On a warm September afternoon in 2026, the Pagosa Springs Middle School in downtown Pagosa Springs was given a fresh coat of paint in the school colors. That image—a familiar building in the heart of town wearing its proud colors—stuck with me. Walk past it on a school morning and you’ll see buses pulling up, parents dropping kids off, teachers unlocking doors, and the day beginning just as it should. This is a living, breathing school, not an abandoned relic. And yet, when the September 24 edition of the weekly Pagosa Springs SUN ran a series of letters in support of a major property tax increase proposed by the Archuleta School District, one of those letters asked us to believe something very different. The school board wants $156.5 million to build a brand-new PreK-8 facility, and one of the letters, written by Lee Stopher, argued that we should invest in the future of our community. She wrote that doctors, nurses, teachers, tradespeople, and small business owners will not move here or stay here if their kids have to attend crumbling schools. She said every American child should be able to attend a fabulous public school. I agree with her, up to a point. I believe in this community. I believe in public schools. But I cannot agree that our current schools are crumbling. They are not. I have walked through those hallways. I have stood in the gyms, attended concerts in the cafeterias, and watched kids learn in classrooms that are clean, bright, and safe. And I suspect many voters in Archuleta County will feel uncomfortable approving a $156.5 million tax increase in the current economic climate when the buildings we already have are in reasonably good shape. That’s not because they don’t care about children. It’s because they care about accuracy.
So what do our school buildings actually look like? Let’s go beyond the political rhetoric and look at the facts. The foundations are sound. The roofs are relatively new. The entrances have been upgraded to provide better security. Fresh paint is applied when needed, and the grounds are maintained. No building is perfect, and there are always things that could use improvement, but the word “crumbling” does not describe this campus. It doesn’t describe any of our schools. Sometimes the difference between a school that feels old and a school that is unsafe gets blurred. We need to remember that “old” is not a code word for “crumbling.” Many of us have fond memories of older schools, but I have been saying for the past two years that the Archuleta School District should ask voters to approve a relatively small tax increase to better maintain what we already have. That would be an honest request, one that taxpayers could understand and probably support. But that’s not what is being proposed. The current proposal is a giant leap, and in order to sell that leap, some local activists have decided to make our existing buildings look like a disaster. They use words like “crumbling” to create an emotional sense of urgency. They know that if they simply said, “We want a new facility, and it will cost $156.5 million,” many voters might ask if that is the best use of their money right now. So they paint a picture of neglect and decay. That picture is false. The truth is that our buildings have been well maintained, given the funding available. And the truth is that we can have an honest conversation about future needs without pretending that our current schools are dangerous.
I say this as someone who has worked as an investigative journalist, with a particular interest in both misinformation and disinformation. Misinformation is a mistake. It happens when we pass along something we heard from a neighbor, or saw in a social media post, or read on a website, and later discover it wasn’t true. We are all misinformed from time to time; it’s part of living in an imperfect information world. Disinformation is different. Disinformation is when someone deliberately spreads propaganda—stories they know to be untrue or partially true—because they want to achieve a personal, social, or political goal. Misinformation comes from carelessness. Disinformation comes from purpose. And when I hear the word “crumbling” used again and again to describe schools that are not crumbling, I don’t think it’s carelessness. I think it’s a deliberate attempt to shape the debate in a way that serves a specific outcome. The question we need to answer is not whether we can afford a new school, but whether we can trust the story being told to justify it. In a small town, rumors and fears travel fast. It’s hard to slow down and ask hard questions. But that’s exactly what we must do. If we are going to ask taxpayers for $156.5 million, we owe them a truthful conversation. We owe them data, not drama. We owe them real assessments, not fear-mongering. And we owe ourselves the discipline to pause when a story seems too frightening or too simple to be true. The word “crumbling” is doing a lot of work in this debate, and none of it is honest work.
Now for the good news, because there is a lot of it. Earlier this month, Pagosa Peak Open School—a tuition-free, tax-supported charter school authorized by the Archuleta School District in 2017—announced that it has earned a “Performance Plan” rating from the Colorado Department of Education in its official three-year framework report. That is the state’s top rating. The school runs in a former office building that was never designed to be a school, and yet its students are thriving. School Director Emily Murphy said, “We are so proud of the hard work and dedication of our staff and students. This single year of growth hitting the 75th percentile highlights the ongoing progress our students are making within a Project-Based Learning environment.” That is not a small accomplishment. And in August, ASD communications manager Kelsy Been sent out a press release celebrating that all five Archuleta School District schools earned a Performance rating. The Colorado Department of Education released 2026 results from CMAS, PSAT, and SAT assessments, along with preliminary school and district performance frameworks. Those assessments show continued student growth across several grade levels and subjects. Let’s be clear about what this means: our public schools are doing some of the best academic work they have done in years. For a rural district, that is a meaningful achievement. It’s accurate information. And it should make us proud—and a little bit skeptical of anyone who tries to convince us that everything is in ruin. These results did not happen by accident. They are the product of hard work by teachers, support staff, administrators, and the students themselves. The least we can do is not let their achievement be buried under false narratives.
We should bring the same standard of evidence to other big public projects. The Archuleta Board of County Commissioners has been talking about a new County Administration Building and Detention Center since the late 1990s, perhaps even longer. At one point, the county purchased a five-acre parcel on Hot Springs Boulevard, directly across from Town Hall, with the idea of creating a local government campus. That plan never came together, and much of the land was eventually donated to an affordable housing project called Rose Mountain Townhomes, which serves 34 households. Now the county is considering the question again. At a recent work session, County Manager Longinos Gonzalez asked the commissioners if they wanted to hire an engineering or architecture firm to produce realistic quotes for two options. Option one is to build a completely new facility on a 5.5-acre parcel recently purchased in the Aspen Village subdivision. Option two is to purchase and remodel an existing building in the City Market shopping center, likely at a much lower cost. Which option is truly the better investment? We don’t know yet. We might have a gut feeling, but a gut feeling is not a substitute for an independent, honest evaluation. And there is an obvious trap: an outside consultant who might earn millions designing a new building may not give us completely objective advice. That is exactly the situation that played out when ASD hired Colorado Springs-based architects to analyze our existing school buildings. All of this matters because public money is precious. It comes out of our paychecks, our property taxes, our savings. It deserves respect. And respecting it means asking for independent information, not just information that tells us what someone wants us to believe. We need to ask who pays for the study, who benefits from the recommendation, and what they want us to think.
At the end of the day, this is a conversation about trust. Lee Stopher and I probably want the same kind of community. We both want a place where doctors, nurses, teachers, tradespeople, and small business owners can put down roots and raise their families. We both want every child to attend a public school that is safe, supportive, and genuinely wonderful. We both want every American child—including every child in Pagosa Springs—to have the kind of education that opens doors. I simply believe we should get there without letting fear rush us into a decision we may not fully understand. Our schools are not crumbling. Our district is not failing. If anything, our schools are showing measurable, state-recognized progress. That doesn’t mean we should stop investing. There are real needs, and I support a reasonable, transparent plan to meet them. But a $156.5 million property tax increase, promoted with exaggerated claims, is not the way to build trust. There is a better way. We can take a deep breath, look at the data, listen to each other, and make a plan grounded in reality. That won’t be as exciting as a bold emergency, but it will be more likely to succeed. We need honest conversations, independent studies, and careful planning. We need to demand information that has not been shaped by the people who would profit from a particular answer. And we need to remember that the future we build together will only be as strong as the truth we build it on. Read Part Two on Monday, when I’ll dig deeper into what the architects found and why it matters. For now, let’s keep our eyes open and our standards high. That’s how we truly invest in the future.