Outdoor Pikes Peak Initiative · Article 24 of 24
The implementation chapter is short on purpose. The four-year process produced research, a public record, tools, and a project list. Carrying them is a different job. The end goal is twofold: implement the strategies, action items, and recommended projects, and leave communities and land managers with tools they can keep using.
Two things that moved before the ink dried
The Royal Gorge Bighorn Roundtable is the local example of a regional plan sprouting a county table. Under Ashlee Sack, then coordinator of Fremont Adventure Recreation, and with Kalem Lenard of the BLM Royal Gorge Field Office, the roundtable has met since early 2024 with stakeholders, industry, and elected officials. It contributed project priorities that the task force vetted onto the regional list. The other early outcome is the December 2024 letter of intent from mountain land managers to explore a long-term recreation agreement with Colorado Parks and Wildlife along the Ring the Peak corridor, and the governor’s public support in January and February 2025. The plan calls both integral to projects that have not started yet.
The implementation task force
Purpose: make sure the Vision Plan is carried out and the goals advance. For each project, initiative, or action item, the task force is supposed to name a champion, clarify whether OPPI leads, partners, or champions, assess what completion still needs, set a short-, mid-, or long-term timeline, and pick a funding mix. A one-to-three-year work plan follows, with leads and dates, then grant writing and philanthropy. The same body keeps the data hub current with UCCS, trains people to use the map and the checklist, and reports progress through newsletters, social media, and press. Successes get celebrated on purpose.
Makeup is the region’s outdoor regional partner, PPORA, plus public land managers, county commissioners, municipal leaders, and conservation and recreation organizations, largely people already on the OPPI task force. The plan was headed to elected officials and stakeholders for comment and endorsement, with the task force to stand up shortly after, meeting monthly or every other month.
The closing paragraph does not pretend the state program will finish the job. Colorado’s Outdoor Regional Partnerships Initiative is staying in, including a path from planning grants to implementation grants. “Local investment is key to its success.” Readers are pointed to the OPPI newsletter and PPORA’s channels. That is the handoff this series is for: a 491-page plan, read as the work still in front of the people who live here.
Source: Outdoor Pikes Peak Initiative Vision Plan 2025, prepared through the Pikes Peak Outdoor Recreation Alliance as the local Colorado Outdoor Regional Partnership, with support from Colorado Parks and Wildlife and Great Outdoors Colorado. Project team: PPORA, Trails and Open Space Coalition, N.E.S. Inc., Bachman PR, and the University of Colorado Colorado Springs Geography Department. The plan was written across a four-year process and released in 2025; some statistics reflect a point in time before publication. Early Outcomes, page 105; Implementation, pages 115–117.
