Those toll revenues — about $62 million a year from I-25 and I-70, not including fines paid by violators caught crossing double white lines — have been earmarked mostly for highway construction projects over the next decade. The projects include the overhaul of I-70 west of Denver and the proposed expansion of Interstate 270.

But the Bustang “has become a backbone of the state’s transit operations along the interstates,” giving Coloradans “more transportation choices to get where they need to go,” Colorado Department of Transportation Director Shoshana Lew said Friday.

The at current levels costs $50 million a year, and keeping the state’s fleet of 80 buses rolling over the next five years otherwise would require annual of around $30 million, CDOT officials told state transportation commissioners at a workshop session on Wednesday.

Colorado lawmakers’ initial grant funding to support the service as an experiment runs out in July.

run as frequently as every 45 minutes on I-25 and I-70, and on numerous “Outrider” routes around Colorado. Fares for riders boarding at Denver Union Station range from $10 to downtown Fort Collins, $12 to Colorado Springs, $28 to Glenwood Springs and $43 to Grand Junction (a 230-mile route).

This week, Lew told the state transportation commissioners that CDOT can tap “excess toll revenues” from I-25 express lanes to pay for the I-25 Bustang service. CDOT can do the same along I-70, though the high cost of the Bustang service linking Denver with Grand Junction likely will also require other funds, she said.

A 2009 state law allows the use of express lane revenues for public transit, in addition to road construction projects, along the interstates.  However, the  restricts the use of the revenues to projects along the roads where the tolls were collected.

Drivers in Colorado take more than 34 million express lane trips a year, according to a CDOT .

Sustaining Colorado’s intercity bus transit is “a top priority,” Lew wrote in a letter to commissioners. Bustang provides “vital connections across our state. …a national model of success,” she said.

Over the past two months, CDOT leaders have been meeting with city and county officials, and business groups, along I-25 and I-70, looking for ways to sustain Bustang. Lew told commissioners most would support using toll revenues “as long as there was a commitment that the capital projects in the 10-year plan would get built.”

Bustang has been expanding. CDOT officials last year added a second daily run between Denver and Crested Butte. They launched a Bustang Outrider route linking Sterling in northeastern Colorado with .

A state transit connections is exploring possible new routes, such as service between Gunnison and Montrose in southwestern Colorado; Limon and Denver; and Salida and Colorado Springs.

Statewide, Bustang ridership has tripled since 2019 – a counterpoint to the lagging ridership on Regional Transportation District buses and trains within metro Denver — with 385,248 intercity bus boardings in 2025, up 24% from 2024, CDOT records show.

Mesa County District Attorney Dan Rubinstein conceded Friday that prosecutors could not prove James Genrich carried out the fatal 1991 bombings — a concession that came three years after Genrich’s original 1993 murder convictions were thrown out because of faulty evidence in the high-profile prosecution.

Rubinstein asked Chief Judge Brian Flynn to dismiss the murder charges rather than proceed to a new trial, but left untouched Genrich’s underlying convictions and their 72-year prison sentence, a stance that suggests prosecutors still believe Genrich committed the killings, even if they don’t believe they can prove it.

“The decision today is not an acknowledgment of innocence, in our minds, but the result of a technicality and an injustice,” Carrie Yantzer, daughter of bombing victim Henry Ruble, said during Monday’s hearing.

Imprisoned for more than three decades for the murders of 43-year-old Ruble and 12-year-old Maria Delores Gonzales, Genrich will now be immediately eligible for parole. He has always maintained his innocence in the bombings, and his attorneys believe all of his convictions should be thrown out because of the flawed evidence in the case.

“It’s very, very frustrating that the same evidence that led to the overturning of the (murder) convictions is now being used, on a technicality, to keep him in prison,” said attorney Chris Fabricant with the Innocence Project, a nonprofit organization dedicated to exonerating wrongly convicted people that is representing Genrich.

The end of the murder prosecution is just the latest turn in a case that riveted the Grand Junction community and was controversial from the start.

Law enforcement tactics during the extensive investigation — including one officer encouraging Genrich to commit suicide — and prosecutorial misconduct during the trial fostered early and lingering doubts about Genrich’s guilt. Two of 11 charges were dismissed as a sanction in the middle of the 1993 trial after a key prosecution witness failed to turn over evidence to the defense; that expert witness faced contempt-of-court proceedings, and his toolmark analysis — the linchpin of the prosecution’s case — was ultimately discredited decades later.

On Monday, Yantzer labeled Genrich “nothing but evil” and said he was not an innocent person.

“This was not just done to our family, this was done to this community, our community,” she said. “Grand Junction was terrorized. Families were devastated. Lives were taken. These people were loved, they mattered and they should still be here. There is something that cannot be ignored: for the past 33 years that you, James Genrich, have been incarcerated, there has not been another pipe bomb in Grand Junction. This community has had peace, and that matters.”

