Good morning and happy Monday! As soon as I finish writing this, I’m jumping in the car and road-tripping to Silver Cliff. I’m most looking forward to that first view of the Sangre de Cristos, made even better because it’s the time of year when Colorado’s snow-capped peaks are such a vivid contrast to a springtime landscape of green grass and blooming pink trees.
I’m going to Custer County to report on an upcoming story about rural resources. It’s our mission at The Sun to tell stories not just about Denver, but about mountain towns and rural communities. We have staff who live in Eagle, Durango, Salida and Colorado Springs, plus about a dozen freelancers in places including Crested Butte, Pueblo, Mesa County and the San Luis Valley.
It’s thanks to your support that we’re able to keep going, bringing you stories that help inform how life in Colorado varies depending on where you are. Tell your friends!
Jennifer Brown
Reporter
THE NEWS
EDUCATION
A sinkhole formed under a rural school library. Colorado may cut funding to a program that could fix it.
South Routt School District RE-3, pictured April 10 in Oak Creek, is pursuing a Building Excellent Schools Today, or BEST, grant to modernize and connect its facilities for its secondary schools. The BEST program, created by state legislation in 2008, provides funding to districts to help them replace buildings or make critical repairs. Lawmakers are considering capping funding for the program in an especially tight budget year. (Matt Stensland, Special to The Colorado Sun)Holyoke Elementary’s library started sinking into the ground three years ago and the school is trying again for a grant from the state’s Building Excellent Schools Today program (aka BEST) to fund the construction of a new school building. But as Erica Breunlin reports, lawmakers want to limit how much the state contributes to the fund — just as schools face funding cuts and ballooning maintenance costs.
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Colorado moms in crisis, jobs lost: The human cost of Trump’s addiction funding cuts. Many advocates worry addiction recovery work — and the funding to support it — will no longer be a priority under the Trump administration.EQUITY
A free apartment comes with strings for Denver RV dwellers — and no place to park
Thomas Turner, left, and Chantel Draper pose for a portrait outside their RV on April 18 near a room they share at a Super 8 in Denver. The couple acquired this vehicle three years ago, after a UPS truck damaged their previous camper beyond repair. (Alyte Katilius, Special to The Colorado Sun)“Anybody else in America can park on the street and the cops won’t give two shits. I park for two minutes, and then I got people calling the cops saying I’m dealing with drugs or whatever.”
— Thomas Turner, who has lived in RVs for more than nine years while working as a mechanic
Denver’s All In Mile High is one of the city’s highest profile programs aimed at reducing homelessness. But as Lincoln Roch reports, the program’s efforts to get people into apartments are meeting resistance from RV dwellers who say the laundry list of rules that could get them kicked out on a moment’s notice is not worth the risk of abandoning their homes on wheels.
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ENVIRONMENT
Let them slither: PETA wants Colorado to require longer enclosures for pet snakes
“Snakes are individuals with unique wants and needs just like any cat or dog, but the Colorado Department of Agriculture’s proposed rules would allow snakes to be crammed into tiny boxes only half the length of their bodies, never able to fully stretch out.”
— PETA General Counsel Lori Kettler said in a press release
The Colorado Department of Agriculture’s rules about pet animal care have gotten the attention of People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, who want the state to change the current rule that allows snake enclosures to be half as long as the snake’s body. Tracy Ross has more.
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POLITICS AND GOVERNMENT
Colorado Senate overrides Jared Polis’ veto of bill regulating social media in extremely rare rebuke of governor
The Meta logo is seen at the Vivatech show in Paris in 2023. A group of 33 states including California and New York are suing Meta Platforms Inc. for harming young people’s mental health and contributing to the youth mental health crisis by knowingly designing features on Instagram and Facebook that addict children to its platforms. (AP Photo/Thibault Camus, File)For the first time since Gov. Bill Ritter was in office, the Colorado Senate passed an override of a governor’s veto. Jesse Paul and CPR’s Bente Birkeland have more on the next step of the override — and why lawmakers are choosing this battle.
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IMMIGRATION
ICE raids Colorado Springs illegal after-hours nightclub, detain more than 100 immigrants
More than 300 agents from the Drug Enforcement Administration and other federal agencies raided what they called an illegal after-hours nightclub early Sunday morning. A similar raid at a club in Adams County in January claimed to be targeting gang members, but no criminal charges were filed or evidence of gang activity was produced.
