{"id":128342,"date":"2026-05-10T05:00:00","date_gmt":"2026-05-10T11:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/sustainability-is-blueprint-for-local-prosperity\/"},"modified":"2026-05-10T05:00:00","modified_gmt":"2026-05-10T11:00:00","slug":"sustainability-is-blueprint-for-local-prosperity","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/sustainability-is-blueprint-for-local-prosperity\/","title":{"rendered":"Sustainability is blueprint for local prosperity"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><figure class=\"wp-block-image naviga-inline-image naviga-align-left alignleft naviga-size-small\" data-naviga-align=\"left\" data-naviga-size=\"small\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/imengine.public.prod.dur.navigacloud.com\/?uuid=3ba4ce41-a358-5d9b-b360-ebd942a1f4df&#038;function=cover&#038;type=preview&#038;source=false&#038;width=2000\" srcset=\"https:\/\/imengine.public.prod.dur.navigacloud.com\/?uuid=3ba4ce41-a358-5d9b-b360-ebd942a1f4df&#038;function=cover&#038;type=preview&#038;source=false&#038;width=800 800w, https:\/\/imengine.public.prod.dur.navigacloud.com\/?uuid=3ba4ce41-a358-5d9b-b360-ebd942a1f4df&#038;function=cover&#038;type=preview&#038;source=false&#038;width=1200 1200w, https:\/\/imengine.public.prod.dur.navigacloud.com\/?uuid=3ba4ce41-a358-5d9b-b360-ebd942a1f4df&#038;function=cover&#038;type=preview&#038;source=false&#038;width=1800 1800w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 480px) 100vw, (max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 2000px\" width=\"1680\" height=\"958\" alt=\"\" class=\"naviga-image\" loading=\"lazy\" \/><\/figure>\n<p>Sustainability is a matter of community and economic well-being.<\/p>\n<p>You might be rolling your eyes, thinking that sustainability is a bunch of bleeding heart hippie nonsense.<\/p>\n<p>Here are some things to consider.<\/p>\n<p>The sun that shines and the wind that blows in Montezuma County doesn\u2019t have to pass through the Strait of Hormuz. Cortez alone, according to the city\u2019s website, gets over 300 days of sunshine each year.<\/p>\n<p>You could save on gas if we had public transportation. Town planning that favors bikes and pedestrians can help too.<\/p>\n<p>Additionally, locally produced food that doesn\u2019t have to travel as far is less affected by fuel prices. It\u2019s better yet if it was grown without synthetic fertilizers.<\/p>\n<p>Goods sold in thrift stores are also not subject to things like fuel prices.<\/p>\n<p>Healthy forests equal healthy rivers. Stewardship and protection of our forests, especially close to the headwaters of our rivers, is essential for our water supply. If we want to do well for ourselves and if we want our communities and country to thrive, we need to look at how to be environmentally sustainable.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Laurel Smerch<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><em id=\"emphasis-110d70ea0119ebe58e45be97275bdcb8\">Mancos<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Sustainability is a matter of community and economic well-being. You might be rolling your eyes, thinking that sustainability is a bunch of bleeding heart hippie nonsense. Here are some things to consider. The sun that shines and the wind that blows in Montezuma County doesn\u2019t have to pass through the Strait of Hormuz. Cortez alone, [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":13329,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[5820,5819],"tags":[125],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-128342","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-letters-to-the-editor","category-opinion","tag-newsletter-opinion"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/128342","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=128342"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/128342\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/13329"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=128342"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=128342"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=128342"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=128342"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}