained. Weight trained.

I’ve hosted many non-familial Thanksgivings, full of the lonely, the broken, the single, and the alone, this year, for whatever reason.

I roast the turkey, decorate, set the table, and light the candles. It is lovely. Often, we stack dishes and move to the piano. I throw great parties, so we haul out all the Billy Joel, Olivia Newton-John, and Beatles lyrics, and we have a sing-along.

We have dessert and dessert wines, and maybe coffee with liqueurs. We banter about the best pecan and pumpkin pies we’ve ever tasted and swear to make the French bourbon cheesecake someone had in Italy for next year’s gathering.

It is joyful in its way — boisterous, tipsy, unorthodox.

But it is not family. We are not related. We do not share private medical information because high cholesterol and a weak heart run rampant on your father’s side. We did not, together, hold our mother’s hand when she passed. We did not attend each other’s children’s births, as blood-related people often do.

It’s a meal, held on a holiday.

At some point, you meet someone somewhere along the way and now you’re sharing their family’s holiday celebration, one populated by someone else’s blood.

This is the part where you’re supposed to feel grateful. And there are moments when you do. But if your family members are addicted, or died young, or suffer mental illness or are a combination of any of that, you are reminded anew that these dynamics are often multi-generational. Addicts take hostages. They do not have relationships. So if your family is in that pool, holidays can only be peaceful with other people.

And sometimes they are not your relatives.

What no one wants at any family holiday table is bitterness, mental illness, or unresolved substance messiness. No one wants the sad facts of real life to puncture the bubble of happy, shared, familial history revisited at the holiday feast. If blood is that, then attending someone else’s Thanksgiving, or just chucking it and going to a movie, is the default.

I am hardly alone. A 2024 Boise State report says that 61% of Americans experience sadness or loneliness during the holiday season and 37% would prefer to skip the holidays entirely.

A November 2024 Harris Poll found that 50% of U.S. adults are currently estranged from at least one close relation, and, among those, 35% are estranged from an immediate family member such as a parent or sibling.

And that is often the most verboten element, the one never brought up but often fibbed about to the others who are clinking glasses, laughing, and reminiscing: estrangement. Who wants to talk about being forced to choose peace over calamity when choosing peace means being alone?

There is stigma in estrangement. Assumptions are made, faces turn dark, and holiday meal revelers suddenly need to take the dog out because estrangement is sad. Estrangement is a bummer and, especially to those who’ve never experienced it, suggests the notion that it may be your fault.

Whether it is or is not, the result is the same. You are not with them because being so is impossible. That is the heartbreak. Moreover, heartbreak can feel amplified when you’re with those who don’t know this sorrow.

It can be so very lonely, even — often especially — because you feel you’re the only one.

My beau and his family graciously include me in their holiday gatherings. This is a loving and lovely gesture.

But it can be hard not to feel the loss of one’s own blood, not being there. It is his daughter who serves her famous sweet potato casserole. Those are his in-laws who turn on the game and then lovingly bicker.

In the past 10 years, my sibling and my daughter died young. In the previous 10 years, another sibling died young, and yet another the previous decade.

What if that 61% of Americans who, according to the Boise State study, feel sad during the holidays did not have to pretend joy-to-the-world at others’ joyous occasions? What if holiday tables and the people populating them realized that half of their holiday table is struggling mightily?

Is it possible that the holidays and the people who gaily celebrate them give 30 seconds of thought to the 50% of U.S. adults currently estranged from a close relative?

Maybe, collectively, the holiday and all the joy-to-the-world memes might hold a tender spot for those with the tenderest of hearts.

Yes, we can volunteer at homeless shelters, and yes, we can help serve Thanksgiving dinner to those who cannot afford one. Volunteering can and does help mend broken hearts.

But maybe we’d like to be at the table, our souls and hearts broken wide open, guts and all, for all to see, to bear witness. No one’s trying to kill the party. But there’s nothing like a forced party to turn the knife even more.

I know that feeling, this and speaking to it is not popular. After all, if 61% want it to all be over with as soon as possible, then 39% love every Hark-the-Herald note of it.

Maybe there’s room for both. That is what I am saying. Maybe the spectrum can provide love and thanksgiving for both. Maybe your widowed uncle across the table, whose son is in a group home for early-onset dementia, doesn’t feel up to raising a glass.

Maybe he does not feel up to being around people and so stays away as a buffer against others’ group gaiety.

But he may be up for someone taking him a plate. He may be up for a conversation about his garden. He may be up for that.

And maybe, from November through January 2, we could all remember, perhaps even seek out and comfort that 50% suffering estrangement or that 37% who want it all to be over with.

