Garfield County residents will elect a new District 1 commissioner in November.
Republican nominee Eric Rudd, a member of the county’s planning commission for 13 years, faces Democratic nominee Jonathan Godes, the former mayor of Glenwood Springs. Both candidates ran unopposed in the parties’ summer primaries.
Whoever wins the election will join the three-person Board of County Commissioners to represent District 1, which covers southeast Garfield County around Glenwood Springs and Carbondale. Currently, all three county commissioners are Republican. The district’s commissioner, Republican Tom Jankovsky, is not seeking reelection after 16 years on the BOCC.
Both Rudd and Godes argue their histories in local government have prepared them for the role as commissioner. In separate interviews with the Aspen Daily News, the county’s road traffic, rapid housing development and rising cost of living emerged as shared top concerns among the two candidates.
“I want to bring more people to the table, more voices to the table,” said Godes. “(I want to) have conversations that lead to actual solutions, start to move the needle on a lot of the issues that are facing us right now.”
Godes, 48, has lived in Glenwood Springs for 20 years and works as director of the nonprofit I-70 Coalition. Rudd, age 40, grew up in Carbondale and works in commercial real estate leasing and raising cattle.
“Seeing how the valley has changed — the impact that it’s had, the rifts it’s caused — really drove me to want to pursue this,” Rudd said. “(I want to) try and mend some of those rifts, show that we can listen, we can learn and we can work together.”
The development arena
County commissioners are charged with weighing, approving or denying commercial and residential development applications nearly every week. They also help shape the county’s long-term growth in the form of its comprehensive plan, which broadly lays out how the county’s land should be developed or preserved as open space in coming decades.
Rudd said he feels the comprehensive plan, adopted in 2010, is outdated, representative of “what we did 20 years ago,” and it’s a top priority to help the county’s planning commissioners revise it. Water, traffic and density would be at the “forefront” of those revision conversations, he said.
Decades ago, the county gave initial approval to large-scale developments like Spring Valley Ranch, which set out to build over 2,000 homes near Glenwood Springs. Amid strong public pushback, the proposed sizes of those kinds of projects have gradually, and significantly, shrunk over the years.
To Rudd, this trend is a sign that the county needs to approve developments with more caution, while acknowledging that some growth is inevitable. He’d want to see the county’s comprehensive plan break its open land into larger segments that have specified, intended uses. This, he said, would help ensure the county grows cohesively, rather than year-by-year, development-by-development.
“It’s just pushed people farther and farther and farther downvalley,” he said. “We’ve grown so much that we have to really consider the impacts developments are having and the direction we’re moving forward.”
For Godes, encouraging dense development and housing within existing cities is a top priority. He said the county must recognize when it doesn’t have the infrastructure or space to accommodate massive developments. In such cases, proposed projects should be denied.
“You can’t just build and build and build, because this is a highly desirable place, and it’s going to be highly desirable, and there is no way that supply is ever going to meet demand,” he said. “At the end of the day, if you don’t have the water, you don’t have the infrastructure, you can’t do the project.”
Godes said he feels developers aren’t doing enough to build affordable housing to support the county’s workforce. He wants to see less free-market developments and more deed-restricted housing that can’t be bought by retirees or second-home owners.
Godes pointed to his eight years on the Glenwood Springs City Council, in which he helped create a mandate that 30% of all new developments be deed-restricted affordable housing tied to the area’s median income (the mandate was 20% when it was first created, but has since been increased to 30%). Garfield County has no county-wide deed restriction requirement.
Common ground
Both candidates said they want to continue to support, and help expand, the bus route that connects upvalley towns like Aspen to communities downvalley as far as Rifle, serviced by the Roaring Fork Transit Authority.
The 24-year-old “Hogback Route” that runs from Glenwood Springs to Rifle every 30 to 60 minutes has in recent years faced an uncertain future. Garfield County commissioners have progressively lowered their contributions to funding the route, and in September promised that 2027 was the last year they would contribute anything.
