Colorado’s burgeoning growth threatens to erase vast areas of open space. With 100,000 more people every year, the magnificent vistas we cherish as our heritage, both natural open spaces and the irreplaceable Western ranches, become subdivisions or ranchettes.
Colorado had a population of 2.2 million in 1970. It’s 4.7 million today, with more than 7 million expected by 2030. In 1970, developed land was 1.3 million acres. By 2000, developed land had almost doubled to 2.5 million acres – and 3.5 million acres is expected to be developed by 2030. To complete your perspective, know that Colorado is 66,618,481 acres. Private lands are 38,634,000, or 58 percent of the state; the federal government has 24,804,000 acres, or 37.2 percent – national forests and parks, Bureau of Land Management, etc. – and the state government owns 3,180,000 acres or 4.8 percent.
Coloradans have strongly backed open space protection and conservation in recent years, both in public opinion polls and by passing tax measures to provide funding for open space. This includes actually buying the land, or buying conservation easements that limit future development while permitting the land owner, usually ranchers or farmers, to continue food production. Eighty percent of Colorado’s private lands are owned by farmers and ranchers, many nearing retirement. Forty municipalities and counties have such dedicated revenues, and in 1992 state voters approved Great Outdoors Colorado (GOCO), which uses a portion of lottery funds for open space, wildlife, parks, etc.
The Colorado Conservation Trust, a statewide non-profit “passionate about keeping the very special places of Colorado special forever,” Tuesday released a statewide survey of open space protection, the first-ever such comprehensive inventory. It’s a powerful and intriguing look into Colorado’s future quality of life.
Participants included the 46 local, statewide and national land trusts that operate in Colorado and the 40 cities and counties with dedicated revenues for open space. They were asked what lands they had protected, what their goals were for the next 5 and 10 years, and how they expected to achieve them.
The land trusts have protected 1.32 million acres of land – 82 percent of the 1.6 million total acres protected, and local governments have protected 280,000 acres. This includes the hundreds of landowners who have donated land for conservation. Ninety percent of the land protected by local governments is along Colorado’s Front Range, where most of the development is, and is expected to continue.
These 86 entities have a goal for open space protection in the next 5 years of 1.061 million acres at a cost of $1.1 billion, and in 10 years, 2 million acres at a cost of $2 billion. Existing revenue sources fall short, at $1.2 billion.
“We’ll need an additional $50 [million] to $75 million per year to achieve this, and private dollars will be the catalyst,” Will Shafroth, executive director of Colorado Conservation Trust and previously of GOCO, said at the reception releasing the report. “This will be money from foundations, corporations, individuals. We’re going to lose some places, so we need to identify and develop conservation priorities so that we focus on the significant lands, whether agricultural, community separators, recreation/park buffers and access, river corridors, scenic lands and wildlife habitat. We must maximize the public benefits. Our actions over the next 10 years will determine Colorado’s future.”
It’s a tremendous challenge, but one that concerned Colorado citizens can meet and achieve. For a copy of “Colorado Conservation at a Crossroads,” go to info@coct.org, call 720-565-8289, or fax 720-565-8670.
Joanne Ditmer’s column on environmental and urban issues for The Post began in 1962 and now appears monthly.