Cathie Beck is a Denver journalist and author of the award-winning “Cheap Cabernet: A Friendship.” Her new memoir, “Hoodbitch on the Near Eastside,” will be released in 2026.

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The Colorado River is in crisis. The seven basin states just blew through a heavily anticipated deadline to announce a new deal on how they would divide up a dwindling resource. Meanwhile, Lake Mead and Lake Powell are teetering on the brink of collapse, and Mother Nature couldn’t care less about politics or posturing.

It’s time to call out an uncomfortable truth. The system is broken. When the Colorado River Compact was signed in 1922, the Upper and Lower Basins made promises to each other that they can’t keep in an era of climate change, drought, and increased competition for our precious supplies of water. Both basins cling to their entitlements under the Compact like they are lifeboats on a sinking ship.

The Upper and Lower Basins each believe they are entitled to 7.5 million acre feet per year under the Compact (yes, it’s complicated). Recently, however, the Colorado has only produced 11 million acre feet per year with even lower dips. There is a glaring math problem, and it’s obvious that neither basin is going to get everything it wants in this new era of aridification.

We had hoped that the hard-working, well-intentioned people representing the states could figure out how to negotiate around these flaws in the Compact. We had hoped that the Department of the Interior might forge a difficult compromise. And we had hoped that we would occasionally get a lot of snow to cover up all this dysfunction.

Now, it’s quite clear those are unrealistic hopes. While a deal is still possible, it seems unlikely to
solve the long-term conflict. As long as the Upper and Lower Basins hold fast to their presumed entitlements, we’ll likely be managing a crisis on the Colorado River.

This crisis calls out for courageous leadership and a change of course. We need to revisit the allocation of water under the 1922 Compact. After all, it’s been more than 100 years – maybe it’s
time for a tune-up.

The seven governors from the basin states need to sit down in a room and change course to figure out we are going to live together in the Colorado River basin for the next hundred years. They need to set aside their entitlements. And they should be joined by a highly skilled and trusted neutral facilitator charged with brokering a deal. Then they should direct their representatives to fix the Compact. We should honor them for trying and reserve a place in history for their eventual success.

This would also provide a historic opportunity to incorporate the rights of the Tribes into an updated Compact.

If we continue floating adrift, the Supreme Court will eventually be forced to do it for us. That process will be painful, expensive, and slow. It could take decades and cost hundreds of millions of dollars. The river won’t wait.

In the interim, the Secretary of the Interior may have to make some very difficult decisions in managing the system. Both basins must share in this pain. And the fourteen U.S. senators from these seven states must convince Congress to provide more money – bridge funding if you will – to help ease the pain until the governors figure this out.

It will be much more difficult for our kids to solve this problem in twenty or thirty years. Every time we kick the can down the road, we make it that much harder for the next generation to run a family farm, to enjoy nature, or just to drink a glass of clean water.

Harry Truman, who had a role in the history of the Colorado River, once said that in “periods where there is no leadership, society stands still. Progress occurs when courageous, skillful leaders seize the opportunity to change things for the better.”

The Colorado River, and the 40 million people who depend on it, are desperate for courageous people to lead us in a course correction.

Chris Winter is the executive director of the Getches-Wilkinson Center for Natural Resources, Energy, and the Environment at the University of Colorado Law School.

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President Donald Trump just threatened an elected Colorado representative with arrest, a trial, and execution.

The response was unhinged. Trump said in a social media post that Crow and others were guilty of “SEDITIOUS BEHAVIOR, punishable by DEATH.” This is only further evidence that Trump is unfit to be the president of the United States.

On a daily basis, this president does something so unbecoming of the Oval Office that it makes me question his loyalty to America. Trump has no decency, no moral compass, and the thinnest understanding of American jurisprudence imaginable for someone tasked with leading a country built on freedom and justice.

This outburst of Vladimir Putin-style authoritarianism gives me the perfect opportunity to expose Trump’s failure to rise to what the White House demands – a man who is both poised and in control.

Colorado Rep. Jason Crow joined six other members of Congress who, like Crow, are all former or current members of the U.S. armed services in a social media video. The congressmembers simply remind members of the military that they can disobey orders from their superiors if the orders are illegal.

“This administration is pitting our uniformed military and intelligence community professionals against American citizens. Like us, you all swore an oath to protect and defend this Constitution. Right now, the threats coming to our Constitution aren’t just coming from abroad but from right here at home. Our laws are clear. You can refuse illegal orders. You must refuse illegal orders,” the lawmakers said in video clips spliced together. “No one has to carry out orders that violate the law or our Constitution.”

