DarkSky Colorado community program manager Michael Rymer hopes Breckenridge is the first domino to fall. 

On Aug. 22, Breckenridge became the first mountain resort community in Colorado to get certified as a DarkSky community, according to DarkSky International. In doing so, Rymer said the town proved it’s possible for tourism-reliant economies to change the way they use light.

DarkSky is a global movement created in 1988 meant to mitigate light pollution for the sake of environmental, human and animal health. Municipalities, parks and reserves, private land and even urban areas can seek various DarkSky certifications. The organization encourages communities to redirect light sources downward and use light in a way that doesn’t pollute the sky rather than turning lights off. For a community like Breckenridge, it must get not only its municipal lights in compliance with DarkSky regulations, but residential lighting as well. This is done through changing town code. 

Breckenridge’s path to certification actually started with a Blue River resident. Assistant Town Manager Julia Puester said Martie Semmer’s public comment encouraging the town to pursue DarkSky certification put the idea on town staff members’ radar around two years ago now. Semmer had been a longtime advocate of mitigating light pollution and was involved with DarkSky Colorado for a number of years. She was familiar with what a community needed to do to get certified and knew certification was feasible for Breckenridge.

Breckenridge Town Council signed off on the idea, and staff members worked getting the town into compliance. Per DarkSky regulations, the town set parameters for outdoor lighting related to max wattages and color hues for bulbs. Outdoor lighting must be fully shielded and cast downward, according to the regulations. 

Rymer helped the town get into compliance, which he said was fairly easy given the town already had elements in its lighting codes that supported the requirements. He’s seen the process of getting certification vary in the communities he’s worked with. He said he thinks the presence of tourism Breckenridge didn’t make the process anymore difficult for the town, he said it created another tourism attraction and shows its feasible for other destination communities.

“Breckenridge being a very highly visible town for that reason, I think we’ll have a lot of positive chain reaction within the state and hopefully within the region for these places that do offer that type of outdoor recreation,” he said.

Rymer said Colorado has the most places pursing some sort of DarkSky certification than anywhere else in the world currently, highlighting how even other places in Summit like Frisco are working towards certification.

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He said the state’s elevation makes for better stargazing than elsewhere.

Higher elevation areas tend to have stronger atmospheric transparency, which is essentially just what it sounds like. He said, as opposed to sea-level destinations, people in mountains have to look through less of Earth’s atmosphere to see the stars because there’s often fewer obstructions in the atmosphere at high elevation.

Rymer said there’s a chart where people can find the best times to view the stars in Breckenridge. That chart can be found through this link ClearOutside.com/forecast/39.48/-106.05.

DarkSky Colorado details the best places to view the stars in Breckenridge on their website including places like Sawmill Museum, Gold Run Nordic Center and the summit of Discovery Hill.

Enforcement for residential lighting does not start until Jan. 2, 2026, thanks to a grace period the town is offering. Town staff members said residents can use the town as a resource to get into compliance, although officials reported some pushback from residents at an Aug. 26 Breckenridge Town Council meeting.

“This has been as divisive as our short term rental (regulations) were,” council member Dick Carleton said. “I experienced both, and I think the dark skies for the community that I’ve heard from is equal to or viewed more negatively.”