2025 brought a fair share of stories throughout Colorado, from the Eastern Plains to the Western Slope — none may have been more captivating than a murder trial in Centennial this summer.

After three weeks of testimony, a jury found former Aurora dentist James Craig guilty of murdering his wife Angela in 2023 with lethal doses of several chemicals, including cyanide, arsenic and tetrahydrozoline — the active ingredient in Visine.

During the trial, two of Craig’s six children, all with Angela, took the stand and recounted their relationship with their father and late mother. One of the defendant’s daughters, Annabelle, spoke of how her father directed her from jail to frame her mother’s death as a suicide.

Craig’s trial wasn’t the only thing that kept people glued to their screens this summer. On the Western Slope, the Lee fire grew to become one of the largest in state history, feasting on a plethora of dry fuel to move rapidly and evade crews.

Multiple towns in the area were evacuated for days as responders worked to quell the blaze through indirect means, utilizing dozer lines to contain and suffocate the fire.

That tactic nearly wasn’t enough: At one point, the blaze came within a half mile of the small town of Meeker, about 40 miles north of Rifle. Even though the blaze was able to jump across Highway 13 — an unexpected turn of events — a change in the wind helped crews keep it at bay without coming into contact with the town.

Thankfully, the highways through Meeker were in good enough condition that responders were able to access the town without any trouble. The same couldn’t be said on the Eastern Plains.

With Colorado facing a $1.2 billion budget deficit to begin the year, the state government cut over $140 million allocated to the Colorado Department of Transportation, including $65 million for state highway funds. It pre-emptively also slashed funds allocated to roadway repair in 2026.

That move was just the latest in a slew of decisions made at the state level to kick the can down the road when it comes to Colorado’s state highway maintenance and repair. Declining revenues from a tax fund supposed to help solve the issue and the ever-increasing cost of construction materials have made the department more reliant than ever on state money to maintain its highway network.

The decision by Gov. Jared Polis further cemented the idea that his priorities lie more on the Front Range than they do in any other part of the state, said state Sen. Byron Pelton.

“When they talk about the rural-urban divide, the conversation begins right with the roads,” Pelton said.