Colorado Water Plan: A Conversation on Exclusion and Movement Building

In anticipation of the 2022 Colorado Water Plan Draft, the Colorado Water and Equity Partnership is excited to host a virtual informational panel and discussion on Thursday, June 2 from 6:30-8:00 pm MT.

Interpretación en español disponible

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The Colorado Water and Equity Partnership invites urban farmers, acequia users and Indigenous and BIPOC communities in Colorado to discuss the upcoming Colorado Water Plan update and related opportunities for advocacy and action. We'll be hearing from expert speakers on the limitations of historical water policy in the West and opportunies to influence the Colorado Water Plan in support of water justice. The 2022 Colorado Water Plan will impact water planning and management in Colorado for years to come. It will be important that all voices and perspectives of Colorado water users are included.

Confirmed speakers are listed below!

Call-in information will be emailed to all registered participants the day of the event.

Kia M. Ruiz is an environmental and economic development consultant who also teaches mindfulness and yoga classes to balance out her brain. She comes from a biologist background where her specialty was in herpetology with an emphasis in connection to environmental systems. Kia is Black and Indigenous with Ngabe-Bugle and Five Tribes ancestry. She enjoys conveying science to the non-scientific public while always seeking the convergent connections that bring people to the land and themselves. You can find her at @kiamruiz on twitter and IG.

Alex Funk joined the Theodore Roosevelt Conservation Partnership (TRCP) in August 2021 as its director of water resources and senior counsel. Funk previously served as the Agricultural and Rural Resiliency Policy Specialist at the Colorado Water Conservation Board, where he acted as the agency’s liaison to agricultural stakeholders on federal and state water policy issues. In this role, he also assisted with the implementation of the Colorado Water Plan. Previously, Funk was the Western policy director for the National Young Farmers Coalition, focusing on Farm Bill policy, and a fellow with American Rivers.

Funk earned his Juris Doctorate from Vermont Law School and his bachelor’s degree in Environmental Policy and Planning from Virginia Tech. He serves on the Colorado State University Food-Energy-Water Graduate Program external advisory board. He lives in Denver, Colo., with his family and can frequently be found mountain biking, backpacking, climbing fourteeners, and paddling his kayak around the West.