March Update

March has been a very busy, very exciting month for the state constitution module of our project. We made a trip to the Capitol, and talked with a few legislators, and gained a good amount of support for our project and the goals we we're striving toward. The survey is still coming together, the copies have been made, (4,000 of them!) and I'm currently in the process of printing all the labels with addresses. I have the newest version of MS Excel and its having a hard time converting into a MS Word mail-merge. We're planning on meeting this Friday April 3rd, to stuff all the envelopes!

February Update

There is a lot going on currently in the HR Clean-Tech group. We're putting together our survey that will be sent to residents of Highlands Ranch. This will be a great way to get feed back and know how the people of Highlands Ranch think about our goals and what our ultimate goal for the project is. Abhi and I are still planning our Capitol visit, which has been delayed for various reasons. A member from each module is presenting in front of Highlands Ranch Metro Districts tomorrow in efforts to show our progress and gain support. This has proven to be a very challenging project, but it keeps us busy and always learning new things. We had a lawyer come into one of our group meetings last week, and she helped by laying out the process of getting an amendment on the ballot. She also explained different ways to go about reaching our goal, which we plan to explore to see what route is the best for us.

End of January Update

This past week I spent about 30 minutes on the phone with Deborah Kalish, who is a lawyer in Boulder, Colorado. She is very supportive of our project, and after the meeting with the representatives, we needed to come up with some creative solutions to continue towards our goal. Ms. Kalish suggested that we contact Metro Districts and get them on board, to see what kind of support we can get from them. She also thought that with the new administration, and such a strong push towards renewable energy, we are in a good postition to be moving foward with this project. Representatives Frank McNulty and Ted Harvey suggested that we conduct a survey in Highlands Ranch to see what the residents think about the goals of our project. We will be having a meeting to organize the surveys and decide how we will go about mailing them.

January Update

Ahbi and I met with Frank McNulty and Ted Harvey on January 2nd at the Corner Bakery, and overall it was a fairly good meeting. They both seemed interested in what we are trying to do with this project, and I think they will support our ideas more once we refine some of our ideas and pin-point what needs to get done to achieve out goal. We explained a lot about the project in the 2 hour meeting, and they gave us lots of suggestions and ideas to further our research as well. We explained how we would like to put an energy incubator in Highlands Ranch, and how that would create revenue for Highlands Ranch, and create more renewable energy sources. They didn't like the idea of Highlands Ranch becoming a city of any kind, because that would require incorporation, which the 2 Representatives have fought every time the idea came up. To make Highlands Ranch a city, we would have to make a change to the constitution, which would require an election and support and publicity, which can get incredibly expensive, and there’s no guarantee the constitutional change will even pass once it reaches the ballot and is voted on. Both Harvey and McNulty thought that was all very unnecessary, and thought that our goals could be achieved without all of that expense. We are currently researching different energy incubators around Colorado to see if CU or the school of Mines can help fund or sponsor an incubator here in Highlands Ranch, as they already have various incubators around the state.