The Roundup | Award-winning journalism, the water desk goes live

Greetings from Aspen Journalism as we welcome the month of May. We’ve got a lot going on in this newsletter, starting with an announcement that our team was recognized with seven awards in the Society of Professional Journalists’ Top of the Rockies competition, where newsrooms from across Colorado, Utah, Wyoming and New Mexico put up their best work to be judged by our peers. It’s an honor to see AJ’s four core desks recognized.

Looking for an excuse to get over to the Grand Valley next week? Join us on Wednesday evening at Colorado Mesa University in Grand Junction for a special live event in collaboration with the Ruth Powell Hutchins Water Center, when Heather Sackett will lead an expert panel discussion titled “Confront Scarcity on the Colorado River.”

And read on below for a heavy dose of the latest local, in-depth and investigative news coverage you expect from Aspen Journalism This breadth of coverage is possible because we are an independent, nonprofit newsroom with growing support from our community. As always, thank you for valuing in-depth, local journalism that connects Aspen, the Roaring Fork Valley and beyond.

– Curtis Wackerle
Editor and Executive Director
Aspen Journalism

Aspen Journalism wins seven awards in 2026 Top of the Rockies Contest

AJ reporters recognized across the categories of business enterprise reporting, climate reporting, legal news, general reporting for a series or package, arts & entertainment, information graphic, and social justice.

April 30, 2026

“It is an honor to have six journalists writing for Aspen Journalism awarded, showcasing the strength of our freelance team, full-time journalists and editors — and the efficiency and efficacy of our model.”

Continue reading…

As the worst snowpack and runoff in decades threatens to strain our already scarce shared water resources, how we manage and conserve water has never been more important.  This conversation, presented in collaboration with Colorado Mesa University’s Ruth Powell Hutchins Water Center, brings together expert voices from across key water-use sectors — agriculture, municipal, and environmental stewardship — to explore how each is navigating uncertainty and adapting to change. 

Panelists include Tina Bergonzini, general manager of the Grand Valley Water Users Association; Ben Hoffman, Water Treatment Superintendent and Operator in Responsible Charge of treatment for the Ute Water Conservancy District; Matt Rice, southwest regional director of American Rivers; and Raquel Flinker, director of interstate and regional water resources for the Colorado River District. Aspen Journalism Water Desk Editor Heather Sackett will moderate.

Location: 
Colorado Mesa University, University Center – UC West Ballroom, 1455 N 12th St, Grand Junction, CO 81501.  The University Center building is #61 on the linked Campus Map.

Date and Time: 
Wed., May 6. Doors at 5:15 p.m., panel at 5:30 p.m. and will wrap up by 7 p.m.

Four Aspen Journalism social justice stories examine immigration enforcement, surveillance and housing pressures on Colorado’s Western Slope. Reporting revealed repeated ICE detention-limit violations that split officials before a permit revocation likely to spur legal conflict. Other coverage shows police scaling back license-plate data sharing amid immigration concerns, and a California firm’s $70 million purchase of seven mobile home parks raising affordability questions. The collaborative desk’s work underscores tensions between federal authority, local policy and community impacts. 

Aspen Journalism’s three-part history series by Tim Cooney traces the turbulent rise and fall of B. Clark Wheeler, a central figure in Aspen’s early mining era. From claim-jumping Ute City and renaming it Aspen to trading silver prospects, Wheeler helped shape the town’s origins. As mayor, his ambition and volatility defined a life marked by personal loss, risky ventures and public clashes. The series — perhaps the strongest effort to date to write B. Clark Wheeler’s biography —  follows his eventual decline amid collapsing silver markets, financial ruin and illness, portraying a complex, driven figure whose outsized influence mirrored the boom-and-bust cycles of the American West.

Aspen Journalism’s Heather Sackett’s reporting chronicles a deepening drought crisis across Colorado driven by record-low snowpack and extreme spring heat. Coverage explores how water managers will cope with record low flows through a critical stretch of river for endangered fish. A March heat wave led to an unbelievably accelerated snowmelt, with rivers peaking early and runoff sharply reduced. In response, Denver Water and Xcel Energy enacted a temporary agreement to boost Front Range diversions. Meanwhile, the Colorado River District considers emergency measures, including limiting water contracts and managing scarce reservoir supplies, as Western Slope communities brace for critical shortages.

Spring and summer use on the North Star Nature Preserve may look different moving forward, as the new management plan emphasizes balancing recreation with ecological protection, introducing a “peak-use” policy to limit crowding during high-traffic periods. The plan includes 39 indicators to track environmental health and guide adaptive management, reflecting a stronger commitment to conservation while maintaining public access.

These stories from the social justice desk are translated and published in Spanish.

Our data desk provides a one-stop shop to stay up to date on real time snowpack and streamflow measurements across the Roaring Fork region.

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