Members of Congress, local leaders and statewide officials call the support critical for rebuilding after a pair of devastating fires tore through Colorado, with flooding not far behind the blazes. Gov. Jared Polis, a Democrat, has rallied support from across political lines to underscore the need for the declaration publicly, and U.S. Rep. Jeff Hurd, a Republican, is organizing a tour with other western lawmakers so he can recruit them to a lobbying effort aimed at winning Trump’s approval.

Hanging over the waiting period is that the Trump administration, breaking with recent history, has rejected similar aid requests from Colorado and other states that voted against his return to the White House.

Both the Aspen Acres and Gold Mountain wildfires burned through Hurd’s Western Slope district, which also covers much of southern Colorado. He said it was still too soon to read anything into the still-unanswered federal aid request — even as he keeps in mind that the administration denied the similar request for the 2025 Elk and Lee fires, also in Hurd’s district, including appeals earlier this year.

To win support for the disaster declaration, he said he was working through “as many channels as we can — both officially, through the press, and through sources the president and his team would see, but also behind the scenes.”

He lauded the bipartisan effort behind the public pressure campaign — and also highlighted that Pueblo County, which bore the brunt of the Aspen Acres fire, voted for Trump in 2024.

“This is a terrible disaster in a crucial part of the state,” Hurd said. “Families have been impacted by not only the wildfire, but the flooding. The scope and nature of this disaster is almost unprecedented in this part of the state, in this part of the country. I will say also, these are communities that are largely rural and support the president.”

This summer, the has burned more than 100,000 acres, or roughly 159 square miles, mostly in southwest Pueblo County. It is the seventh-largest wildfire in Colorado history. The has burned nearly 40,000 acres, or 62 square miles, mostly in Ouray County. Both are largely contained, but still active in a season that has seen many other fires in the state.

The fires have destroyed more than 800 structures and 324 homes, according to signed by all of Colorado’s members of Congress and both senators.

Polis declared each fire a disaster at the end of June, and since then the state has opened up nearly $266 million to help with fire suppression, recovery and response, according to his office.

State ‘has worked closely with FEMA,’ Polis says

Polis made the formal request for federal aid to the White House on Aug. 23, after state and local officials worked with the Federal Emergency Management Agency to document and validate eligible damage.

The next day, Polis’ office publicized quotes from nearly two dozen local leaders and homeowners calling on the White House to approve the declaration.��

“The State of Colorado has worked closely with FEMA to put this request together and ensure we are doing all we can to support the communities impacted,” Polis said in a statement as the request neared the one-week mark.��“I’m grateful to Colorado’s entire congressional delegation for coming together in bipartisan support of our request. These rural communities have been through an incredibly difficult summer and I urge the President to approve Colorado’s request so that survivors can rebuild, repair, and recover from these catastrophic events.”

As of Monday afternoon, the White House still had not approved the declaration.

In an unattributed statement, a White House spokesperson said Trump responds to each request “with great care and consideration, ensuring American tax dollars are used appropriately and efficiently by the states to supplement — not substitute, their obligation to respond to and recover from disasters.”

That is the exact language the White House used when offering a statement on why it denied support for the Elk and Lee fires.

“The Trump administration remains committed to empowering and working with State and local governments to invest in their own resilience before disaster strikes, making response less urgent and recovery less prolonged,” the statement continued.

The disaster declaration would help the local governments in the affected areas rebuild infrastructure, including roads, water treatment plants and parks that were damaged or destroyed by the wildfires. Rural electric cooperatives would get help to rebuild destroyed power lines and transmission stations.

A declaration would also help homeowners rebuild property that was uninsured, either because insurers wouldn’t cover them or because they didn’t need coverage — as was the case with homes that weren’t in flood zones until the blazes remade local topography.

In recent months, Trump has increasingly politicized disaster relief. In July, he announced nearly $1 billion in aid to red states while praising candidates he backed in elections set at the same time, . Politico that Trump overrode regional approval to deny aid to New York, New Jersey, Rhode Island and Massachusetts.��

The administration has also admitted in court documents to canceling grant funding for blue states and not “based on any programmatic, statutory, cost-reduction or performance-based factor,” . Colorado was among those states.

The Times that data showed a sharp spike in disaster funding denials for Democratic states in Trump’s current term compared to presidents of both parties going back to the start of the century — including Trump’s first term. The Times’ analysis showed Trump had denied 43% of disaster relief requests made by Democratic states in his second term, compared to 19% of requests made by Republican states.

Colorado was also targeted by administration officials in December as the president lashed out at Polis for the ongoing imprisonment of Tina Peters, the disgraced election official who was sentenced for election-related crimes. Polis later commuted her sentence.

While the White House has denied playing politics with disaster relief, it����ap a pattern officials — Republican and Democrat — have invoked.

“Politics should never determine who rebuilds after a natural disaster,” U.S. Sen. John Hickenlooper, a Democrat, said in a statement. “Americans count on their government to support their communities after disaster strikes. This administration’s shameful trend of denying disaster aid to Colorado, and other states the president wants to punish, shatters Americans’ trust in their government.

“We won’t stop fighting for Colorado communities and making sure politics stays out of disaster recovery.”

Republicans join push, hoping to add leverage

State Rep. Larry Don Suckla, a Cortez Republican whose district includes the Gold Mountain fire burn area, said he watched the smoke rise from his backyard.

Places like Lake City, in Hinsdale County, were particularly devastated, both from the fire itself and from a halt in the summer tourism the area relies on, he said. He signed on to Polis’ letter, and, in an interview, emphasized that rural Colorado — the part of the state that grows food and harvests timber — would benefit from the disaster declaration.��

“Maybe my party affiliation, and the party affiliation of (Rep. Stephanie Luck, a Republican whose district includes the Aspen Acres fire), will make a difference. I don’t know,” Suckla said. He added that he owed it to his constituents to use whatever leverage he could to secure federal help.

State Sen. Cleave Simpson, an Alamosa Republican and leader of his caucus, said he considered the prior denials in his decision to join Polis’ public push.

He urged officials to “please not make this political theater, or comedy, and recognize the impacts these disasters have had on people’s livelihoods.”

He also warns of “a sense of frustration and abandonment” if the declaration isn’t approved.��

“Folks in general are pretty resilient, and we’ll figure out a way to move forward,” Simpson said. “It might take longer, and more energy and more resources, and it takes away from other efforts. Something will suffer along the way, I suppose. But I’m sure it would be a sense of defeatism if the declaration isn’t made and declared, and support doesn’t follow.”

Meanwhile, people in the Aspen Acres and Gold Mountain burn areas will be left dealing with the aftermath.��

Ouray County Commissioner Michelle Nauer evacuated when the fire neared her neighborhood, and she had to listen as a nearby creek broke its banks and overflowed into neighbors’ homes in the following days — neighbors who didn’t live in a flood zone, and so they hadn’t needed to buy insurance to protect against that type of calamity. Flooding often acts as a double whammy following fires, after the blazes scour the earth of vegetation that has kept banks in place.

Her friends, neighbors and constituents lost homes and businesses. Nauer, who is unaffiliated with a party, says she’s “not putting a whole lot of hope” into the disaster declaration request, given recent history.

But that doesn’t mean her community doesn’t need it.

“The emotional and financial devastation to the community, it has been horrific to us. I don’t know how else to describe it,” Nauer said. “I don’t know what else I would say (to people deciding on disaster relief). Please? Of course, please.”

Polis announced Sunday that he has submitted a formal request for a federal disaster declaration that would open Colorado to assistance from the Federal Emergency Management Agency. However, approval is given at the president’s discretion, and when Colorado asked for help in 2025, President Donald Trump denied it.

Polis submitted a 50-page letter outlining Colorado’s case and how it complies with federal law that governs disaster assistance.

In a news release, Polis said Colorado officials had assessed the damage “correctly and by the book” to support the communities that suffered from the wildfires.

“These disasters clearly meet all the requirements for a major disaster declaration, and the flooding and debris flows that followed have caused further destruction and claimed a life,” Polis said. “Colorado has committed significant resources to this response, but the scale of this disaster requires a strong partnership among federal, state and local governments for a successful recovery.”

Typically, presidential approval for a state’s request for help following natural disasters is routine.