The bombings

Genrich was 28, living in downtown Grand Junction and working at the Two Rivers Convention Center when a bomb went off in the center’s parking garage on Feb. 14, 1991. A man was injured, but no one was killed in that bombing.

Then, in April 1991, a family got into their van in Grand Junction to go shopping, and a bomb under a wheel well exploded, killing 12-year-old Gonzales.

Just weeks later, in June 1991, Ruble and his wife were driving home from dinner in downtown Grand Junction when they spotted a strange object in the restaurant parking lot. Ruble picked it up and died when it exploded.

Investigators at the time faced immense public pressure to identify the bomber, and Genrich became a top suspect when he went to a bookstore after the three bombings and asked for a book that included instructions on bomb-making. Prosecutors relied heavily on circumstantial evidence to build the case, including notes Genrich wrote that were found in his apartment, in which he expressed a desire to kill women and said he might harm “innocents.”

Genrich had been seen in some of the areas where the 1991 bombs detonated, and lived within walking distance of two sites. He’d studied electronics, and investigators found two fuses in his apartment that were the same type as those used in one of the bombs. Investigators did not find any gunpowder, schematics or bomb-making tools in Genrich’s apartment.

They did seize some of his tools, which the prosecution’s key expert later matched to marks on an unexploded bomb that had been discovered in Grand Junction in 1989. Prosecutors pursued a theory that the same person made all four bombs, Fabricant said.

But Genrich lived in Phoenix in 1989 and was at work in a bookstore there when the first, unexploded bomb was placed in Grand Junction.

“An unshakeable alibi,” Fabricant said.

During the trial, prosecutors suggested Genrich may have worked with an accomplice, but never named anyone.

Other evidence also casts doubt.

A white vehicle was seen at each of the 1991 bombings, and Genrich did not own or have access to a vehicle. A witness also testified that he saw a “Spanish-looking man” handling one of the bombs; Genrich is white. He told The Denver Post in 1993 that the homicidal notes he wrote were a practice he picked up in therapy — to write down what he was feeling instead of going out and “losing his temper.”

Genrich never admitted to the bombings, even when investigators followed him round-the-clock for months, and his parents secretly wore a wire and tried to get him to confess. It was during that round-the-clock surveillance that an investigator accompanied Genrich to a bar and then to his brother’s grave and suggested there that Genrich commit suicide “so we can all go home,” according to a 1993 Denver Post story.

At another point, investigators took Genrich to lunch and suggested they’d help him get a better job, then “happened to run into” a polygraph examiner, who brought Genrich into a room that had already been set up with the testing equipment and enlarged, gruesome photos of the bombing. (The polygraph test results from that day were later thrown out by a judge.)

Conviction and appeals

In 1993, Genrich was tried in Weld County due to the extensive publicity in Grand Junction. The jury convicted him of two counts of first-degree murder, three counts of using an explosive device to commit a felony and a single count of assault.

In 2019, the Colorado Court of Appeals found Genrich was entitled to a hearing to determine whether he should be given a new trial because of potentially flawed toolmark evidence in his case. That hearing took place in January 2022, and then-Mesa County District Judge Richard Gurley overturned Grenrich’s murder convictions in 2023.

Gurley found that the prosecution’s key toolmark evidence was flawed. The expert testified during the 1993 trial that marks on the bombs must have been made by Genrich’s tools. The expert — the same one who later faced contempt-of-court proceedings for withholding evidence — testified that his analysis ruled out the possibility that any other tools could have made the marks.

New science and forensics have since discredited the expert’s conclusion, prompting Gurley to throw out the convictions and order a new trial. That toolmark evidence was the keystone of the prosecution’s case, which was otherwise entirely circumstantial.

The murder counts were the only convictions affected by Gurley’s decision because the Court of Appeals ruled in its 2019 opinion that Genrich’s less-serious convictions of using an explosive device and assault were too old to be challenged.

Those lesser convictions, which together carried a 72-year prison sentence, still stand, though Genrich’s attorneys are challenging the convictions and expect to file a new appeal in the coming weeks.

“The courts have spoken that the crimes he was convicted of should remain,” Rubinstein said Monday. “And the sentence he is serving should remain.”

Genrich no longer faces the punishment of life in prison without the possibility of parole that comes with first-degree murder convictions, making him eligible for parole. He is scheduled for a parole hearing in May, according to the Colorado Department of Corrections.

In the prosecution’s motion to dismiss the murder charges, Rubinstein outlined a number of problems with trying the case again three decades later, including that 28 of the original witnesses have since died, and that the toolmark expert who testified in the original case is now 84 years old and lives with a cognitive impairment. Modern experts who retested the tools and wires in January found that they could not conclusively tie the tools to the bombs.

