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Top 10 countdown: These are the most popular Texas state parks each winter

Published Mon, 23 Dec 2024 23:55:51 GMT

AUSTIN (KXAN) — Looking for an outdoor adventure this winter? Depending on the weather, one of Texas' many state parks may be just what you're looking for.Across the Lone Star State, there are 86 state parks, natural areas and historic sites currently operated by the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department. What is the most-visited state park in Texas? Here’s the top 10 countdown for 2023 The first parks were opened to the public in the 1930s and the newest, Old Tunnel State Park, opened in 2012. TPWD also has plans to develop five sites into future state parks.TPWD splits the state into seven ‘natural regions,’ each of which is home to several state parks. The Prairies & Lakes region is home to 22 parks, more than any other region. The South Texas Plains region is home to the fewest, with seven parks.To determine the average winter totals, we looked at the number of visitors each December, January and February since 2018-19. In an average winter, the state park system a...

'Better off without me': Mom shares postpartum depression struggle as Texas works to improve access, treatment 

Published Mon, 23 Dec 2024 23:55:51 GMT

AUSTIN (KXAN) — She can only describe it as a breakdown. It was during the COVID-19 pandemic when the east Austin mom explained she "could no longer keep the balls all in the air. They all fell down."A book displayed at The Village Place in northeast Austin. (KXAN Photo/Arezow Doost) The 36-year-old was teaching not only students but her daughter at the time. She said her husband helped but nothing could prevent what happened next. "I suddenly had no desire to eat or live. I was just really tired and overwhelmed. Not having a lot of support made things even harder. No one to ask for a break, childcare," she wrote to KXAN investigators anonymously. "I knew it wasn't baby blues because the constant feeling of sadness, hopelessness, and extreme tiredness never went away. There was even some difficulty bonding with my baby and thoughts she would really be better off without me." READ: Austin-based Black Mamas Village debuts new community hub She said she had dealt with ...

Mark Gongloff: Do 70,000 people really need to be at a climate confab?

Published Mon, 23 Dec 2024 23:55:51 GMT

How many people do you think it takes to hammer out a global climate agreement? 500? 5,000? 50,000?Apparently, the correct answer is 70,000. That’s about how many people are expected to turn up in Dubai over the next few weeks for COP28, the latest United Nations climate confab, which started on Thursday. This is up from 49,704 at COP27 last year in Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt, and 38,457 at COP26 in Glasgow, Scotland. Attendance has more than tripled since 2019. In COP’s early years, attendance averaged just 5,000.Whether this explosion is a sign that the world is taking climate change more seriously or just the bloat that naturally accumulates around gatherings of humans who control large pools of political and financial capital remains to be seen. Is COP Man devolving into Davos Man? The answer depends partly — but not entirely — on how much real progress gets made over the next few weeks.On that front, it’s difficult to be optimistic. Many of those 70,00...

Cathedral Christmas Festival among holiday events in the Twin Cities this year

Published Mon, 23 Dec 2024 23:55:51 GMT

An hour of live classic Christmas songs, an old-school European marketplace, and special recognition of a rescued fox kit will be featured at the Cathedral of St. Paul’s Cathedral Christmas Festival.The fox kit, which came to be known as the Cathedral Fox, was found on the brink of death on Cathedral grounds in 2021 by the Rev. John Ubel. With the help of volunteers from the Wildlife Rehabilitation Center of Minnesota, the fox kit was nursed back to health and released to roam free on a 300-acre piece of private land in Cass County.The fox, and the story of it being saved, has become a focus of the annual festival. The event — from Dec. 7 to Dec. 9 — has been held for the last seven years.“The successful rescue of this cold, hungry, orphaned fox by cathedral rector Father John Ubel is an apt metaphor for the giving spirit of the Christmas season,” Christmas festival chair Andrew Kuhrmeyer said in a news release.How the “Cathedral Fox” was sa...

Editorial: Denver officials right to examine, restructure sidewalk fees

Published Mon, 23 Dec 2024 23:55:51 GMT

The sidewalk fee lookup tool posted on the Denver government website has been taken down, and that is a good sign. We had hoped the city council would see the gross inequities and sheer burden of the fee, which was approved by voters in November 2022, and take action to prevent it from being implemented as it was written.Voters, focusing on the upside of finally getting a completed and connected sidewalk network in the city, passed Initiated Ordinance 307, the sidewalk repair ballot measure, with 55.9% of voters’ support.But as The Denver Post Editorial Board noted in its opposition to the measure, this one came with implementation problems. For residents already facing increases in property taxes, groceries, insurance, trash services and other basic needs, the reality of the sidewalk fee struck hard as the calculator showed everyone just how much it would add to their mounting financial burdens.As written, the fee is not equitable for Denver’s residents, certainly not b...

