Most people who live in La Plata County don’t like it when people from outside the county try to dictate what we should and shouldn’t do with our laws, resources, schools, etc.
As a fifth-generation resident of Southwest Colorado, count me as one of those people. Yet that is exactly what the billionaire Koch brothers are trying to do.
Recently, their foundation, the so-called “Americans For Prosperity,” hired a staff person here in Durango to push their agenda. What is their agenda? No regulations at all for oil and gas drilling or for mining.
If you are a farmer who doesn’t want an oil well drilled ten feet away from your house, the Kochs figure that’s just too bad.
If you want your kids to have clean drinking water and don’t want mining waste dumped directly into streams, the Kochs think your opinion doesn’t count.
Now they’re even trying to get rid of at least one of our county commissioners with a recall campaign. Why? Because she thinks that La Plata County residents should have a say in how oil and gas extraction and mining are done in our county.
Tell the Koch brothers to buzz off back to New York and Kansas and let La Plata County residents decide for themselves who our elected officials should be and what regulations we enact here.
And while you’re at it, tell them they should rename their foundation “Americans for the Koch’s Prosperity,” because that’s what it really is.
Ann Emigh
Durango
