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The environment desk at Aspen Public Radio covers issues in the Roaring Fork Valley and throughout the state of Colorado including water use and quality, impact of recreation, population growth and oil and gas development. APR’s Environment Reporter is Elizabeth Stewart-Severy.

Aspen City Council makes its voice heard at the nation’s capital

Courtesy of Ann Mullins

Aspen city councilmember Ann Mullins was among elected representatives from five mountain communities who traveled to Washington D.C. last week. They were there with the advocacy group Mountain Pact.

 

Mullins and officials from Frisco, Avon, Telluride and Bend, Oregon, met with senators and representatives, as well as with senior officials at agencies like the Department of the Interior. This is the second year that Mullins has traveled to the Capitol with Mountain Pact; last year, the group successfully pushed for completion of a report that shows that outdoor recreation contributes nearly $400 billion to the economy annually. Much of that recreation happens on federal lands.

“It points out the importance of keeping these lands healthy, keeping them managed at the federal level and funneling money toward maintenance,” Mullins said.

This year, the group pointed to that economic influence to argue for three policy points. They want congress to ensure that oil and gas leasing goes through substantial environmental review. They also pushed for long-term renewal of the Land and Water Conservation Fund, which is financed by royalties from oil and gas companies, and they advocated for maintaining the Bureau of Land Management methane waste rule.

 

Aspen native Elizabeth Stewart-Severy is excited to be making a return to both the Red Brick, where she attended kindergarten, and the field of journalism. She has spent her entire life playing in the mountains and rivers around Aspen, and is thrilled to be reporting about all things environmental in this special place. She attended the University of Colorado with a Boettcher Scholarship, and graduated as the top student from the School of Journalism in 2006. Her lifelong love of hockey lead to a stint working for the Colorado Avalanche, and she still plays in local leagues and coaches the Aspen Junior Hockey U-19 girls.