Will the Bureau’s Colorado River study live up to the hype?

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One measure of the high anxiety around water in the West is the hyper-interest in the Nov. 30 release of the final phase of Bureau of Reclamation’s Colorado River study. This phase promises to be the most interesting, approachable part of the study, focusing on a long list of proposals submitted by the public to restore the Colorado River to a healthy balance, where supply can meet growing demand.

But those looking for a silver bullet from the Bureau’s research might be disappointed. It’s a good possibility this final report won’t live up to the hype. For one, researchers have warned that policy recommendations will be avoided. The study won’t propose a plan to fix the imbalance in the river. We’re instead promised more information that will facilitate good policy-making. The question is whether the report will lead to answers to the big, intractable challenges that Western water planners face.

That said, the Bureau study has already broken new ground. It has quantified use throughout the seven-state Colorado River Basin and forecast it decades into the future, a first. Modeled against the study’s supply data, it’s how we know with certainty there’s an imbalance – that the demand for Colorado River water exceeds supply.

I’m told the final report will analyze the dozens of proposals to fix the imbalance against the study data. It’s a fascinating list of proposals ranging from suggestions to increase supply, reduce demand, modify operations and conceive of ways to govern or regulate water differently. At minimum, if the report provides meaningful feedback on the feasibility of the more promising suggestions, planners will have the makings of a new and helpful tool kit of options to consider when dealing with river issues.

It remains to be seen, however, whether the final report will help resolve huge policy issues that loom.Two issues top my list:

1. Will the Upper Basin be ‘made whole’?

In the 90-plus years the Colorado River Compact and related agreements (the ‘law of the river’) have managed its allocation, the river has tilted downstream, decidedly in favor of the Lower Basin states of Arizona, Nevada and California. For decades, the Lower Basin has used its share plus the unused portion earmarked for the Upper Basin by the Compact. But now, the Upper Basin needs the water and likely will pursue its entitlement, as every gallon of ‘surplus’ water that flows downstream equates to economic loss.
Colorado is required to protect its allocation by statute, and the study has already determined it uses less than the Compact entitles by a wide margin, as much as a million-acre feet. Will the study contemplate a future where the Upper Basin uses more water, not less? It’s a near certainty Colorado will develop its remaining allocation, much as New Mexico and Utah are. What impact will this have Basin-wide?

2. Can Basin-wide planning co-exist with prior appropriation?

Of the suggestions relating to ‘governance and implementation’ received by the Bureau, none dealt with the long-term efficacy of ‘prior appropriation’ (first in time, first in right). Western water law has developed with prior appropriation at its core, but as a 19th-century concept, some view it as barrier to effective planning.

Natural resources law specialist Michael Blumm, writing in the informative book The Public’s Water Resource by Colorado Justice Greg Hobbs, sums up a growing opinion in water circles: “The current system of water allocation (prior appropriation)suffers from poor enforcement, little citizen involvement, and virtually eschews comprehensive planning entirely.”

But a higher level of Basin-wide planning seems inevitable. If Blumm is right, prior appropriation may have to modified. That’s a tall order. Will the study offer a way forward?

Other questions may elude the study. Drought and climate change can be measured fairly easily. Can inaction by policy-makers be “modeled?” It’s difficult to see how. I’m guessing the study will take a close look at the viability of widespread desalination – an expensive and resource intensive process. Again, is their political will to follow-through, today, before a crisis unfolds?

But if the study doesn’t offer a management “silver-bullet” that some hope for, the Bureau will still have done a service. It’s already added much to the discussion. Possible short term disappointment aside.

I’ll review the results next time.

When energy needs and water supply collide

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Have water planners in the Colorado River Basin states anticipated a winter with as much anxiety as 2012-13? It would be hard to imagine. As sanguine as they’ve been this beautiful Western fall about the forthcoming snow pack, hope gives way to expectations in November. In Colorado, a foot of weekend snow helped, but without more snow by month’s end, optimism will give way to deep concern.

Two related news items again brought Colorado River issues into sharp relief here, the most prolific headwater state.

