Letters to the Editor - The Durango Herald

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Gardner all talk on conservation fund

I just returned from Washington, D.C., speaking to Senator Cory Gardner’s staff. I told them that as a business owner in Central Colorado, I depend upon Colorado’s incredible natural resourc...

DATE: Jul 3, 2018 | CATEGORY: Letters to the Editor

It’s simple: lose the train, lose the tourists

I am not a resident of Durango. I visit there as much as I can. The train brings me and my wallet. I am sure that I am not alone in my love for the D&SNGRR. I make the point that...

DATE: Jul 3, 2018 | CATEGORY: Letters to the Editor

Fire a reminder of importance of clean air

The Herald’s recent article, “Air-quality in Durango measures at ‘hazardous’ levels” (June 11) is scary news for moms across the state. Children are especially sensitive to particulates and ...

DATE: Jul 3, 2018 | CATEGORY: Letters to the Editor

Policies contributed to normalized violence

Normalized violence has so many pieces to its puzzle. Our culture is addicted to violence in legends, games, movies, racism, religion and television. Add to that conflict in high-density hou...

DATE: Jul 1, 2018 | CATEGORY: Letters to the Editor

Blueprint for safe, affordable prescription drugs

As a physician, I have seen the harm to families due to the exorbitant costs of medical care and medications in this area. Having recently worked in New Zealand, which ensures a ...

DATE: Jul 1, 2018 | CATEGORY: Letters to the Editor

Regarding the Supreme Court cake case

As a gay man and a person who tries to follow the teachings of Christ, I find the decision of the Supreme Court to accurately reflect our laws. I do not know why the two men who wanted a wed...

DATE: Jun 30, 2018 | CATEGORY: Letters to the Editor

Is No. 482 to blame for No. 416?

Riding the rails, there are many tales But this the most horrific. Let’s be more specific: Is No. 482 to blame for No. 416? Mandatory evacuations. Ruined v...

DATE: Jun 30, 2018 | CATEGORY: Letters to the Editor

Mexico, U.S. should show compassion

A few months ago, the first busloads of Central American immigrants were camped out on Mexican soil in Tijuana and were processed legally for asylum to legally live in the U.S. The filthy co...

DATE: Jun 30, 2018 | CATEGORY: Letters to the Editor

Congressman Scott Tipton and the NRA

When the National Rifle Association talks, our representative, Scott Tipton, listens. Why? He received substantial campaign contributions from the NRA. In return, he co-sponsored the Conceal...

DATE: Jun 30, 2018 | CATEGORY: Letters to the Editor

Politicians show they can join hands

Thanks to Sen. (Cory) Gardner, Sen. (Michael) Bennet, Congressman (Scott) Tipton and Gov. (John) Hickenlooper for meeting with Durango’s business community recently. I was pleased to see my ...

DATE: Jun 30, 2018 | CATEGORY: Letters to the Editor

Scott Tipton is wrong person for District 3

As the daughter of an evangelical minister, I was taught to love my neighbor, to provide food and shelter to those in need, to welcome the stranger and to uphold the bonds between parents an...

DATE: Jun 30, 2018 | CATEGORY: Letters to the Editor

Scott Tipton beholden to fossil fuel industry

Like most Coloradans, I am interested in seeing our state transition toward a clean renewable energy economy. Benefits include lower energy costs, lower greenhouse gas emissions, better heal...

DATE: Jun 30, 2018 | CATEGORY: Letters to the Editor

Photos: Fort Lewis College commencement ceremony

Photos: Ron Keller Invitational track meetDemons win home meet against local schools on Saturday

Demons win home meet against local schools on Saturday

Photos: Ben Nighthorse Campbell memorial

Photos/video: Scrambling for eggs

Photos: A very welcome spring stormA spring storm Tuesday and Wednesday brought 1 to 2 feet of snow to the San Juan Mountains, including about 17 inches in Silverton, 19 inches at Wolf Creek Pass and 11 inches in Telluride. Meanwhile, the moisture arrived in the form of rain in lower elevations such as Durango, which received more than eight-tenths of an inch of precipitation.

A spring storm Tuesday and Wednesday brought 1 to 2 feet of snow to the San Juan Mountains, includin...

Third No Kings protest in Durango draws thousandsEstimated 3,200 protesters march down Main Avenue

Calls for love and solidarity rebounded through Buckley Park on Saturday afternoon where several thousand protesters gathered for a third No Kings march and rally.The protest, as with previous No Kings events, was held in more than 1,000 towns and cities across the country on Saturday in a movement of defiance against President Donald Trump and his administration.The march began with a rally at Buckley Park and went down Main Avenue to Fifth Street. Organizers said they had all the proper permits in place to close Main Avenue. They limited speakers to half an hour, noting they had a tight timeline to demonstrate in compliance with permits.National No Kings organizers expected the nationwide protests to draw about 9 million people across the country on Saturday, KPTV reported. The last No Kings event in October had an estimated 7 million attendees, and the first No Kings protest in June had about 5 million participants.The Durango Herald estimated 3,200 or more protesters attended the march in Durango on Saturday.