Jewish Family Service continues to render critical help to those seeking stability

Published Mon, 23 Dec 2024 23:55:51 GMT

As a single mom with four kids, life for Gloria Sadler wasn’t easy in San Antonio, Texas. Then her house burned down.“It was very traumatizing,” Sadler said of the midnight fire about a year ago. “I would have dark moments of depression. We cried it all out in San Antonio and then we left.”The Denver Post Season To Share is the annual holiday fundraising campaign for The Denver Post and The Denver Post Community Foundation, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization. Grants are awarded to local nonprofit agencies that provide life-changing programs to help low-income children, families and individuals move out of poverty toward stabilization and self-sufficiency. Visit seasontoshare.com for more information.Left for Denver, where Sadler’s brother and sister-in-law live. Soon after arriving in the Mile High City, the 38-year-old mother of kids ranging in age from 10 to 18 was referred to Jewish Family Service, a 151-year-old human services organization bas...

Can Deion Sanders, CU Buffs rebuild an offensive line via transfer portal alone?

Published Mon, 23 Dec 2024 23:55:51 GMT

BOULDER — If the Buffs’ plan is to replace their whole offensive line with transfers, James Moore knows what his dad would probably say to Deion Sanders about that one.“That’s a big mistake,” Moore, son of the late offensive line coach and blocking guru Joe Moore, told The Denver Post last week when asked about CU. “My opinion: You’ve got to have somebody (who’s a veteran) in that room. … If you can build it, that’s not how I would build it.”Moore’s father, Joe, was the longtime offensive line coach at Pitt and Notre Dame, a football icon in western Pennsylvania and Mr. Miyagi to blocking senseis from Iowa’s Kirk Ferentz to Jimbo Covert and Russ Grimm.Joe Moore was a tough cookie, old-school, a contemporary of Mickey Andrews, the former Florida State defensive coordinator and one of Sanders’ spiritual mentors. A demanding son of a gun. A “we” guy and not a “me” guy.So much so,...

The wolves are coming to Colorado, and the state has stockpiled explosives and deterrents. How are ranchers preparing?

Published Mon, 23 Dec 2024 23:55:51 GMT

Brian Anderson and his father were completing their early morning chores on the ranch and loading cattle into trailers when they found the dead sheep, 200 yards from his house.A wolf killed the three lambs overnight on Nov. 17. One lamb was partially eaten. The wolf left the other two whole.Anderson looked for tracks in the snow at the ranch, located just south of Walden. He found nothing. He called the local wildlife manager, who examined the carcasses and confirmed them as wolf kills.Ranching with wolves has been a reality for people in Anderson’s community since 2019, when a wolf migrated south from Wyoming and established a small, now-dwindled pack.In the coming weeks, ranchers in other parts of Colorado will have to learn to live with the apex predators, too, under the country’s first voter-mandated wolf reintroduction. After years of public meetings, planning and controversy, Colorado’s ranching community — bracing for the relocation of wolves to the st...

Construction litigation blocking condo development in Colorado, but how does it get unblocked?

Published Mon, 23 Dec 2024 23:55:51 GMT

Where Shelby’s Bar & Grill long stood on the corner of 18th and Glenarm streets, and before that the old Broadway Hotel, two towers are rising that will provide 461 for-sale condos, defying the odds in more ways than one.The project represents a vote of confidence in downtown Denver at a time when office vacancy rates have soared above 30% and remote work has left the future of central business districts uncertain.And it conveys a degree of faith by Amacon, the Canadian developer behind the project, that Colorado’s litigious environment around construction defects won’t come back to bite it once it completes the city’s largest condo project since 2009.“We have been visiting Denver for years and over time we fell in love with the city and realized early on there was a need for and shortage of homes,” said Stephanie Badineau, vice president of sales and marketing with Amacon, which is based in Vancouver, British Columbia.About 70% of residents i...

California tax forecast falls $58 billion short, signaling cuts

Published Mon, 23 Dec 2024 23:55:51 GMT

By Eliyahu Kamisher | BloombergCalifornia’s tax revenue fell short of forecasts as expectations of a tax windfall late in the year failed to materialize, the nonpartisan budget advisor office said.The forecast on Friday by the Legislative Analyst’s Office said California’s tax revenue is expected to be $58 billion lower than earlier projections for the current and upcoming fiscal year. The state had expected a surge of tax payments in October and November due to delays in the tax filing deadline caused by natural disasters.“With the recent receipt of various postponed tax payments, the impact of recent economic weakness and last year’s financial market distress on state revenues has become clearer,” the LAO said. “The postponed payments came in much weaker than anticipated.”The latest update means California will face another difficult budget year that could force the state to cut back on services and tap into its rainy day fund. In July, California approved a $311 billion budget fo...