Kunc's Colorado Edition

For a holiday centered on gratitude, Thanksgiving is also a recipe for tension. If you’re among the 60 percent of Coloradans traveling for the holidays, you’re likely navigating congested roads or chaotic airports. (Yeah, we're looking at you, DIA!) If you’re hosting dinner, you’ve got a whole other set of concerns, like catering to an array of dietary needs, and getting a hundred different dishes to come out of the oven at the same time.OK, so you did it — you made it to grandma’s, or you cooked the turkey just right. Now the wine is flowing like water and it’s time to relax. But not so fast… even in the kindest of families, with the best of intentions, friendly dinner table discussions sometimes sour. And we’ve all got plenty of opinions, whether it’s on the war in the Middle East, reproductive rights, or the upcoming presidential election. But with some thought and intention, you don't have to dread the holiday dinner discussion. “Sometimes when you have a pretty good conversation with someone, the main th

Colorado has made multiple strides toward representation and equality for queer residents. The Movement Advancement Project, an independent think tank, gives our state high ratings for a range of policies that protect sexual orientation and gender identity. This marks a big change from a few decades earlier, when Colorado was dubbed the 'Hate State' after voters approved a 1992 ballot initiative, Amendment 2, that prohibited state and local governments from granting protections for LGBTQ residents. Activists responded by organizing a successful boycott against Colorado, steering tourists and businesses away from the state. Amendment 2 was eventually struck down by the U.S. Supreme Court.Still, being queer in Colorado doesn’t come without anxiety or very real fears for your physical safety. Nearly one year ago, the mass shooting at Club Q, an LGBTQ nightclub in Colorado Springs, revived and deepened some of those worries. Susy Bates, campaign director at One Colorado, says it’s critically important we hold ont

Across the state, people are struggling to find and keep affordable housing. That’s especially true in Colorado’s mountain towns. KUNC managing editor Stephanie Daniel recently pulled back the curtain on this issue with the latest season of her podcast The Colorado Dream Season 3: Housing Wanted. What separates these mountain towns from other communities confronting the state’s housing shortage is “that it is hard for people at all income levels to find housing,” Daniel said. “I'm talking about restaurant servers, police officers, nurses.”Meanwhile, certain factors are intensifying the problem, particularly in the communities Stephanie and her team visited —  Routt, Eagle and Summit counties. For one, they are all home to world class ski resorts. “Visitors flock to these communities throughout the year, and tourism really drives the local economies. And that leads back to one of the challenges, which is the huge increase in short term rentals,” Daniel said.The pandemic and a subsequent increase in remote work

In communities across Northern Colorado, people are struggling with their mental health, while also struggling to get the care they need. And the problem is widespread – around a quarter of residents reported having poor mental health in the most recent Colorado Health Access Survey. Of the 1 in 6 Coloradans who were unable to get needed care, nearly half said they had a hard time getting an appointment, while nearly 60% were concerned about cost.Over the past few months, KUNC’s Senior Editor & Reporter Leigh Paterson has been reporting on the barriers residents face in getting help, despite laws in place to ensure insurance coverage. She joins host Erin O’Toole to break down what you need to know about mental health parity laws.

A lot of Coloradans love the idea of recycling. But our recycling habits are in the dumps. In 2020, the rate of recycling statewide was just 15 percent — less than half the rate nationwide. That’s according to a report from the Colorado Public Interest Research Group and Eco-Cycle. Perhaps that's because the actual practice of it can be confusing. It seems like the rules are often changing – and let’s not forget that recycling is expensive, both for residents and municipalities.Ahead of America Recycles Day on Wednesday, we're doing a little recycling of our own, revisiting our conversation with Mark Snedecor, director of recycling services for Waste Management (WM) of Colorado. He shares some of the big recycling blunders we're making, and why you don't have to worry too much about those little numbers within the “chasing arrows” recycling symbol.The Boulder County Recycling Center is marking America Recycles Day this Wednesday evening with a "Reduce & Reuse" showcase, self-guided tours, and more. NOTE:

There’s so much going on behind the scenes when you sit down at a restaurant. In the back of the house, cooks are rushing to prep, cook and plate your food. Dishwashers are trying to keep pace with those cooks — and hungry diners. In the front of the house, the servers are sweating, too. They’re deciphering complex requests, running through mazes of tables, chairs, and people, to deliver your dish without a hitch. And finding people to do this work has gotten tough. Beyond the frenzied nature of the job, long hours and physical demands, inflation is hitting the industry hard. In August, Colorado saw the sharpest restaurant inflation in the country. Laura Shunk, president of the nonprofit Colorado Restaurant Foundation, says this is stressing almost every aspect of the restaurant industry. “If you've noticed that menu prices are going up, it's because every cost in the restaurant is going up,” Shunk said. A key part of Shunk’s work is helping restaurateurs find solutions to these challenges. She told us about

