The region’s growing Hispanic population likely will force county clerks in Pitkin, Eagle and Garfield counties to publish bilingual ballots for the first time ever. And as Hispanics make up a larger and larger population of potential voters, both Democrats and Republicans are looking to Latino voters to boost their parties. Under the 1973 Voting […]
Author Archives: David Frey
Posted inEducation, Land Use
Hispanics Boom in Region, and in Some Towns, Most Children are Hispanic
When Samuel Garcia opened his grocery in New Castle a decade ago, it was a sign of changing times. The town’s old general store became a grocery serving the Latino population at the same time New Castle’s complexion was beginning to change. By 2010, New Castle’s Hispanic population grew five times its size in 2000, […]
Posted inLand Use
After recession, empty homes fill the region
When the recession ended the boom times of the first decade of the 21st Century, it left the lights out in thousands of unoccupied homes across the Roaring Fork and Colorado River valleys. Results of the 2010 U.S. Census show vacancy rates climbed from Aspen to Parachute, largely as a result of new construction outpacing […]
Posted inLand Use
Garfield County, New Castle lead Western Slope growth
In the first decade of the 21st Century, a wave of newcomers filled manufactured houses and million-dollar golf course mansions to make New Castle the fastest-growing town on the Western Slope and put it in the ranks of Colorado’s biggest boomtowns. Garfield County became the state’s fourth fastest-growing county, trailing only the metro suburbs. Neighboring […]