What, you might ask, could prompt distinguished veterans in the U.S. Congress to issue such a dire reminder? Well, consider the bombing of boats in international waters suspected of smuggling drugs. It might seem to be legally ambiguous to those of us watching boats explode far from U.S. soil, killing all on board without trial. But what if a military checkpoint were established at the Canadian border and members of the army were ordered to take any drivers discovered to have drugs in their vehicles out behind customs’ buildings and shoot them in the head?

Is that legally ambiguous? I agree our military leaders – including U.S. generals – need to start asking themselves how far they would follow a soulless man’s orders, lest they jeopardize their own souls. I would appeal to the generals’ moral compasses, but Crow was smart to instead appeal to U.S. law. As we know, American soldiers are guided first by the U.S. Constitution, the law, and then by orders from their commanders. There is no room for conscientious objectors in war.

American presidents have for generations believed they operate beyond the reproach of the U.S. Constitution in international waters and on foreign soil. But eventually, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that President George W. Bush’s administration acted unlawfully at times in Guantanamo Bay. Perhaps someone should have reminded the 11 soldiers who faced criminal charges stemming from their actions at Abu Graib prison that they could and should disobey unlawful orders.

Trump’s response to a forceful reminder that individual members of the military can refuse to commit murder if they are ordered to open fire on an unarmed crowd, belies my very concern about Trump. Execution is how he would like to deal with U.S. Rep. Jason Crow and, now, possibly me. I sure hope that if military members are ordered to arrest me for this column, they consider the legality of doing so without an act of Congress. Members of the military cannot make arrests on American soil, and even the U.S. National Guard is prohibited from acting as law enforcement when their orders are coming from the White House rather than the governor’s mansion.

But what if the order was given? Would National Guard members violate the Posse Comitatus Act?

House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., said Crow’s message was “dangerous” and “unprecedented in American history.”

Yes, it certainly is an extreme message during an extremely dangerous time for America, and perhaps unprecedented. But if the message in the video takes the debate about Trump’s handling of our military too far, then Trump’s response must be condemned for what it is – a radical and unacceptable escalation.

Crow and his colleagues articulated a worry that has been at the forefront of mind – who in the U.S. military will protect Americans from a lawless president?

Megan Schrader is the opinion editor of The Denver Post.

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Music was the topic in our English practice session. “What is music like in Afghanistan?” one of us asked. “Music not allowed,” said one of the women. “Taliban,” said another pantomiming the bucking recoil of a machine gun. “Hurt you.”

If these women are ever sent back, they will be imprisoned or worse, even if they do so much as hum a tune. Their husbands worked with the U.S. government during our 20-year presence in Afghanistan. After the country fell to the Taliban, these Afghans got a target on their back. Many fled with their families to neighboring Iran or Pakistan while others traveled bravely to the other side of the world.

Recognizing our responsibility to protect to these allied Afghans, the U.S. has enabled thousands to come here legally as refugees, special immigrant visa holders, and humanitarian parolees. The later requires individuals apply for asylum, a long process that requires applicants meet regularly with immigration officials.

That’s what Mohammad Ali Dadfar and his family did. Since Dadfar had worked with U.S. troops, they were forced to flee Afghanistan. They came here as humanitarian parolees and applied for asylum. They settled in Boulder and Dadfar got a job to support his family as a long-haul truck driver. They met faithfully with immigration officials and were awaiting a final hearing date.

Imagine Dadfar’s shock and dread when masked Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents seized him at an Indiana truck stop last month and imprisoned him at a detainment center in Missouri.

This innocent man who followed the rules is now behind bars. While unlawfully detained, he is unable to earn money to support his family. And, this is not the first time a lawful resident has been swept up in ICE’s zeal to arrest, detain, and deport as many suspected illegal immigrants as they can, often without due process.

Whether one agrees or disagrees with the Trump Administration’s policy to deport immigrants here illegally, we can all agree that detaining and deporting immigrants who are here legally is both an affront to the rule of law and a cruel abuse of police power. This is particularly true of Afghan immigrants whose presence in the U.S. is due to our own foreign policy actions.

ICE and the Indiana State Police said they were targeting drivers close to the border with Illinois who held commercial licenses issued by jurisdictions considered “sanctuary states” by the Trump Administration. Did they ask any blond-haired, green-eyed truck drivers to show their commercial licenses? How many “Operation Midway Blitz” detainees look like me? Not a one person, I’m guessing.

