WEEK OF JULY 3, 2025
VOLUME 38 | ISSUE 31
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With one swing of his golf club Highlands Ranch teenager shoots a hole-in-one BY HALEY LENA HLENA@COLORADOCOMMUNITYMEDIA.COM
LONE TREE VOICE Section included in this week’s edition P11
PORTAL TO PAST Lamb Spring takes visitors to the last Ice Age P2
NEW HOCKEY RULES Changes are made for high school athletics P4
On the South Suburban Golf Course, Dylan Jimenez, a 12-yearold Highlands Ranch resident, stood in front of the tee of the Par 3 second hole on May 28. And with one swing of his golf club, the unimaginable happened that day. Dylan Jimenez struck the ball and watched it fly into the distance. The ball became smaller and smaller. In fact, he and his friends couldn’t exactly tell where the ball went. At that moment, Joe Jimenez, Dylan’s father, got a call from his son as he was pulling into a parking spot at work. Dylan said to his father: “I think I got a hole-in-one.” Joe asked where the ball was and Dylan told his father that he thought it rolled towards the pin and that he was going to go look. As they hung up the phone, Joe was overcome with excitement, and all he could think was: “I hope he got it.” Within minutes, Dylan Jimenez FaceTime called his father to show him that he got a hole-in-one. He told his father that people who had witnessed the ball go in were waiting for him at the hole, and once he got there, he was greeted with applause. “Getting that FaceTime call from him was one of the best dad moments of my life,” said Joe. “Seeing and hearing the pure joy in his voice, and biggest smile ever, made me so proud.” According to the National SEE HOLE-IN-ONE, P4
Dylan Jimenez stands at the second hole of the South Suburban Golf Course where he hit his first hole-inCOURTESY OF JOE JIMENEZ one, after just one year of playing golf.
Home rule plan’s landslide loss leaves questions Douglas County residents aren’t finished talking about how they want to be governed BY JULIA KING SPECIAL TO COLORADO COMMUNITY MEDIA
ANIMAL ATTRACTION Shop dogs make stores fun for owners, customers P16
Douglas County voters sent a decisive message with the June 24 home rule ballot: not so fast. But also — maybe not never? Though home rule — the ability for the county to write
VOICES: 8 | CALENDAR: 18 | PUZZLES: 19 | CLASSIFIEDS: 20
its own governing charter — wasn’t universally opposed, many residents objected to how the proposal was introduced. Roughly 71% of voters rejected the measure in the special election, but conversations about home rule and the structure of Douglas County’s government are likely to keep
unfolding. The election marked a moment of broad consensus in a county with a shifting political landscape. With unaffiliated voters now making up about half of Douglas County’s electorate — which historically has been a Republican stronghold — the result offered more than a simple party-line rebuke. Nearly 95,000 ballots were counted on Election Night, with the vast majority — over 98% — cast by mail. Unaffiliat-
ed voters made up the largest share of participants at 45.5%, followed by Republicans at 31.5% and Democrats at 23%. Turnout was highest among older voters, particularly those between the ages of 50 and 75, and was concentrated in larger suburbs like Highlands Ranch, Castle Rock and Parker. Voter trends were made more clear in district-level races for the commission that SEE HOME RULE, P6
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