
Gaines: A letter to the Colorado Oil and Gas Conservation Commission
To try and tie Colorado’s actions alone to rises in temperature is to be ignorant of the hugely complex mechanisms that govern climate on this planet.
To try and tie Colorado’s actions alone to rises in temperature is to be ignorant of the hugely complex mechanisms that govern climate on this planet.
The situation in Texas is both a warning and a call to action for other states to assess their energy sources and to be clear-eyed about the weaknesses of wind and solar.
While the surface of the land in question is part of Boulder’s Open Space program, the Wells have owned the mineral rights below since 1981.
The explosion at 6312 Twilight Avenue killed Mark Martinez and plumber Joey Irwin and caused serious burns to Irwin’s sister and Martinez’s wife Erin and destroyed the house.
The expired MOU allowed the state to tell federal lands operators to get a second permit from the state. The criteria were much the same for both, so it was an expensive duplicative effort.
The commission’s suppressive tactics played into the hands of anti-oil and gas groups, who had nowhere else to be and happily filled the speaking slots of energy workers, industry experts and community leaders who couldn’t stay indefinitely.
“The COGCC is on a collision course with the federal government.”–State Sen. Ray Scott
“Voters overwhelmingly rejected a de facto ban on oil and gas last fall, and when given the chance in 2019, we believe they’ll reject the backdoor ban barreling through the legislature too.” — Barbara Kirkmeyer and John Brackney on their ballot initiatives.
“They refused to work with us,” Sen. John Cooke said. “They see us as irrelevant. They won’t talk about changes. They won’t listen to the industry. The only way to slow it down was this.” — On stalling the debate on Senate Bill 181.
Roughly 90 percent of land across Colorado would be walled off, with an even greater impact in the handful of counties where most of the state’s oil and gas production takes place.
By Jon Caldara
Hollywood is coming to my hometown. By now you’ve heard the Sundance Film Festival is moving to Boulder.
What a relief! Finally, some common folk are coming to town. As you know, Boulder is home to the state’s most smug elite, those who know how the rest of us should live, what we should value.
And they are thrilled to use government to mandate it upon us.
But starting in 2027, for one glorious week a year, Hollywood types, with their humble, live-and-let-live, limited government views will descend on my little hamlet of progressive hate. People with more common sense and basic American values will finally be walking the streets of my neighborhood. Boulder’s level of arrogance should be cut in half.
It will be so refreshing to hang with thousands of Harvey Weinstein types, who have so much more respect for people.
For one week my hometown won’t be all about virtue signaling. My little metropolis will be visited by normal folks like George Clooney who, next to the average Boulderite, doesn’t need to constantly emote his beliefs and political desires.
Sundance said they moved to Boulder because of its “welcoming environment.”
Don’t need to be a codebreaker to read between the lines. They wanted to move out of a red state to a pronoun-policed, righteousness infatuated city nestled in a Trump Derangement Syndrome state.
And I don’t mind my wacky town getting wackier for a week. Tens of thousands of mega-wealthy, moralistic, image-obsessed progressives will descend upon the town of mega-wealthy, moralistic, image-obsessed progressives. Maybe I’ll Airbnb my house and make a few bucks. After all the governor’s office says this party will bring in $2 billion of revenue over 10 years. That’s a lot of cheddar.
In fact, that’s why he just signed a bill to give Sundance $35 million out of our massively underfunded state budget.
Wow! Only $35 million to bring in $2 billion! We should make that deal all day long. That’s a 57-fold return on investment. How many of your investments are paying 5700%? I’m guessing less than half?
A 5700% return is known as “economic development math,” which also goes by the street name “complete fiction.”
Before special interests can extract that kind of payoff, they need to give elected officials some political coverage. Economists come up with “multiplier effects” to show us taxpayers we’re not just giving our money to the politically connected, especially during a state budget shortfall.
But wait a second. If the economic benefit is going to bring in $2 billion, why would taxpayers have to put in a penny? Boulder hotels, restaurants, and movie houses would be more than happy to scrape together the kickback for that kind of payout. For $2 billion it’s a no-brainer.
So, either they don’t want to pay it because they can use other people’s money, or they know the return on investment might not actually be 5700%. (It’s both.)
Diffused taxpayers getting their money confiscated and bundled then given to concentrated politically tied special interests is how cronyism works. Thus, the code name “economic development.”
And might there be some conflicts of interest here?
Jared Polis owns property in downtown Boulder, and purportedly income property as well. Instead of tapping taxpayers across the state, our near-billionaire governor could pay a good share of the ransom if he’s getting some of the benefit.
Among all the economic development scams, subsidies to film makers are notoriously the worst. Analysis from New Mexico’s own government discovered their “films subsidies have a negative return on investment.” Now, I’m not a mathematician, but a “negative return on investment” sounds like less than a 5700% return.
New Jersey found that of the $430 million in taxpayer subsidies looked like more than the $300 million earned by all film and video production employees. But then again, Jersey isn’t known for math. Well, maybe the mob accountants.
On behalf of the governor and all the economic winners in Boulder, I like to thank the taxpayers from all the far-flung corners of Colorado who will get almost nothing out of this corporate welfare except some pictures of celebrities in the news. Taxpayers in Colorado Springs, Pueblo, Grand Junction, and every little town in between are paying Robert Redford’s organization to make the state’s richest city just a little more wealthy.
Sounds fair.
Colorado Media slanders providers that don’t align with their viewpoints, and PowerGab Hosts Jake Fogleman and Amy Cooke call them out. They talk about their “pet peeves” in the power industry along with legislative measures that are suffocating Colorado’s economy.
Show Notes:
A pet peeve:
I can’t do business in Denver
Executive Orders:
The legislative “fix” to Building Regs
Within six years, Colorado Governor Jared Polis has signed 23 anti gun bills into law. His most recent, Senate Bill 3 (SB25-003), creates the country’s most restrictive permitting scheme to buy a gun. Second Amendment expert Dave Kopel explains the bleak situation.