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Today's News

  • County ‘sales pitch’ irks citizen budgeters

    Some members of the citizen panel asked to prioritize $277 million in county spending over the next four years are growing tired of the “sales pitch” from the county and want to get to work.

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  • County must borrow more to build animal shelter; groundbreaking now scheduled for June 15

    The weak economy and an “unrealistic fund-raising timeline” have forced the county to borrow more money for the Table Mountain Animal Center project, according to the shelter’s spokesman.

    “It was never realistic for us to reach $3 million in actual money by the time they break ground,” said Ben Drotar, TMAC spokesman. “With the current economic climate, and the problems that pretty much happened at the end of October, that threw a little wrench in the spokes.”

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  • Snow not a surprise

    You had to have seen this coming, right?

    “It” of course, refers to the more than a foot of snow dumped on us March 26.

    Every year around this time, just as we’re entering the thick of the spring sports season, Mother Nature not-so-kindly reminds us that while the calendar may say its spring, she’s not through with us just yet.

    Granted, the snowfall was much-needed as we had a very mild winter. But, typically when it snows, it is bad news for area sports teams.

    Not so, this year.

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  • County still behind on food-stamp applications

    Nearly 200 Jeffco families awaiting food assistance have endured waits between 35 and 40 days — five to 10 days longer than federal law allows.

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  • School official arrested on suspicion of attempted sexual assault on a child

    Don Jenkins, Jeffco Public Schools’ chief information officer, was arrested March 19 for investigation of Internet luring of a child and attempted sexual assault on a child.

    Jenkins was arrested by the Aurora Police Department after an undercover Internet sting operation.

    “This is devastating news for us on so many levels,” said Jeffco Public Schools Superintendent Cindy Stevenson. “Accusations like these violate our organizational values and our mission of protecting children.”

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  • Kopp holds first virtual town hall meeting

    State Sen. Mike Kopp’s first “virtual town hall meeting” went off with only one technological glitch on March 23, but the bigger issue may be ensuring that constituents who don’t agree with Kopp get a chance to weigh in.

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  • Chargers get best of Rebels

    LAKEWOOD — Greg Kelsic said he and his Chatfield lacrosse teammates were expecting a physical encounter with rival Columbine.

    The Rebels certainly supplied the physicality, and the rival Chargers were more than happy to return the favor.

    Play on both sides of the field at times more resembled football than lacrosse. Penalty flags littered the synthetic turf field at Trailblazer Stadium on numerous occasions.

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  • DA Storey wants to extend term limits for his office

    For Jeffco District Attorney Scott Storey, eight is definitely not enough.

    Term limits mean that Storey must leave office when his second four-year term ends in 2012, but he’s determined to stick around. And so, he will soon propose to the county commissioners that the limits be extended to let him seek another term.

    “As it applies to the DA, and as it applies to those offices that are not necessarily policy-makers but have a specialty attached to them — like the sheriff, for example — I felt like eight years is not enough,” Storey said.

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  • Open Space could save $5 million by refinancing loans

    The Jefferson County Open Space Division might be able to buy more land after it refinances more than $70 million in loans to take advantage of low interest rates.

    “Unfortunately, the economy is bad, but it also creates the opportunity for us to do better with our bonds,” said Open Space Director Ralph Schell.

    Schell said the open space program took out about $160 million in loans in 1999 to buy land. The county currently pays an average interest rate of 4.94 percent on the remaining debt, but prevailing rates are nearly 2 points lower.

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  • Iraq: What is the status of U.S. mission?

    By Hannah Hayes

    What do you call 50,000 troops that will be left behind when the U.S. withdraws from Iraq? Re-missioned. How can you re-mission troops when they never had their original mission disclosed?

    But we’re jumping ahead on Iraq (while we’re falling behind at home). The reality today is that lives keep being lost, dollars continue to be spent, and troops still redeploy. It ain’t over, folks.

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