Let CPW responsibly manage our wildlife

Colorado lawmakers and state wildlife biologists have rejected previous proposals to ban wild cat hunting. Advocates now seek to circumvent these science-based decisions with Proposition 127.

I didn’t grow up hunting, so I understand how paradoxical it may sound when hunters say they care about wildlife. But their concern is as genuine as the grocery shopper who cares about the welfare of the animals they eat. And while I respect anyone’s decision to outsource death, if you consume meat, an animal has died for your meal. Hunting, for me, ensures that the meat my family eats comes from ethically harvested animals that lived wild and free, without antibiotics or hormones. It could not be more free-range and organic.

Moreover, using every part of the animal — meat for food, hide for leather, bones for broth and antlers for pup chews — does not make me a trophy hunter. Rather, it means I’ve respected the life I took by ensuring nothing is wasted.

Colorado law reflects this ethos by requiring that the meat from all big game animals, including mountain lions, be taken for human consumption. Mountain lion hunters are also legally obligated to preserve and present the hide and skull to a Colorado Parks and Wildlife office or officer. Given these requirements, the notion of “trophy hunting” in this context is a misrepresentation.

Just as we wouldn’t put heart surgery or car repairs to a public vote, we shouldn’t do so with wildlife biology either. Instead, we should rely on Colorado Parks and Wildlife professionals, whose decisions are based on decades of experience, careful research, and current data, to continue to manage our wildlife responsibly. While I don’t personally hunt wild cats, I support the right to do so in a science-based, state-regulated and ethical manner.

Please vote “no” on Proposition 127.

— Matthew Meyer, Longmont

Support Amendment 79

I grew up knowing that as a woman I had the right to make medical decisions, sometimes difficult, with the advice of medical professionals. Unfortunately for my granddaughter, daughter-in-law and countless other women across the country, this is no longer the case. While Colorado legislation currently allows for abortion, this law can be changed by any shift in control of the state legislature. To protect the right of women to make decisions about our own bodies, we need to vote “yes” on Amendment 79 to affirm the right to abortion in our state constitution.

I trust patients and medical professionals to make these decisions, not politicians. Passing this measure is crucial for women’s freedom, bodily autonomy, and access to the full array of health care including, when needed, abortion.

Abortion is an evidence-based medical component of women’s health and well-being. A woman’s doctor is the only person who should be able to advise a woman on her individual circumstances, allowing her to make the decision that is right for her health and her future.

Right now, groups of politicians across our country are dictating medical care without medical training and they are knowingly endangering women’s lives for political gain.

Approving this amendment is not a “yes or no” decision about having an abortion, but a vote that says the government should not be involved in the fundamental reproductive health care choices of the women of Colorado. This amendment ensures a woman has the power to make a decision with the people she chooses: her family, her faith leader and her doctor — that’s freedom.

Please urge everyone you know to vote “yes” on Amendment 79.

— Helayne Jones, Boulder