Katie Wallace elected as new D17 senator
Boulder County Democrat Katie Wallace, a former federal policy advisor for Congressman Joe Neguse, was selected to fill the vacant Senate District 17 seat Tuesday, March 18.
The SD17 vacancy committee, consisting of 114 D17 Democrats, elected Wallace from a field of nine candidates during the virtual vacancy meeting. She won 59.8% of the vote.
“Through 13 years of grassroots organizing in our neighborhoods and making policy on behalf of us in both the State House and Congress,” Wallace said during the meeting,“I learned that change happens when we listen first, act second and never stop fighting for what's right.”
The senator-elect said she would push for stronger environmental regulations and “an aggressive shift toward renewable energy,” more affordable housing in the community, funding for public services, and protections for immigrants.
Wallace will fill the seat vacated by Sen. Sonya Jaquez-Lewis, who resigned amid an ongoing ethics probe to take a job for a women and LGBTQ+ advocacy nonprofit earlier this year.
The 2025 legislative session is scheduled to conclude May 7, but Wallace will serve in the seat until at least the 2026 election.
DOGE plans to terminate two Boulder leases
The U.S. Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) will terminate two leases in Boulder worth almost $1 million in their efforts to slash government spending.
The terminations were published on the DOGE website along with over $9.4 million and 335,000 square feet of other leased space in Colorado, according to KDVR.
One lease, located at 3215 Marine St., is $913,334 annually for 29,170 square feet, and the other at 4725 Nautilus Court was listed at $49,575 and 3,830 square feet. Both were being leased by the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS).
The lease at 3215 Marine St., located inside the CU Boulder Marine Street Science Center, was a mix of 50% office and administrative space, 40% lab space and 10% storage, said CU spokesperson Nicole Mueksch. The lease will be terminated effectively on Aug. 31.
The building at 4725 Nautilus Court, an industrial warehouse, was largely used as storage for files and did not house any personnel, according to Gibbons-White, the commercial real estate brokerage firm for the facility. The lease will be terminated as of June 1, said brokerage vice president Michael-Ryan McCarty.
It is unclear how many USGS employees will be affected by these terminations. “We do not comment on personnel. USGS remains committed to its congressional mandate as the science arm of the Department of the Interior,” said a USGS spokesperson.
A spokesperson for the U.S. General Services Administration, which oversees government leased property, added “Acting Administrator [Stephen] Ehikian’s vision for GSA includes reducing our deferred maintenance liabilities, supporting the return to office of federal employees, and taking advantage of a stronger private/government partnership in managing the workforce for the future.”
Boulder artists launch petition for funding
Boulder creatives are bringing a petition back to the city to allocate $3.6 million of sales tax revenue to fund community arts.
Two years ago, Boulder voters approved ballot initiative 2A, which reupped an expiring sales tax and allocated half of the revenue towards funding for the local art ecosystem — including nonprofits, professional artists, education, workspaces, public art and multicultural programs.
The ballot organizer's goal was for half of the amount, which at the time funded city administrative services, to go directly toward the arts — a compromise with the city that restructured the final ballot language to split the revenue evenly between the arts and city operations, and was approved by 75% of Boulder voters.
Only 51% of that amount, roughly $1.8 million, was allocated directly to the arts, with the rest set aside for future use and internal city expenses such as salaries for the arts and culture staff and updating the 2015 Community Cultural Plan. Now, a group of community leaders, artists and activists are setting their sites on the original goal.
“Arts organizations have the same financial pressures as every other individual and business in Boulder County, including rent, insurance and payroll,” Marie-Juliette Bird, Founder of the nonprofit The New Local said in an email response to Boulder Weekly. “We cannot survive if the city absorbs half of the arts money.”
Petitioners hope to sway the city to move the funds from the tax used for city expenses into the general fund at the next budget adjustment this spring.
“The public voted for 2A money to fund arts directly, and we are asking the city to make good on voters’ intent,” Bird said.
The petition is just 11 names shy of its 2,000 signature goal as of Monday, March 17 Bird said.
Editor's note: this story has been updated to include additional clarification on the allocation of funds and the petition organizers.