President Joe Biden approved federal aid for the 2021 Marshall fire in Boulder County within hours of the state’s request for help. President Barack Obama gave his blessing for the federal assistance within a few days of the catastrophic Front Range floods in 2013.

But Trump denied Colorado’s request for federal disaster assistance for the 2025 Elk and Lee fires in northwestern Colorado and for flooding on the Western Slope. The state appealed the first denial only to have that appeal turned down, too.

The denial was the first for Colorado in 35 years, and it caught state officials off guard.

The previous denial came from President George H.W. Bush, who declined assistance after an F3 tornado on June 11, 1990, that caused an estimated $20 million in damages in Limon, according to .

Federal aid would help Pueblo, Custer and Ouray counties rebuild roads, water treatment plants, parks and other public services that were damaged or destroyed by the two wildfires. Rural electric cooperatives would qualify for assistance in rebuilding lost power lines and transmission stations, said Kevin Klein, director of the state’s Division of Homeland Security and Emergency Management.

Federal dollars would also be available to people whose houses were uninsured, bringing much needed help to residents who cannot afford to rebuild their mountain homes. It is unclear how many people who lost homes did not carry insurance, but The Denver Post talked to multiple people in Beulah who said they and their neighbors were denied insurance coverage because of the wildfire risk. Secondary homes would not be covered by federal disaster aid.

In Beulah, people not only lost homes in the Aspen Acres fire, but they also have suffered from flooding on the burn scar, which has sent mud, fallen trees and debris from burned houses into the valley,�� ruining people’s floors, walls and furniture.

The Aspen Acres fire ignited on June 29 in Custer County and then spread to Pueblo and Fremont counties, where it has to date burned more than 102,000 acres, ranking it the seventh largest wildfire in the state’s recorded history. The fire is 74% contained and is burning in unpopulated areas of rugged terrain.

The Aspen Acres fire destroyed 329 houses and another 62 were damaged, according to the governor’s letter. The wildfire also destroyed hundreds of other buildings such as barns, garages and work sheds. Those outbuildings would not qualify property owners for federal disaster money.

Of those destroyed homes, 208 were in Beulah, and 85 homes burned in unincorporated Custer County, which accounts for 2% of the county’s entire housing stock, the governor’s letter stated.

“These losses were inflicted on two rural counties with limited housing inventory, a high proportion of older residents on fixed incomes, and a documented pattern of underinsurance,” Polis’s letter stated.

The San Isabel Electric Cooperative, which provides electricity to 24,000 people in seven southern Colorado counties, lost millions of dollars of equipment such as power lines, transformers and distribution infrastructure.

The Gold Mountain fire started on June 28 in Ouray County and has burned 39,500 acres and is 87% contained. While that fire burned largely on public land, it destroyed five homes and damaged five others. But most f the destruction followed flooding from its burn scar.

U.S. 550 between Ouray and Ridgway has been closed repeatedly as debris flowed off the burn scar and buried the roadway and clogged culverts. Mudslides on Red Mountain Pass closed the highway between Ouray and Silverton.

“Because U.S. 550 is the only route in this corridor, each closure isolates residents from medical care, employment, and emergency services,” the governor’s letter said. “The closures ruptured the region’s tourism economy at the height of its high summer season.”

Trump is willing to withhold federal funding from Colorado in what many argue is political retaliation over the state’s support for Democratic presidential candidates and its mail-in voting system.

He has stripped hundreds of millions of dollars from Colorado, including grants from the U.S. Department of Agriculture and the U.S. Department of Energy, which is led by Coloradan Chris Wright. The administration also wants to close the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Boulder and to move other federal agencies out of state.

Earlier this month, The Post reported that the White House in late 2025 held a meeting with five agency leaders to discuss what they could do about Colorado as Trump berated Polis over former Mesa County clerk Tina Peters’ imprisonment. Peters was found guilty in 2024 of four felonies and three misdemeanors in connection with her scheme to allow an unauthorized person access to the county’s voting machines.

An email about the December meeting was disclosed during a federal court hearing over a Colorado lawsuit alleging retaliation by the Trump administration. State officials argue that retaliation was motivated by the president����ap frustration with Peters’ incarceration and by the state’s mail-in balloting system.

Even if Polis’s disaster request is denied, the state will do all it can to help the communities recover, Klein said.

“This is about the survivors and what we can do to help them and the communities rebuild,” he said. “That����ap where our focus is and that����ap where our focus will remain.”

On June 29, he had fled in an old pickup truck as the Aspen Acres fire raced toward his home. It burned 30 minutes later.

Now, the 88-year-old Griggs, who had no homeowners insurance and little savings, doesn’t believe he’ll be able to live in a house of his own again.

“At my age, I don’t think I’ll be able to rebuild,” he said. “My heart tells me that.”

As Griggs walked the property on Tuesday, he marveled at an antique, cast iron Fisher stove that had heated his home for nearly 60 years. It was the only thing in the house that withstood the intense flames.

The home was built in 1876 as a stagecoach inn. Griggs moved there as a young man after he married, and on the land he raised a family, built an in-ground swimming pool, tinkered with old cars and chopped firewood for that old stove while working at a steel mill in Pueblo and as a gravedigger at the Beulah cemetery.

“The only way to look at all of this is the good Lord made it and he took it away,” he said.

The Aspen Acres fire, the in recorded state history, destroyed more than 300 homes as it tore through 102,000 acres across four counties since igniting on June 29. The wildfire was 72% contained as of Friday, burning in remote areas and no longer threatening homes. Colorado insurance commissioner Michael Conway told The Denver Post that the fire will be “one of the first big tests” of the legislative measures passed since 2021’s Marshall fire — laws designed to provide insurance coverage to homeowners who have been denied and to make policies more affordable for everyone.

That insurance coverage is more critical than ever, with the Trump administration not inclined to support Colorado with federal disaster assistance during emergencies, and state and local government budgets stretched thin.

Officials do not yet know how many of the homes destroyed by the Aspen Acres fire were uninsured, but the Griggs family’s story is indicative of the struggles Coloradans face in buying coverage for their properties. The insurance crisis is driven by the growing threat of severe weather in the drought-stricken state, as climate change fuels more powerful storms and aggressive wildfires.

Bob Griggs could not find a company willing to write a policy for his 150-year-old home, where the only sources of heat were that old wood-burning stove in his living room and another in the kitchen.

“They said it was a cracker box,” he said.

Meanwhile, his son and daughter-in-law, Donald Griggs and Nicole Richardson-Griggs, had insurance on their newer home, which was a football field’s length away on the same property.

They paid about $16,000 a year to insure the property, Richardson-Griggs said. And now they are tangling with the carrier to be reimbursed for what they lost.��The family held a $420,000 policy for their home, and the Pueblo County tax assessor valued it at $380,000. Their insurance company offered $240,000 after the fire, Richardson-Griggs said.

The insurer offered to pay 65% of the total value of all the possessions inside their home, such as appliances, furniture and tools. The family is already stressed about how long it will take to rebuild and how they will pay for temporary housing, even though state law requires insurance companies to pay for living expenses for people displaced by fires and other natural disasters.

Richardson-Griggs said the ordeal makes her angry and disappointed.

“We pay a lot of money,” she said. “They’re offering half what the fair market value is. Last night, I just had to pray a lot about it.”

Legislative action and a FAIR Plan

The push for reforms began in earnest after the Marshall fire in Boulder County destroyed 1,084 homes worth a combined half-billion dollars in December 2021, exposing shortfalls in people’s insurance coverage that made rebuilding a challenge.

At the same time, people who own homes in Colorado’s mountain towns were finding it increasingly difficult to buy insurance due to the ever-present wildfire threat. Some people reported they could not find coverage at all, while others saw their premiums skyrocket.

The state legislature jumped into action as people demanded help.

The recent reforms included the requirement to provide 36 months of additional living expenses as well as a change in how insurance companies reimburse people for their lost possessions after a wildfire. If a person loses a home in a wildfire declared a disaster by the governor, the insurance company must offer 65% of the value upfront without requiring an inventory of the home’s contents.

One big addition to Colorado’s insurance landscape was the creation of the FAIR Plan — a state-backed insurance plan that serves as a last resort for those who cannot otherwise find property insurance. The plan is less than two years old and, thus far, has fewer than 300 participants, said Kelly Campbell, the FAIR Plan’s executive director.

