The Home Front: Colorado’s Lesley Mumford will be the first transgender woman to attend the national FBI Academy

“In January, the Summit County Sheriff’s Office operations commander and SWAT team coordinator, Lesley Mumford, was called into Sheriff Jaime FitzSimons’ office for a sit-down,” reports Summit Daily. “Undersheriff Joel Cochran was there, too, and it seemed like this was no ordinary meeting. ‘I was quickly trying to recall anything that I might have done to get me in trouble,’ Mumford said. ‘I was at a loss, but it seemed like a very serious conversation was about to take place.’ The pall was quickly lifted when FitzSimons told Mumford she had been accepted into the FBI National Academy, an elite, 10-week training course for law enforcement in Quantico, Virginia. … Mumford’s selection isn’t just an honor for her, though. It’s also a groundbreaking moment for the FBI and law enforcement generally, as she will be the first transgender woman to ever attend the academy in its 83-year history.”

“A plan to drill for oil in the Whitewater Basin can go forward, the Bureau of Land Management said,” reports The Grand Junction Daily Sentinel. “The approval of Fram Operating LLC’s Whitewater development plan comes as part of the Trump administration’s America First Energy Plan, the BLM said in announcing the decision.”

“Before UCHealth administrators changed the system, Dr. Christina Reimer remembers having to enter the many details of a patient’s visit herself,” reports The Greeley Tribune. “‘I would sit behind a computer screen in an exam room with a patient,’ Reimer said. ‘Having been a patient on the other side of that computer screen, it doesn’t feel necessarily like the provider’s interacting with the patient, but more so with the computer.’ Reimer’s experience probably sounds familiar. Federal and insurance regulations require detailed medical records, and health care providers such as Reimer typically had to enter those details themselves. It can be menial work that takes health care providers away from direct contact with patients. Such regulatory work is a leading factor in physician burnout.”

“Polanka’s pierogies and other Polish delicacies are packing up and moving west to Rifle,” reports The Glenwood Springs Post-Independent. “The Glenwood Springs shop will close its doors on April 7 and reopen in Rifle on April 14. Why the departure? “There’s no reason to stay,” said Jerry Housin, who owns the restaurant with his wife. His mother in law first opened the place in 2012. Since then, following the Grand Avenue Bridge work and ongoing construction, he says the Sixth Street corridor is “dark, dismal,” and bad for business. “The other side is lit up all fancy, but none of that attention is being paid over here,” he said, referencing the south side of the bridge leading into downtown Glenwood Springs.”

“In honor of National Farmworkers Awareness Week and Cesar Chavez Day on Saturday, a new coalition of Longmont leaders are holding the first Cesar Chavez and Dolores Huerta Celebration at Front Range Community College on Saturday,” reports The Longmont Times-Call. “Various community leaders got together to create the event and found that they enjoyed working together so much that they created a new organization for future events, La Lucha: Social Justice Coalition. Coalition member Jennifer Diaz-Leon said that in the future, La Lucha hopes to start a scholarship fund for local students.”

“A Colorado lawmaker who advocated to make ‘rolling coal’ illegal was glad to see Steamboat Springs Police Department officers are holding offenders accountable by issuing tickets,” reports The Steamboat Pilot. “‘That’s exactly how I think it needs to be used,’ said state Rep. Joann Ginal, a Fort Collins Democrat. Steamboat police so far have cited two of the three drivers they suspect blasted demonstrators with black exhaust during the ‘March For Our Lives’ event Saturday at the Routt County Courthouse. ‘It’s kind of an infringement of the First Amendment and the freedom of speech,’ Ginal said. ‘It’s really harassment, and to me, a form of bullying.’ It took three tries, but Ginal and state Sen. Don Coram from Montrose finally got the ‘rolling coal’ law passed last May. It was then signed into law by Gov. John Hickenlooper in June.”