Officers from Durango Police Department were on scene to monitor event and escort the march. Barricades were placed at 13th and 14th streets bordering Buckley Park to keep vehicle traffic out of the staging area.Hecklers appeared to be few and far between. The Herald observed one man riding a bicycle and aggressively shouting “Democracy in action.”A group of teenagers on the 1200 block of Main Avenue watched protesters march by. The Herald observed a teenage girl say to a boy, “Dare me to yell ‘I support Trump?’”One protester passed masks out to participants in Buckley Park, noting a police camera tower placed in the grass near the southwest end of the park.Several speakers rallied the crowd before it marched up Main Avenue.Buckley Park was sparsely populated as of 1 p.m. But over the course of about 30 minutes, hundreds of attendees from the greater Durango area made their way onto the grass, many carrying signs expressing their displeasure with the current administration or demanding accountability.

“Turn the files into trials,” “Make corruption criminal again” and “No kings, no ICE, no liars, no ballrooms, no wars” were just some of the messages displayed on protesters’ signs.The Iran war, the Epstein files and U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement were common grievances with the Trump administration. However, solidarity and community were on protesters’ minds as well.

“It’s just so great to see everybody coming together over a common cause,” said Durango resident Zoey Wisler.She said the protest on Saturday was her first No Kings event and the vibes were “fire” and “immaculate” because she felt welcome and a part of something.“We all have our differences, but at the end of the day we are all human beings,” she said.Durango resident Craig Himmelmann said Congress isn’t doing the job the framers of the U.S. Constitution intended.“They’ve laid down,” he said. “The DOJ (U.S. Department of Justice) is being used against the American people. I don’t see a lot we can do other than this – peaceful demonstrations that will grow and grow and grow, and eventually, our legislators need to wake up and do their jobs or get out.”He said he is optimistic about getting new congresspeople into power through the November midterm elections. The only thing that gives him pause is if the Trump administration were to attempt to suspend elections because of the conflict with Iran.“We were in Vietnam and Afghanistan and no postponement of elections ever took place,” he said. “The elections better not be postponed because there’s no precedent for that, and that’s what I’m concerned about.”

Durango resident Jim Fuge chimed in, saying the United States has never postponed elections because of any conflict – including the American Civil War.Trump has entertained the idea of delaying or canceling elections before, including in a 30-minute interview with Reuters on Jan. 14.“When you think of it, we shouldn't even have an election,” Trump said, according to Reuters.Reuters reported Trump made the comment in the context of his administration’s success – that he is doing so well, midterm elections aren’t necessary.

Fuge said he was concentrated on “unity, energy and understanding you have to fight” on Saturday. “This doesn’t happen by accident. People aren’t here just because they have nothing better to do.”He noted how quickly Buckley Park was filling with people in the span of five to 10 minutes. He said No Kings is about speaking up and voicing one’s concerns. He said he has talked to Trump supporters who are upset about the Iran war – and he would welcome them to attend a No Kings event to voice their thoughts.ADDEDAccording to reporting by Axios, Trump has called the conflict with Iran “a little excursion,” “major combat operations,” a “war” that “has been won” and “both” an excursion and a war.END

One protester from Aztec, who declined to provide their name because they work in the public sector, said Trump lied about lowering gas prices, fixing the economy and releasing the Epstein files.“He was giving his speeches and he made all these promises, and they’ve mostly turned out to be lies,” they said.cburney@durangoherald.com

Estimated 3,200 protesters march down Main Avenue

Bayfield High School students win big in robotics, animatronicsSelf-designed projects catch attention among competitors’ kit-made creations at state championship

Bayfield High School students took home big wins last month at the Denver Technology Student Association State Championships. Eight students from BHS brought back team wins, including first and second place in the robotics category, first place in animatronics and a top-five finish in System Control – three of more than 35 technology-related categories students could enter in the competition. The Bayfield Technology Student Association – or TSA – chapter was also awarded a Gold Chapter of Excellence Award. “We are extremely proud of these kids,” said Brian McDonagh, an engineering instructor and TSA adviser. TSA is “a national nonprofit career and technical student organization of middle and high school students engaged in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics,” according to the nonprofit’s website. The organization focuses on supplying on-the-ground experiences to students to prepare them for careers in the STEM and tech fields. The Bayfield School District has been involved with TSA for X years. Around X number of students from schools across Colorado competed at State. More than 1,500 students competed at State, McDonagh said. What set Bayfield apart from its competitors, he said, was the students’ made-from-scratch designs. Many competitors used premade VEX Robotics kits for their creations, McDonagh said, whereas his students designed, 3D printed and assembled every piece of their projects from the ground up.

