Democratic nominee for Colorado's House District 58 disqualified from ballot due to paperwork issue
Alec Lindeman was the Democratic nominee for Colorado’s House District 58– until this past Tuesday. As it turns out, Democratic Party officers failed to file proper paperwork to put him on the ballot.
The Telluride Times reports that Susannah Smith actually ran for the seat in the primary, but only as a “placeholder.” She always intended to withdraw from the race once Democrats found a viable candidate.
Lindeman, who serves as the executive director of the Crested Butte Mountain Theater, stepped up. The Democratic Party House District 58 Vacancy Committee was in charge of filing paperwork with the Secretary of State to withdraw Smith, and have Lindeman replace her on the ballot. But, according to the Secretary of State, that paperwork wasn’t received until more than two months after the vacancy committee meeting. The Times says the Secretary of State’s office accepted Smith's withdrawal, but the vacancy committee missed the July deadline for submitting Lindeman's appointment.
The district represents eight counties stretching from Cortez to Crested Butte, and skews to the right. Incumbent State Representative Larry Don Suckla (sook-la) won his initial election in 2024 with 54.6% of the vote. Since there is now no Democratic nominee, Suckla is running unopposed.
The house district and vacancy committee chair, Jim Starr, explained that he was notified of the missing forms last week, and though he was initially convinced that he had sent them in, he realized that he had confused them with a different set of paperwork. Starr took full responsibility for the error, and said he thought Lindeman “had a long, but possible, shot at winning the race, and that makes the situation even more difficult.”
Lindeman told the Telluride Times that he plans to run again in 2028.
CPW euthanizes a bear that was critically ill from eating trash in Durango
And in wildlife news, Colorado Parks and Wildlife had to euthanize a bear in Durango last weekend that had gotten sick from eating trash.
CPW was contacted about a black bear in someone’s yard that appeared lethargic and unresponsive to human presence. When District Wildlife Manager Luke Clancy arrived, he heard the bear moaning and observed it was incredibly bloated. It was unable to move aside from standing up and pivoting from one side to another.
After darting the bear and performing a health assessment, three CPW officers made the decision to euthanize the roughly 300-pound male bear.
The officers conducted a field necropsy and discovered the stomach and upper intestine were completely blocked with trash, including entire plastic garbage bags and at least 10 non-flushable cleaning wipes.
Clancy says, “We had not seen this bear since 2012, when it was caught during the research study in Durango. We estimated this bear was now 18 years old. It’s a pretty horrible way to die for a wild bear that we hadn’t seen involved in any conflict or nuisance behavior in all these years.”
District Wildlife Manager Stephanie Taylor noted the plastic was so compacted in the upper intestine that the bear no longer would have been able to digest food and would have slowly starved to death over the course of months if it didn’t die from illness or infection sooner.
This is a sad reminder that bears finding their way into residential areas and accessing trash cans is not only unsafe for humans, but also unsafe for the bears themselves. CPW says this incident is an urgent reminder to the public – residents, visitors and business owners alike – to properly secure trash to avoid human-bear conflict.
Trump administration considering taking gray wolves off the endangered species list
Last week, President Trump signed an executive order directing the Department of the Interior to look into whether gray wolves should be taken off the endangered species list.
It’s something Western lawmakers have previously tried to do through Congress.
Rocky Mountain Community Radio’s Caroline Llanes has more.
Delta Egyptian Theatre celebrating new projector with film festival
The projector at the Delta Egyptian Theatre failed during the showing of a film over Mother’s Day weekend. The failure initiated an intensive fundraising campaign to replace the vital piece of equipment.
To celebrate the new projector and the 98th Anniversary of the iconic theatre the local non-profit that manages the venue will host the Delta Egyptian Theatre Film Festival. The festival is made possible with support from the Colorado Office of Film, Television and Media.
For KVNF, Lisa Young spoke with Bryan Wade, Theatre and Film Manager about the one day event taking place on Saturday, September 26th.
