WEEK OF MARCH 6, 2025
VOLUME 37| ISSUE 10
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Amid budget crunch, Youth Advisory Council on chopping block BY JESSE PAUL THE COLORADO SUN
and Wildlife Service, local fire departments and other federal agencies will participate. “Safety is the number one priority, and every burn is carefully planned to ensure the safety of the surrounding community, the public and firefighters,” according to the release. Prioritizing your health in a time where smoke will be in the area is important, and health impacts vary based on different factors such as what’s in the smoke or the length of time of exposure, as well as your health history and lifestyle factors, according to Colorado’s health department.
The Colorado legislature, as part of its efforts to close a budget hole of more than $1 billion, is planning to axe a nearly two-decade program that enlists teenagers from across the state to help draft and offer input on bills. Shutting down the Colorado Youth Advisory Council would save about $50,000 a year. That’s a relatively paltry amount, but it’s meant to send a message that costs must be trimmed wherever possible. The cut foreshadows the big, and often painful, line-item reductions the legislature will have to make in the coming weeks. Sidd Nareddi, who served on COYAC from 2022 to 2024 while he was in high school, said he was heartbroken to hear the program may be discontinued. Now a first-year student at Brown University, Nareddi said being a member of COYAC was one of the most formative experiences of his high school years. “It really was a personal development program for me,” he said. “It’s a very empowering process.” The Colorado Youth Advisory Council was created in 2008 and is composed of 40 junior high and high school students representing each of the state’s 35 Senate districts, as well as the Ute Mountain Ute and Southern Ute tribes. Teens serve two-year terms on the council. The panel is currently supposed to continue through at least 2028. In recent years, the panel — known as COYAC — has drafted legislation to require school staff to address students by their chosen name, boost mental health resources in schools, reduce food waste in public schools and get young people involved in environmental justice. “That would be a huge mistake,” Sen. Faith Winter, a Broomfield Democrat and a legislative liaison to the council, said of ending the program. “We know that the bud-
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A prescribed burn is planned for Rocky Mountain Arsenal National Wildlife Refuge near Commerce City from March 4 through March 18. The U.S. Fish FILE PHOTO and Wildlife Service said smoke may be visible for several miles from the perimeter.
Prescribed burn planned at Rocky Mountain Arsenal • Vestas to lay off 200 employees •27J Schools moves online-only Dec. 1
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U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to burn almost 3,000 acres in March BY JACKIE RAMIREZ SPECIAL TO COLORADO COMMUNITY MEDIA
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The Rocky Mountain Arsenal National Wildlife Refuge near Commerce City will be burning nearly 3,000 acres of vegetation from March 4 through March 18, weather permitting, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service announced earlier this week. Smoke may be visible for several miles from the perimeter of the refuge, and people in the area may smell smoke, according to a Feb. 25 press release from the service’s Mountain-Prairie Region office, which covers Colorado, Kansas, Montana, Nebraska, and North and South Dakota.
Given the Los Angeles fires early this year, burning of any kind could cause concern for folks, but the release explained that the purpose of the prescribed burn at the wildlife refuge near Commerce City is to “reinvigorate the growth of native prairie vegetation, reduce accumulated vegetation, manage efforts for weed control and improve habitat to sustain wildlife.” They also serve to reduce the risk of wildfire in local communities. “Contrary to what many of us learned as kids, fire is not nature’s enemy,” wrote Susan Morse in an article about managing fire in the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service’s website. “Pre-
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scribed fire – sometimes called a controlled burn – doesn’t just reduce wildlife risk to surrounding communities; it also helps meet refuge land management goals, such as restoring nesting habitat and controlling invasive weeds.” Wildfire is also controlled by thinning trees and brush and creating fuel breaks, which reduce intensity and help to slow a fire’s spread. A fire prescription isn’t as simple as a doctor’s visit; it actually requires several months of planning where specialists develop a fire plan with natural resource experts before review by a refuge manager. For next week’s prescribed burning, interagency fire crews from the U.S. Fish
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