{"id":63929,"date":"2018-07-26T16:57:09","date_gmt":"2018-07-26T22:57:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/we-can-agree-candidates-for-governor-vow-to-continue-some-of-hickenloopers-work\/"},"modified":"2018-07-26T22:57:09","modified_gmt":"2018-07-26T22:57:09","slug":"we-can-agree-candidates-for-governor-vow-to-continue-some-of-hickenloopers-work","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/we-can-agree-candidates-for-governor-vow-to-continue-some-of-hickenloopers-work\/","title":{"rendered":"We can agree: Candidates for governor vow to continue some of Hickenlooper\u2019s work"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"FILE
FILE \u2013 In this May 4, 2017, file photo, workers dismantle the charred remains of a house where an explosion killed two people in Firestone, Colo. (AP Photo\/Brennan Linsley, File)<\/span>du1-i-syn<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Take the Endangered Species Act. Signed into law by President Nixon in 1973, it\u2019s never ceased to be controversial. Forty-five years later, it\u2019s under new and fierce attacks by politicians and industry that hope to lock in reductions to the act before possible setbacks in midterm elections.<\/p>\n

At the federal level, this can be a lot of political sound and fury that signifies little about whether our drinking water will be safe tomorrow. At the state level, at least in Colorado, sometimes it\u2019s a different story.<\/p>\n

Gov. John Hickenlooper, for example, has been working to address the hazards posed by the state\u2019s abandoned oil and gas wells. He just took another step in that direction, ordering state regulators to accelerate well cleanups and study whether the bonds that oil and gas producers now must post are big enough to cover future costs of plugging wells, should that be necessary.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s a sound initiative for Southwest Colorado, where there are numerous abandoned wells. Just because we\u2019re talking about action at the state rather than the national level doesn\u2019t guarantee that politics won\u2019t keep us from doing the right thing. In this case, however, we see a commonsensical consensus.<\/p>\n

Hickenlooper will be leaving office soon. Jared Polis, a Democrat, and Walker Stapleton, a Republican, are vying to replace him in what should be a lively contest. The race, The New York Times noted yesterday in a profile of Stapleton, \u201chas turned into a nationally watched contest that is largely viewed as a test of the political direction of one of the purplest states in the nation.\u201d<\/p>\n

So, we asked both campaigns where the candidates stand on efforts to clean up wells.<\/p>\n

Specifically, we told each candidate that we wanted to know \u201cwhether as governor, you would support and extend Hickenlooper\u2019s executive order to prioritize the cleanup of orphaned oil and gas wells; whether you would seek the means to pay the approximately $25 million Hickenlooper says it will take now to clean up those wells; and whether you would toughen or increase the bonding requirements for oil and gas producers.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cJared supports Gov. Hickenlooper\u2019s executive order and will continue to implement it if he is elected,\u201d Polis\u2019 spokesperson, Mara Sheldon, told us. \u201cThis is exactly the kind of sensible policy to strengthen health and safety that we all should be able to agree on and get done.\u201d<\/p>\n

In a statement provided by Stapleton\u2019s spokesperson, he said, \u201cI commend the effort to clean up orphan wells in order to protect our environment and I will continue to pursue this policy as governor. This is a great example where different stakeholders came together to craft a workable solution.\u201d<\/p>\n

No matter who our next governor is, the good work continues \u2013 in at least this one area. And we would be remiss if we didn\u2019t give Hickenlooper at least some of the credit for that.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u2013 In this May 4, 2017, file photo, workers dismantle the charred remains of a house where an explosion killed two people in Firestone, Colo. (AP Photo\/Brennan Linsley, File)du1-i-syn Take the Endangered Species Act. Signed into law by President Nixon in 1973, it\u2019s never ceased to be controversial. Forty-five years later, it\u2019s under new […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":63930,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[125],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-63929","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-newsletter-opinion"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/63929","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=63929"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/63929\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/63930"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=63929"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=63929"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=63929"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=63929"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}