“It s important to have diversity throughout all of these roles across the valley, whether it s at a nonprofit or a government function, because the value is that you re going to have diversity in response,” said Ramirez with Voces Unidas de las Montañas “United Voices of the Mountains.”
The group formed in May 2020 to address what it saw was a lack of support for Latinos in Eagle, Garfield and Pitkin counties. They began by sharing information about COVID-19 in the pandemic’s early stages, though the focus soon grew to include wildfires.
On Aug. 10, 2020, after a dry and warm spring, the Grizzly Creek Fire ignited in the Glenwood Canyon in Garfield County. It would grow to burn more than 32,600 acres, and serve as a prequel to even larger wildfires that would burn and scar Colorado.
An Eagle County crew completes a section of the Eagle Valley Trail during 2019. While the county’s budget for 2021 is a conservative spending plan, $2.4 million has been allocated to complete an EagleVail section of the trail, which will eventually run the length of the valley. (Daily file photo)
In these uncertain times it can be difficult to figure out household spending from one week to the next, so planning a $131 million budget for 2021 presents a unique challenge for Eagle County. a spending plan that anticipates a 15% drop in sales tax receipts at the beginning of the year and flat revenues over the coming 12 months as the county, nation and world hopefully begins its emergence into a post-COVID-19 era.