Three Republican candidates seeking a seat on the Montezuma County commission largely agreed on many issues at a forum Monday night, but expressed some key differences.
Candidates Bonnie Anderson, Rodney Cox, and Diane Fox-Spratlen spoke before an audience of about 50 at an event sponsored by the Montezuma County Republican Central Committee.
They are seeking to become the GOP candidate to replace Jim Candelaria, who is term-limited.
The winner of the June 30 Republican primary will face Democrat Rebecca Busic in the general election.
All three said they support the 1 percent sales tax that has been proposed by the board, but Anderson said there should be exemptions from the tax for more items than agricultural equipment, which is how the tax now stands. She said food and utilities should also be exempted.
“No candidate ever wants to say ‘I’m in favor of raising your tax’,” Fox-Spratlen said. “Is it necessary? Probably.”
The revenues from the proposed tax would be split between the Sheriff’s Office and the Road and Bridge Department, and Fox-Spratlen said that would make the county safer.
“Without a safe community, people don’t want to stay here; they don’t want to visit here,” she said.
Cox said he would support the sales tax, adding that “property taxes right now are not a level playing field” because the Ute Mountain Ute Tribe doesn’t pay property taxes on its reservation land, churches don’t pay them, and people who rent property don’t (directly) pay them.
With a county sales tax, Cox said, the 475,000 people who visited Mesa Verde last year would contribute to the county’s revenues.
Anderson said splitting the tax revenues between the Sheriff’s Office and road department makes sense, but she wants to see a detailed plan for how the money would be spent.
In answer to an audience question, all three candidates voiced concerns about mail-in voting but didn’t say they would seek to eliminate it.
Cox said mail-in voting provides “an opportunity for fraud,” adding, “I’ve seen some things at the national level that I’m not sure how could be possible without a little fraud.”
He said he prefers voting “the old-fashioned way” by walking into a booth, but mail-in voting is convenient and he utilizes it. He said he would support the county clerk in what she wanted to do regarding voting.
Fox-Spratlen said she thinks Congress should pass the SAVE Act. “We need voter ID – that’s just common sense,” she said.
The Senate has so far balked at passing the act, which would use an algorithm to purge supposedly ineligible people from voter rolls and would then require them to provide birth certificates or passports to vote.
Fox-Spratlen said she didn’t know whether it would actually be possible to undo mail-in voting.
She said ballots for two of her children who served in the military came to her house and she could have filled them out herself and turned them in, though of course she hadn’t. However, she noted that mail-in ballots require signatures, which are scrupulously checked at the clerk and recorder’s office.
Anderson said she wants more facts, such as how many elderly people who don’t have a vehicle rely on mail-in ballots. She said she understands the SAVE Act’s purpose but the current election system is “pretty good.”
“I would refer to the people that are the experts and get their opinion,” Anderson said.
Anderson, who was head of the county weed department until she was terminated in 2023, was more critical of the current commissioners than her opponents.
She repeatedly called for more transparency from the board, saying that if elected, she will have regular office hours.
Fox-Spratlen said she will have office hours. She said the county is “in pretty decent shape” because of the way the commissioners have managed funds over the years
Anderson also was critical of the commission’s handling of the road department, which she said has high turnover, and a plan to sell some graders.
She said the nine graders the county has are each assigned to a route to cover when there is heavy snowfall, and selling any of them would mean some routes would not be plowed.
Cox and Fox-Spratlen both said the graders the county is planning to sell are antiquated.
When the candidates could ask each other questions, Fox-Spratlen asked, “Do you feel the commissioners are not being transparent?”
Anderson said there needs to be more easily accessible, meaningful information that gets to the public without making them attend meetings. “The more information, the better,” she said. “You can’t over-communicate”
Cox, who is retired, said he attends all the commissioners’ meetings and work sessions, as well as Planning and Zoning meetings.
“The only people I haven’t seen at those meetings is you guys,” he said to Anderson and Fox-Spratlen, both of whom have jobs but who said they would quit those if elected.
Cox said he would make himself available to the public and would do reports. He said he does believe the current commissioners are being transparent.
Cox also said whoever is elected will need to learn the job rapidly.
“In two years we’re going to lose 40 years of experience,” Cox said.
Candelaria has served eight years on the board, while Gerald Koppenhafer and Kent Lindsay have both served 16 years.
The candidates were asked whether the county land-use code sufficiently protects private property rights with respect to uses such as solar farms and dollar stores.
Anderson said the code is good and provides needed flexibility, but the comprehensive plan, which was adopted in 1997, needs to be updated so that it recommends the type of industries that are important for the county.
“We can’t support data centers,” Anderson said.
Anderson also said the county needs to hire people to enforce its land-use regulations.
Fox-Spratlen said private property rights are paramount. “I’m not going to tell somebody what they can and can’t do on their land” as long as it’s not detrimental to the neighbors, she said.
In regard to things such as dollar stores, Fox-Spratlen said, “That’s why public input is so important.”
Cox said he thinks that legally, a proposed Dollar General store should be permitted where it is proposed, on N Road, “but I don’t want it there.”
He said for the county to get involved in regulating blight, a problem that has come before the commission, would be opening a can of worms.
“I like my tractors even though they don’t run,” he said. “I want them on my land.”