Monday’s report from the International Energy Association that the “U.S. will become the world’s largest oil producer by 2017, overtaking current leaders Saudi Arabia and Russia…” was met with relief in many quarters, but perhaps not as enthusiastically along Colorado’s thirsty Front Range. Certainly, the state benefits from the boom in natural gas and oil production that has transformed the energy segment in profound ways. And unless another major macro-economic slowdown materializes that would drive energy prices and demand down, Colorado will continue to benefit and be a national leader.

But the technologies driving the spike in natural gas and oil recovery here can be water-intensive, and questions persist about both the availability of sustainable supplies and the state’s ability to manage its long-term water future.

The process of hydraulic fracturing, or “fracking,” requires water. How much is debatable, but in Colorado and other Western states, any new supplies earmarked for energy reduce amounts available elsewhere. Thus far, the energy sector has worked arm-in-arm primarily with agriculture to acquire enough water to drive the shale gas boom. Long-term, questions remain as to whether ag will continue to divest itself of enough water to support this rapidly growing sector.

This may be especially true with regard to shale oil. The IEA boldly predicts that by 2017, the U.S. “would become the world’s largest oil producer,” and become a net exporter of oil by 2030. It’s unlikely, however, that states like Colorado will lead a boom in shale oil production unless more water-efficient processes come online. It’s unclear how the IEA forecasts might account for the water challenge.

Uncertainty over how much water is available even in the near-term for energy quickly became the focus of a court case last week regarding a request for 140,000 acre-feet of water from the White River in northwest Colorado, a tributary of the Colorado River. The Yellow Jacket Water Conservancy District is seeking a new source to support industrial oil shale development. A state water court rejected its initial application.

Ag and conservation interests have been quick to disparage the filing, on grounds that the White River would be unable to sustain such a diversion and adequately support current uses; and importantly, that the shale oil industry is unproven, that the diversion would be speculative. Whoever prevails in Colorado’s Supreme Court, the lesson is fairly clear: Any new, substantial filing for water to support shale oil will be challenged here and throughout the West, and not only by conservation or environmental interests. Urban users who also rely on ag transfers to water growth will likely be hyper-competitors for new supplies.

Complicating matters is Colorado’s lack of a comprehensive roadmap, a framework, to evaluate claims by energy and urban providers in the context of the state’s long-term interests. In fact, Colorado’s water community remains divided over the most basic if profound questions, such as whether the state should pursue its remaining Colorado River Compact allocation.

Faced with the enormous economic benefits that flow downstream with every surplus acre-foot of water, it’s likely that Colorado and the other Upper Basin states will choose to develop every last gallon of water to which they’re entitled. But until consensus is reached on this major issue, energy providers will continue to acquire rights in the hope it’s enough to support the current boom and will face growing opposition to filings substantially more modest than Yellow Jacket’s.

Substantial drought will only cause more pain. Stay tuned.

TopCo leaders optimistic and hiring

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Business leaders attending the ColoradoBiz/UMB Financial Top Company awards retreat in Napa, Calif., lamented a lack of qualified workers to fill openings but expressed “cautious optimism” in discussing Colorado’s economic prospects in 2013. Executives from 11 Top Company winners attended the annual event.

Against a backdrop of improving national economic news including gains in home prices and starts, slowing increases in health-care costs, unemployment rates trending down and consumer confidence rising, executives pointed to labor-related issues as a potential barrier to growth.

Tom Tolkacz, longtime CEO of Swingle Lawn, Tree & Landscape Care and winner in the services category summed up the “good news, bad news” scenario facing Colorado companies. “We’re currently seeing our best year since the recession. But we feel like we could have grown our business significantly more than we did if we were fully staffed. We don’t know where the people are going to come from to fill our positions.

“From entry level unskilled labor all the up to skilled positions like engineers, it seems like those companies who are hiring are struggling,” he said.

Melissa Grandchamp, director of human resources at Ping Identity, a Top Company software-category winner, echoed Tolkacz’s sentiment. “We grew 67 percent last year just in head count … we can’t hire fast enough and find talent fast enough. We’re finding the universities in Denver don’t graduate a lot of talent in technology – so we’re trying to do a lot of visibility at the high school level and track it through to college. But we’re doing great.”