The FAIR Plan is intended to insure homes only when an owner cannot find a policy on the regular market. And it only offers bare-bones coverage — a maximum of $750,000 for the home’s cash value. It does not provide liability, water damage or theft coverage. Customers must find separate policies to cover the possessions inside their homes or pay for additional living expenses elsewhere.

“It’s still a safety-net policy,” Campbell said.

When Colorado created the FAIR Plan, Campbell and her staff were not sure how many homeowners would buy into it, but they anticipated selling more than 300 policies, she said, noting that the number of insured homes and commercial buildings fluctuates as people find other options.

“It����ap always hard to know what to expect,” Campbell said. “It was difficult to know for sure how many people truly didn’t have options for coverage.”

Only one of the homes that burned in the Aspen Acres fire was insured under the FAIR Plan, and that represented the program’s first payout since the state started writing policies in April 2025, she said.

The Aspen Acres fire has been labeled a “catastrophic disaster” by the state because of the extensive damage. It’s unclear how many other buildings, such as barns and detached garages, were damaged or destroyed, but estimates have been close to 850 total structures.

A dollar amount has not yet been placed on the property damage, and Conway said it is too early to understand how many people did not have insurance. But he is trying to prevent more people in the fire zone from losing their homeowners coverage.

On Tuesday, the Colorado Division of Insurance announced it wants to place on policy cancellations and non-renewals in the Aspen Acres fire territory, saying the state needs to protect homeowners from unfair discrimination by insurance carriers. The division is asking for public comment on the proposed emergency regulation by Monday. Those comments can be emailed to DORA_Ins_RulesandRecords@state.co.us.

“Without the protections provided for in this emergency regulation, such homeowner policyholders could have their insurance policies canceled or nonrenewed at their greatest time of need and could face extreme financial duress should their residence be impacted by the Aspen Acres wildfire,” the division’s request for comment states.

‘This president is not the biggest fan of Colorado’

Fire recovery is slow and complicated as people piece together resources to help put their lives back together.

During the Marshall fire, it took a combination of insurance payouts, federal disaster loans, nonprofit assistance, local government cooperation and community goodwill to rebuild the fire-ravaged sections of Louisville and Superior.

But there’s one piece of that financial puzzle that is no longer a guarantee in Colorado: federal disaster assistance.

The Marshall fire ignited on Dec. 20, 2021, and the next day President Joe Biden approved a major disaster declaration, opening the gates for millions in federal assistance to public agencies and individuals.

President Donald Trump has been less willing to help Colorado fire victims.

In April, the Federal Emergency Management Agency denied Colorado’s appeal for a similar declaration for the Lee and Elk fires, which burned last summer in the northwest corner of the state, and for flooding on the Western Slope. It was the first time in 35 years the state was denied federal assistance for a major disaster.

Aspen Acres fire victims, especially those without insurance, are waiting to learn whether or not the federal government will step up this time.

State officials asked FEMA for a joint preliminary damage assessment, which was conducted the first week of August, Joshua Johnson, the Pueblo County Sheriff’s Office emergency management coordinator, told residents at a community meeting Tuesday night.

Once that report is complete, Gov. Jared Polis can ask the president for the major disaster declaration, which would trigger federal money to help individuals and public agencies. The governor has 30 days from the end of the incident to make the request.

On Tuesday night, Johnson tried to temper expectations in Beulah.

“This isn’t a political statement, but as you may or may not know, this president is not the biggest fan of Colorado,” he said. “There is a chance we may not get anything.”

Johnson also talked about pressure on Pueblo County’s budget when residents asked whether there was any local money to help. He cited as an example the fact that the county spent $60,000 on dumpsters so people could throw away spoiled food and other possessions ruined when they evacuated and lost electricity.

‘Here comes the flood’

A failure to receive federal aid could hurt people like Paul and Christine Taft, a couple whose Beulah home survived the flames but was swamped by floodwaters a few weeks later.

The Tafts have property insurance, which paid out after the Aspen Acres fire burned a barn and a work shed, Christine Taft said.

But that policy does not cover floods.

When the couple was warned about potential flooding across the burn scar, they decided to buy a flood policy.��The company that insures their house said no. So Christine Taft started making calls. She bought a policy on July 20 that came with a 10-day waiting period, which means they would have flood insurance effective at midnight July 30.

But a rainstorm over the mountains surrounding the Beulah Valley sent water and fire debris rolling toward their house around 7 p.m. July 29, just hours before that policy kicked in. The water, which carried burned trees, loose dirt and fire-scarred items from homes higher up, poured over the banks of Squirrel Creek, which splits their property, Christine Taft said.

“I saw this wall coming at me,” she said.

Christine Taft escaped with their two dogs, walking through knee-deep water and losing her shoes as she traversed the mud.

The couple received help from the to rip out ruined floors and scrape mud off the walls. But they have not figured out a long-term solution to get back into their house, in part because more flooding is expected.

The couple had been creating an itemized list of Paul Taft’s tools that were lost when the shed and barn burned, compiling receipts and replacement costs, so they can be reimbursed by their insurance company. But the floodwaters destroyed those documents, and now they must start over.

On Wednesday, the couple filled 300 sandbags in anticipation of the next wave of thunderstorms forecast at the end of the week.

The Tafts are using the insurance money they already received for living expenses, she said. She also visited the Salvation Army and Catholic Charities to find out what financial assistance might be available.

It’s a disheartening situation, Christine Taft said.

“We are looking out for ourselves, knowing where we live in this wildland urban interface,” she said. “We made it through the fire and then here comes the flood. How much more can a person handle? And here we are asking for help.”

Climate change, hail and drought

The wildfire risk across Colorado is not improving any time soon. An extended statewide drought, hot and windy weather, and forests ransacked by pine beetles persist, making conditions ripe for fires.

An estimated 301,308 residential properties in Colorado, valued at more than $146 billion, are at a moderate or great risk of wildfire, according to the , which is used by insurers. Colorado ranks second in the nation to California when it comes to wildfire risk, the report said.

Yet severe hailstorms are a bigger threat in Colorado, driving insurance costs even higher for property owners. Earlier this year, the state Division of Insurance surveyed 20 insurance carriers and determined that hail damage accounts for an average of 26% to 54% of the total homeowner insurance premium, depending on the county.

All of these conditions are driven by climate change, which makes wildfires burn hotter and faster and causes more severe storms.

It’s the changing climate that is leading Evon Davis to reconsider how she will live on her family’s mountainside land in Beulah after the Aspen Acres fire destroyed a home her father, a school teacher, started building in the 1960s.

Her father, Wes Davis, 92, had taken steps to mitigate wildfire risk by cutting down trees and other forest growth near the house. But when the Aspen Acres fire roared over a ridge and downhill toward their house, it didn’t make a difference.

“There’s nothing you can do to stop it,” she said.

The Davis family lost insurance coverage about 10 years ago when their carrier dropped their policy due to the fire risk. When asked if she had considered Colorado’s FAIR Plan, Davis said she had only recently heard of it, then shrugged and said, “But it won’t do me any good now.”

The Griggs family said they had never heard of the FAIR Plan.

Campbell, who runs the state’s insurance-of-last-resort program, acknowledged that more consumer education is needed so Coloradans know it is available.

The plan does not directly sell policies. Instead, they are sold through registered agents. The state plan last week issued more educational material to those agents and asked them to tell their clients about it, she said. And the staff sent material to state legislators so they could talk to constituents.

“Traditionally in FAIR plans, because it����ap safety-net coverage, you don’t do a lot of marketing,” Campbell said. “We want to make sure they know about it. If they don’t know about it, it’s not an option.”

Carole Walker, executive director of the , said the state’s FAIR Plan is working well from the industry’s perspective.

“We didn’t want people to turn to the FAIR Plan if they didn’t have to,” she said. “We’ve always hoped it wouldn’t go the way of California and there wouldn’t be a run on the FAIR Plan. We just want it to be a pressure valve release.”

The industry’s research shows that secondary homes in high-risk areas are more likely to be uninsured than primary residences, Walker said.

“They tend to be paid off and that����ap when people gamble on self-insurance rather than paying the higher cost of insurance,” she said.

But she warns people about the risk.

