The ‘Cable Cowboy’ Battles a Giant Gas Station for the Soul of the West

PALMER LAKE, Colo.—Trina Shook took to the podium during a town hall meeting here in May to denounce a plan to locate a Buc-ee’s, a colossal roadside rest stop, on the outskirts of the tiny town.

“I’m disgusted by you personally, and by the company,” Shook informed the mayor in the packed meeting room, while an overflow crowd listened outside, shivering in the rain.

Mayor Glant Havenar snapped back: “Trina you’re done.” Shook stepped away to cheers and supporters waving anti-Buc-ee’s signs.

Emotions have boiled over in Palmer Lake (population 2,500) since the Texas-based Buc-ee’s chain—featuring a grinning beaver mascot—targeted undeveloped land along Interstate 25 for a new outlet: a 74,000-square-foot store with 60 gas pumps and parking for nearly 800 cars, open 24 hours a day.

Some residents display “Heave the Beave” signs in their front yards. They have a powerful ally: billionaire media mogul John Malone, America’s second-largest private landowner. His nearby Greenland Ranch is one of the largest stretches of open land between Denver and Colorado Springs.

“This would really ruin it for people driving between the metros wanting to see a little of the Old West,” Malone, 84, said in a Zoom interview from one of his summer homes in Ireland.

Ranch hand Ben Perez gives a cow antibodies to help with a respiratory infection at John Malone’s Greenland Ranch.

It has become an epic battle over the soul of the American West—and it has descended into accusations of harassment, slashed tires, crude name-calling and vicious private texts made public. Havenar said she sits with her back to the wall in public.

The Buc-ee’s brouhaha reflects rising backlash against sprawl in the West, where population growth is devouring open land. Between 2017 and 2022, the region lost 6.6 million acres of farm and ranch land, according to the American Farm Bureau Federation—an area the size of Massachusetts. And Colorado is ground zero: No state in the nation lost more farm and ranch land during that period.

Since 2000, metropolitan Denver has added nearly a million residents, to reach three million, while greater Colorado Springs shot up 40%, to more than 700,000.

As sprawl creeps outward, more fights are breaking out over whether to welcome development. Local boosters contend growth is inevitable and that they need the new tax revenue. Others see an erosion in their way of life, and of the very essence of Colorado.

A view of the proposed Buc-ee’s site in Palmer Lake.

The anti-Buc-ee’s forces fear harm to water supplies and light pollution obscuring the starry night skies. They argue that elk, deer and other migrating animals will be frightened by the up to 11,000 cars a day that a Palmer Lake study predicts Buc-ee’s would draw. Wildlife-vehicle crashes are already a problem—a $15 million wildlife overpass on Interstate 25 is under construction 2.4 miles north to keep animals from getting hit by traffic.

‘Legacy of the West’

Malone, raised in Connecticut, moved to Colorado a half-century ago with his wife, Leslie, and fell in love with the land. Encouraged by friend and fellow media mogul Ted Turner, Malone—known as “the cable cowboy” for building Tele-Communications, Inc. into a giant—began buying ranches for conservation in Colorado, New Mexico and Wyoming. He owns 2.2 million acres across the U.S.

“The land talks to me,” said Malone, chairman of Liberty Media Corp. “I kind of like the freedom cowboys feel.”

John Malone in 2016.

In the late 1990s, subdivisions sprouted south from Denver along I-25 toward Colorado Springs, 70 miles away. Douglas County, the southernmost part of greater Denver, began brokering deals to conserve land. The county eyed a prize—the 22,000-acre Greenland Ranch.

“That allowed us to go to John Malone and say, this is an important public benefit, 8 miles of open land along the freeway,” said Brooke Fox, then-director of the county’s open space program.

Malone was receptive. He noted that Greenland Ranch was once part of a much larger 1800s land claim that stretched to the Kansas border. The grave of a U.S. cavalry soldier scalped during the Indian wars lies nearby, and cattle pioneer Charles Goodnight drove herds across the land.

“I think it’s an important part of the legacy of the West,” said Malone. In 2000 he acquired 17,000 acres of the land east of I-25, while the county bought much of the rest on the Rockies side. Both properties are now under conservation easements that prohibit development.

In all, $120 million—much of it from Malone—has been invested to create a corridor of sage and ponderosa pine.

“Oh look, the fawn went the wrong way,” said Rye Austin, who manages Malone’s land preservation foundation, as his pickup truck flushed out a young white-tailed deer during a ranch tour in early June. “Mama’s gonna come back looking for him.”

Malone Family Land Preservation Foundation executive director Rye Austin at Greenland Ranch.

An antler found during a tour of Greenland Ranch.

Elk at Greenland Ranch.

As the conservation deals took shape, small towns on the sprawl’s periphery sought new revenue sources to help pay for their own growth. Palmer Lake, at the northern edge of El Paso County, home to Colorado Springs, has grown by about 15%, to 2,500 residents, since 2000. Known for its rustic character—some unpaved streets and a mountainside star that lights up for Christmas—the town lacked enough money for water-system upgrades and to modernize an old ballfield and a fire station.