Brett Huston, executive vice president at SpectraLogic, a robotics and automated storage libraries manufacturer and winner in the technology category, agreed. “We’re doing fine – Europe is slow, but in the U.S. it continues to be a great ride but we can’t hire fast enough,” Huston said, also citing a lack of technical talent, including engineers.

Labor issues aside, executives were optimistic about national news and bullish on Colorado’s current standing. “We just haven’t seen the downtick we probably thought we would,” said Sandy Rothe, managing director of Deloitte’s Denver office and event co-sponsor. “Part of that is Denver’s doing better than much of the rest of the country, though even nationwide we continue to grow. Most of our clients are profitable, skeptical if profitable, as many aren’t making the investments we’d otherwise see them do; but they’re fundamentally pretty healthy.”

Robin Wise, Junior Achievement-Rocky Mountain president and CEO of and co-winner in nonprofit category, also suggested companies are still cautious. “Our supporters … have not really dialed back their giving … but we have seen organizations look hard at where they give and what they give to. Companies are also looking to give more to fewer and looking at making their charitable contributions go further in terms of branding and return on investment.”

Executives also heard from UMB Executive Vice President and Chief Investment Officer KC Mathews, who asserted that a “fiscal-cliff” would likely be avoided given the significant blow-back politicians might experience, but agreed with others who forecast very modest GDP growth over the next decade – in the 1.8 percent to 2.2 percent range.

Mathews also commented on the dampening effects of the current labor situation, suggesting that extended unemployment benefits may be working to keep otherwise qualified – and much-needed – workers out of the labor pool. “An extended unemployment benefit is not stimulative. The labor participation rate, the percent of individuals active in the job market is … is 63.6 percent, the lowest rate in 30 years. It’s 66 percent on average since 1980. Six million workers have basically said ‘I’m done.’”

Yet Mathews also pointed to housing as a bright national and regional segment, citing the housing ecosystem as a potential high-growth opportunity in markets like Colorado.

Go here for more information on the ColoradoBiz/UMB Financial Top Company awards.

Water disrupts the West: Will business begin to look elsewhere?

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Until we have a government that understands we’re running out of water, we’ll get nowhere in the water discussion.”

–Participant in Colorado Cleantech Industry Association, Deloitte-sponsored ‘No Water, No Energy’ seminar, Denver, July 2012

One can say this about our current level of understanding about our water future: it’s incomplete, but getting better. We’ve known for some time we’re on an unsustainable path in the West. The Bureau of Reclamation’s Colorado River Supply and Demand Study has already determined that throughout the seven-state Basin, demand exceeds supply most years. Reservoir storage, and the occasional wet years like 2011 help meet short-term demand. This fall, we’ll learn more on how the Colorado River system will stand-up to multiple supply and demand scenarios they’re modeled in the study’s final phase.

We may also see then, as our commentator suggests, whether state and local governments fully understand the scope of the challenge.

But as the gap between supply and demand from the Colorado River grows – its forecast by the Bureau to be 4 to 6 million acre-feet by mid-century, roughly one-third its entire annual volume – the long-term implication is inarguable: change is coming to the Southwest U.S. Have water today? You may not in the future – and for some the near-future. We may not be “running out,” but a radically new supply regime could transform our economy – with new water have’s-and-have not’s, new means to regulate ownership and distribution, new projects and infrastructure, and profoundly, new industry that displaces water-intensive business that simply can’t operate in the West.

How disruptive will the change be? Among the questions:

Is business ruling out the West?

Water prices are rising. Circle of Blue, a global water information resource, reports an 18 percent rise in 30 major U.S cities since 2010 – and a 7 percent increase last year alone. In south metro-Denver, in the suburbs of Phoenix and Las Vegas, in Albuquerque, they’re certain to rise more for consumers and business.

At the same time businesses are refining they way they assess water-related risk. The value of water – or the lack of it – is increasingly quantified. For businesses looking to expand or relocate here, the prospect of rising water costs and supply shortfalls may add up to trouble for economic developers in the West.

For agriculture, how little is enough?

Ag’s the biggest user of water in the West by far – three of every four gallons. As it feeds the country, agribusiness is also selling water to urban users, to energy, to developers. But for how long? When will ag begin to push back? Of course agribusiness is already stressed – Weld County farmers in northeast Colorado can attest. At what point will growing communities, or shale gas producers, be asked to find water elsewhere? Who will water growth and energy development in the West?

