Voters, for the first time, could get final say in the war over wolves in Colorado

fter 40 years of battling to restore wolf populations in the Southwest, Northern Rockies and Great Lakes states, the legal, political and biological war for wolves is coming to Colorado. But this time it could be voters — not federal and state wildlife managers — pushing the only state in the Rocky Mountains without wolves to welcome the roaming predators. With the federal government ready to remove the gray wolf from endangered species protection, a ballot proposal submitted to the Secretary of State last week hopes to enlist Colorado residents in finalizing the long effort to restore wolf populations in North America. “A wolf population in Western Colorado would serve as the archstone, the final piece that would connect wolves from the high Arctic all the way to the Mexican border,” said Montana state Sen. Mike Phillips, a longtime wolf advocate and wildlife biologist who is advising Rocky Mountain Wolf Project and Rocky Mountain Wolf Action Fund, the two partner groups behind the push for wolf reintroduction in Colorado. “Colorado is maybe the last piece of the puzzle and it is a critically important piece.”...MORE