It was the first day of the new year, and Sarah Kaplan from The Washington Post was all doom and gloom: “Global emissions are expected to hit an all-time high this year, and humanity is on track to cr...

A group of legislators toured the Winter Colorado Outdoor Recreation Convention in Denver last week, where companies from around the world touted their incredible selection of outdoor equipment, cloth...

We’re launching our new readers’ choice awards in today’s edition of the Plaindealer and online at ouraynews.com. You might wonder why we’ve taken this on, in addition to the other changes we’ve made ...

After a couple of weeks celebrating our Western heritage at the National Western Stock Show, hobnobbing with steers in the Brown Palace Hotel during their high tea, enjoying dinner with members of the...

President Ronald Reagan signed a bill marking the third Monday of January as Martin Luther King Jr. Day in 1983, and for years the Ridgway School District took that Monday as a holiday break. Faculty ...

Janus, the two-faced Roman god of doors who sees both past and future, might be the most appropriate symbol for this third decade of the 21st Century. The deep winter doldrums of January slow down the...

New organizations in Colorado will soon get some much-needed extra legal firepower to fight wrongful denials of access to government records and proceedings. The Reporters Committee for Freedom of the...

FROM THE PUBLISHER Getting to the bottom of a story often means locating a public record, or some piece of paper documenting what happened. Sometimes that takes considerable effort. It takes some digg...

Our rivers are shrinking, populations are rising, and many rural communities are suffering from drought and economic dislocation. Urban water use is declining, despite population growth, and communiti...

We’ve all said it, or at least heard someone say it. It happened to be the day after Christmas and I got to wondering where the saying came from. Purely coincidental, of course. A piece in the New Yor...

TROOPER TIPS One of the things about living in rural parts of Colorado means often having to travel on two lane roads. Where it is sometimes a lot more pleasant than driving on a big highway, it can h...

FROM THE PUBLISHER You might notice the Plaindealer looks a little bit different today. If you’re reading this, it means we’ve successfully upgraded our computer system and designed the paper using a ...

ERIN STADELMAN As I look outside the window today, the snow is falling ever so slightly. It is just enough to cover up the dirt of the driveway and make the vehicles on the highway seem to be moving a...

TROOPER TIPS How often do you ask yourself if you are driving impaired? I know you’re asking why you would ask yourself that if you are not drinking. But are you actually impaired and don’t realize it...

FROM THE PUBLISHER Even small places deserve good journalism. That was one of our mantras when we decided to purchase the Plaindealer. Since the two of us took on the jobs of publishers, editors, repo...

The season of winter is well upon us these days. I do love the snow. It covers up all the stuff you have in your yard that you didn’t have time to put away before the snow came. All the hay meadows ar...

  In the past few months of attending Ridgway Town Council meetings, we’ve had the opportunity to hear robust public discussion on topics ranging from water rate structures to the ethical reasons for ...

FROM THE PUBLISHER Six years ago, a Front Range billionaire delivered $5,000 checks to each of three conservative candidates for the School District 51 Board of Education in Mesa County. The teachers’...

Dear Editor: The nearly 300 miles of roads located within both the unincorporated and incorporated territory of Ouray County are a small but essential transportation network that serves not only the l...

A story on Page 2 of the Aug. 29 edition, “Commissioners consider sunset in tax question,” incorrectly stated the amount by which residential property taxes would increase if a 3.7 mill levy increase ...