Mayor Of Ouray Wants To Declare Emergency
OURAY, Colo. (CBS4) – The mayor of Ouray in southwestern Colorado wants to declare and economic disaster and emergency.
She says businesses are struggling because of a January rockslide on Red Mountain Pass.
Highway 550 was completely closed for more than a month and then closed for hours at a time every day while crews worked on rockfall mitigation.
The economic disaster declaration still needs approval from the city council.
"That has opened the door for a lot of our businesses to have an opportunity to get a small business loan, a low interest rate loan to help them through the downturn they've experienced with the lack of people coming into our community to get them to into this busy season, where they should be able to make up that difference with summer once the highway is back open," said city administrator Patrick Rondinelli.
The Colorado Department of Transportation plans to continue the highway closures through next Thursday and but not during Memorial Day weekend.