Fabricant said that the renewed investigation as prosecutors prepared to potentially bring the murder case to trial again actually strengthened Genrich’s innocence claim. Investigators found a new fingerprint on a piece of tape used on a battery on one of the bombs that did not match Genrich’s fingerprints, Fabricant said.

Rubinstein said it is unclear who left that unidentified, new fingerprint. He noted that prosecutors had concerns about the chain of custody for the evidence in the case, as it was moved several times over the three decades since Genrich’s conviction.

filed the motion to dismiss on Friday, stating in the court filing that with this specific evidence now excluded from the case and no other forensic evidence, “we can no longer meet the high ethical and legal burden of proof beyond a reasonable doubt.”

Genrich was accused of planting three bombs between February and June 1991 that killed 12-year-old Maria Delores Gonzales and 43-year-old Henry Ruble. He has maintained his innocence since he was arrested in 1992.

The case relied largely on circumstantial evidence as well as a key piece of expert testimony that markings on the bombs were made by Genrich’s tools and could not have come from other tools.

Genrich successfully appealed part of the case through the Innocence Project in 2023, when a district court judge found that the expert����ap testimony was flawed because he could not have definitively ruled out other tools from making those marks.

Rubinstein appealed that ruling, but the Colorado Court of Appeals upheld the lower court’s decision in May, and the Colorado Supreme Court declined to hear the case in December.

The DA’s office and Grand Junction Police Department investigators have also sought additional evidence but came up empty. There were no fingerprints or DNA found on evidence tested by the Colorado Bureau of Investigation, and another round of independent testing of the bomb fragments, wires and Genrich’s tools came back inconclusive, Rubinstein wrote.

It����ap also been 35 years since the bombings, and at least 28 witnesses who testified in the 1993 trial are dead. The expert witness who testified about the tool markings, John O’Neil, is now 84 years old, has a cognitive impairment and is not available to testify, the DA wrote.

“The District Attorney’s Office remains committed to the victims of these horrific crimes and their families,” Rubinstein wrote. “However, prosecuting a case we know cannot be proven beyond a reasonable doubt violates our ethical obligations. It risks further traumatizing the victims with a futile trial and wastes public resources.”

Genrich is still serving a 72-year sentence for his convictions for use of an explosive device and third-degree assault in the case, but will be able to apply for parole if a judge grants the DA’s motion.

A court hearing is set for 9 a.m. Monday.

Storefronts along Walden’s Main Street have emptied, including the 10th Frame, a bowling alley that closed its doors when it failed to find a buyer after more than a year of trying, said Samantha Martin, the county’s administrator and a long-time resident.

“We have talked about it multiple times, and there is no perfect answer,” Martin said of strategies to stem the declines. “Right now we don’t have an action plan.”

Since 2020, Jackson County has lost a larger share of its population, 12.2%, than any county in the state, leaving it with 1,211 people as of June 30, 2025, according to the U.S. Census Bureau.

Young people continue to depart for better jobs in larger cities. A loyal remnant is aging in place, even when moving to a lower altitude might benefit their health, Martin said. But they can defy time for only so long.

When homes come on the market, some heirs convert the properties to family vacation homes in Colorado’s “moose viewing capital.” If they do get listed, investors looking for short-term rentals snap them up, leaving limited options for anyone looking to relocate.

Long accustomed to drawing people without even trying, Colorado last year experienced its slowest population gains since the late 1980s. Winners and losers are coming into sharper focus as the battle intensifies to retain and attract people.

Defying predictions that the state’s population gains would be back on track by now following the pandemic, a majority of Colorado counties have lost their demographic momentum.

Much of Colorado’s growth is now concentrated in a belt of counties stretching from Weld down to Elbert and El Paso counties, temporarily bypassing Arapahoe, which had the state’s biggest population loss in raw numbers.

Of Colorado’s 64 counties, more than half, 33, lost population last year, including four of the state’s largest: Arapahoe, Denver, Boulder and Pueblo counties.

Resort areas, with some of the highest home prices in the country, are starting to shrink, joining the aging agricultural counties on the Eastern Plains that have suffered a steady drip of population losses for years.

More than a third of Colorado counties have fewer residents than they did in 2020, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. That group includes Jefferson County, the state’s fourth most populous county.

After Jackson, Sedgwick, Otero, Hinsdale and Pitkin counties have the largest five-year percentage declines in population.

Colorado added 225,688 people in the first half of this decade, including 24,059 last year. A majority of the state’s gains this decade have come from immigration, which contributed 130,218 people. But that source, already down under the Trump administration, may dry up this year.

“Certainly in 2026, we can expect very weak or negative net international immigration to Colorado,” said State Demographer Kate Watkins.

The White House in every major metro area in a news release after the county and metro area Census numbers came out. Metro Denver earned a mention for having one of the biggest declines after Laredo, Texas, where immigration flows dropped 95%.