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ICE is reversing termination of legal status for international students around US, lawyers say. The federal government is reversing the termination of legal status for international students around the U.S., including some of the targeted students attending Colorado universities, government lawyers said. ICE deports immigrant mother of an infant and 3 children who are US citizens, lawyers say. The ACLU, National Immigration Project and other allied groups said in a statement that the way ICE deported children who are U.S. citizens and their mothers is a “shocking — although increasingly common — abuse of power.”— Sentinel ColoradoMORE NEWS
What’s Working: Why rents in Denver and other parts of Colorado are dropping. So many new apartments hit the metro Denver market last year. Too many? Plus: Not every place has seen rents drop. Safety work on Gross Reservoir dam can continue, appeals court rules. Denver Water may continue safety shoring up on its Gross Dam expansion despite an injunction, a U.S. appeals court says. Colorado man guilty of first-degree murder in rock-throwing death of 20-year-old woman. Joseph Koenig, 20, was charged in the death of 20-year-old Alexa Bartell during a weekslong rock-throwing spree in 2023. Vaccinated adult from Colorado infected with measles, the state’s first “breakthrough” case this year. A vaccinated Denver resident who had recently traveled to Mexico was confirmed as the state’s fifth measles case of 2025. Fact Brief ☀️ Is transportation a top household expense in the US? Yes. Transportation is the second-highest expense for households nationwide, behind housing costs, Bureau of Labor Statistics data shows.COLORADO SUNDAY
Magic mushrooms aren’t the only fungi growing in Colorado. Meet the gourmet “weirdos.”
A cluster of chestnut mushrooms on display inside Monumental Mushrooms in Palisade. (William Woody, Special to The Colorado Sun)While psychedelics grab the headlines, interest in edible mushrooms is also peaking. With at least 100 varieties grown in Colorado and millions around the world, it’s boom times for fungi enthusiasts, Nancy Lofholm reports.
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Section by Eric Lubbers | CTO & Newsletter Wrangler
THE COLORADO REPORT
? = source has article meter or paywall
Downtown Denver office vacancy tops 35% Total downtown vacancy was 16.5% at the end of 2019, a few months before COVID.— BusinessDen MyPillow CEO Mike Lindell’s legal team accused of submitting inaccurate, AI-generated brief to Colorado court. According to court documents, federal judge Nina Wang found about 30 defective citations in a brief Lindell’s legal team filed in February. The defects range from misquotes to “citations of cases that do not exist,” indicating that the brief may have been written by an AI chatbot which can “hallucinate” plausible-sounding — but completely made up — references. — KDVR Colorado traffic deaths plunge as the year begins, with less speeding, impairment cited. “The simple answer is that people are driving more safely,” said Sam Cole, traffic safety manager with the Colorado Department of Transportation. “They’re not driving impaired quite as much, their speeds are down, they’re less distracted.”— Colorado Public Radio Denver record club won’t fill orders, send refunds or respond to emails, customers say. The upscale “Vinyl Me, Please” record-club has seen lawsuits, layoffs and numerous complaints over the past year, with some people saying the club continues to charge annual fees and sell products on their website while leaving existing customers waiting months for records they’ve already paid for.— The Denver Post ?Section by Eric Lubbers | CTO & Newsletter Wrangler
THE OPINION PAGE
COLUMNS
DOJ interference in Tina Peters case only demonstrates their full capitulation. The blatantly political attempt to enter into an action over a state case exposes the agency’s swift fall from independence.— Mario Nicolais The resistance is growing, just as Trump’s poll numbers are rapidly shrinking. When Harvard stood up to Trump, it pushed more than 400 colleges to join the resistance, including at least four from Colorado.— Mike LittwinThe Colorado Sun is a nonpartisan news organization, and the opinions of columnists and editorial writers do not reflect the opinions of the newsroom. Read our ethics policy for more on The Sun’s opinion policy and submit columns, suggest writers or provide feedback at [email protected].
Hope your week starts off great!
— Jennifer and the whole staff of The Sun
The Colorado Sun is part of The Trust Project. Read our policies.
Corrections & Clarifications
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