The Home Front: A Colorado town has a ‘Cannabis Discovery Center’ for tourists with questions

“When curious visitors come to Colorado with questions about legal marijuana, Durango now has the go-to place,” reports The Durango Herald. “The mission of the Durango Cannabis Discovery Center is to provide information about cannabis, the cannabis industry and laws governing the marijuana industry. “We deal with people every day, mostly tourists, who have questions, and we wanted to provide a center that provides information from seed to sale,” said Jason Barker, co-owner of the discovery center at 965 Main Ave., the space previously occupied by Jewelry Works.”

“Colorado House District 50 hasn’t had an open seat this millennium, and a Republican hasn’t won the mostly Greeley seat since 2002,” reports The Greeley Tribune. “This year, two Democratic candidates, including a former District 50 representative, will face off in a primary to see who gets to attempt to keep the Democratic streak alive. Former Greeley City Councilwoman Rochelle Galindo is running as the fresh face of the district, pitching herself as a more representative representative for the strongly Latino district.”

“When community volunteers started going to local gun shops, pawn shops and firing ranges in Mesa County to ask to display suicide prevention and gun safety materials, Susan Becker was a little nervous,” reports The Grand Junction Daily Sentinel. “I know I wasn’t alone in being concerned that shop owners would have concerns about being singled out or that this was about gun control,” she said. But those concerns never materialized, because Colorado’s Gun Shop Project has seen wide success across the state. Becker, a psychology professor at Colorado Mesa University, in the fall visited 96 gun shops, pawn shops and firing ranges in 16 Colorado counties that agreed to participate in a pilot phase of the Gun Shop Project. Of those, 74 percent still had materials about gun safety and suicide prevention displayed for their customers to access.”

“An elk calf was attacked by a dog near the trailhead of Blackmere Drive on Emerald Mountain this morning, closing the trail for the day,” reports The Steamboat Pilot. “A Colorado Parks and Wildlife officer was dispatched to the scene after Routt County Communications received a call from the dog owner about the incident. The calf, which was found about 15 yards south of the trailhead, didn’t have any apparent wounds, according to Kris Middledorf, Colorado Parks and Wildlife area wildlife manager, who arrived on scene at about 8:30 a.m.”

“After nearly two decades in Summit County, Norma Quezada thought she would be a homeowner by now, but her hopes have been dashed repeatedly by poor credit and rising home prices,” reports Summit Daily. “‘It’s very frustrating,” Quezada said, with her daughter translating in the kitchen of her small Wildernest apartment. “I’ve tried many times.” Rent prices have soared as well, and Quezada has been forced to move at least five times since leaving Mexico for Summit County 20 years ago. In 2016, the latest time she and her family of four were told to pack up, she had just one month’s notice. “We were scrambling because it was just such a surprise,” Quezada said. ‘Out of nowhere we just get a call saying the owner is deciding to sell the apartment, so we didn’t really know where to start looking.'”

“Lawmakers from Colorado, Kansas and New Mexico are demanding that new Amtrak President Richard Anderson keep the federally sponsored railroad’s past commitment to support improvements to the route of the Southwest Chief passenger train,” reports The Pueblo Chieftain. “In a letter to Anderson, the federal lawmakers — including Colorado Sens. Michael Bennet and Cory Gardner — are demanding that Amtrak provide a $3 million grant the railroad had agreed to provide before Anderson became chief of Amtrak last year.”

“Jefferson County’s public health chief on Thursday declared that the Rocky Flats National Wildlife Refuge should stay closed to the public for lack of a ‘truly independent’ assessment of potentially lethal plutonium contamination both on and off the federal property,” reports The Denver Post. “Dr. Mark Johnson’s declaration — made in federal court to back a request by environment groups for a judicial order blocking the scheduled opening this summer — intensifies the recent flaring of mistrust around cleanup of the nation’s Cold War nuclear sites. It is rooted in decades of obfuscation and secrecy that have come back to haunt the government as the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service labors to begin a new chapter.”

“A local teen was on the run only a few hours after he allegedly stabbed a female jogger in the early morning of Thursday, May 31,” reports Vail Daily. “Andrew Young, Jr., 18, was arrested at 9:53 a.m., about three hours after the 6:32 a.m. attack, in which Young allegedly stabbed a female jogger on the Eagle Valley Trail near The Westin Riverfront Resort & Spa in Avon Two people rendered immediate lifesaving aid to the victim, Avon Police Chief Greg Daly said. She was rushed to the Vail Health hospital, where she was reported in stable condition as of late Thursday afternoon. Young immediately fled the scene. Avon police and Eagle County Sheriff’s deputies soon arrested Young without incident, Daly said.”

“Peter Tippett is taking on homelessness one home at a time,” reports The Coloradoan in Fort Collins. “Tippett, a former real estate agent, wants to help provide housing to people often described as the “invisible homeless.” “These are people who live in Fort Collins and have jobs and cars and families and they are homeless — or on the verge of being homeless,” he said. “This is our target audience, as opposed to the chronic homeless.” These are the couch-surfers, the people staying with family and friends for a few weeks at a time. They might earn too much income to qualify for government housing assistance but not enough to afford Fort Collins’ rising rents.”

“Beaten, bound and forced onto his stomach with his hands tied behind his back, Full Throttle Auto Service owner George Maldonado Sr. was anything but a threat,” reports The Gazette in Colorado Springs. “But that didn’t stop one of his robbers from making sure with a single deadly stomp on the incapacitated man’s head, authorities say. “Right there – no provocation, nothing,” prosecutor Nathaniel Marsh said Thursday as he walked a jury through surveillance footage that captured the fatal blow, allegedly inflicted by Eric William Grant, 39, after two men burst into Maldonado’s shop last July disguised as utilities workers.”

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