But Godes and Rudd both view the route as central to residents’ quality of life, especially as congestion along Interstate 70 and Highway 82 worsens.
The candidates want to see more frequent buses stopping in Silt, Rifle and New Castle so that more residents are drawn to using the route. Rudd said he wants to initiate conversations about a localized passenger rail system that uses the railroad track running along I-70 to connect the corridor.
Public transit is one of several social benefits that both candidates said they want to invest in — even as the county faces continued budget shortfalls.
The county has in recent years struggled to balance its budget, and last year faced a $9 million shortfall. Its struggles primarily stem from lessened revenue from taxes on natural gas producers.
The oil-rich county once received a large portion of its budget from local drilling operations, but heightened state regulations and shifting natural gas markets have in recent years led operators to significantly pull out of the region.
Godes criticized the county’s spending of millions on lawsuits to fight those state-level regulations. While profits from the natural gas industry have benefited Garfield County schools, libraries and hospitals, he noted, he wants to now invest county dollars into attracting new industries — preferably ones that more align with the region’s identity as an outdoor recreation hub.
“We can’t just continue to spend millions of dollars clinging to an industry that has declining revenues, hoping beyond hope that more people will wake up tomorrow wanting fossil fuels than wanting renewables,” Godes said.
Rudd, a self-described “green Republican,” echoed Godes’ sentiment. He sees Garfield County as being too reliant on oil and gas revenue, and he wants to see it diversify. Both candidates noted they drive electric vehicles.
“It takes a lot of time and a lot of effort to promote industries to move here,” Rudd said. “So we really have to be focused on what we’re good at, what we’re not good at, to create that direction for what our next types of industry will be in this area.”
Not tied to party labels
When asked why they most align with their respective parties, both candidates said they’d have rather run with no affiliation. But for fundraising and political strategy purposes, they chose to run with the party that most aligns with their views.
Rudd said he chose to run as a Republican for his belief in “small government” and “fiduciary responsibility.” He noted that believing in small government does not mean he wants to shrink the county’s staff or social safety programs.
“It’s too easy to spend other people’s money, so we should have a tattoo down on our arms to make sure we never forget this isn’t our money,” he said.
Rudd, who said he’s attended nearly every county commissioners’ meeting for the past two years, said he didn’t agree with the party’s general sentiment that government should be run like a business. He said he’s learned that the county has too much responsibility to preserve its open space and social programs, so it can’t be run with a “for-profit” mindset.
Godes, who described himself as a lifelong Democrat, said he stands with his party on a national scale, aligning most with its social and foreign policies. But he said he feels that party labels at a local scale do more harm than good.
“I don’t view it as two Republican commissioners that I’ll be joining,” he said. “I view it as two gentlemen who may have a different world view about national politics, and might have a different view on some issues of local politics, but are people who want to do the best for Garfield County.”
Godes said he’d want to form advisory committees of communities within the county — noting its Latino, LGBTQ and youth populations — to ensure he’s representing his full constituency.
Rudd has reportedly spent significantly more money than Godes on his campaign, spending about $34,062 to Godes’ $4,350, according to campaign finance reports that cover the period between fall 2025 and July 2026.
Godes reported raising $10,756 in that time frame, with his two biggest donors being Erik Kushto, a self-employed finance professional, and Mark Spidell, co-founder of Defiance Capital, a real estate lending company. Both funders are local residents who contributed $1,000 and $1,000, respectively.
Rudd is self-funding his campaign. The next round of campaign finance reports are due Oct. 13.
County clerks across Colorado started mailing out ballots to registered voters last week. The last day to register to vote by mail is Oct. 26. Residents can find if they are registered at the secretary of state’s website.
Drew Shaw is a Report for America corps member covering public lands and other items of interest in Garfield County for the Aspen Daily News.
Editor's note: This story has been updated to correct Glenwood Springs' deed-restricted affordable housing mandate; Garfield County's deed restriction requirements and Matt Spidell's contribution amount to Jonathan Godes' campaign.