“Brian Repola, executive director for Pueblo School for Arts and Sciences, has been terminated by the school’s board of directors,” reports The Pueblo Chieftain. “In a press release issued Thursday, James Olonia, president of the PSAS board, said Repola’s firing comes after an investigation into allegations of “inappropriate behavior and communications” involving Repola to staff members on both PSAS campuses. Pueblo School for Arts and Sciences is a charter school at 2415 Jones authorized by Pueblo City Schools (D60). It recently opened a second campus in Fulton Heights in the Salt Creek area, with plans to expand that campus in the future.”

“In response to an active rabies season, Larimer County Public Health and Environment will offer low-cost vaccinations to pets in the coming months,” reports The Loveland Reporter-Herald. “The county has received four new reports of rabid skunks in the past week, bringing the total for the season to 10. Department spokeswoman Katie O’Donnell said the dates and places of the vaccinations have yet to be determined, but they will provide more affordable rabies shots for pets. ‘The shots will give a lot of people the opportunity to vaccinate their pets when they may not have otherwise,’ O’Donnell said.”

“Warren Miller Day is being held in Vail for several reasons, but the most obvious, said Miller’s son Kurt, is the skiing,” reports Vail Daily. “‘What better place to slide on the side of the hill?’ Kurt Miller said. When Vail Mountain hosts the Warren Miller Day celebration and ski down on Saturday, April 7, Kurt Miller said it will also be a celebration of the history Vail has always had with his father.”

“Erica Bishop is no stranger to racial stereotypes, especially on campus or out and about in Fort Collins,” reports The Coloradoan in Fort Collins. “She’s been told she’s hot for a black girl. She’s been asked if she attends Colorado State University because of affirmative action. She was once even listed as a “cooperative black girl” in a police report regarding a car crash, she said. Bishop, 20, is an ethnic studies major at Colorado State University. Those stereotypes are unacceptable, she said. That’s why she showed up Thursday to participate in the “CSUnite: No Place for Hate” walk, along with about 1,000 other students, faculty and Fort Collins residents.”

“In a report that comes ahead of an upcoming City Council study session, Boulder sustainability officers note that the Paris emissions-reduction targets the city and governments around the world committed to underestimated just how quickly the climate already is changing,” reports The Boulder Daily Camera. “And, as a separate 2016 report detailed, Boulder County citizens can expect to witness that acceleration. On the “current path of steadily increasing heat-trapping emissions,” Boulder is projected to see, by mid-century, 38 days per year with temperatures rising above 95 degrees, according to the Rocky Mountain Climate Organization.”

“Citing lack of demand, Las Vegas-based low-fare carrier Allegiant Air will halt service April 29 to Colorado Springs after 16 years, becoming the second airline to leave the city in the past six months,” reports The Gazette in Colorado Springs. “Allegiant operates round-trip flights on Friday and Sunday to Las Vegas, competing with daily service from Denver-based Frontier Airlines. The airline boarded 1,515 passengers on outbound flights in the first two months of the year, or just 1.2 percent of the 127,473 passengers boarded on all flights from the Springs airport during the same period. “Our decision to end service from Colorado Springs was based entirely on a lack of demand in the area,’ Krysta Levy, an Allegiant spokeswoman, said late Wednesday in an email. ‘We are grateful for more than a decade of partnership with the Colorado Springs Airport.'”

“Two blocks from the crumbling Interstate 70 viaduct that soon will be torn down as part of a $1.2 billion freeway expansion, 17-year-old Ruben Sanchez and three other members of his family have lived for years with sometimes-debilitating asthma,” reports The Denver Post. “They don’t think that’s a coincidence, given the soot and other pollutants that waft off the freeway. And Denver city health data at least confirm that children in Sanchez’s Elyria-Swansea neighborhood, which also has several industrial operations, seek asthma-related treatment in emergency rooms at a rate that’s 40 percent higher than the city as a whole. “Living next to the highway has not helped me to improve in the slightest,” Sanchez said. He has watched his mother, Yadira, develop an even more severe case of asthma that limits her ability to work.”

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1 COMMENT

  1. Hello – I’d like to send my 100% support for Lesley Mumford. How can I follow her and support her? I appreciate everything she is doing for all the right things. thank you!

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