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Debate topic turns to Lachelt

Commissioner a focus between guv, Beauprez

DENVER – Republican gubernatorial challenger Bob Beauprez on Thursday accused La Plata County Commissioner Gwen Lachelt of a radical environmental agenda in co-chairing an oil and gas task force.

Beauprez’s comments came during a debate with Gov. John Hickenlooper, a Democrat who remains in a tight race against the former congressman.

“The person he appointed as co-chair of the commission, Gwen Lachelt, is part of an environmental group in Southwestern Colorado that is sworn to ban drilling in Colorado,” Beauprez said during the Colorado Association of Commerce and Industry debate.

Beauprez pointed to Lachelt’s environmental past. She founded Earthworks’ Oil & Gas Accountability Project in 1999 and served as director before becoming a county commissioner in the 2012 election.

Hickenlooper appointed Lachelt to co-chair the 19-member task force that is currently meeting to discuss a need for additional rules and regulations governing energy development in Colorado.

The governor announced the task force in early August as part of an agreement with U.S. Rep. Jared Polis, D-Boulder, who threatened to send oil and gas issues to the ballot.

“You can’t compromise with people who don’t want any energy development in Colorado,” Beauprez said. “Jared Polis has already said numerous times, as has Gwen Lachelt, that they’ll be back in 2015 or 2016.”

Lachelt took issue with Beauprez’s comments, stating that she has never taken a position on banning hydraulic fracturing, which remains the most controversial component of the oil and gas regulatory debate.

“I accepted the role of co-chair of the task force because I see it as an opportunity to hopefully provide a model for other states that are facing similar impacts,” Lachelt told The Durango Herald after the debate.

She said she supports regulations on fracking, including under the Safe Drinking Water Act. Lachelt has also called for the disclosure of chemicals used in frack fluids. She said she played no role in the initiatives financed by Polis, which sought to increase well setbacks and offer local governments more control over regulatory matters.

Lachelt said it’s interesting to be placed in a political spotlight as a result of her role on the oil and gas task force.

“The task force really is a high-profile body,” she said. “The issues that we’re grappling with are front and center issues for Colorado and other states. So, there are a lot of people watching this process.”

For his part, Hickenlooper said at the debate that it would have been devastating for Colorado to have those issues on the ballot, potentially crippling the state’s energy industry.

“We have an opportunity here. That commission ... they are talented people from a diverse array of backgrounds,” Hickenlooper said. “I have every confidence they will be able to get to those recommendations and find the appropriate compromise.”

Beauprez, however, said Hickenlooper simply wanted to avoid seeing the issues on the November ballot because it would have motivated conservatives to the polls, which would have hurt incumbent Democrats.

“This was about keeping some measures off the ballot that might compromise the political fortune of Mark Udall and John Hickenlooper,” Beauprez said. “They didn’t want to drive a conservative vote to limit their chances of re-election.”

pmarcus@durangoherald.com



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