Can local utilities survive?

Water delivery and wastewater management in the United States is a decidedly local affair. A dizzying maze of water districts, associations, and civic authorities manage a network of over 55,000 water utilities and about 16,000 wastewater facilities. In Colorado alone, around 300 separate entities deliver water to residents and businesses.

But can the interests of local utilities dovetail with those of regional planners? Northern Water in Fort Collins, Colo., has a bright future, serving thousands of users in northeastern Colorado via a huge system of water assets including the Big Thompson and Windy Gap projects. Less than a hundred miles south, along I-25, the water future of communities like Castle Rock and Parker is far less certain – some would argue in crisis. Is there incentive for Northern to act in Parker’s interest? The governor of the state might say yes; residents of Ft. Collins, not so much. ‘Local control’ may hamper collective planning throughout the Southwest.

Also, is current water law incompatible with regional planning?

Coloradans can’t capture rain water to irrigate lawns or otherwise use the water. It’s already spoken-for. A user senior to you or me claimed a prior right, put the water to beneficial use, and therefore owns it. Furthermore, if that users stops putting the water to use, they’ll lose their right in some cases.

Arguably, there’s little incentive to conserve. Or share. Or contemplate a new conservation paradigm.

On a regional level, the Colorado River Compact, the law of the river in part, is straining under the weight of inexorable demand, of ninety years of change within the Basin. As durable and constructive as the Compact has been, questions continue to be asked about its relevancy as a blueprint for future allocation.

What’s the future of the West’s great dams?

It’s become fashionable to contemplate the decommissioning of the great dams along the Colorado River. But without them, meeting regional demand during dry periods is hard to imagine, all things remaining equal. In fact more storage is forecast to be needed by local and state planners.

The massive impoundments are also terribly inefficient. It’s estimated a million-acre feet of water evaporate from their surface every year. In today’s American West, this represents a huge amount.

Water issues: at the forefront for business in the West.

More next time on how businesses are assessing water-related risk.

(Thanks to Steven Maxwell’s TechKNOWLEDGy Strategic Group for statistics quoted here.)

A new business agenda on water

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With a slim snowpack serving only to reiterate Colorado’s long-term water challenge, its clear that reaching out to business to talk about water is increasingly important – but doing so in a meaningful way is difficult. Generally, business hasn’t been involved in the water discussion.

There’s every reason to believe they will be.

The system we rely on, the network of public providers that manage the complex web of water rights and delivery, is in flux, straining under the pressure of inexorable demand. And the scale of the challenge, of meeting growing demand for municipal and industrial water with finite or even diminishing supplies, is prompting a system-wide reassessment of how states and communities will meet their obligations.

The water landscape is changing. And business will be forced to get involved.

“Without a seat at the table,” says Jim Kuiken, SVP at global water infrastructure leader MWH, “their future will be decided for them.”

Business leaders in agriculture, energy, real estate, and manufacturing, to name a few, are engaged; their future is water-dependent and state and regional supply shortfalls are forecast in much of the West. Agriculture, especially, is in the bullseye. Ag is the largest single water – roughly 85% of current demand – and also the one dependable short-term new supply for urban users. Ag “transfers” are watering new development throughout the West.

But how long can the ag sector transfer water before its business is fundamentally changed? What impact will a diminished ag sector have on food production, on land-use, on quality of life issues in ag states and the economy at large?

The regional boom in gas and oil production is transforming America’s energy landscape. Energy development is water intensive. Large-scale gas and oil development requires more water. Other business segments will be the source – like ag. Colorado’s natural gas boom is a by-product, in part, of agricultural water. For how long?

(Developers of nuclear power face similar potential limitations. Utah recently approved a new 50,000 acre-foot diversion from the Green River for a new nuclear facility. A coalition of business and environmental voices oppose the allocation.)

When real-estate reawakens, as it will, water will replace finance as a significant barrier to growth in Colorado, Nevada, and Arizona, and other locales in the West. No-growth is real-estate’s ‘nuclear option’. How close to no-growth edicts are we in places like southeast-metro Denver and other locales? Don’t believe water can impact development? Developers of Sterling Ranch, or the Canyons, both in Douglas County, may disagree.