“In Denver and its suburbs, the net immigration rate fell by almost three-quarters. In the Chicago area, it was slashed by nearly two-thirds,” the release said.

Immigration had been masking big declines in people moving from other states. Domestic net migration was why Colorado averaged population gains of 100,000 people a year in the 1990s, and more than 72,000 a year in the ’00s and ’10s.

Since 2020, it has only contributed 17,729 people total.Until housing costs become more competitive, it is hard to see how it rebounds.

That leaves natural change, or births minus deaths, as the main driver of population growth going forward. In Colorado, that currently contributes a little over 20,000 people a year.

But as more baby boomers die, expect that to shrink too. Nationally, natural decline, or more deaths than births, is expected to set in by 2030. Colorado isn’t expected to hit that grim milestone until 2047.

“We are a young state relative to the nation as a whole,” Watkins said.

Population declines elsewhere will result in fewer adults available to move to Colorado in the years ahead.

Growth is now concentrated mostly in Weld, Douglas, Adams, El Paso, and Larimer counties, which gained a combined 26,678 people last year, more than the statewide population gain.

A lower birth rate, higher living costs that deter domestic migration, and slower immigration are all contributing to more modest population gains. And that slowing has set off a battle to capture whatever population growth is available.

Where the population is shrinking

Arapahoe County led the state with a net gain of 4,621 immigrants last year, but it also saw the most residents move out to other parts of Colorado or other states, 9,859. That contributed to a net loss of 1,940 residents in the 2025 count.

Since 2020, Arapahoe has lost nearly 32,000 residents domestically, which was offset by a gain of nearly 35,000 immigrants.

When immigrants leave Colorado for other states, they count as outbound domestic migrants, Watkins said. That could explain, in part, why counties like Arapahoe and Denver are seeing such large domestic outflows.

So why didn’t more immigrants, as well as other residents, stay put?

“Like every county in Colorado, we’re experiencing a crisis of affordability in the housing market,” said Jill McGranahan, a spokeswoman for Arapahoe County.

To what degree high housing costs pushed immigrants to move to more affordable places is hard to parse out. Some immigrants never intended to land in Colorado in the first place.

In 2023, Denver spent more than $35 million to handle an unexpected surge of immigrants, mostly from Venezuela, including purchasing 14,800 tickets to send them to other cities.

Denver had the state’s second-largest population loss last year at 978, reflecting net domestic outflows of 8,023, less a natural increase of 4,197, and continued immigration of 2,871.

Denver and Arapahoe counties rank high for births, and they should remain gateways for young adults relocating from other states.

Denver has a big surplus of new apartments that is pushing down rents. And home construction is set to take off in Arapahoe County, especially south of the airport.

A harder demographic hurdle to overcome will be a shrinking gap between births and deaths, which Jefferson, Boulder, Pueblo and Mesa counties are staring down.

When there aren’t enough homes available for young families at prices they can afford, they either delay moving forward with children or move elsewhere. Not only is inbound migration limited, but so are future births.

“We wanted to help people age in place and stay in their homes, but what that means is these homes don’t turn over?” asks Phyllis Resnick, executive director of the Colorado Futures Center.

If homes don’t turn over or not enough are built, families wanting to have children are forced to move elsewhere. They might end up in Weld County. Or Idaho or South Carolina.

“Our birth rate and our death rate are getting closer and closer together,” acknowledged Chris O’Keefe, the planning and zoning director for Jefferson County. “People enjoy it here and they age here. People don’t leave their houses.”

Over the past five years, the county has recorded 28,791 births and 26,745 deaths, according to the Census Bureau.

Home to nearly 10% of the state’s population, Jefferson County has contributed only 2.3% of the state’s natural increase since 2020. Denver, by contrast, accounts for 12.3% of the state’s population, but has contributed 22.3% of the natural increase.

Fewer children means fewer enrollments. Jefferson County Public Schools, the state’s second-largest school district, has seen a wave of closures, especially on its eastern side, which has older neighborhoods.

Developments such as Candelas and Leyden Rock further west, by contrast, have brought in young families. But it isn’t enough to offset losses in Lakewood and Wheat Ridge.

Vivian Elementary, where Mollie Crampton had her two young sons enrolled, was among the schools shuttered in 2022.

Declining enrollments are linked to the county’s stagnating population, which in turn, Crampton argues, is linked to the county’s high home prices.

“I think a really big part of it is affordable housing,” she said. “Prices just don’t go down.”

Lakewood enacted rezoning ordinances to permit higher density in an effort to increase supply and lower home prices and rents.

But long-time residents of the state’s fifth largest city, skeptical that the zoning changes would work and worried about crowding and congestion, rallied to call a special election to repeal the measures.

Crampton said she voted early in Tuesday’s election — against repealing the recently enacted rezoning ordinance.