“What you need to understand when that bad day comes — the unthinkable — is: will you have that money not only to rebuild, but can you afford to replace the contents?” Walker said. “And the cost to live elsewhere is expensive.”

‘This is generational land’

On Davis’s hillside, there were four other houses; none was insured, she said.

“It’s not like they couldn’t afford it or didn’t want it,” Davis said. “They couldn’t get it. All of these houses were paid for. There were no mortgages.”

All of those homeowners are similar to Davis’ father — older Beulah residents whose families had owned land and mountain cabins for decades. Their homes were not like the large estates found in wealthier Colorado mountain towns, but smaller structures where their blue-collar families went to relax and enjoy the outdoors.

“This is generational land,” Davis said.

The Davis family home was valued at $210,000 by the Pueblo County tax assessor, she said.

That amount doesn’t include all the furniture, appliances, tools and clothes that were destroyed. Rusted saw blades and shards of pottery were scattered in the blackened earth on Tuesday as Davis walked the land.

The home was Davis’s retirement plan. She spent most of the year in Beulah but retreated to Arizona during the winter to live in a nomadic community.

Now, she’s homeless and isn’t sure what her future living arrangements will entail. She and her father don’t have the money to build another home.��The house was constructed during a time when there were fewer regulations and less code enforcement. That wouldn’t be the case now, and it would cost far more than $210,000 to replace it.

Like many who lost homes in the Aspen Acres fire, Davis is asking for financial help through So far, she’s received less than $5,000.

She would like to live in Beulah again and is considering a camper, a hut similar to those at Colorado state park campgrounds, or a tiny house.

But one thing is certain — the Davis family will not rebuild another traditional mountain home that cannot be insured.

“Even if I had insurance, I wouldn’t rebuild a house like that again,” she said. “You’re just asking for it to burn down again.”

As for the Griggs family, they also have ��to raise money. Thus far, they have collected $4,850 to help Bob Griggs, who they call “Grandpa Bob.”

For now, Bob Griggs is living in a rented Airbnb with his son and daughter-in-law in Pueblo. He will not be homeless, Richardson-Griggs said. But it’s unclear what the future home for the three of them will look like.

“I don’t know what we’re going to be able to afford,” she said.

Under the subject line “brainstorm call,” Emily Underwood asked officials from five agencies to join a call later that day “prepared to discuss immediate actions that your department or agency can take with respect to Colorado.”

“The purpose of this call is to prioritize Colorado for the purposes of ensuring grants and federal support are in line with administration priorities,” Underwood, a deputy assistant to the president, wrote to officials from the departments of energy, transportation, interior and agriculture, as well as the Office of Management and Budget.

The email was sent at 2:43 a.m. on Dec. 15, hours before Trump over the continued imprisonment of former Mesa County clerk Tina Peters.

The Underwood email was disclosed publicly during a hearing in Denver on Tuesday as part of a Colorado lawsuit alleging retaliation by the Trump administration that state officials argue was motivated by the president’s frustration with Peters’ incarceration and by the state’s mail-in balloting system.

According to a transcript of the hearing reviewed by The Denver Post, a senior state attorney said the email amounted to a “smoking gun”: In the days that followed Underwood’s note, several agencies included in the email announced adverse actions against Colorado, canceling hundreds of millions of dollars in funding and moving to close a renowned climate lab in Boulder.

“It’s extraordinary,” David Moskowitz, Colorado’s deputy solicitor general, said during the Tuesday hearing in U.S. District Court. The state had requested the hearing — and produced the email — in an effort to force the Trump administration to turn over more records. “And it’s extraordinary because the scheme was run directly out of (the Executive Office of the President).”

The White House on Thursday denied that the Underwood email was related to Peters. A spokeswoman did not comment on the record for this story, other than to direct questions about grant funding to the budget management office.

Throughout the fall, tension had mounted between the state and Trump administration.

In November, Colorado prison officials had rejected a request to transfer Peters, a Trump ally who was serving a prison sentence for facilitating a plot to give a third party access to secure election equipment. , demanding Peters’ release. (In May, Polis reduced her sentence and released her early.)

The Justice Department’s pardon attorney told Trump ally Steve Bannon that federal officials were putting “the right kind of pressure” on the state to secure Peters’ transfer; Trump had also promised “harsh measures” if the former clerk remained incarcerated.

Four days before Underwood’s email, the president .

Within days of that “brainstorm call,” that the Department of Energy was cutting $615 million in funding intended for Colorado. The Department of Transportation said to the state. The Office of Management and Budget moved to shutter the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Boulder. Federal emergency officials on the Western Slope. The Department of Agriculture .

Before the month was out, Trump vetoed legislation that would have brought��clean water to parts of the state.

Underwood’s email appeared to leave the federal judge overseeing the case aghast. According to the transcript, U.S. District Judge R. Brooke Jackson said the administration’s apparent targeting of Colorado “makes no sense in our democracy,” and he ordered the Executive Office of the President to turn over more documents and records to the state.

“I’ve never seen anything like it. I’ve never even imagined something like it,” Jackson said of the email, which he read aloud in court. “The very idea that the president of the United States or the Executive Office of the President would target a state because they don’t feel that the state and its administrators are in line with the current administration’s priorities is phenomenal.”

“That’s not the country I think we live in,” he said later in the hearing.

In a statement Thursday, Colorado Attorney General Phil Weiser called the email “shocking” and said it proved that “the White House orchestrated an unconstitutional scheme to weaponize the federal government to attack and punish Colorado for its lawful decisions over elections and our criminal justice system.”

Polis spokeswoman Ally Sullivan said in a separate statement that the Trump administration “has taken a number of actions that have negatively impacted Coloradans and our communities. If those decisions were based on political retribution against Colorado, we hope the courts will provide relief to Colorado.”

Sullivan did not respond to specific questions about the timing or substance of Polis’ call with Trump last year.

Officials in Colorado and elsewhere have long argued that the Trump administration has used the regulatory and financial powers of the federal government to target states that have run afoul of the president and his priorities. The lawsuit that produced the email was initially filed over allegations that Trump had moved U.S. Space Command from Colorado Springs because of the state’s mail-in balloting system. Last month, that they’d terminated clean energy grants for several states, including Colorado, “based solely on the political identity” of those states.

During Tuesday’s hearing, lawyers for the state said they wanted the president’s office to turn over evidence, including records of oral or written communication, that may further prove that Colorado was targeted for unconstitutional retaliation. Moskowitz, the deputy solicitor general, said that the state has already received evidence that showed there was a “mad scramble” after the Dec. 15 meeting to “immediately identify actions against Colorado.”

He said the USDA had acknowledged that it had proposed its SNAP review after the call. The Energy Department, he said, held a “high-level mandatory (meeting) … to discuss what they were going to do.” That same day, the Interior Department “immediately requested … a compilation of all outstanding grants to Colorado or any entity simply located in Colorado.”

The hearing was about evidence discovery, and Adam Fox, the Justice Department attorney representing the Trump administration, largely did not respond to statements about the email, though he did not dispute its reported contents.

He argued that the state’s requests for more information from the president’s executive office were overly broad and burdensome, and that the state hadn’t first exhausted other avenues to get evidence that may help its case.

Jackson was largely unmoved. He asked Fox whether there “were so many written communications about actions or threats against Colorado that it’s an undue burden to even try to find them all.”

He ordered the federal government to comply with most of the state’s requests for additional evidence. He said he understood that the government should be protected from turning over information, particularly if it’s sensitive, to anyone who files a lawsuit against the president.

“But these are extraordinary times we’re talking about, and this is an extraordinary memo,” Jackson continued. “And it’s very troublesome to this court. And I think it would be very troublesome to most people if this were broadcast in The Denver Post, for example. This is something that I have never even conceived of before.”

The New York Times contributed to this report.

But when Clayton Homes announced in December that it was shutting down the state’s largest modular manufacturing plant, located in Adams County, it raised a critical question.

If Clayton, the nation’s leading manufactured homebuilder, couldn’t justify operating in Colorado, what are the survival odds for the 18 newer and much smaller home-construction innovators the state has backed in recent years?

Before the housing crash in the late 2000s, Colorado was home to a half-dozen modular factories. Clayton’s Heibar facility, formerly known as Precision Building Systems, part of Oakwood Homes, was the last of that generation to finally call it quits.

