Quick and Dirty

Fluoride stays; Council gets newbies

Nearly 40 percent of the City of Durango’s 10,800 registered voters turned in ballots for Tuesday’s election, which proved to be the most well-attended – and one of the most debated – in City history.

Some 4,900 voters weighed in on five candidates for three open seats on the City Council as well as whether or not to continue adding fluoride to the City’s water supply.

It was perhaps the latter, a debate that has been simmering for years and was brought to the ballot by citizen petition, that drove the higher numbers. In the end, however, residents voted to continue adding fluoride by a large margin of 3,094 to 1,735.

Opponents of the practice, organized as Clean Water Durango, argued that adding fluoride to the city’s water at the least is unnecessary and amount to government overreach, and at the worst, harmful and toxic.

Proponents, who were buoyed by a cash infusion from the Denver-based nonprofit Healthier Colorado that out-paced opponents’ spending by nearly five times, argued that fluoride is proven safe and effective in preventing cavities. It is also particularly important for lower-income families tha may not have access to adequate health care.

Despite the defeat, Clean Water Durango organizers vow to continue the fight. “It’s not over yet,” Jules Masterjohn, one of the group’s members, said Wednesday morning. “We did an awesome job. A lot of people got educated on the subject and we feel like we need to keep pursuing this.”

In the end, she said the loss came down to simple numbers. “The numbers were against us,” she said. “The opposition spent almost $23,000, mostly from outside the city. And we’ve got 70 years of propaganda to fight.”

And while the fight over fluoride may not be over, the battle over three open seats on the City Council is. Melissa Youssef walked away as the top vote-getter Tuesday, garnering 3,565 votes. Incumbent Dean Brookie logged 3,025 votes with Chris Bettin earning 2,368.

Dave McHenry, in his second bid, won 2,126 votes and Tom Eskew had 1,117.

Youssef, who was busy picking up yard signs Wednesday morning, expressed gratitude, and said she was excited to get to work.

“I’m very thankful to the community for its trust, confidence and support,” she said.

Her first few weeks will be spent getting acclimated and oriented to the new job and getting to know her fellow councilors, she said. From there, she would like to tackle the issue of homelessness, a concern that she said came up repeatedly during her campaign.

“I had an overwhelming amount of people very concerned about that and reaching out to offer help,” she said. “We have to have a lot of compassion ... but it also affects our quality of life and character of the town. There are so many different facets.”

Brookie and Bettin were not available for comment Wednesday morning.

The councilors will be sworn into office Tues., April 18.

FOSJ to help fund new forecaster

The avalanche season may be winding down in Colorado, but Friends of the San Juans is already looking ahead to next season – and beyond. The local avi-awareness non-profit recently launched a campaign dubbed the “Avalanche Forecasting Project.” The goal is to raise enough money to supply the San Juan Mountains with an additional avi forecaster.

Currently, the Colorado Avalanche Information Center staffs one backcountry avalanche forecaster for the entire San Juan Mountain region – an area that covers almost 12,000 square miles and is roughly the size of the Swiss Alps. “An additional backcountry forecaster will create more accurate and detailed forecasts in this vast region, which will ultimately offer additional information and tools to support safer backcountry travel,” stated a release from the group.

To that end, FOSJ is hosting an endo-of-the season fundraiser this Thurs., April 6, from 6 – 9 p.m. at the Power-house Science Center. The group hopes to raise $25,000 to help pay for a new forecaster for one season. The evening will also include a presentation on Alex Lowe’s charitable organization in Nepal, the Khumbu Climbing Center.

According to FOSJ, winter recreation in the Colorado backcountry, and the San Juans, has skyrocketed recently. Monitoring of backcountry trailhead parking on the US-550 corridor has found an average of 50 vehicles per day parked at Coal Bank, Molas and Red Mountain pass trail-heads, with nearly 100 vehicles on peak days.

As of mid-February, there were 50 reports of people caught in slides across the state, with eight full burials and one death, according to the CAIC. The CAIC has recorded more than 1,000 avalanches so far this season – with more than half of them occurring in the San Juan Mountains.

For more info., go to www.thesanjuans.org