“If it passes, I think a lot of people will leave because they can (only) afford to buy a home in another state, or another county,” Crampton said. “There’s never going to be more inventory.”

According to early results posted by elections officials Tuesday night, voters in Lakewood overwhelmingly approved four measures that restore the zoning code the city had before elected leaders changed it last year to prod more home building.

Pueblo and Mesa counties have had the largest natural decreases this decade — with Pueblo down 2,787 and Mesa down 1,738.

Mesa County has offset that with relatively strong domestic migration this decade, allowing its population to grow by 7,135 people vs. 1,110 for Pueblo.

Fremont County has also managed to pull a rabbit out of a hat, increasing its population by 1,102 this decade, despite a natural decrease of 1,629 people.

Both are retirement havens that have attracted residents from the Front Range with lower living costs, and in the case of Grand Junction, a more temperate climate. Colorado’s aging population is working in their favor.

By contrast, resort areas, where housing costs are so high that even doctors and corporate managers struggle to find affordable accommodations, are seeing residents leave.

Pitkin County, home to Aspen, has seen its population shrink by 4.3% this decade, while San Miguel, home to Telluride, is down by 3.7%, and Eagle County, home to Vail and Beaver Creek, has lost 2.5% of its population.

On the whole, the forecast calls for continued growth, although at a slower pace than in prior decades, Watkins said. Colorado reached 5 million people in 2010 and hit 6 million last year. It should cross 7 million by 2045.

New homes, new faces

Weld County Commissioner Scott James, 63, grew up in LaSalle and has had a front row seat in the county’s transformation from farm and oil fields into Colorado’s fastest growing county.

With 46,992 people added over the past five years, including 7,146 last year, Weld County surpassed Boulder County in population before the pandemic, and last year it surpassed Larimer County.

In 1998, James moved to Johnstown, which had 3,200 people at the time, and he paid $136,400 for a home in what he said represented an “iconic Americana slice of life.”

The town now counts around 21,000 people, who live largely on former farms and ranches, said James, who witnessed the transformation when he was mayor.

“These guys would sit in the back of the room and almost hang their heads — but what choice did they have? The farmer has a chance to cash in on all his hard work,” he said.

One thing that Weld County shares in common with the state’s other growing counties is an openness to home construction. And those new homes open the door to babies.

Weld County has welcomed more than 25,000 babies in the past five years, while Adams County has added 33,349 and Douglas County has added more than 20,000.

“People who want a bigger home and more land, it’s available to them,” said Jeff Keener, president and CEO of the South Metro Denver Chamber, which is based in Lone Tree.

Douglas County hosts the state’s largest master planned community, Sterling Ranch, which has ranked in the top 50 nationally for the past six years and has sold more than 3,000 homes since construction started in 2017.

Parker and Castle Rock have also been actively adding homes at lower price points.

“The home-rule cities have done a really good job of planning for that,” Keener said. “They have worked really hard to put in a wide variation of housing prices.”

With greater housing availability, the fastest-growing counties are also winning when it comes to net domestic migration. Weld County added 31,411 people that way since 2020, while Douglas County added 27,490 and Larimer County added 12,518.

Domestic gains in Weld and Douglas surpass the 17,729 added statewide, which reflects their ability to lure residents from other parts of the state.

James said he sees nothing but opportunity for Weld County, provided people can think differently and stay open to new ideas.

“We are excited about geothermal, we are excited about renewables — and by God, bring on nuclear,” he said. “The fact that Weld County is a county of almost 400,000 people tells me we’re doing it right.”

Update made noon Wednesday: The general location of Jackson County has been updated.

Of the 17 semifinalists hailing from the state, five will be moving on to a gala ceremony in Chicago this summer:

• Josh Niernberg, chef and owner of Bin 707 Foodbar, Grand Junction, for outstanding chef
• Johnny Curiel, chef and owner of Alma Fonda Fina, Denver, for best chef in the mountain region
• Penelope Wong, chef and co-owner of Yuan Wonton, Denver, for best chef in the mountain region
• Ryan Fletter, wine director and owner of Barolo Grill, Denver, for outstanding professional in beverage service
• McLain Hedges and Mary Allison Wright, owners and operators of Yacht Club, Denver, for outstanding professionals in cocktail service

Niernberg and his Grand Junction station, Bin 707 Foodbar, have earned recognition from the James Beard Foundation since 2020, when Niernberg first made the shortlist of best chefs in the mountain region.

“The honor is absolutely amazing,” Niernberg said from Grand Junction in a video call arranged by the James Beard Foundation. “The category is a completely surreal category.”

Bin 707 Foodbar originally opened in 2009, two years after Niernberg and his wife moved to the Western Slope. The restaurant showcases regional game such as bison and elk and blue corn grown by Ute Mountain Ute indigenous farmers.

“We’re not really fine dining,” he said. “I think that our relevance is just being that unexpected, consistent, approachable restaurant that we have been year after year.”