Enter , which is trying to fill the void, to the point of acquiring equipment and hiring some of the workers let go last year by Clayton’s Heibar Installation plant.

Vederra’s 140,000-square-foot facility in Aurora is two-thirds the size of the shuttered Heibar plant. And the company says it has co-developed a proprietary model to create factory-built homes and apartments at a significantly lower cost.

Founder Nathan Peterson, who has spent 25 years in the modular industry, pointed with pride during a factory tour on the equipment deals he managed to land, some at pennies on the dollar.

He is leasing space rather than buying land for the factory. He has avoided investing heavily in robotics, in part because he lacks the money, but also because it would create a burdensome overhead when work orders slow.

Silicon Valley tried to address the inefficiencies in the home construction industry through a startup called Katerra, which deployed advanced robotics and software throughout.

Katerra was a private equity darling until it burned through $2.4 billion in six years before abruptly liquidating in June 2021. Its sudden failure left two Denver apartment buildings and a hotel in limbo, although all three were eventually completed.

Equity investors and unsecured creditors weren’t so fortunate.

Vederra Modular, by contrast, represents a bootstrap venture, one that is relying heavily on state support but also finding a way to lower costs.

In 2024, the collateral support via the Innovative Housing Incentive Program, through Colorado’s economic development office, and $3.5 million in working capital from the state’s Proposition 123 Affordable Housing Financing Fund, administered by the Colorado Housing and Finance Authority.

Peterson acknowledged his factory wouldn’t have gotten off the ground without state funds, which have some strings attached — the creation of 150 local jobs and 316 affordable housing units a year.

“Vederra is one of a growing number of Colorado companies developing innovative new off-site construction methods such as modular, panelization, 3D printing, foundation and framing kits, and composite wood technologies,” said Hilary Cooper, director of Innovative Funding for Housing Programs at the Colorado Office of Economic Development and International Trade.

Rather than betting big on one technology or a couple of companies, the state has spread its wagers across 18 housing innovators in 12 counties.��The target they have set is the construction of 7,000 housing units a year, which would represent a sizeable chunk of the 35,000 or so building permits pulled in the state in 2024.

Over time, the hope is that innovation can shrink the state’s shortfall, which the State Demography Office estimated last fall at 106,000 homes and apartments.

“By helping these companies launch and grow, we can help more Coloradans live close to their jobs, and in communities they love,” Cooper said.

Modular construction involves building components, such as walls or trusses, or entire structures, inside a factory, rather than on the home site.��Assembly lines can run day and night, protected from the elements, making for a more efficient and attractive work environment. Quality control is easier to maintain, and waste is much lower.

Completed components ship to the home site, where they are assembled or put on a foundation. Modular construction promises lower costs, higher quality and much faster completion time. But factories need a steady flow of orders to support their overhead, and that went away after orders dried up during the housing crash in the late 2000s.

Workforce housing in the mountains

With the Front Range currently facing a glut of apartments, Vederra Modular has zeroed in on the affordable housing market in resort communities where the shortfall remains acute.

The approach of building energy-efficient modules in a factory, while the land is prepared, aligns better with the short building season faced in mountain communities, said Paul Capps, president of Summit Housing Group in Missoula, Mont.

Summit Housing and the town of Granby are currently developing a 66-unit project called the Summit at Granby Apartments for people earning between 30% and 60% of the area median income in Grand County.��That would likely put rents in the range of $600 to $1,200 a month for a two-bedroom unit based on the AMI.

They are also developing a related 75-unit workforce housing development within Nuche Village, which targets workers making 80% to 120% of the area’s median income.

Summit expects to close on its construction loans within the next 30 days, at which point it will give Vederra Modular the go-ahead to start assembling modules.

“We hope that the boxes can be built and shipped up there by November of this year before it gets too cold,” Capps said.

Time is money when it comes to construction. Each month of delay will cost Summit $100,000 in interest payments on its construction loans, he said.

Having apartments completed and occupied in one year rather than in two or three years could save Summit Housing between $1.2 million and $2.4 million in financing costs, he estimates.

Modules currently take about three weeks to build, Peterson said, and the company is working on a real-time labor management software called Vederra OS to keep the assembly line flowing more smoothly by reducing the idle time of workers.

Savings in the void

One of the key innovations developed by Peterson, in partnership with Dean Dalvit, owner of EVstudio in Denver, is a construction method known as Alt-Mod.

Traditional modular designs contain complete walls and floors ready to be shipped to the construction site. That allows boxes, which can contain a full room or a room and parts of other rooms, to be more easily stacked on top of or next to each other.

However, the convenience in assembly comes with a trade-off: overbuilt walls and floors and wasted construction materials.

Vederra’s method, which will be tested in Granby, only builds enough of the walls and floors to interlock with other modules.

“We intentionally leave a void space,” Peterson said. “That cuts the number of boxes needed in half.”

The approach involves more finishing work onsite, but it saves between 15% to 20% over traditional modular methods, according to EVstudio.

For The Summit at Granby, a traditional modular approach would require 93 boxes with a component cost estimated at�� $13.7 million.��The Alt-Mod method reduces the box count to 47 and brings the component costs to $9.4 million.

The system, however, does require more on-site labor to complete the unfinished spaces. Those costs rise to $1.93 million versus $581,000.

All in, the Summit at Granby carries a price tag of $18.7 million versus $22.6 million using more traditional modular methods, a savings of 17%.

Rodger Hara, an affordable housing industry consultant, said better economies of scale mean more affordable homes can be built.

Vederra and EVstudio appear to have made a promising breakthrough in that regard, he added.

Capps said lower costs can make the difference between an affordable project winning tax credits and getting completed or staying on the drawing board.��And that can make the difference between workers in a community having a place to lay their heads near where jobs are or having to make long commutes on icy roads.

“The Alt-Mod program is a cost-saver and a game-changer in the affordable housing space,” he said.

Emergency housing on the go

Another innovation that Vederra is working on involves moveable “pop-up” factories that can be brought into disaster areas or into remote areas without homebuilders.

Vederra Onsite is developing a system to quickly set up 60,000-square-foot factories capable of producing 350 homes a year in areas where the housing stock has been destroyed or isn’t keeping up.

The idea is to put factories close to where homes are needed, whether it is a hurricane-scoured Gulf Coast community or a fire-scorched mountain town.��As an added benefit, the factories could provide 50 to 75 jobs to residents who might otherwise be unemployed after a natural disaster.

Factories could also be set up in isolated places with acute housing shortages, like North Dakota’s Williston Basin experienced during the shale oil boom from 2006 to 2014.

Peterson said the Colorado Department of Local Affairs is funding a pilot plant. He is working to get the Federal Emergency Management Agency interested.

“We are trying to take one to Hawaii,” he said.

A catastrophic wildfire in August 2023 killed 102 residents of Lahaina in Maui and destroyed about 1,900 homes and apartments.��Nearly three years later, only 231 replacement homes have been completed, with building permits issued for another 549, according to a .

In January, Colorado extended a $1 million line of credit through Proposition 123 and a $1.8 million loan through the Innovative Housing Incentive Program for a pilot project to assemble the first pop-up factory.

After the homes are built, the factories can then be packed up and moved to the next crisis zone as needed, Peterson said.

Colorado leaders are bracing for possibly extreme fire behavior over the Fourth of July weekend, with forecasters expecting near-zero humidity, gusty winds and temperatures near 100 degrees.

“If you care about our state, if you care about our firefighters, do not use fireworks or other types of flames this Fourth of July weekend,” Gov. Jared Polis said at a news conference in Pueblo County on Thursday afternoon, where the Aspen Acres fire has burned more than 50,000 acres and destroyed an estimated 200 buildings.

“We cannot handle another major incident in our state right now,” Polis continued.

Firefighters gained 10% containment on the Ferris fire near Dolores and increased containment on the deadly Snyder fire in Utah and Mesa County to 65% as of Thursday evening.

Together, the Aspen Acres, Gold Mountain, Snyder, Ferris and Willow fires have charred 133,325 acres — 208 square miles — as of Thursday afternoon.

Colorado’s largest wildfire, the Aspen Acres fire, grew to 55,391 acres, or 86 square miles, as of Thursday evening.

