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Main, News...

January 8, 2025

A Ridgway man was killed Tuesday after being caught in an avalanche while backcountry skiing near Red Mountain Pass. Ouray County Coroner Glenn Boyd identified the victim as 57-year-old Donald Moden J...

Main, News...

Donors emerge in effort to save homes

Philanthropists commit $900K toward purchase of Ouray's Swiss Village

By Mike Wiggins mike@ouraynews.com

January 8, 2025

The people who climbed the stairs at the Ouray Community Center and filled the seats inside the City Council hearing room carried the heavy weight of worry and desperation with them. The mother of two...

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Police chief finalists to visit Ouray

Public can meet Furstenfeld, Hoguet, Valerio Jan. 16

By Erin McIntyre erin@ouraynews.com

January 8, 2025

The search for Ouray's new police chief has yielded three finalists for the position — three career law enforcement officers with varying experiences, all living in the region. Community members will ...

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Blasting project resumes above Ouray

New analysis finds no likely impact to ice park, but work will pause during festival

By Lia Salvatierra lia@ouraynews.com

January 8, 2025

Blasting for a private homeowner’s garage project resumed Tuesday in the side of a mountain above Ouray, with operations paused for the upcoming Ouray Ice Festival due to safety concerns. The project ...

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Governments playing waiting game for housing dollars

Voters approved Proposition 123 in 2022 to provide dedicated funding, but county entities still sorting through state's application standards

By Lia Salvatierra lia@ouraynews.com

January 8, 2025

Ouray County’s local governments and developers are still working to draw from the state’s first stream of dedicated affordable housing dollars mainly by updating and aligning housing needs assessment...

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Ice Park on precipice of fundraising goal

By Lia Salvatierra lia@ouraynews.com

January 8, 2025

More than two years after securing conditional rights to access water from Canyon Creek, the Ouray Ice Park is about $200,000 away from finishing its $1.4 million campaign to tap into that water suppl...

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San Juan Skijoring saddles up again this weekend

Annual competition pairing horses with winter sports returns Friday-Sunday at fairgrounds

By Erin McIntyre erin@ouraynews.com

January 8, 2025

The sport marrying Western horse culture with slope shredders returns to Ridgway this weekend, with the ninth annual San Juan Skijoriing competition at the Ouray County 4-H Event Center. Riders on hor...

Looking Back, News...

OURAY COUNTY

LOOKING BACK

40 YEARS AGO

January 8, 2025

January 10, 1975 – Jan. 27 is the date in 1950 when Ouray City Hall was almost totally destroyed by fire of undetermined origin that broke out late that night and left only three walls standing of the...

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Ridgway man killed in avalanche

By Mike Wiggins

January 8, 2025

A Ridgway man who was backcountry skiing near Red Mountain Pass was killed after being buried by an avalanche on Tuesday. Ouray County Coroner Glenn Boyd identified the victim as 57-year-old Donald Mo...

Top story of 2024: Department beset by complaints, audit, firing

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TOP STORIES OF THE YEAR: OURAY POLICE TURMOIL

Top story of 2024: Department beset by complaints, audit, firing

By Mike Wiggins mike@ouraynews.com

January 1, 2025

The revelation that a 17-year-old girl was allegedly sexually assaulted inside the home of Ouray’s police chief ignited a turbulent 2024 for the police department, a year that witnessed multiple inter...

Top story of 2024: Overwhelmed district attorney resigns

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TOP STORIES OF THE YEAR: TROUBLES WITHIN DA'S OFFICE

Top story of 2024: Overwhelmed district attorney resigns

By Erin McIntyre erin@ouraynews.com

January 1, 2025

The top prosecutor for Ouray and five other counties announced his resignation in September and left the job only days before he would have been re-elected to his unopposed seat. His replacement will ...

Top story of 2024: What will become of Red Mountain reservoir?

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TOP STORIES OF THE YEAR: CRYSTAL'S FUTURE CLOUDY

Top story of 2024: What will become of Red Mountain reservoir?

By Lia Salvatierra lia@ouraynews.com

January 1, 2025

The future of Crystal Reservoir, the shallow body of water atop Red Mountain Pass prized for its scenic values and water rights, is very much up in the air heading into the new year. The U.S. Forest S...

Top story of 2024: Council scrambles after administrator resigns

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TOP STORIES OF THE YEAR: CHANGE AT THE TOP IN OURAY

Top story of 2024: Council scrambles after administrator resigns

By Mike Wiggins mike@ouraynews.com

January 1, 2025

When the Ouray City Council hired Silas Clarke as the city administrator in 2020, it did so hoping to end a merry-go-round of chief executive officers. Three people had rotated through the job in the ...