We’re sifting though some of the results from Tuesday’s election, which brought roughly 42% of registered voters to the polls. Loveland resident Lee Rhodes visited a dropbox in Fort Collins this week to weigh in on Proposition HH. “That was important. I like the idea of the government keeping to a budget,” he told In The NoCo’s Erin O’Toole. The complicated measure, which intended to address a looming spike in property taxes, was defeated. KUNC’s statehouse reporter Lucas Brady Woods explains why on this episode. We also discuss Proposition II, which voters approved. That measure allows the state to use more of the taxes it gets from tobacco and nicotine products that previously went back to manufacturers and distributors.We talk about Boulder’s mayoral race, where voters for the first time made the call on who should lead the city, and we set the stage for some upcoming conversation on school board elections and their increasing politicization.And you can find more KUNC election coverage here.

Today we’re turning back the pages of Colorado’s not-so-distant past to better grasp the problems of the present with a discussion about Indian boarding schools. The U.S. government established hundreds of these schools across the U.S. to forcibly dismantle the cultural identities of young Native Americans. A recent 140-page state report that is the result of a 2022 state law uncovers the trauma, abuse and death that occurred at these schools in Colorado, like Fort Lewis Indian Boarding School — now the site of Fort Lewis College. Heather Shotton, a citizen of the Wichita and Affiliated tribes, and also Kiowa and Cheyenne, is vice president for diversity affairs at the college. She joined host Erin O'Toole to discuss the hard truths that this report has uncovered — and how many descendants of the students who attended the schools continue to navigate intergenerational trauma.

Young people in Colorado continue to struggle with their mental health. KUNC senior editor and reporter Leigh Paterson has helped us to understand the complexities of this problem. She joins In The NoCo to discuss some of her recent reporting, which looks at a new law that will provide statewide mental health screenings for kids. She tells us how this effort holds promise — and why some experts remain skeptical. And, she takes us to Glenwood Springs High School, where the school has already spearheaded its own mental health screenings and services. Meanwhile, Election Day is here and that means voters are hitting the polls and KUNC reporters are on the move. We’re watching the races and speaking with voters as they cast their ballots. In the coming days, we’ll be hearing from Northern Coloradans about what matters to them this election. We’ll also sit down with our statehouse reporter Lucas Brady Woods to make sense of the results later in the week. 

Diversity isn’t exactly classical music’s strong suit. The work of white, European composers has been center stage for for centuries. Today, people of color comprise a small  percentage of musicians in American orchestras, though that number appears to be growing. Black violinist and author Brendan Slocumb says representation plays a big role in this.“When I was a kid, had I seen someone who looked like me playing the violin, I would probably never put it down — ever, ever,” Slocumb said.Slocumb is a longtime music educator and when he goes into schools, students don’t believe he’s a violinist. He says he doesn’t fit the part for a few reasons. “If it's warm out, I usually have on a short-sleeved shirt and I've got tattoos. And, you know, I'm going to go ahead and say, I'm a, you know, muscular guy.” Then he picks up his violin and plays. “And they're just like, are you serious? You really do this?”Slocumb’s response is typically: “Yeah, it's for everybody. You don't have to live in a certain place or have a

Dia de los Muertos is an ancient cultural tradition that has strong roots in Mexico and is celebrated in many of our Northern Colorado communities. The holiday is celebrated from October 31 to November 2. Not to be confused with All Hallows' Eve — it is a way to honor friends and family who have died. People write and recite satirical poems about the dead, calaveras literarias, which translates to skull literature, and create intricate altars known as ofrendas, or offerings. The holiday is also an opportunity to contemplate heritage, identity, and the Indigenous people in Mesoamerica who first practiced this tradition to honor the cycle of life.We spoke with Justin Veach of the Longmont Museum, which, along with the City of Longmont, has a long-running tradition of Dia de los Muertos festivities. That includes this Thursday night's Noche de Museo at the Stewart Auditorium, an evening of live performances spanning the ages, from ancient Aztec dance to the contemporary Chicano funk of Denver-based Los Mocochete

Election Day is less than a week away and Coloradans are already casting their ballots with early in-person voting at dozens of voting centers. Others are using the hundreds of dropboxes throughout the state, or they’ve already mailed in their votes. All of this happens under the purview of Colorado’s top election official, Secretary of State Jena Griswold. She says she has embraced the mission of making Colorado elections secure and more accessible. And although she says she rarely encounters confusion about how voting works here, there is one misconception that occasionally crops up…"Maybe that there's just too many drop boxes at this point,” Griswold laughed.We invited Griswold on the show to discuss Colorado's ranking as one of the easiest states to cast a vote, and why there really can't be too many dropboxes.If you need to check your voter registration, find your polling location or locate one of those many dropboxes, GoVoteColorado.gov has you covered!

