Business View Civil & Municipal | July 2022

40 CIVIL AND MUNICIPAL VOLUME 3, ISSUE 7 has to offer. Manufacturing is another growing sector, and mining and forest operations are also seeing a boost recently. The county is looking to bolster its already diverse employment sector by drawing in more outdoor industry manufacturing. They already have Alpacka Rafts, a packable raft manufacturer, and Osprey Packs, which makes outdoor backpacks. “Manufacturing is definitely something that we’re working on to diversify our industry, and our County more,” Thurman says. In that regard, Montezuma County has its eye on becoming the prime location for manufactured housing. “The region between those major cities of Denver, Salt Lake, Vegas, Phoenix, Albuquerque is some of the most natural, disaster-free area on earth,” Powers says. “We don’t have floods, tornadoes, earthquakes, hurricanes, any of that. So it’s really the ideal environment for manufactured homes. So much of the area in the region is remote that it doesn’t even make sense to site-build houses because of the difficulty in getting materials Plans are already in place to improve the broadband access to Montezuma County. Emery Telcom is working through the Utah side of the county, putting fiber lines into nearby Dolores County and into parts of Montezuma, and plans are beginning to form to bring access in from the east on Highway 160. “The governor has also given executive orders to start using the Colorado Department of Transportation right of ways to install fiber in all the state highways within the state,” Powers explains. As it stands, the county is already home to a variety of robust industry sectors. “Our economy is three to four-fold,” Powers reports. “There’s oil and gas. Kinder Morgan is our biggest economic driver and they extract CO2. Then there’s agriculture. It’s a big hay, pinto bean, and cattle area, and then there’s a lot of smaller firms as well.” Tourism is also a major economic driver. The area draws up to 700,000 visitors a year to see all the archeological wonders that Montezuma County