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Here’s how millions in Colorado pot taxes are being used to fix up outdated, sagging schools

By Monte Whaley / The Denver Post
The building that houses the shuttered swimming pool at Deer Trail K-12 School has bad cracks in the walls and has been deemed unsafe for use, shown here June 29, 2017 in Deer Trail. A new school will be built within two years thanks to millions of dollars in revenue from Colorado marijuana excise taxes.
Andy Cross, The Denver Post

But there is also excitement on these streets 60 miles southeast of Denver. New homes are popping up just off Interstate 70 and a state-of-the-art preK-12 school is on the horizon, to be built in part from money collected from legal pot buys.

Plenty of people have personal objections to marijuana use, but state and local school officials say no one is protesting that rundown schools are getting millions in revenue from excise taxes on retail marijuana sales for renovations and wholesale replacement.

That’s the case in Deer Trail, where swimmers are banned from using the 50-year-old pool, students in wheelchairs must be hoisted up ill-equipped stairs and into narrow bathrooms, and the coach’s locker room is closed due to a sewage leak.

“It’s just a nightmare to keep things going around here,” school principal Dave Casey said.

Read the full story on The Denver Post website, click here.


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