Commerce City
Audio By Carbonatix
Ask any Coloradan about this winter’s weather and you’ll get a mouthful of hot air. Which, ironically, is what the continent’s climate has dished out to the state in no small quantity this year. According to the USDA, “Record warm temperatures and below normal snowfall since October have driven Colorado’s snowpack to record low levels across many basins.” Businesses throughout Colorado’s vast mountain ranges are already seeing an effect. The dismal snowpack is a direct hit on the region’s economy, causing many ski resorts to operate at 60 percent capacity and some to reduce employee hours due to lack of snow and terrain offerings.
Meanwhile, down on the Denver plain, communities with a drastically different character are facing a number of challenges related to a warming climate: heat islands, lack of tree canopy cover, and longstanding environmental injustice — i.e., the impacts of pollution from resource extraction, industry and other land uses.
Whether skiing in Aspen or riding a bike down the Platte River trail in Commerce City, we inhabit the historical inertia of land use, zoning, industry and infrastructure. Communities must wrestle with these legacies but, more important, harness the power of the present to improve community resilience and fight for environmental justice. In this fight, it is imperative that local governments, policy advocates and community organizations help build community resilience in the face of a warming climate.
“It’s beyond drought. I think we’re reaching a point of desertification,” Ean Tafoya, a Denver-based environmental activist, opined recently in response to the state’s winter weather. The science of climate change is clear: Human activities are warming the planet’s climate. When scientists average data from thousands of weather stations worldwide, where people have been recording daily high and low temperatures for over a century, the average surface temperature has risen about 1.8*F (1.0*C) since 1880. But you don’t have to read dense academic literature or conduct a systemic review to know that this winter in Colorado has been one for the record books. All you need to do is check your weather app!
In communities like Commerce City, the warming climate is exacerbating existing issues of poor air quality, heat islands and limited tree canopies. City leadership — both elected leaders and the city manager — have set a goal of expanding the city’s overall tree canopy from its current level of 4 percent to 20 percent. The city is adapting and leveraging partnerships with the private sector to assess, map and inventory the city’s entire tree canopy. Led by the city’s recently formed E3 division (Energy, Equity and Environment), a multi-departmental team has been working with PlanItGeo, an urban forestry consulting business, to develop the city’s first-ever tree canopy report and assessment. The draft report was completed in early 2026 and presented to the city’s citizen commission on the environment, also known as EPIC (Environmental Policy and Innovation Commission). The final report will be presented to Commerce City City Council in April.
The state’s warming climate requires innovative thinking and context-dependent policy tools that match the diverse communities in our state to adapt to and overcome challenges associated with the cascading effects of climate change. For Commerce City, promoting a resilient, climate-ready urban forest and expanding the urban tree canopy in underserved neighborhoods is innovation in action. Data-driven, evidence-based urban forestry management that leverages modern technology is a policy tool that could have major impacts on mitigating heat islands and improving the quality of life for residents in this northeast metro suburb.
America’s political philosophy and economy are inextricably intertwined with the climate, more so than previous generations understood. Unbeknownst to the Founding Fathers, their declaration of independence contained both the seeds of justice for generations throughout our country’s history to the present day, as well as the seeds of the Anthropocene. Two hundred and fifty years after the nation’s founding, America’s industrial output and economic behemoth collide with its climate. Echoes of the nation’s founding declaration, which reverberate today in the movements for environmental justice in northeast Denver, push local governments and community advocates to realize more truth to the words “we hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal….”
