The residents of San Luis Valley gathered on Tuesday to see how governor Jared Polis signs a new law that comes up in the heart of a centuries -old question: the right -wealthy landowners towards the rights of people who use the country.
The law could help to solve future disputes that the locals of Costilla County sets against a billionaire Texas Ölerbe, which raised about 20 miles 8 foot wire fence around his ranch. It could also block future attempts to expand the fence.
The Cielo Vista Ranch includes more than 100 square miles Piñon Pine Forest and more than 20 peaks in the Sangre de Cristo area. The country is part of the Sangre de Cristo Land scholarship from 1844, the early settlement – and its descendants – gave legal access to the country to collect firewood and graze their cattle.
They call the country “La Sierra” and the rights come from the middle of the 19th century, when settlers each received a desert act with access to an Acequia irrigation ditch.
The still unsolved fight for the fence has continued for four years. The fence building was discontinued in 2023 after Costilla County Commissioners won a temporary injunction against the ranch owner William Harrison, who bought the 2017 Ranch after it was listed for $ 105 million.
The struggle has moved several politicians in the past few months, including Attorney General Phil Weiser and state legislature who had sponsored legislation to see the fence for themselves. The new law requires land owners to apply to local government officials before building a fence in the country scholarship from Sangre de Cristo, which is more than 5 feet high and contains more than a mile fence line that includes property or is more than half a mile long but not enclosed.
There is the responsibility of the district commissioners whether the advantages of the fence outweigh the damage.
The residents of the Costilla district said that they hoped that legislation would become a template for other parts of the state, not just their land scholarship.
“This will enable other counties to protect themselves from the destructive obscene committees, where the ultra-rich, the large mountain tracts in Colorado can be committed to separate themselves in their private protected areas,” said Joseph Quintana, who documents the effect of the fence on wildlife and water flow.
Quintana and other locals argued that the fence separated the wild animals of water sources and disturbed their migration patterns. They said they saw how deer and moose ran into panic and searched for a place to cross. The construction of the fence included a 20-foot Bulldozed path through the forest, which worsened erosion problems and sent drainage along the sand, said residents and district officials.
However, the landowner has argued that the fence should keep the intruders away, who have entered their private property in order to map garbage and collect antlers, illegally fish and drive ATVS. The fence should also comply with its bison herds, he said.
The descendants of the original settlers have keys to nine gates through which they can enter property, so that Harrison honors the land grant, he previously told the sun through his lawyer.
On Tuesday afternoon, Polis signed the Bill 1023 house under a large tree in a city park in San Luis.
Senator Byron Pelton, a Republican from Sterling, was one of those who voted against the bill during a hearing from the Senate Agriculture Committee. The measure was passed 4-3.
“I am really concerned about the aspect of private property,” said Pelton. “Someone is considering that the country of this country has. This is the thing that the rights of private property is accepted.”
But the Republican Senator Cleave Simpson, who comes from Alamosa and one of the main sponsors of the law, argued that the Cielo Vista Ranch fence was so big and annoying that people needed the help of the state.
“It's really about a story and a feeling of the place and part of Colorado, which is as unique as you can,” he said. “Part of Colorado's story centered in San Luis Valley and Costilla County.”
The Ranch owner and the district commissioners are now carrying out separate wildlife studies as part of the pending court proceedings.