Today is July 1, 2024, and here’s what you need to know:

Protection or overreach? In western Colorado, national monument proposal ignites controversy

Sean Pond was around a small town of his native western Colorado when he spotted a man in a blue ball cap. Above the bill were the words at the center of an ongoing controversy: “PROTECT THE DOLORES.”

Pond approached the man.

“He said someone at REI just gave it to him and he liked it,” Pond recalls, “but he had no idea what it meant.”

Protection or overreach? In western Colorado, national monument proposal ignites controversy

Sean Pond was around a small town of his native western Colorado when he spotted a man in a blue ball cap. Above the bill were the words at the center of an ongoing controversy: “PROTECT THE DOLORES.”

Pond approached the man.

“He said someone at REI just gave it to him and he liked it,” Pond recalls, “but he had no idea what it meant.”

In Colorado, when and how police bodycam footage is released depends on the department

The nine shootings involving officers throughout Denver metro stretching from Lakewood to Arapahoe County since April 29 underscored police departments’ differences in their levels of responses to media inquiries and in their policies governing the release of body camera footages. 

With each shooting leading to a multi-agency investigation that sometimes take up to six weeks to complete, individual police departments said they juggle releasing information to the public and maintaining a fair process for those involved.

Some, including the families of individuals shot by officers, do not believe the response is clear enough. Police officials said it’s a balancing act.  

Study: Fentanyl-related deaths cost Colorado estimated $16 billion last year

It takes two milligrams of fentanyl to be fatal.

A record 425.6 kilograms of fentanyl, enough to kill 36 times the state’s population, was seized in Colorado in 2023 by the Drug Enforcement Administration Rocky Mountain Field Division.

That year, Colorado had a staggering $16 billion in costs associated with fentanyl-related overdose deaths, according to a recent study by the Common Sense Institute.

“Colorado’s fentanyl problem is growing, and it is increasingly costly,” CSI representatives said.

Delayed surgeries. A mass staff exodus. A culture of fear. New IG reports outline issues at Aurora VA hospital

The Department of Veterans Affairs hospital in Aurora has stopped all cardiac surgeries for 11 months amid an exodus of clinical staff and leadership problems that created a culture of fear. 

That is according to two VA Office of Inspector General reports released last week. The documents outlined the problems that led to numerous clinical leaders departing the Rocky Mountain Regional VA Medical Center while regional leadership remained unaware or unengaged. In addition, the VA’s central offices were not notified that cardiac surgeries at the medical center were shut down, according to a report.

The leaders who left included the chief of hospital medicine, the chief of hematology and oncology, the chief of cardiothoracic surgery and the chief of anesthesiology, among others. All but one of the cardiac surgical staff resigned. The other employee was fired.