On the western slope in Colorado, and in communities along the River throughout the Basin, business that relies on steady, regular flows for their livelihood are attuned to the major fight developing over the future of the River. New alliances are forming to join the battle, like Protect the Flows, a coalition of business and environmental interests in western Colorado. They generally oppose new appropriations from the River, though Upper Basin interests may be entitled to more. Who’s right? Business, or, well, business that needs the water?

What impact can new corporate sustainability initiatives have on reducing demand and extending current supply? Should water replace energy conservation as the compelling ‘green’ initiative for business? If so, how?

Without a sustainable water plan – one that business supports – can the West promote its otherwise brilliant future? Or will industry rule out Colorado and the West and locate elsewhere?

Business will joining the water discussion to address these and a dozen other questions.

Search for consensus elusive in Colorado River Basin

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The tale of the Colorado River has become tangled in part because of its evolution into two distinct water realities, that of the Upper and Lower River Basins. One operates in a deficit relative to its annual water allocation, the other a surplus. Arizona, Nevada and California are managing the river in reverse, backtracking to limits long since exceeded. Some of the water belongs to the Upper Basin, its origin. Indifferent before, these headwater states now cast a wary eye not only toward the Lower Basin but to each other’s plans to develop more from the river. Self-interest is replacing the collegial attitudes of the past.

To further complicate matters, water interests within the Upper Basin states have yet to fully reconcile their differences. This is certainly the case here, in Colorado, but it is played out similarly in states like California.

I described the rising tensions in the headwater states to Rita Sudman, Executive Director of the California Water Education Foundation, who calmly replied via email, “I think most people involved in the Western water debate will agree that flexibility is the key, that the ability to trade, transfer and make new types of arrangements including different types of storage, more conservation and deals, is all part of the mix to get more water to certain users.”

In other words, welcome to the party.

California is steeled not only to rough and tumble inter-basin river tussles with states like Arizona but to the type of in-state competition simmering in Colorado. Sudman’s most recent Colorado River Project River Report outlines the embattled state of the Quantification Settlement Agreement (QSA), written to “settle California’s chronic overuse of the Colorado River” as it winds its way through a predictable litany of court challenges.

A divisive component of the QSA, one that may ring familiar to Colorado planners, involves a “water conservation/transfer agreement between Imperial Irrigation District (IID) and the San Diego County Water Authority.” IID manages water for California’s verdant Imperial Valley, which comes entirely from the Colorado River. It’s a California ag gem that shines to the tune of more than $1 billion a year in crop production.

But as with Western Slope interests here who chafe at water transfers east, there’s push-back. QSA “is not popular in the Imperial Valley, where proprietary feelings about water have always run strong and there is a belief that the QSA was foisted upon the Valley with less than favorable results.”

Michael Cohen, senior research associate with the Pacific Institute, adds, “Some people don’t want to see any water leave the valley.”

Familiar indeed. Move the conversation a thousand or so miles east, into the Rocky Mountains along the same river, change the valley reference from Imperial to Grand, and the sentiment is nearly identical.

Colorado is also hard at work to establish more modern water-sharing mechanisms. Denver Water and 40 Western Slope water suppliers recently hammered out the Colorado River Cooperative Agreement, signed in May. Among the provisions of the so-called “global” agreement is a commitment that “any new water project by Denver Water in the Colorado River Basin will be developed only in cooperation with those entities impacted by the development.” In others words, we’ll stop taking Western Slope water without asking.

What’s changed is that for the first time, Colorado faces a water supply gap: There won’t be enough to meet the needs of users, at current levels, in the near future. Collaboration is in everyone’s best interest.

But the agreement may quickly be tested.

As mentioned, Colorado and the other headwater states are entitled to more water. Colorado’s share may be as much as a million acre-feet, almost a third as much as it is using now – lots or water by any estimate.

Yet there’s a lack of consensus among officials here whether the state should aggressively pursue this water. There’s fear of a Compact “call,” where future data indicates we miscalculated, are using water earmarked for the Lower Basin and are asked to curtail use. There’s deeply rooted opposition to the prospect of more growth along the Front Range. Certainly any new supply will find its way to urban users and developers.