A complex incident management team from Alaska took command of the fire at 6 a.m. Thursday and ordered 100 fire engines that are heading to Colorado from California, incident commander Jake Livingston said.

The team also ordered 17 hand crews, six dozers and 15 water tenders to respond to the fire.

Jump to:��Aspen Acres fire |��Gold Mountain fire��|��Ferris fire | Willow fire��| Snyder fire | Air quality alerts

Aspen Acres fire in Custer and Pueblo counties

The Aspen Acres fire sparked Monday morning in southern Colorado and grew rapidly. It nearly doubled in size on Wednesday alone, prompting a wave of new evacuations as it jumped from an estimated 28,363 acres to 47,953 acres with no containment.

The fire is burning on 55,391 acres, or 86 square miles, as of Thursday evening, fire officials said.

Fire officials believe the has destroyed more than 200 structures, Gov. Jared Polis said at a news conference Thursday afternoon. At least 125 structures have been destroyed in Pueblo County, and another 55 — primarily homes — were lost in Custer County.

Pueblo County Sheriff David Lucero said the number of burned buildings was likely higher, but the fire has blocked first responders from accessing the area for a more accurate count.

Authorities said the following areas are under mandatory evacuation orders:

• Town of Wetmore: North of Wetmore to Fremont County and Pueblo, closing Colorado 96
• Colorado City: North of Highway 165, east of Table Mountain Church, and west of Crow Cutoff
• Red Creek Ranch: North of Colorado 78 and south of Colorado 96, west of Siloam Road and east to the Red Creek Springs area
• The North Creek area from Central Road to the Custer County Line
  Aspen Acres subdivision
• Property on 12 Mile Road
• South Pine Drive
• Beulah
• Rye
• San Isabel Lake
• Bishop Castle

Evacuated residents can seek shelter at the Pueblo County Recreation Center, 1650 Cooper Place; the Wetmore Community Center, 95 County Road 393; or at Pathfinder Park in Florence, 6655 Colorado 115.

As of Thursday morning, according to the Colorado Department of Transportation, the following road closures were in effect:

• between Butler Street in Silver Cliff and Siloam Road west of Pueblo
• between Cap Rock Road and Colorado 96 south of Florence
• between Colorado 96 and Colorado Boulevard in Colorado City
• between Colorado 165 and Rock Creek Road west of Pueblo

The wildfire was reported as a spot fire near the Aspen Acres campground shortly before 6 a.m. Monday. It grew to 362 acres by 10 a.m., reached 2,476 acres around noon and exploded in size to 22,827 acres Monday evening, according to fire officials.

The Federal Emergency Management Agency authorized the use of federal funds to help with the firefighting costs on Tuesday. FEMA officials said the Aspen Acres fire “threatened such destruction that it would constitute a major disaster.”

Federal funding will cover 75% of the state’s eligible firefighting costs, including for field camps; equipment use, repair and replacement; mobilization and demobilization activities; and tools, materials and supplies.

Officials with the U.S. Forest Service and the Colorado Department of Public Safety are investigating the cause of the fire, according to the Custer County Sheriff’s Office.

Gold Mountain fire near Ouray

The had scorched 18,005 acres, or 28 square miles, with no containment as of Wednesday evening, according to Rocky Mountain Area Complex Incident Management Team 3, which is leading the fire response.

That’s up more than 3,000 acres from the 14,960-acre estimate reported Wednesday morning, and more than double the 8,277-acre burn area reported on Tuesday. As of Wednesday, the fire’s footprint was bigger than the city of Boulder.

The wildfire��sparked Saturday north of Ouray, forcing evacuations. Colorado Gov. Jared Polis��issued a disaster declaration��for the Gold Mountain fire on Sunday.

As of Thursday morning, mandatory evacuation orders remained active west of the fire, according to Ouray County’s .

The southern evacuation zone included Lake Lenore and was bordered to the west by U.S. 550, to the north by Cutler Creek, to the east by the wildfire burn area and to the south by Bridalveil Creek. The northern evacuation zone was bordered to the west by Ouray County Road 10, to the north by Cow and Deer creeks, to the east by Lou Creek Pass and to the south by Bald Peak and the wildfire.

Pre-evacuation orders were also issued for southwest Gunnison County, along Coal Creek and the Cimarron Ridge, according to the map.

An evacuation shelter was opened at the Ridgway Secondary School, 1200 Green St., according to county officials.

The Federal Emergency Management Agency has authorized the use of federal funds to help with the firefighting costs for the Gold Mountain fire, the Colorado governor’s office announced Wednesday. FEMA will cover 75% of the state’s eligible firefighting costs.

When Polis requested federal aid, the fire was threatening 266 homes and had forced more than 400 people to evacuate, according to the office.

Ferris fire in San Juan National Forest, near Dolores

The Ferris fire, which started Saturday as three separate fires north of Dolores in southwestern Colorado’s San Juan National Forest, has consumed more than 27,000 acres with no containment, according to federal officials.

As of Wednesday evening, the lightning-sparked wildfire was estimated to be burning on 27,382 acres, according to fire officials. That����ap just over 42 square miles, larger than Grand Junction.

Mandatory evacuations were issued for residents east and west of the wildfires, according to the Dolores County Office of Emergency Management. The eastern evacuation area was bordered to the north by Disappointment Road, to the south by the Glade Ranch community, to the west by the fire and to the east by Lone Mesa, . The was bordered to the north by County Road J, to the south by County Road S, to the west by Cahone and to the east by the Bradfield area.

The U.S. Forest Service also closed the Bradfield Bridge Campground, Forest Service Road 504 to the base of McPhee Dam, Forest Service Road 521 and Forest Service Road 504 “out of an abundance of caution,”��federal officials said.

Colorado Parks and Wildlife on Tuesday cut off public access to the Lone Dome State Wildlife Area in Dolores and Montezuma counties, according to a news release from the agency. As fire conditions continue to change, further closures may be put into place for public safety and to support firefighting efforts, wildlife officials said.

Willow fire near Leadville

The sparked Sunday evening near Leadville and quickly grew across more than 2,000 acres, prompting evacuations for residents west of town.

By Thursday evening, the fire had spread to an estimated 2,355 acres with no containment in the San Isabel National Forest.

The wildfire was��first reported at about 4:20 p.m. Sunday��by the Lake County Office of Emergency Management. At that time, it was burning on a handful of U.S. Forest Service acres below Mount Massive, near Twin Mounds,��county officials said.

Colorado Gov. Jared Polis issued a disaster declaration for the fire on Monday.

As of Thursday morning, the mandatory evacuation area included Turquoise Lake and was bordered to the south by Rock Creek, to the west by Hagerman Pass, to the north by Galena Mountain and to the east by Leadville, according to the Lake County evacuation map. The Leadville area and homes north of the fire along U.S. 24 were on pre-evacuation status at that time.

The cause of the fire remains under investigation.

Snyder fire in Mesa County and Utah

Activity on the Snyder fire dwindled on Wednesday as crews gained containment around the wildfire’s perimeter.

As of Thursday evening, the had consumed 30,193 acres with 65% containment, up from 49% containment on Wednesday, according to the Rocky Mountain Complex Incident Management Team in charge. That’s roughly 47 square miles and nearly the size of , which operates on 34,000 acres.

Containment doesn’t mean the fire is fully extinguished, but that crews have managed to secure a control line around a section of the fire’s perimeter. If firefighters construct a fire line around the fire’s entire perimeter, the blaze is considered 100% contained. Crews then remain in the area to extinguish hot spots and ensure the containment holds.

The Snyder fire is the result of Utah’s Snyder Mesa and Jones fires merging and moving into western Colorado, consuming the Western Slope’s Knowles and Gore fires. The flames overtook a group of firefighters responding to the Mesa County fires, killing three of them.

3 wildland firefighters killed in western Colorado identified

Colorado Gov. Jared Polis issued a disaster declaration for the fire on Saturday.

All evacuations and pre-evacuations were lifted at 7 p.m. Wednesday, according to the .

Air quality alerts

As wildfires continue to burn across Colorado, state health officials have for the western state.

The newest alert from the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment will remain in effect until at least 9 a.m. Friday, according to the agency.