This is Wong’s third nomination for best chef of the mountain region and Curiel’s second nomination overall. Last year, his breakout restaurant Alma Fonda Fina was nominated for best new restaurant.

The other three nominations for best chef in the mountain region hail from restaurants in Salt Lake City and Whitefish, Mont.

Bin 707 Foodbar and Curiel’s Denver restaurant, Mezcaleria Alma, made The New York Times’ list of the 50 best restaurants in the U.S. last year.

Fletter, long a part of Denver’s food scene at Barolo Grill, earned his first James Beard Foundation nomination for outstanding professional in beverage service.

The team behind Yacht Club, Hedges and Wright, were nominated last year for outstanding professionals in cocktail service. Since then, they opened a full-fledged restaurant, Rougarou, specializing in southern cuisine. (Wright’s brother, John David Wright, leads the kitchen there.)

The winners will be announced at a ceremony at the Lyric Opera of Chicago on June 15.

Colorado State Patrol troopers responded to the fire at 6:20 a.m. at mile post 9, west of Loma, according to a news release from the agency. Initial reports indicated a tire caught fire before quickly spreading and engulfing the rest of the cab and the trailer, which was hauling dried cherries and chocolate.

The 35-year-old male driver was not injured, the release stated.

Eastbound I-70 was closed between Exit 2 for Rabbit Valley and Exit 11 for U.S. 6 near Loma at about 6:30 a.m., according to the release. Loma is approximately 18 miles northwest of Grand Junction.

The right lane of eastbound I-70 had reopened as of 4:40 p.m., according to , CDOT’s trip planning website. The left lane reopened at 9:18 a.m., according to the state patrol release.

cleared its first legislative chamber on a 39-26 vote, with most Democrats in support and every Republican, plus a handful of Democrats, opposed. The bill is the latest in a multiyear effort by Democratic lawmakers and Gov. Jared Polis to reform local land-use laws, especially in urban areas, to ease housing development.

HB-1308 builds directly on , which let homeowners build accessory dwelling units on their properties without local government approval. ADUs include “granny flats,” backyard cottages and garage apartments. If passed and signed into law, this year’s bill would allow a homeowner who has built an ADU to then split the lot and sell the ADU, while keeping their own home.

The bill would apply in other scenarios, too, including when an owner splits off an empty part of the lot to allow a new home to be built.

“This offers a modest but important step forward to help us address our housing crisis in Colorado, and in particular barriers we see to homeownership,” Rep. Andy Boesenecker, a Fort Collins Democrat, told fellow lawmakers during committee debate last week. “… We cannot solve a 21st-century housing crisis with mid-20th-century land-use rules. It is time to let Coloradans build their future, one lot at a time.”

He’s sponsoring the bill with Denver Rep. Steven Woodrow.

If passed, HB-1308 would take effect on Dec. 31, 2027. Like previous land use bills, the proposal would constrain local governments’ input on lot-splitting to certain exemptions and an administrative approval process. It also would apply mostly to Front Range communities — specifically, towns with more than 1,000 residents that are part of metropolitan planning organizations. That means it would also cover the Grand Junction area.

The bill also would only allow the splitting of lots of a certain size. Should a property be split, the smaller of the two new lots could not be less than 1,200 square feet. The smaller lot also could not be less than 30% of the size of the original lot. So a 6,000-square-foot lot could be broken up, but not into two lots that are wildly different in size — say, 4,800 square feet and 1,200 square feet.

Eligible properties also would have to be served by water and sewage.

Like earlier land-use bills, the measure is opposed by local governments, Republicans and the Colorado Municipal League.

“This bill does undermine a fundamental principle that has long guided land use in Colorado, where decisions about local development are made locally,” Beverly Stables, a lobbyist for CML, told lawmakers at the committee hearing.

The bill now moves to the state Senate. Should it pass there, it will go to Polis, who is expected to sign it into law.

Thomas Steffens, a 72-year-old former neurosurgeon, is accused of drugging and sexually assaulting an unidentified victim in Grand Junction earlier this year, according to his arrest affidavit.

The victim told Grand Junction police officers that they had walked to a restaurant near their home on Jan. 25 to watch the Broncos game, according to the affidavit. The victim said their memory of that night was foggy and that they didn’t remember anything after the restaurant, where their phone showed they stayed for nearly four hours.

At one point, the victim left their beer unattended on the bar while using the restroom, the affidavit stated.

Cameras outside the restaurant captured the victim and a man, later identified as Steffans, walking through the parking lot after leaving. The victim stumbled several times in the video and was being led by the arm.

A bartender at the restaurant told police that the two were both there when he arrived for his shift, but they weren’t sitting together until later. Steffens “was being extremely forward in a sexual manner” and was trying to get the victim to kiss him and come home with him.