Ghost stories have been on Heather Kelley’s mind for a long time. Kelley is an actor and educator at University of Colorado Boulder where her research focuses on dark tourism, ghosts as manifestations of trauma, and haunted attractions, to name a few. Since the early days of her acting career, Kelley has heard no shortage of haunting tales about the theaters and venues where she’s performed, beginning with her time as an undergraduate student at the Eugene O'Neill Theater Center in Connecticut. “Before I even got there, I had been warned that the place was haunted, that there was a ghost there by the name of Lucy, and that all the people that had worked there for years not only believed in Lucy, but made decisions based off of like, what Lucy would or wouldn't like,” Kelley told In The NoCo. We sat down with Kelley on this All Hallow’s Eve to unwrap that strange feeling some of us get when we spend time in old theaters and other storied places.You can help Kelley deepen her research by filling out this theate

Colorado spends a lot of money on K-12 students, but the state allocates much less for adult education, in fact it's near the bottom of the list nationally. That means some of Colorado’s more economically vulnerable adults aren’t getting the support they need. Chalkbeat higher education reporter Jason Gonzales says some new laws are helping to shift the focus to adult education. He told us about those measures and how state lawmakers are scrambling to repair a problem that could jeopardize some access to adult education.

Nearly 200,000 undocumented people live in Colorado. It’s a life that comes with a lot of uncertainty, especially in accessing things like healthcare. A 2021 law expanded healthcare access for Coloradans regardless of immigration or documentation status. It paved the way for the creation of OmniSalud, which helped connect 10,000 undocumented low-income residents with affordable health insurance last year. With Colorado's open enrollment period right around the corner (Nov. 1), host Erin O'Toole spoke with Dale Whyte, program manager of Boulder County's health coverage enrollment center. 

Water — we know it’s a precious resource; yet in many American households, it’s easy to take it for granted. We turn on our tap and expect a clean gush of H2O to always spill out. But our water supply is shrinking — and the infrastructure helping to quench our thirst is aging. All this could mean the price of our water bills is likely to increase. In some of his recent reporting, KUNC’s Alex Hager dives into some of the factors at play, like the state of the Colorado River and middle-aged utilities. He joins In The NoCo to explain.

Much of what we understand about Elijah McClain — both his life and his death in 2019 at the hands of Aurora police and paramedics — is thanks in large part to people like Candice Bailey. The Aurora activist led many of the protests that introduced Coloradans to McClain, a 23-year-old Black man described by friends and family as gentle, creative and a free spirit. Her work helped people honor McClain’s life and examine the practices of Aurora police and paramedics that led to his death. As trials continue for the officers and paramedics charged for McClain’s death, Bailey joined In The NoCo to reflect on her fight for racial justice.

Yes, winter is just around the corner. But today, let us take just a moment to appreciate flowers — one of the best souvenirs of summer — as we look forward to next year's garden. Many of the annual flower varieties you'll find in garden stores in the spring have just endured a rigorous, real-world testing process at the Annual Flower Trial Garden at Colorado State University. KUNC’s Emma VandenEinde covered the final rounds of plant judging at the end of the summer. She joins In the NoCo to sustain our summer dreams.

Moviegoers in Northern Colorado helped fuel the Barbie phenomenon, not only for big cinema chains, but also infusing mom-and-pop theaters with massive revenue from ticket sales. The Lyric - a local indie theater in Fort Collins - said Barbie was its number one grossing film of all time. Colorado State University professor Karrin Vasby Anderson has been watching this craze unfold. The feminist scholar was astounded when a film full of frills and pink turned out to be about feminism, and wrote about some of the backlash that provoked. She joins In The NoCo to unpack some of the messaging in the billion-dollar blockbuster.

Dozens of Native people have gone missing in Colorado since the state activated a new alert system in late December of last year. But advocates say some of those alerts aren’t going out fast enough. Raven Payment, who is Ojibwe and Kanienkehaka, is on the task force that helped set those alerts in motion through a recent law. She works closely on the crisis of missing and murdered Indigenous people, who face disproportionately high rates of violence. She sat down with In the NoCo to talk about recent strides and setbacks in addressing the problem.