Smoke could create unhealthy conditions in Chaffee, Clear Creek, Custer, Delta, Dolores, Eagle, Elbert, El Paso, Fremont, Garfield, Gilpin, Grand, Gunnison, Jackson, Lake, Mesa, Moffat, Montezuma, Montrose, Ouray, Park, Pitkin, Pueblo, Rio Blanco, Routt, Saguache, San Miguel, Summit and Teller counties, according to state health officials.

If the smoke drops visibility to less than 5 miles in an area, it has reached unhealthy levels, according to the agency. Those with heart disease and respiratory illnesses, young children and older adults are more at risk.

This is a developing story and may be updated.

The White River Electric Association, a non-profit cooperative, lost several miles of power lines in two fires that burned public and private land just outside of Meeker in August 2025. Power lines are uninsurable, for obvious reasons, and White River has had to take out a $23.6 million loan to rebuild transmission lines and get power to critical gas development projects in the Piceance Basin.

“The loan itself is not a long-term loan. It was issued with the hope that FEMA would help us,” said Alan J. Michalewicz, general manager and CEO of White River Electric Association. “Now, with FEMA being declined, we are exploring the options that are available to us and what it would take to turn this into a long-term loan. It could have up to a 5% rate impact on membership, across the board to all our members.”

Michalewicz said he is grateful for the bipartisan support in Colorado following the fires and lauded the state’s work in the aftermath of the fires. White River rebuilt transmission lines quickly, and full power will be restored next week to oil and gas operators in the area.

We worry that even a 3% rate increase will hurt families, small businesses and oil and gas operations in a time when everyone, including utilities, is facing the pressure of increased fuel prices.

Trump’s denial is the first time in 35 years that the federal government refused to use Federal Emergency Management Act funds to assist a community in Colorado recovering from a natural disaster, but under Trump’s leadership, such denials are now the norm – that is, if you live in a “blue” state.

According to , Trump’s administration has denied 77% of disaster funding requests when the request comes from a state with a Democratic governor and two Democratic senators. When the request comes from a state with a Republican governor and two Republican Senators, Trump’s administration only denied 11% of requests.

Such partisan wielding of federal dollars intended to provide communities and individuals with assistance to rebuild in the wake of natural disasters is unprecedented. Politico went through 45 years of FEMA records and found that no other president, going back as far as Reagan, has denied a majority of requests from any states, let alone singled out states for political retribution using FEMA dollars. While the rate of approval for Republican-state requests has remained mostly unchanged compared to previous administrations, Democratic-state approvals have plummeted.

We are outraged, but far more than anything, we are sad for our neighbors in Rio Blanco, La Plata, Archuletta and Mineral counties.

Sadly, the counties that Trump is denying funds to had a majority of voters support him for president in 2024. In Rio Grande County, 60% of voters cast their ballots for Trump. Now he has denied their request for disaster relief, which will directly result in increased utility costs for the foreseeable future. Did they vote for this? Surely they did not expect Trump to wield federal funds as a cudgel to punish them for the politics of their neighbors.

Colorado’s leaders cannot drop this issue until Trump reverses this bad decision.

Every single member of Colorado’s congressional delegation — Republicans and Democrats — signed off on . Now that Trump rejected the appeal, our elected officials must increase the political pressure.

No one should be talking about this more than U.S. Rep. Jeff Hurd, who represents all four affected counties in Congressional District 3. Hurd is facing a primary for re-election, and he has until June to prove he can deliver for his constituents. Hurd should be spending time on the campaign trail explaining how he is fighting for these federal funds.

But he can’t do it alone. Colorado’s U.S. senators — John Hickenlooper and Michael Bennet — have decrying Trump’s denial of these funds.

“The president is solely responsible for this abdication of responsibility; the consequences of which will continue to be severe and long-lasting,” the statement reads.

But that doesn’t go far enough.

We need our elected officials to be a thorn in Trump’s side, requesting meetings, talking at every public event about the detailed repercussions of this decision and lauding Gov. Jared Polis for his ongoing support of these counties.

The emphasis from our leaders should be on the unprecedented and politically motivated nature of Trump’s decision. Trump is setting a dire precedent. Will future presidents withhold federal disaster aid unless a state’s leaders laud her achievements, bow to her every demand, and kiss the ring?

We want to live in a country that is free from the tyranny of an executive branch with unlimited power and unlimited spite. Now is the time for Colorado leaders to push back on this bad decision and fight for a future where disaster declarations are considered on their merits and qualifications, not on the angry whims of one man.

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The denials follow a third disaster relief request submitted earlier this year by Colorado’s members of Congress. The federal decision blocks access to critical FEMA public assistance for affected communities, as well as statewide hazard mitigation support.

is related to September’s Elk and Lee fires in Rio Blanco County, and is in response to recovery efforts in La Plata, Archuleta, and Mineral counties following flooding that occurred last October in western Colorado.

“This is incredibly disappointing for Coloradans. Colorado communities have done everything right — responding quickly, documenting the damage, and working in good faith with federal partners — only for the Trump administration to deny funding to help Colorado communities recover,” Polis said in the Monday news release.

“These disasters caused real damage to homes, infrastructure, and local economies, and Coloradans should not be left to shoulder these costs alone. We will continue supporting impacted communities and exploring every available path forward, but the federal government must be a reliable partner in disaster recovery.”

Without federal assistance, the announcement stated affected communities will have fewer resources to recover, will have to make challenging decisions about how to balance expensive recovery costs with limited resources, will be at heightened risk of future disasters, and may not be able to perform the repairs to energy systems and river channels that would help them avoid future damage and disruption.

The Elk and Lee fires burned more than 137,000 acres from Aug. 2–29, 2025, and caused over $27 million in damages.

Flooding and mudslides further compounded damage to roads, bridges and public systems, according to the news release.

In Southwest Colorado, historic flooding from Oct. 10-14, 2025, caused more than $13 million in damages to infrastructure, including the destruction of over 60 miles of road, major impacts to water and wastewater systems and long-term risks to communities along the San Juan River basin.

The announcement stated Polis formally requested disaster declarations for both events in September and November 2025. The federal government denied both requests in December 2025, and the state submitted formal appeals in January.

“It is frustrating that for the first time in 35 years, the State of Colorado has been denied federal assistance as part of a major disaster declaration request,” said Kevin Klein, Director of the Colorado Division of Homeland Security and Emergency Management.

“Our damage assessments documented and showed that each of the disasters exceeded the federal thresholds for assistance. Our State Recovery Task Force will continue to work on alternatives to fill the gap, but providing substantial relief to the disaster survivors becomes much more difficult with this decision. I don’t want it to sound like we can just fill all the gaps — we can’t, but of course we will do our best to support them.”

which has operated at 2001 S. Platte River Drive for 44 years, has asked the city to reverse approval of a sewer and drainage permit, the last step needed before starting construction. The printing company, its attorneys and water experts contend city regulations clearly prohibit uses like gas stations in a floodplain.

And Publication Printers says the parcel, which is under an acre, is too small for the kind of stormwater drainage system that QuikTrip plans to install.

“Our biggest concern is pollution to the river,” said Solomon Rael, manager of�� environmental health and safety and facilities for the printing company.

“We don’t know of anywhere in the city of Denver or the state of Colorado where a gas station has been approved that close to the Platte River or river or any body of water,” Rael said.

QuikTrip has started grading the land at the intersection of West Evans Avenue and South Platte River Drive. But Publication Printers will appear before an administrative hearing officer in April to try to overturn the city permit and halt the work.

QuikTrip has opened 26 locations in Colorado since 2022. The Tulsa, Okla., company has more than 1,000 stores in 17 states and a loyal following of fans who like the gas prices and rave about the food. Company spokeswoman Aisha Jefferson said QuikTrip employs about 500 people across Colorado.

Because of the ongoing review of QuikTrip’s permit, Jefferson said she couldn’t respond to Publication Printer’s specific claims about the store planned in southwest Denver.

“QuikTrip has worked closely with the city throughout this project and has completed all required reviews and permitting steps. We trust the city’s established processes and the standards our projects are designed to meet,” Jefferson said in an email.

QuikTrip is “committed to being a responsible and supportive neighbor in the Denver community,” Jefferson added.

Publication Printers believes QuikTrip picked the wrong spot this time.