Top story of 2024: Record rain triggers destructive flooding

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TOP STORIES OF THE YEAR: SUMMER MONSOON WREAKS HAVOC

Top story of 2024: Record rain triggers destructive flooding

By Lia Salvatierra lia@ouraynews.com

January 1, 2025

Record August rainfall caused extensive countywide destruction, at least $5 million in damages and triggered emergency disaster declarations at the local and state level, creating ripple effects for t...

Top story of 2024: With housing, progress for some, uncertainty for others

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TOP STORIES OF THE YEAR: AFFORDABLE HOUSING'S SUCCESSES, CHALLENGES

Top story of 2024: With housing, progress for some, uncertainty for others

By Lia Salvatierra lia@ouraynews.com

January 1, 2025

Gains in planning and constructing deed-restricted housing in 2024 were matched by struggles to preserve one of Ouray County’s largest existing affordable housing communities. As homeowners celebrated...

Top story of 2024: Feds affirm plan to limit hikers, campers

News

TOP STORIES OF THE YEAR: BLUE LAKES PERMIT SYSTEM

Top story of 2024: Feds affirm plan to limit hikers, campers

By Lia Salvatierra lia@ouraynews.com

January 1, 2025

Hikers and campers will need permits to visit Blue Lakes southwest of Ridgway as soon as the summer of 2025 as part of a larger wilderness management plan the U.S. Forest Service signed in 2024. The “...

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TOP STORIES OF THE YEAR: THE THEFT HEARD 'ROUND THE WORLD

Top story of 2024: Stolen newspapers triggers international story

By Plaindealer Staff Report Plaindealer@ouraynews.com

January 1, 2025

A Ridgway business owner upset at the Ouray County Plaindealer tried to prevent others from reading it when he stole nearly 200 copies of the newspaper from racks in Ridgway and Ouray in January. Inst...

Looking Back, News...

OURAY COUNTY

OURAY COUNTY LOOKING BACK

40 YEARS AGO

By From the Ouray County Herald, Ouray County Plaindealer and the Ridgway Sun

January 1, 2025

50 YEARS AGO January 3, 1975 – John Wilson, 28, of Ouray suffered the loss of his left arm in an accident at the Camp Bird Mill Dec. 28. The accident occurred between 3:30 and 4 p.m. According to Jim ...

Main, News...

Home for the holidays

Perennial renters. Globetrotters. Forced minimalists. For financial and other reasons, they've spent most of their lives moving from place to place. Now, for the first time, these new Waterview homeowners are putting down roots in Ouray.

By LIA SALVATIERRA

December 27, 2024

When Diane Todd pulled her white Chevy pickup into the driveway of her new home in Ouray, she jumped out of the car and gave her next-door neighbor a hug. It was the first time they had met, and both ...

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Blasting to resume above Ouray Jan. 6

By LIA SALVATIERRA

December 27, 2024

Blasting for a private homeowner's garage project will resume Jan. 6 in the side of a mountain above Ouray, with operations paused for the upcoming Ouray Ice Festival due to safety concerns. The proje...

Main, News...

Popular trail needs new steward

Uncompahgre Riverway Trail founder, longtime volunteer ready to step down

By James Hanlon

September 23, 2026

Chip Marlow, the man who spearheaded the construction of the Uncompahgre Riverway Trail from Ridgway to Ridgway State Park, has maintained the multiuse path largely by himself for many years. Now 80 y...

Main, News...

‘Super El Niño’ won’t be savior for West Slope

Officials: Warming Pacific temps may bring more snow but won't wipe out drought or fill reservoirs

By Chart Riggall

September 23, 2026

GRAND JUNCTION — Amid a stream of bad news for Western Slope water stakeholders last week, Russ Schumacher had the pleasure of opening the sluice. Nearly on the far side of the state’s worst drought y...

Main, News...

Judge to hotel: End workforce housing

Injunction prohibits MTN Lodge from housing resort construction workers

By James Hanlon

September 23, 2026

A district court judge has ordered Ridgway's largest hotel to stop housing construction workers who are building a new Four Seasons in Mountain Village. In a preliminary injunction filed Sept. 16, the...

Main, News...

Investigators close case on mine shaft death

Nearly a year later, authorities conclude Ridgway resident Jennifer Nelson accidentally drowned

By Erin McIntyre erin@ouraynews.com

September 23, 2026

Eleven months after rescue volunteers found Jennifer Nelson's body in a water-filled mine shaft on Red Mountain Pass, investigators are left wondering what her final moments looked like. Their case, w...

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City ready to cut losses with building

More than a year after purchase, council tells staff to sell empty Sixth Avenue property for reduced price

By Mike Wiggins mike@ouraynews.com

September 23, 2026

When the two-story building across the street from Ouray City Hall went up for sale last spring, Ouray city leaders scrambled to buy it, envisioning a top-tobottom renovation culminating in a new, lar...

Remote-triggered avalanche in San Juan Mountains

First responders receive first COVID-19 vaccines