Over the last few decades, the Boulder County Commissioners have been particularly astute in creating oil and gas regulations that provide maximum health and environmental protections without overreaching and provoking court rulings that would limit their flexibility and authority.

In the time of the novel coronavirus, decision-making bodies on local environmental issues are all on hold while local and state governments concentrate on those parts of the crisis for which they have to assume responsibility.

Black-tailed prairie dogs once occupied a territory hundreds of miles wide, stretching from Mexico to Canada. We have now converted nearly all of that grassland to cropland for wheat, corn, other crops; pastures of European grasses; or paved it over for homes and shopping centers. We also introduced sylvatic plague (bubonic plague in humans), a disease that did not exist in North America and for which prairie dogs are not evolved to deal with.