And there’s a fear that further west-to-east diversions of any kind will diminish business and lifestyle prospects in Colorado’s Western Slope communities. Without certainty as to how the state would move to develop more water out of the river, and despite the “global” agreement, opposition to developing the state’s remaining Compact allocation may well materialize – from within Colorado.

In California or Colorado, in the tale of the Upper and Lower Basins, the search for common ground – among basins, states, friends and neighbors – continues to be elusive.

Sterling Ranch ruling highlights Front Range water supply issues

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Colorado’s business community was reminded again last week that water threatens the region’s economic prospects. District Court Judge Paul King ruled that the Sterling Ranch development in Douglas County had not lined up sufficient long-term water supply pursuant to a 2008 statute requiring “a water supply that will be sufficient for build-out of the proposed development in terms of quality, quantity, dependability, and availability to provide a supply of water for the type of development proposed…”

Despite protests of the Denver Post, King’s decision isn’t an indictment of Sterling Ranch, but a reasonable reading of the statute.

The proposed community southwest of Denver has been lauded as a water-efficient, sustainable community of the future, but it’s also a poster child for the challenge facing the south metro area of the Front Range. Most Douglas County communities rely on non-renewable, diminishing aquifers. By DC standards, Sterling Ranch has lined-up a diverse water supply, including an agreement to buy 190 million gallons of water annually from Aurora to support the 12,000 or so homes planned for the community. King said it wasn’t enough.

Harold Smethills, the development’s managing partner, promised to move ahead. King’s decision seemed to surprise others. David Tschetter, chairman of the Colorado Association of Homebuilders, quoted in the Denver Post, suggested the ruling “will have a negative impact on development, no question…Who knows what water-usage needs are going to be 30 years from now?”

But if pressed, Tschetter would agree that Douglas County’s water problem is spooking development, King’s ruling notwithstanding. Despite membership in a loose coalition called the South Metro Water Supply Authority, most communities in DC are pursuing their own water plans. Some are faring better than others. Aurora, in a position to sell water to Smethills, may be the region’s most innovative water operator. None, arguably, have developed a comprehensive program that guarantees residents and business renewable (non-ground water), affordable, sustainable supplies – and mitigates regional concerns.

There’s a chance then that Tschetter, Smethills, and others, like those on the Douglas County Board of Commissioners, are feigning surprise. Without a plan floating around Douglas County that would satisfy a close reading of the statute, King’s ruling may be doing everyone a favor by highlighting the problem – the lack of a statewide roadmap that would provide developers a satisfactory backdrop to pursue growth. And in the case Sterling Ranch, very responsible growth.

If it’s a clarion call the developers seek, I’ll provide the amplifier: water supply issues will increasingly vex not only water-intensive businesses like ag and energy, currently in the bullseye, but the general business community. As a result, business leaders would do well to contemplate a pro-business water platform around which economic interests can rally.

Remembering Bob Schwab

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ColoradoBiz lost a meaningful part of its past this week. Former editor Bob Schwab passed away.

Born and raised in Chicago, Bob Schwab was an inveterate newspaper man turned magazine editor. If he had his druthers, he’d probably have lived a decade earlier, been a Mike Royko contemporary at theSun-Times, or Trib, and retired on a pension like those before him.

He certainly belonged. Bob was a talent, a working man’s writer and journalist who put in the time and earned the right later in life to be a columnist and editor, to have an opinion. He was passionate – and large – 6-foot-3 of irresolute blond hair and white-beard. His poetry was bare, raw but powerful. Potent. Chicago.

He arrived every morning with a paper under his arm, usually the Wall Street Journal, and made no pretense of working until he’d pored through the Journal, the Post, the Rocky, the New York Times. Unlike the self-styled media critics with whom he battled, he relished our media plurality; he was stained with ink.

We argued, owing to strong personalities, and to Bob, heartfelt differences. For him some things weren’t to be compromised. But we agreed early on that ColoradoBiz had lost its edge and that the way forward involved a commitment to great editorial. Our collaboration bore fruit. In 2006 we won the Morton Margolin Prize for Distinguished Business Reporting from the University of Denver Daniels College of Business Bob liked to remind me it was his parting gift, as he left the magazine shortly after.

