Fast hyperlinks: Entrance Vary inhabitants declines | Behind Boulder County’s wage improve | U.S. vs. native minimal wages evaluated | Boulder County’s minimal wage to 2030 | Skyhook Photo voltaic
It’s been a tough few years for Boulder County, which skilled one of many biggest inhabitants declines in Colorado since 2020. New knowledge had the State Demography Workplace revising previous estimates, which had been shared Friday on the annual State Demography Summit.
“The Entrance Vary area had a lot of the inhabitants development. However not each county within the Entrance Vary. Denver, Jefferson County and Boulder County had inhabitants losses throughout this two-year interval,” Nancy Gedeon, a demographer within the state’s Demography Workplace, mentioned through the occasion.
Boulder’s inhabitants is down 1.1% from the place it was in 2020 and Gedeon attributed the change to residents (particularly faculty college students) scattering through the pandemic and the Marshall hearth. Jefferson County had the best decline within the Entrance Vary, down 1.2%, and that was as a consequence of an older inhabitants with extra deaths.
“We at all times revise backwards,” Gedeon mentioned. “And the information that we received from the U.S. census on migration did have some important adjustments of their knowledge for 2020 and 2021. A lot in order that the estimate that we offered final yr for the state for July of 2021 has now been revised down by 3,600 folks.”
However folks dwelling in group quarters are returning, so future revisions may see a change for Boulder County. What’s Working will discover extra of the revised demographic knowledge in future columns.
➔ MORE: See State Demography Summit web page
What else is altering in Boulder County? Its minimal wage.
Boulder County minimal wage going up 15%
Boulder County will be a part of Denver and Edgewater in January because the third place within the state with its personal minimal wage after unanimous approval by Boulder County commissioners earlier this week.
The brand new minimal wage will improve 15% to $15.69 from the state’s present minimal of $13.65, however solely in unincorporated Boulder County. An effort to get the entire county on the identical wage proved too difficult.
“We’re listening to, ‘Oh, the market is rising wages, we don’t must take this motion. The market is doing it for us,’” Commissioner Claire Levy mentioned through the public listening to Thursday. “Properly, (wages final yr) went up 5.5% for the bottom paid earners. Inflation elevated 8.5% and … the highest 10% of the best paid jobs, the hourly price elevated 16.4%. So we have to do what we’ve got the facility to do as commissioners to attempt to shut the gaps, to attempt to degree the taking part in discipline, to attempt to create an surroundings during which everybody can stay a dignified life. And we will’t wait.”
A 2019 state regulation allowed municipalities to undertake their very own minimal wage however prevents the wage from rising greater than 15% a yr. Denver was the primary metropolis to take action three years in the past. It’s now at $17.29 an hour and since it’s pegged to annual inflation, it’ll improve to $18.29 in January.
Edgewater turned the second earlier this yr. That additionally takes impact in January and can begin at $15.02 an hour. Town’s anticipated annual will increase will get its minimal wage to the identical degree as Denver by 2029.
On the public listening to Thursday, Boulder County employees mentioned that in surveys, most individuals needed to get the county’s minimal to $25 by 2028, a wage proposed by the Self-Sufficiency Wage Coalition. An modification to the ordinance, additionally handed Thursday, will get the county to $25 an hour by 2030.
That 2030 purpose was strategic. If Boulder County cities and cities undertake a brand new minimal subsequent yr, they may catch as much as the county and all would find yourself at $16.57 in 2025.
Representatives from the Colorado Restaurant Affiliation and the Boulder Chamber requested the county to attend.
“We’ve been working in good religion together with our colleagues within the enterprise group on a regional minimal wage and have been engaged within the course of,” mentioned Cole Larson, the federal government affairs director for the restaurant affiliation. “And to see this wage ordinance transfer ahead, separate from the remainder of the county on a truncated timeline, is inflicting, to start with, quite a lot of consternation and points for a few of our companies which have already deliberate out and budgeted for his or her 2024 yr.”
Commissioner Marta Loachamin disagreed. “This may have, in my view, been rushed if in March of 2020, when Colorado shut down on March 5, if county commissioners … would have instantly put in a minimal wage in response to important staff and the wants and the dire straits that folk had been in,” she mentioned. “I really feel actually good concerning the course of (and) my skill to take part on this dialog as an elected official since 2021.”
Loachamin additionally talked about her assist of a program that’s being designed to assist enterprise homeowners transition to the brand new greater wage construction.
In response to a coverage temporary from the Emergency Household Help Affiliation shared by the county, greater than 10%, or over 20,000 jobs in Boulder County, paid lower than $15 per hour final yr.
Levy identified that even at $15.69, that’s simply $32,635 a yr. That’s not sufficient to pay for a spot to stay and afford baby care.
“It is a step and I’m happy that we’re going ahead,” she mentioned. “I hope that our municipal companions can be a part of us.”
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Extra Solar economic system tales
➔ Denver arts economic system is again. Or is it? Nonprofit arts and cultural exercise final yr had a $2.6 billion financial affect within the state, up 13.5% from 2019, in response to an replace from the Colorado Enterprise Committee for the Arts. Whereas those that survived the pandemic credit score public support, we’re now in a interval the place no extra help is out there and in-person attendance at occasions hasn’t returned to pre-pandemic ranges, and 55% of organizations run by or tailor-made to folks of shade mentioned they lacked monetary sources to get again the place they was once. Solar tradition reporter Parker Yamasaki stories on the financial replace. >> Learn story
➔ Western Slope water pursuits provide to purchase Colorado River water rights from Xcel. Negotiations are underway for the Glenwood Springs-based Colorado River District to buy one of many oldest, largest water rights on the Colorado River inside state strains from Xcel, in alternate for extra alternatives to guard streamflows for fish, habitat and wildlife, stories our buddy from Contemporary Water Information Jerd Smith. >> Learn story
➔ Grocery retailer merger attracts FTC chair in Denver. It’s been greater than a yr since Kroger and Albertsons proposed a merger. Colorado Lawyer Normal Phil Weiser has performed 19 stops on a listening tour across the state and has heard an earful of parents against the tie-up, he mentioned. On his most up-to-date cease in Denver, Federal Commerce Fee Chair Lina Khan solely heard opposition. The Solar was there. >> Learn story
Different working bits
➔ Skyhook Photo voltaic shifting to Grand Junction. A Carbondale developer of moveable photo voltaic turbines that would cost electrical automobiles in distant areas has moved its manufacturing to Grand Junction. Skyhook Photo voltaic, which has spent the previous two years engaged on the know-how, employs seven folks however hopes so as to add 38 jobs within the subsequent 4 years. It was additionally picked to be a part of the state’s Rural Leap Begin Program, which provides money grants of as much as $20,000 to offset startup prices plus $2,500 per new rent. Skyhook can be working with Colorado Mesa College to create a workforce program. A spokesman for the corporate mentioned that it’s engaged on a seed-funding spherical, which is anticipated to shut later this month. >> Extra
➔ How the native quantum workforce plans to develop. After final month’s massive information that Colorado was picked as an official Tech Hub for quantum know-how (right here’s a refresher on the tech), the Entrance Vary Group School shared a bit extra on the way it’s getting ready college students for careers in quantum. The brand new standing helps “allow us to construct out our curriculum and lab areas to show extra of those crucial quantum-related abilities,” FRCC Optics Program Director Amanda Meier mentioned in a information launch.
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