Elizabeth Philbrick

“I have always built grounded evidence and scientific thinking into policy processes. But specifically:

First, every significant policy proposal that comes before the Board should carry a staff analysis grounded in actual data — not just intent — including input from the subject-matter experts already on our staff, who I believe should be trusted and elevated, not worked around.

Second, I’d continue to lean on and strengthen our existing advisory bodies — planning commissions, public health partners, and our CSU Extension office — as standing channels for research-based input before votes, not just after problems surface.

Third, I’d bring in outside expertise where our own staff doesn’t have it: regional universities, the State Demography Office, and peer counties who’ve already tackled the same problem.

But evidence only matters if we follow through — so the mechanism I care about most is a built-in review cycle that checks whether a policy actually produced the outcome we predicted, and adjusts when it didn’t. Good policy isn’t just evidence-informed going in; it’s accountable to evidence coming out.”

“This question isn’t abstract for me — it’s every morning at my own operation. You see, I am the CEO of an Agriculture based business. At EsoTerra, we’ve put in drip irrigation, built retention ponds, to capture and reuse water, planted wind breaks, and gone solar, not because it was trendy, but because at nearly 7,000 feet in a region where water is never guaranteed, efficiency isn’t optional — it’s survival. So when I think about supporting farmers across this county, I’m not starting from theory. I’m starting from what I’ve had to learn by doing it on my own land.

As Commissioner, my role isn’t to tell farmers how to farm — it’s to make sure the tools that actually work are within reach, and that our policy is grounded in evidence, not assumption. That means supporting cost-share and grant programs that help growers adopt water-efficient infrastructure like drip systems and retention storage, the same way we did. It means working with groups like NRCS, CSU Extension and regional water districts to get real, local data into farmers’ hands — not generic guidance, but what actually performs in our soil, our elevation, our water rights system. And with fertilizer and input costs rising, it means exploring regional and cooperative purchasing models that give small operations some of the buying power that only large ag currently has.

Agriculture is our top export sector, but more than that, it’s our identity and our land stewardship. Protecting it means investing in resilience now — water efficiency, renewable energy, and shared infrastructure — so the next generation of farmers in La Plata County isn’t gambling against scarcity. I’m not guessing at what farmers need. I’m living it alongside them.”

“Data centers haven’t landed in La Plata County yet, and I intend to use that lead time well. Rather than react after a proposal is on our doorstep, we’re already gathering the information now — water and power demand, tax and job impacts, and how other Colorado communities have negotiated these agreements — so that if a project does come here, we’re not deciding under pressure.

The right balance protects our water and grid capacity first, and ensures real local benefit — jobs, tax revenue, reinvestment — isn’t traded away for speed. Being prepared now is how we make sure we get that balance right. However, I can’t speak to the ‘right balance’ because information is still coming in and there are gaps in my knowledge. I will never pretend to know something, if I do not - and for now… I still have a lot to learn on this matter.”

“I want to be direct: I believe deeply in modern medicine, and vaccines are one of the greatest inventions in human history. They’ve saved more lives than almost any other public health tool we have, and the science behind them is not in question. When I see a disease like measles — something we had effectively eliminated — lingering in our state since last spring, that tells me our vaccination coverage has slipped somewhere, and that’s a problem worth taking seriously, not politically.

My approach is evidence-based prevention paired with genuine caution when a threat is active. That means supporting our public health partners in maintaining strong, accessible vaccination programs, investing in real-time disease surveillance so we catch outbreaks early rather than after they’ve spread, and communicating clearly and honestly with residents instead of either minimizing a threat or stoking fear around it.

I also believe good policy stays open to new evidence. Science evolves, and so should we — but “staying open” doesn’t mean waiting until a threat is confirmed before acting. When the risk is real and the evidence is solid, caution now is how we protect families later. That’s the standard I hold myself to on every public health decision.”

“I think we do our kids a disservice when we tell them they’re “the best in the world” without being honest that, by most international measures, we haven’t ranked near the top in science and math for years. That gap doesn’t close by pretending it isn’t there — it closes by being honest about it and getting curious about why. We were once the undisputed leader in science and technology, and I don’t think that’s gone for good, but complacency is how you lose it permanently.

A commissioner doesn’t set K-12 curriculum — that’s our school boards and the state — but I can still be a voice for what I know works: science learning that’s hands-on and tied to real problems, not just memorized for a test. We have an extraordinary natural laboratory right here — our rivers, our soil, our agriculture, our changing climate — and partnerships between our schools, our community partners, and local producers like ours can turn that into real science education, not abstract theory.

I also push hard for critical thinking and media literacy alongside content knowledge, because the ability to evaluate evidence is itself a core science skill, and it’s one that protects kids long after graduation. Raising science literacy starts with admitting where we actually stand — and then doing the unglamorous work of building curiosity back up from there.”