Ironically, a disagreement with me over a magazine editorial compelled Bob to resign fromColoradoBiz, though I suspect he’d had enough of 21st century “journalism.” A year or so later, he was diagnosed with cancer. I wish we’d been there for him.

RIP, big fella.

American Apparel president Brad Gebhard to keynote Colorado Apparel + Lifestyle Manufacturing Summit

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Brad Gebhard, president of Los Angeles-based American Apparel, will keynote the 3rd annual Apparel + Lifestyle Manufacturing Summit next Wednesday, September 28 in Denver, Colorado at the newly remodeled McNichols Building in Civic Center park.

Gebhard appears at an interesting time not only for the American Apparel, North America’s largest apparel company, but also for the industry, said Bart Taylor, publisher of CompanyWeek, host of the event.

“The 3rd annual Summit occurs at a pivotal time for apparel and consumer product manufacturing and for local brands and communities,” Taylor said. “So many entrepreneurs want to launch lifestyle and fashion brands here, in the West. And established companies are evaluating whether domestic production is now viable. The question is, have we reached a point where today it’s possible to go ‘back to the future’ and support American industry in a meaningful way?”

American Apparel is today evaluating this question on a larger scale. The company has implemented a major reorganization after ousting it’s controversial founder, Dov Charney, and Gebhard, alongside new CEO Paula Schneider, have set the company on a new path as questions persist about AA’s ability to continue manufacturing in Los Angeles. California’s new labor laws have made that prospect increasingly challenging.

It all happens as industry players in Colorado are working hard to reconstitute supply-chain resources that would make apparel and consumer product manufacturing competitive on an international stage. Gebhard will join other company founders to discuss a blueprint for growth in Colorado and the West, and the future of American apparel manufacturing.

Apparel and consumer product designers, brands, production firms, business advocates and other community representatives are invited to attend the Summit. Industry professionals attending the Outdoor Industry Association Rendevous conference, or COILS, hosted by the Colorado Office of Outdoor Recreation, are also invited to attend. Registration fees for either event also included attendance to the Summit.

For more information or to register, click here, or contact Leslie Pera, CompanyWeek media, at lpera@companyweek.com, or 303-522-3906.

Alicia Knight Cunningham joins CompanyWeek Utah editorial team

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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

SALT LAKE CITY, September 30, 2015 — CompanyWeek Media announced this week that Alicia Cunningham has joined the content development team as business writer and market ambassador.

Bart Taylor, founder and publisher of CompanyWeek, said Knight will lead local content development efforts with the aim of highlighting Utah’s growing manufacturing sector, in keeping with the editorial mission of the two-year old media franchise.

“We’re excited that Alicia will be our editorial point person in Utah, something we’ve really needed to more effectively chronicle the contributions Utah manufacturers to the regional and national economy,” Taylor said. “To have found someone with her background is of course a huge bonus.”

Cunningham graduated from Brigham Young University with a B.A. in Public Relations and a B.A. in Political Science. She also graduated from George Mason School of Law with a specialty in International Trade and is an Associate Member of the Virginia Bar. Cunningham spent many years in politics and has worked for a state party, two senators and a congressman as well as the Legislative Counsel for a major trade association. She now divides her time raising four (gorgeous!) children and working as a business and legal writer.

Taylor said Cunningham will develop editorial profiles of growing Utah manufacturers, coordinate photo shoots with the publication’s network of local photographers, and act as liaison for communications between industry and market stakeholders and relevant contacts at CompanyWeek.

Cunningham’s work debuts this week with a profile of Salem, Utah’s Bear Country Bees.

CompanyWeek is the “voice of the Rocky Mountain manufacturing economy,” focusing on companies and business leaders in Colorado and Utah shaping the modern manufacturing economy. A Utah-specific email newsletter, linked to a content hub featuring Utah businesses, is the core, digital media product. Plans are to host market-specific events in 2016.

CompanyWeek Utah was launched in cooperation with the Utah Manufacturing Association, the longstanding resource and advocate for regional manufacturers.

Contact Alicia Knight Cunningham at aliciaknightesq@yahoo.com for more information, or Bart Taylor at btaylor@companyweek.com.