- The Montezuma County commissioners sparred with Dolores District Manager Derek Padilla of the Forest Service on Monday over two perennially contentious issues: weed control and roads.
The Montezuma County commissioners sparred with Dolores District Manager Derek Padilla of the Forest Service on Monday over two perennially contentious issues: weed control and roads. The commissioners said there is a 200-acre patch of invasive Canada thistle near McPhee Reservoir and irrigation water could carry seeds all over the county. Padilla said the Dolores District’s weed program is in flux at present but the agency and county have put in a grant request for money to treat McPhee. The commissioners questioned the need for a proposed archaeological survey near the reservoir and asked why those funds can’t be spent on weeds instead. Padilla said his funding is earmarked for specific purposes but if Congress “just gave us a checkbook and said ‘go do good things’, I could do that”. The board also reiterated its long-standing complaint about the way the Forest Service disburses funds for road maintenance. Commissioner Keenan Ertel said fees collected for the commercial use of roads such as the Dolores-Norwood road should be spent on upkeep of those specific routes instead of being put into a pot and spread around the district. Padilla said under that policy, the Forest Service would have been able to gravel just a quarter-mile of the Echo Basin road instead of the four miles it did recently.