Fortunately, some of those detained by this ICE operation will be released because a judge just ruled that the Department of Homeland Security violated a consent decree that restricts federal agents’ ability to conduct arrests without a warrant. Will detained lawful immigrants get reimbursed for wages lost during their unjust incarceration? Not one cent, I’m guessing.

In the meantime, U.S. Rep. Joe Neguse (CO-2) is in communication with Dadfar’s attorney and is trying to help end his unlawful detainment.

Working toward long-term solutions, U.S Rep. Jason Crow (CO-6) has introduced legislation to solidify legal permanent status for Afghan immigrants. Humanitarian parole and refugee and asylee programs have enjoyed bipartisan support until recently. In fact, President Dwight Eisenhower was the first to offer humanitarian parole to people fleeing persecution – anti-communist Hungarians who would have been killed or imprisoned by the Soviets.

Recently, the administration terminated humanitarian parole for Cubans, Haitians, Nicaraguans, and Venezuelans who came during the Biden administration. Although Afghans and Ukrainians are still eligible, one wonders for how long. The administration has also restricted legal pathways for refugees and asylees to seek refuge in the U.S.

How a large, wealthy country can turn its back on people fleeing death and imprisonment is unconscionable. If Dadfar is not released and returned to his family and if ICE does not start abiding by the laws of the land, the Trump Administration should consider demolishing the Statue of Liberty along with the East Wing. It will no longer stand false to those who hope in vain.

Krista Kafer is a Sunday Denver Post columnist.

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I was a student at Western Colorado University in Gunnison when my professor told our class he had a message for anyone wanting to work as a seasonal in the outdoor industry after graduating.

His message was simple: “Get out of my classroom.”

It wasn’t that he didn’t want us working as outdoor guides, trail crew leaders or ski bums. He wanted us to work as a seasonal, then come back to college when we were ready to value the economic stability of a degree.

“You don’t need a degree to be a guide,” he said. “A degree is so you can move into management after you burn out.” Most outdoor guides he knew burned out after five to seven years in the field, he said.

I took his advice and dropped out. It took me only three years to burn out.

It all started when I took a sabbatical between my junior and senior years. I found work for a season on a schooner, then at an organic farm, and finally with AmeriCorps in Denver. After finishing my bachelor’s degree, more seasonal jobs followed: a stint at a museum, a tall ship on the Hudson River, working as a outdoor educator. For four years, I moved every two to eight months.

I was lucky. I was still on my parents’ health insurance. My car never broke down. I had no student loans, so I could build up a financial cushion.

Seasonal work provided travel, flexibility, constant learning and sometimes fun. But if you asked me now if I’d recommend it, I’d say “no — unless you plan ahead.” I learned that the hard way.

After one seasonal job fell through, I found myself over a thousand miles from home and a month away from being homeless. Luckily, I found work as a library assistant and temporarily moved in with my family back in Colorado. I qualified for the library position only because of my bachelor’s degree in Spanish, which I had finally finished thanks to my outdoor education professor.

Here are some of the hard questions I had to answer while working as a seasonal: Where would I live between contracts, and what was the distance between jobs? Where would I store all my stuff? When I worked on the East Coast, I was a four-day drive away from my family in Denver, which made moving and swapping out gear extra difficult, especially in winter weather.

As a seasonal, you also have to keep start and end dates of seasonal jobs in mind, as not all run on the same schedule. If you live in employee housing, you risk becoming homeless between contracts. Always ask about relocation and travel stipends to fund the in-between.

If you enjoy a job and feel like you could learn more, try to return for multiple seasons. You’re more likely to be offered a permanent or management position, and it shows consistency to future employers. You’re also likely to make more money if you ask for a raise every season.

Seasonal work lets you try on professions until you find a good fit, or not. But regardless of how cool a job sounds, or how qualified you are to do it, you always need a backup plan.

Apply for multiple positions and be open to learning new skills on the job. If you have the chance to cross-train or pivot to doing something new at the same workplace, do it. And if you get a job with the U.S. Forest Service or any other federal land management agency, know that these days you could be fired without notice.

My professor was right. My degree saved me when seasonal work became too stressful to keep pursuing it anymore. But working seasonally in the “real world” and out of a classroom was invaluable. I had to be resilient and adept at picking up technical skills while connecting with people I would never have met while attending classes. I became someone who was always ready to learn new things.

When I finish my master’s degree, I want to teach, holding onto summers for outdoor jobs. This time, I’ll be doing it right.

Kira Cordova is a contributor to Writers on the Range, writersontherange.org, an independent nonprofit dedicated to spurring lively conversation about the West. She is currently working a seasonal job for Outward Bound while also completing a master’s degree in nature writing online.

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