Several of the bartender’s coworkers refused to serve Steffens because he had been inappropriate with them before, the bartender told police.

The next thing the victim remembered after the restaurant was waking up completely naked in Steffens’ bed with a bright ring light shining at them and a laptop on the bed, almost like the room was set up for filming, the victim told police.

As the victim searched for clothes, a man they said they “never would have gone home with” walked into the room, police wrote in the affidavit. That man, whom the victim described as “gross and creepy and yucky”, insisted on driving the victim back home, despite her protests.

The man dropped the victim off near their house, but made the victim call his phone so he had their number before letting them out of the car, the affidavit stated. That phone number was registered to Steffens.

“I don’t want to talk to you anymore,” the victim wrote in a text to Steffens. “I’m not trying to be mean. I just don’t think it����ap a gentleman thing to have sex with a drunk (redacted). I blacked out.”

“You did not blackout,” Steffens responded, according to the affidavit. “Don’t start building some (expletive) case against me.”

The victim filed a report with the Grand Junction Police Department on Jan. 28, according to court records. A warrant was issued for his arrest on Feb. 25.

When officers searched Steffens’ car, they found a container holding both breath mints and unidentified red pills, according to the affidavit. The search continued in the man’s home, where police found a cup in the kitchen sink filled with clear liquid, a white granulated substance and a spoon.

An additional bag of red pills was found in a separate car parked in Steffens’ driveway, police wrote in the affidavit. The pills and white powder were submitted for testing, but those results were not available on Thursday.

Steffens was arrested in Vero Beach, Florida, after he shot at U.S. Marshals and local law enforcement during a traffic stop. He allegedly said he “would not be taken into custody alive” before opening fire.

Vero Beach is approximately 80 miles north of Palm Beach.

The former doctor was shot several times and injured at least one U.S. Marshal, Florida law enforcement said Monday. He will face attempted murder charges in Florida as well as sexual assault and assault charges in Grand Junction, police said.

The Senate’s rejected in a bipartisan 3-2 vote on Thursday. Government officials who testified in favor of the proposal described waves of public records requests that have strained their staff members in recent years.

But journalists from several news outlets, including The Denver Post, warned that state and local agencies already can — and often do — unilaterally delay their own response times. The journalists also described investigative stories that relied on timely access to government records.

The proposal would have made several changes to the Colorado Open Records Act, which generally gives Coloradans access to documents and information held by government entities. But its most substantial change — instead of three — to respond to requests.

Agencies already can choose to extend their response time on a request to seven working days, and the bill would’ve increased that to 10 days. Together, the changes would allow up to three weeks for responses, the Colorado Freedom of Information Coalition .

To assuage concerns about that change, the bill would’ve also required government agencies to provide more free research time if they exceeded SB-107’s expanded timelines.

“What this bill does is modernize CORAs in ways that are fair to everyone,” said Sen. Cathy Kipp, a Fort Collins Democrat, who sponsored the bill with Republican Sen. Janice Rich of Grand Junction. CORAs are the colloquial shorthand for public records requests.

But the lawmakers who voted against the bill argued that the proposal would make the government less transparent, both in reality and in public perception.

“I believe government should provide accountability and transparency every chance it gets to its people,” Sen. Katie Wallace, a Longmont Democrat, said shortly before voting against the bill. “When governments start hiding or even appearing to hide, it����ap a bad thing for representative democracy.”

The bill’s demise comes less than a year after Gov. Jared Polis vetoed a similar version of the proposal during the 2025 session. That bill had substantially similar goals, though it included a carveout for members of the media that Polis opposed. died during the 2024 session.

The surging Wolves. No. 13 Grandview, the 2018 state champions and a consistent Coliseum participant over the past several decades, upset No. 4 Arvada West in the Sweet 16, 62-58. Head coach Ryan Turk’s team is battle-tested and led by senior forward Noah Sevy, who is averaging 14.0 points and 5.6 rebounds, and scored seven in the final minute of the road win over A-West.

Trio of favorites. No 1. Chaparral, No. 2 Ralston Valley and No. 3 Rangeview are the frontrunners to win the championship next weekend. Chaparral is led by juniors Luke Howery and Christian Williams, Ralston Valley features seniors Caiden Braketa and Zeke Andrews, and Rangeview is headlined by the trio of Archie Weatherspoon V, Marceles Duncan and Aidan Perez.

The Junker factor. If you were at the Coliseum last year, you know that Mountain Vista forward Oliver Junker is capable of total domination in the paint. The 6-foot-8 senior who is pledged to North Dakota State is averaging 12.9 points and 8.9 rebounds, and the Great 8 matchup against Chaparral’s big man, 6-10 senior Luke Williams, will be one of the tournament’s best showdowns.

