Cortez Police Department

The Cortez Police Department recognized the bravery and dedication of numerous officers and dispatchers in its first annual awards ceremony Thursday night.

An investigation is ongoing into a report of a student with a gun in the vicinity of Montezuma-Cortez High School on Tuesday. Cortez police are asking local high-school students and their parents for help in the matter.

Thursday night's massive Fourth of July fireworks display by the City of Cortez ended abruptly because of gunfire in the middle of the celebration. According to the Cortez Police Department, a 17-year-old has been arrested in the incident.

Plans for a biochar facility at the former Ironwood mill site got a thumbs-up Thursday night from the Montezuma County Planning and Zoning Commission. In other news, a local man whose actions sparked concern early this month when he twice approached children in Cortez and offered them money has been cleared of any wrongdoing.

According to the Cortez Police Department, a man has reportedly admitted to contacting children in Cortez and offering them money, but says he did not mean to intimidate or scare anyone.

On Friday, Colorado Secretary of State Jena Griswold visited Towaoc and met with officials from the Ute Mountain Ute Tribe to discuss automatic voter registration for the state’s tribal communities. The Colorado Votes Act passed by the legislature earlier this year means some enrolled tribal members in Colorado will be automatically registered to vote. It’s the first instance of automatic voter registration for enrolled members of tribal nations in the U.S., and is part of a broader election reform package by the Secretary of State’s office. Griswold says that since she was elected in 2019, her office has been considering ways they could try to reverse the historical voter suppression of Native American people in Colorado. And the funeral for the Cortez police officer who was killed in the line of duty last week takes place on Wednesday morning.

Sgt. Michael Moran was shot near South Broadway in Cortez on Wednesday. The suspects fled in their vehicle but were quickly located. This is a developing story.

An officer in the Cortez Police Department was shot and killed in the line of duty on Wednesday. The officer conducted a traffic stop on South Broadway around 11:30 a.m., during which he was shot and injured. The suspects fled in their vehicle but were quickly located. One suspect was shot by police and died at the scene, the other was taken into custody. The officer, who has not yet been identified, was taken to Southwest Memorial Hospital and later died from his injuries. And on Tuesday, the Cortez City Council passed a resolution in support of a grant to fund archaeological surveys of Carpenter and Geer natural areas to identify prehistoric sites. The city’s Historic Preservation Board recommended that the city apply for the grant from the Colorado Historical Society. A preliminary survey conducted in 1993 by the city found six areas of interest in the Carpenter area alone. Geer has never been studied.

Later this month, Montezuma and Dolores counties will be transitioning to a new emergency alert system called Everbridge. Both counties and the Cortez Police Department will make the change from using the Nixle alert system to Everbridge. The switch comes after recent shootings in Cortez and flooding in Dolores this past spring exposed weaknesses in the old system. Vicki Shaffer, the public information coordinator for Montezuma County, says that the upgrade will mean officials will be able to target specific neighborhoods during an emergency when sending out alerts. And Colorado House District 32 has a new Representative at the statehouse.

Concerns are being raised in Cortez about how – and when – ongoing emergencies are communicated to residents, especially after recent shootings in town. On September 15, a fight broke out near Empire Street that resulted in one bystander being shot and transported to a hospital. It came after another report of shots fired the week before. However, in that case, nobody was injured. Last week, Cortez Police Chief Vernon Knuckles held a community update in Montezuma Park where several residents voiced concerns about not receiving notifications of the shootings through Montezuma County’s Nixle alert system. Cortez police have issued warrants for four suspects they believe were involved in the shooting, but have only made one arrest in connection to it so far.