“Ninety-nine percent of every other schools, they buy a kit and they assemble the kit, kind of like Legos,” he said. “... And our kids, they design it completely from scratch and customize everything, and they just dominate.” Seniors Reese Appenzeller, Parker Perkerewicz and Wyatt Hefner took home first place in robotics for their remote controlled vehicle named RAM ROD, which the team has been working on and improving for around two years. RAM ROD won second at last years’ State competition.

Seniors Kylynd Parrish and Tyler Berry and juniors Julian Polanco and Taj Houpt also entered a remote-controlled vehicle in this years’ competition and took home second place. The robotic vehicles had to prove they were hardy and well-programmed by navigating a complex course filled with obstacles and tasks. Two students, each holding a remote, had to work together to dual-operate one robot. The robots were carefully designed by the students to navigate the course smoothly and effectively, McDonagh said, and practice routes were set up in the classroom before the group headed to Denver for the competition. “Every element of the robot – for example, the drivetrain, the gears, the material used for the wheels – they’ve all been designed and carefully chosen,” he said. “And (the students have) iterated on their designs multiple times to get the most effective design.” Kylynd, Tyler, Julian and Taj, along with classmate Riley Murphy, were also behind the school’s first place animatronics creation – a scale model theater depicting the 1969 Apollo 11 moon landing.

The small theater featured self-parting curtains, a moving astronaut floating through ‘space’ and a spacecraft that gently came to rest on the surface of the faux moon. Audio of Neil Armstrong’s famous quote – “That’s one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind” – was programmed into the theater and played over the scene. Like the process for making the robots, each step of designing, assembling and programming the scene was done from scratch by the students. The project took several months to complete, the team said, and involved a fair share of complications, setbacks, trial and error, and sleepless nights. The animatronic required last-minute adjustments right up until the day of competition, the team said. “It took a lot of failure and redesign – a bunch of iterations – to finally get to our final product,” Taj said. “… With the stage design, the one you see right now, it used to be half the size, but to account for the hydraulics, we had to double the size.” . And originally, it was going to be a movie stage, kind of making fun of the idea that the moon landing was fake – the conspiracy – but since we doubled the size, we actually made it based off the NASA Vehicle Assembly building.” The animatronic creation wasn’t the only project that saw failures as well as wins leading up to State, McDonagh said. “They have built (these projects) several times, stress-tested various elements of systems. … They’ve blown things up by accident, through trial and error, and learning the hard way about voltages, and the importance of using the right voltages,” he said. In addition to catching the attention of State judges, the students’ made-from-scratch designs helped cultivate an inside-out understanding of what was being built, and what needed to be changed and adapted when issues arose, Wyatt said.

“(At Bayfield,) we have that drive of, ‘It’s better if you do it yourself,’” he said. “Everything we did in-house. The motors on here, it was me who soldered these all together. … I think that’s why we’re so successful, is because we know the insides and outs of our robot. We have that drive to make everything better.” Bayfield’s TSA students said the win proved that students from small, rural schools can be just as successful as those from bigger, more metropolitan districts. “All these other schools in the Denver area that have ‘STEM’ or ‘Tech’ in their names (competed), and we single-handedly got first and second podium,” Kylynd said. “We can compete, you know? We’re just as good as all these other schools with ‘STEM’ (in their name,) if not better.”Wyatt agreed. “ (At State) they saw what we're doing here at Bayfield,” he said. “We're a school with 400 kids, right – and then we go and just pump out that success. Especially in robotics, that's something that you wouldn't quite (expect), especially against 5A schools.” Students from the Bayfield and Durango school districts competed in the TSA regionals in Durango in January. The Bayfield state champs will be going to the national competition in Washington in June. Fresh off their wins, Kylynd, Tyler, Julian, Taj, Riley, Wyatt and Reese are already looking forward to how they can improve their creations for Nationals.

Improving the strength of the remote-controlled robots and working on making the animatronic creation look more lifelike are on the to-do list before June, Taj said; but the group is also taking time to celebrate their accomplishments and express gratitude for the mentors and faculty – like McDonagh, Principal Jason Wayman and Vice Principal Andy Duffy – who helped them achieve their wins. “(We’re) so proud, and we’re extremely thankful for the people that have helped us,” he said. epond@durangoherald.com

Self-designed projects catch attention among competitors’ kit-made creations at state championship

Photos: Demons track and field hosts Durango Dust Off meet to begin season

Photos: FLC men’s basketball wins RMAC playoff game against Adams State

Gardner all talk on conservation fund

It’s simple: lose the train, lose the tourists

Fire a reminder of importance of clean air

Policies contributed to normalized violence

Blueprint for safe, affordable prescription drugs

Regarding the Supreme Court cake case

Is No. 482 to blame for No. 416?

Mexico, U.S. should show compassion

Congressman Scott Tipton and the NRA

Politicians show they can join hands

Scott Tipton is wrong person for District 3

Scott Tipton beholden to fossil fuel industry

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