{"id":16089,"date":"2025-10-16T21:59:26","date_gmt":"2025-10-16T21:59:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/former-la-plata-commissioner-welcomed-as-interim-dolores-attorney\/"},"modified":"2026-03-31T03:53:31","modified_gmt":"2026-03-31T03:53:31","slug":"former-la-plata-commissioner-welcomed-as-interim-dolores-attorney","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/former-la-plata-commissioner-welcomed-as-interim-dolores-attorney\/","title":{"rendered":"Former La Plata commissioner welcomed as interim Dolores attorney"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Julie
Julie Westendorff (left) with Gwen Lachelt, former La Plata County commissioners. In October, Dolores trustees appointed Westendorff as interim town attorney, succeeding Jon Kelly. (Jerry McBride\/The Durango Herald)<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>\n

The Dolores Board of Trustees welcomed a new interim town attorney on Monday, marking the end of Jon Kelly\u2019s six-year tenure.<\/p>\n

Trustees appointed Julie Westendorff, a La Plata County commissioner from 2013 to 2021<\/a>, serve as the town\u2019s attorney through January at the latest.<\/p>\n

Kelly, who has held the role since 2018<\/a>, will continue to handle legal matters in Dolores Municipal Court, he said. He grew up in Cortez and has worked in U.S. District Court, U.S. Bankruptcy Court for Colorado and the Ute Mountain Ute Tribal Court, according to a biography on his firm\u2019s website. His service to the town is ending.<\/p>\n

Looking ahead, the trustees will form a three-member committee to find a new full-time attorney, said Town Manager Leigh Reeves.<\/p>\n

Westendorff joined Monday\u2019s regular meeting via video chat to introduce herself.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think I\u2019m bringing a good background that\u2019ll match what Dolores needs right now in that I\u2019m certainly well acquainted with southwestern Colorado and your town,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

After serving as a La Plata County commissioner, Westendorff said she worked for the Durango-based law firm Maynes, Bradford, Shipps and Sheftel. That firm has long represented the Southern Ute Tribe, she said.<\/p>\n

She has also done legal work for Park County and for special districts in the Denver region, she said. As La Plata commissioner, she worked with Montezuma County commissioners as well.<\/p>\n

\u201cHaving been a commissioner, I\u2019m a nerd about local government,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

Westendorff said that if Dolores were engaged in litigation, she would not represent the town. She said she\u2019s better positioned to handle day-to-day tasks or emergency needs, but not extended litigation.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s more being a Band-Aid to get you to your next attorney than maybe necessarily moving a lot of balls forward,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Westendorff enters the role temporarily as town attorney after Jon Kelly steps aside<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":16090,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[28,29],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-16089","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-headlines","tag-newsletter"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16089","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=16089"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16089\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":20009,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16089\/revisions\/20009"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/16090"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16089"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16089"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16089"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=16089"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}