“The basic issue is that the Denver Municipal Code expressly disallows this type of use on a floodplain parcel,” said Carrie Schaffer, an attorney with Snell &Wilmer, the law firm representing Publication Printers.

Schaffer said the location is about 73 feet from the South Platte River. on a Federal Emergency Management Agency flood insurance rate map. The designation means there’s a 1% chance the area will experience a flood any given year, making it a high risk.

The sewer use and drainage permit issued to QuikTrip is prohibited under a city code that bars the storage or processing of materials that are “flammable, explosive or otherwise potentially injurious to human, animal or plant life in time of flooding,” Snell & Wilmer attorneys said in a Feb. 7 petition to the Denver Department of Transportation and Infrastructure.

The department declined to comment on the petition’s claims.

“The language of this regulation is unambiguous. The regulation does not authorize conditional approval or mitigation-based exceptions,” attorney William Ojile Jr. said in the petition.

He also criticized QuikTrip’s stormwater drainage plan, which he said doesn’t comply with the design and technical criteria in the city’s manual. He said the 0.89-acre parcel is too small for the detention pond planned for the site.

“Because the approval conflicts with mandatory floodplain protections, violates binding technical criteria, and rests on a design that cannot functionally satisfy Denver’s stormwater requirements, the (permit) lacks any valid legal or technical foundation,” Ojile said in the petition.

The city approved QuikTrip’s site development plan in April 2025 and approved the sewer use and drainage permit Jan. 9. The development plan, filed with the Denver Planning Commission in 2022, was flagged because it was in a floodplain.

Schaffer said Publication Printers unsuccessfully appealed the rezoning of QuikTrip’s land. She said only the chairman of the Board of Adjustment, who raised the floodplain issue, voted against the rezoning.

If the city upholds QuikTrip’s permit, Schaffer said Publication Printers could choose to pursue the matter in state district court.

Rael said he has seen two major floods at work during his 18.5 years with Publication Printers. He worries about the fallout if floodwaters were to carry gasoline into the South Platte River.

The South Platte extends 12.5 miles through Denver. which serves the city and many surrounding suburbs, gets roughly 50% of its water from the South Platte River basin.

The 48-year-old Publication Printers has been involved with , a Denver-based nonprofit, which has worked to revitalize and protect the South Platte River and its tributaries. The printing company, which has 400 employees and customers nationwide, has worked on conservation projects in the area, Rael said.

The company doesn’t store any flammable materials or other items prohibited in floodplains, Rael said. “We worry about the people way downstream, even outside of Denver.”

Re: “RTD: Panel suggests smaller board,” Jan. 30 news story

With or without changes in the RTD Board’s make-up, at some point the Board must tackle the elephant in the room: the loss of ridership due to a lack of consistent connectivity for passengers between train-to-bus, and bus-to-bus routes, so transfer “wait” times become less than two minutes.

One glaring problem is found in Olde Town Arvada, where connecting from the light rail to departing bus service in a timely manner is impossible.��The bus depot is two stories beneath the train platform and several blocks from the closest stairway.

Whatever form the RTD board takes in the future, I strongly urge its members to spend a week in Montreal or Toronto.�� For several days they should depend solely on mass transit to find their way to various places around the metro areas. Board members will experience an efficient mass transit system (much larger than Denver’s) that will take them from point A to point B, C, all the way to Z, with minimal “wait” times at transfer stops.

There must be a way to have a smooth-running mass transit system here, at least from morning rush hour into the evening. That is how you increase dependability, ridership, and loyalty, no matter how many people serve on the RTD board. And building a train stop for Coors Field shouldn’t be that difficult either. The track is already there.

Pete Simon, Arvada

Former state senator should face real consequences for her felonies

Re: “Jury finds ex-Longmont state senator guilty of four felonies,” Jan. 29 news story

A recent story about the trial of former state Sen. Sonya Jaquez Lewis indicated the prosecutor would recommend probation for her felony convictions. If that is true, that would be a terrible thing to do. She was convicted of misusing her power and violating the trust given to her as a public official. Elected officials should be held to higher standards than most people.

In these times where public trust in institutions is breaking down, this is exactly the wrong message. She should serve the maximum possible sentence in jail — in a state medium-security jail, not a plush adult day care center.

If she receives only probation, that will further inflame mistrust of government and lead only to more cynicism. I can’t help looking at it as her being handed a “get out of jail free” card because she is a loyal member of the Democratic organization.

Ed Schlotzhauer, Loveland

Musicians’ messaging provides hope

Re: “Iran: Supreme leader warns any U.S. attack would spark ‘regional war’,” and “Bad Bunny wins album of the year; Eilish wins song of year Grammy Awards,” Feb. 2 news stories

Our old President Trump and Iran’s old Supreme Leader exchanged threats. And then Billie Eilish said, “No one is illegal on stolen land.” And then Bad Bunny said, “We’re not savage, we’re not animals, we’re not aliens. We are humans and we are Americans.”

Music and musicians give me hope.

David L Stevenson, Denver

Enough of the pleasant weather already

I’ve endured over 80 years of snow and blistery winters – including a Thanksgiving storm back in the 1980s that left 40 inches of snow at the house here — but never one like this.

I’m not complaining, mind you — it����ap gratifying to make our frequent doctor and follow-up appointments on dry streets. But it����ap weird. I have to experience winter vicariously by reading about all the heroic folks back east persevering while a battalion of snow-removal vehicles sit idle here.

Our ski areas are beginning to call this a “lost” year as their snow totals are half the usual amount.��We may experience water rationing come summer if they don’t return our winters to us soon.

Harry Puncec, Lakewood

Trump’s retribution against Colorado hurts many of his voters

Trump and his administration’s retribution efforts against Colorado are going to hurt many of the 43% of voters in Colorado that cast their 2024 ballots for him.

FEMA assistance from fires and flooding in and near Pagosa? Denied, a red area. Moving Space Command away from Colorado Springs? A red area. Vetoing a bipartisan bill that would provide fresh drinking water to the lower Arkansas Valley? A red area. Trying to shut down NCAR? True enough, it is in Boulder County, but hundreds of jobs will be lost if that decision (which legally is solely Congress’ decision) stands and that will have ramifications beyond NCAR that will impact all voters.�� I truly wish all politicians would realize that they were chosen to represent their entire electorate, not just their voters, and act accordingly.�� Democracy works best when it works for the good for as many as possible.

John W Thomas, Fort Collins

Expand access to physical therapy for older Americans

If you have older loved ones in your life, it����ap likely that one of them has experienced a fall. As the leading cause of injury and injury-related death in individuals over 65, falls can be devasting physically, emotionally, and financially for patients. Yet many falls could be avoided with the right preventative care: physical therapy.

As we age, physical therapy can be an important tool to keeping us strong, healthy, and mobile. As fall experts, physical therapists have specialized knowledge in assessing patients and tailoring treatment plans to prevent falls. That����ap why it����ap crucial that older Coloradans have access to this life-saving care.

One way to improve access is through the bipartisan Stopping Addiction and Falls for the Elderly (SAFE) Act (H.R. 1171), which would enable Medicare beneficiaries to receive a no-cost falls risk assessment by a physical or occupational therapist as part of their annual wellness visit.

I’m thankful to Representative Gabe Evans for recently sending staff to North Boulder Physical Therapy to discuss the value of physical therapy care and the importance of passing the SAFE Act to help prevent falls and reduce healthcare spending. I now encourage Rep. Evans to cosponsor this commonsense legislative solution.

By preventing falls, we can help more older Americans thrive and live their lives to the fullest.

Dane Kelley, Westminster

DIA makes simple move to help large percentage of travelers

Recently traveling through DIA Denver International Airport I had reason to use the women’s toilets on the C concourse. I was surprised and delighted to discover that inside the stalls there was a dispenser of sanitary pads.

This is something I had never seen before and worked like a roll of toilet paper.

Since 50% of the population has need of this product at various times in their life it made so much sense to make it available to travelers in the space where it is useful.

My kudos to the management of the airport for thinking of the most efficient delivery system of period products to their customers. While I’m quite sure it also streamlines costs and improves the maintenance of the facility, the peace of mind of the female travelers are reaping the greatest benefits of all. Thank you DIA. My tax dollars at work in a way that makes me proud to be from Denver.

Carol Edwards, Littleton

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