University Boulevard pipeline. Three Great 8 teams are all off the same road: No. 2 Arapahoe, No. 3 Valor Christian and No. 7 Highlands Ranch. The Warriors and Falcons meet on Friday. Arapahoe features the scoring tandem of Jaya White and Izzy Johnston, Highlands Ranch has the dynamic Kimora Banks-Thomas, and Valor Christian boasts Utah commit Peyton Jones.

Cherokee Trail’s chances. Head coach Tammi Statewright’s Cougars have been knocking on the door of a championship for a while now, and this season might be their time to get a ring. Cherokee Trail lost two close games to Arapahoe, but besides that, no one else in Colorado has beaten the Cougars. Cherokee Trail is headlined by three potent scorers in Aaliyah Broadus, Chloe Cain and Karson Chaney.

Riverdale Ridge’s star power. What dum-dum computer formula gave the Ravens a No. 13 seed? Yes, Riverdale Ridge annihilated every single Rocky Mountain Basketball league opponent and was hardly tested in state. But as evidenced by their 62-51 win over previously undefeated Broomfield in the Sweet 16, generational talent Brihanna Crittendon & Co. can make a title run.

Banning’s swan song. In the Class 5A boys bracket, will, fittingly, end at the Coliseum after No. 13 Silver Creek upset No. 4 Eagle Valley in the Sweet 16. Banning’s helmed the Raptors for a quarter century in a career that has spanned 48 years, with other stops at Niwot and Skyline. Colorado doffs its cap to you, Coach Banning.

Western Slope reppin’. The 5A boys bracket features No. 1 Palisade and No. 2 Grand Junction. The Bulldogs have never won a state title, while the Tigers’ last championship came in Class A in 1946 — a game they won by a score of 23-13. Palisade has three double-digit scorers led by senior Hunter Howard, while Grand Junction has two star sophomores in Grant Lewis and Will Weirath.

The defending champs. Windsor, which won its first hoops title in 101 years last season, is seasoned coming into the Coliseum. The Wizards only lost one game to a Colorado Class 5A opponent all year, a 47-45 defeat to Air Academy back in December. Senior guard Madden Smiley, a Wyoming commit, is one of the most lethal scorers in the state at 24.2 points per game.

The Asp factor. Air Academy, last year’s 5A girls runner-up, is back in the Coliseum behind star senior guard Kinley Asp. The Boston College commit is averaging 25 points, 6.9 rebounds and 3.6 assists as a one-woman wrecking crew. Undefeated Montrose (25-0) has its work cut out to limit Asp; much of that task will fall to the Red Hawks’ senior guard, captain Maggie Legg.

Lutheran’s rise. The Lions girls were a measly 13-12 last season and lost in the second round of the playoffs. But Lutheran has ascended this season, with a 22-3 record and a Pikes Peak League championship. No. 1 Lutheran has won five state titles but none above Class 3A, and is led by senior guard Berkley Schneider (14.4 points) and junior center Isla Koffmann (8.2 rebounds).

The Runnin’ Rams. No. 2 Green Mountain has never won a girls hoops title, but after making the Final Four last season, is again capable of cutting down the nets next weekend. The Rams’ lone loss came to Class 6A No. 1 Cherokee Trail 59-48 on Dec. 6, as they are riding a 22-game win streak. They have three double-digit scorers, led by senior guard Kantyn Pearson’s 16.4 points.

Great 8 schedule

Class 6A on Friday

8:45 a.m. — Girls: No. 5 Northfield vs. No. 13 Riverdale Ridge
10:15 a.m. — Boys: No. 5 Rock Canyon vs. No. 13 Grandview
11:45 a.m. — Girls: No. 3 Valor Christian vs. No. 6 Denver East
1:15 p.m. — Boys: No. 3 Rangeview vs. No. 6 Cherry Creek
4 p.m. — Girls: No. 1 Cherokee Trail vs. No. 9 Legend
5:30 p.m. — Boys: No. 1 Chaparral vs. No. 8 Mountain Vista
7 p.m. — Girls: No. 2 Arapahoe vs. No. 7 Highlands Ranch
8:30 p.m. — Boys: No. 2 Ralston Valley vs. No. 7 George Washington

Class 5A on Saturday

8:45 a.m. — Girls: No. 2 Green Mountain vs. No. 7 Mead
10:15 a.m. — Boys: No. 12 Mesa Ridge vs. No. 13 Silver Creek
11:45 a.m. — Girls: No. 4 Windsor vs. No. 5 Standley Lake
1:15 p.m. — Boys: No. 3 Severance vs. No. 11 Windsor
4 p.m. — Girls: No. 3 Montrose vs. No. 6 Air Academy
5:30 p.m. — Boys: No. 1 Palisade vs. No. 8 Lewis-Palmer
7 p.m. — Girls: No. 9 Pueblo East vs. No. 1 Lutheran
8:30 p.m. — Boys:” No. 2 Grand Junction vs. No. 10 Lutheran