Author: reporter

Most drivers who want to use Interstate 25 express lanes between Monument and Castle Rock will be required to pay a toll starting Wednesday, the Colorado Department of Transportation announced in a news release. Opened in December 2021, the express lanes were a central feature of the $419 million project to improve the 18-mile South Gap stretch of I-25, which also included rebuilding bridges and interchanges, adding wildlife crossings, adding extra lanes on Monument Hill and widening the highway’s shoulders. Project construction wrapped up in November 2022. The toll lanes will be open 24/7, with tolls ranging from 70 cents…

Former Mesa County Clerk Tina Peters isn’t giving up in her attempt to get the federal courts to block her upcoming trial on state criminal charges. Peters’ Virginia-based attorney, Robert Cynkar, filed a notice of appeal to the 10th Circuit Court of Appeals in Denver on Wednesday to get it to reverse a ruling earlier this week from U.S. District Judge Nina Wang that removed Mesa County District Attorney Dan Rubinstein as a defendant in a whistleblower lawsuit she filed in federal court last fall. That suit, which also names Colorado Secretary of State Jena Griswold and U.S. Attorney General…

A day after the Colorado Avalanche Information Center issued a special avalanche advisory, CAIC forecasters have upgraded the avalanche risk rating from considerable to high for much of the state’s mountainous terrain and issued avalanche warnings for two areas. Avalanche warnings are in effect for the Park Range, north and east of Steamboat Springs from the Wyoming border to the Kremmling area, and the Ruby, Anthracite, and Ragged mountains west of Crested Butte and Marble. “Very dangerous avalanche conditions exist,” CAIC said of those areas. “You can easily trigger avalanches large enough to bury you, and you can expect many…

The Denver City Council is poised to approve a $2.3 million settlement on Tuesday with Jax Feldmann, a Denverite who was blinded in his left eye after a police officer shot him in the face with a pepper ball during the George Floyd protests in 2020. The payment would settle a lawsuit attorneys filed on Feldmann’s behalf in January 2022 stemming from the May 30, 2020, incident. Feldmann was not participating in the protests when an officer in a passing truck shot him with the projectile while he walking back to his car after meeting with a friend, according to…

Jon Healey | Los Angeles Times (TNS) As shocking as the in-flight blowout on Alaska Airlines Flight 1282 was last week, federal officials initially estimated that the problem that caused a gaping hole to open in the plane’s fuselage would be relatively easy to diagnose and fix. On Tuesday, though, the Federal Aviation Administration said the process will take a bit longer than anticipated. For the time being, all planes configured the same way as Flight 1282 — a recently introduced update to the extremely popular Boeing 737 — will remain grounded. That means more travelers on United and Alaska…

A group of a dozen U.S. attorneys general, led by Colorado’s Phil Weiser, are calling on the Drug Enforcement Administration to reschedule cannabis. In a letter sent to the DEA on Friday, the attorneys general said they support the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services’ recommendation to reschedule cannabis from Schedule I to Schedule III, citing public safety and advocating for legal businesses. Their pleas echo Colorado Gov. Jared Polis, who in December voiced support for a federal rescheduling. Attorneys general from Colorado, California, Connecticut, Delaware, Illinois, Maryland, Massachusetts, Nevada, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Oregon, and Rhode Island signed the…

Elijah McClain (Courtesy of McClain family) AURORA — The police officers who wrestled Elijah McClain to the ground as the unarmed Black man walked home in 2019 went “hands-on” too quickly, Aurora’s interim chief of police said Thursday in an about-face from the police department’s initial stance in the case. Interim Chief Art Acevedo, who joined the police department more than three years after McClain’s death, commented on the officers’ actions days after former Officer Randy Roedema was sentenced to 14 months in jail with the option for work-release on assault and criminally negligent homicide convictions in McClain’s death. “We don’t…

Broncos coach Sean Payton has a better chance of being hilarious on “Hard Knocks” than being victorious in a playoff game during the 2024 NFL season. I kid you not. But let’s hope Payton does indeed possess a healthy sense of humor we’ve yet to see, because a young quarterback this team needs could well be available with the second-round pick in the draft that the Broncos don’t own because they traded it to the New Orleans Saints for Payton. You must remember this: Long before he surrendered 70 points to Miami or benched Russell Wilson, Payton poked fun at…

The Douglas County school board selected three finalists Thursday to fill the vacant seat previously held by former President Mike Peterson, who resigned last year. The Douglas County School District’s Board of Education interviewed nine candidates for the position during a public meeting Thursday afternoon, with members asking applicants about their leadership skills, and how they would communicate with parents, address concerns that the board is “too political,” and tackle “hot button issues” the district might face. After the interviews, members voted to name Timothy Moore, Sandra Lyle Brownrigg and Natalie Wong as finalists for the open seat. Brownrigg is a familiar…

By LOLITA C. BALDOR and TARA COPP (Associated Press) WASHINGTON (AP) — The U.S. and British militaries bombed more than a dozen sites used by the Iranian-backed Houthis in Yemen on Thursday, in a massive retaliatory strike using warship- and submarine-launched Tomahawk missiles and fighter jets, U.S. officials said. The U.S. Air Force’s Mideast command said it struck over 60 targets at 16 sites in Yemen, including “command-and-control nodes, munitions depots, launching systems, production facilities and air defense radar systems.” President Joe Biden said the strikes were meant to demonstrate that the U.S. and its allies “will not tolerate” the…