Mark Waller, a lawyer and political lobbyist who lives in Palmer Lake, studied how neighboring communities were getting by. “I drive through this town and I’m jealous every time,” he said while motoring recently through Larkspur (pop. 200), which gets enough taxes from an annexed RV theme park to help maintain its athletic fields and fire station.

A year ago, Waller got a call asking him to meet with Buc-ee’s representatives about a possible new location nearby.

‘A game changer’

Founded by Arch “Beaver” Aplin III in 1982, Buc-ee’s has grown to more than 50 locations, mostly in the South. The first Colorado Buc-ee’s opened last year in Johnstown—100 miles up Interstate 25—and like other locations, quickly gained a cult following for its barbecued brisket sandwiches, fudge, sparkling bathrooms, kitschy merchandise and “beaver nuggets,” a sweet, crunchy corn puff snack.

“People think it’s ‘just a gas station,’ but honestly, it’s become a way of life,” said Rickie Marie Betancis, 32, a flight attendant from Orlando, Fla., who holds Buc-ee’s themed birthday parties and visited the Johnstown Buc-ee’s in early June.

Waller said the representatives sought advice on the chain’s plan to build on 41 acres of undeveloped land of pine trees and grass it had under contract in the county. No rules prevented a business from going there. It had been zoned for commercial development since 1955.

Still, Buc-ee’s needed to convince a neighboring town to annex the county parcel so their complex could receive municipal services, such as water.

Over breakfast at Rosie’s Diner, Stan Beard, Buc-ee’s director of real-estate development, told Waller he wanted a “temperature check” of options, including being annexed by Monument, the closest town to the parcel.

Waller wasn’t encouraging. In the past, he had represented a developer who struggled to get Monument to annex a proposed subdivision on the same property. Waller suggested an alternative: Palmer Lake, 2 miles away.

“All of a sudden we pull out the map…and it dawns on me, Palmer Lake is the right place to do this,” Waller said. “It’s going to generate tax revenue for them—it’s a game changer for the town.”

Beard left the diner persuaded. “Palmer Lake quickly became my focus and a much better relationship to pursue,” he said.

A few weeks later, Havenar, who was Palmer Lake’s mayor, raised the idea during a closed-door meeting of the Palmer Lake trustees. They later heard from the Buc-ee’s team, and learned how the deal would work. Palmer Lake would do a “flagpole annexation,” meaning the trustees would extend the city limits only narrowly along County Line Road to the Buc-ee’s.

In return, Palmer Lake could expect at least $1 million annually in new sales tax revenues, a 30% boost in what the town typically sees in a year. Few trustees saw downsides—especially since the town needed millions to complete deferred maintenance on infrastructure and other big-ticket items. Plus, they reasoned, no one in town would even see the Buc-ee’s.

“My gut was it seemed like a good possibility,” said Dennis Stern, one of the trustees.

Texting scandal

As word spread, detractors emerged. Fierce opposition came from Woodmoor, a subdivision across the freeway from the proposed Buc-ee’s. Grace Foy, 41, a resident there, helped organize the pushback. “We called it the Buc-ee’s Resistance,” she said.

Some Palmer Lake residents grew alarmed, too. They didn’t buy that they would avoid seeing the rest stop. They envisioned it glowing like an alien city. They said it would damage local mom-and-pop businesses. And they noted that the daily water use of 37,000 gallons would require drilling new wells in an already strained aquifer.

Waller, now retained by Buc-ee’s, said the new wells would actually increase the town’s water supply and that store lights would be aimed downward to minimize nighttime glow. Beard said some Buc-ee’s customers would likely patronize local shops.

The Buc-ee’s representatives tried to outline the plan for about 300 locals packed into the cafeteria at Palmer Lake Elementary School on Dec. 3. But they were met with jeers. “We don’t want your Buc-ee’s, we don’t need your Buc-ee’s, we don’t desire your Beaver Nuggets,” lifelong Palmer Lake resident Alexandria Olivier shouted from the front, waving her arms angrily as the crowd applauded.

One night a week later, more tension erupted in Palmer Lake’s cramped town hall, which has served as a central gathering point since it was built in 1914. Residents filled every seat and the overflow crowd spilled outside into the freezing air, listening to the proceedings over a loudspeaker. The town’s trustees had convened to determine whether the store site was eligible for annexation. On a 4-1 vote, they determined it was—despite protests.

Supporters emerged, too. “It’s just not fair to say, ‘I’m here and I want to close the door behind me,’” said Darcy Schoening, 43, a Monument resident who formerly lived in Palmer Lake and attended the meeting.

She was also good friends with Mayor Havenar, who wasn’t at town hall that night but was watching a live feed from vacation in New Zealand. In communications later made public, Schoening and Havenar exchanged texts insulting the anti-Buc-ee’s speakers at town hall. “They are married and terrorists,” Havenar messaged about one couple. Of another attendee, Havenar texted, “fat ass is there…”

Noticing Shook, another critic, enter the room, Schoening texted, “They let the sex workers in.”

Shook, 53, who owns a medical spa in Palmer Lake, later called the jab disappointing. “Glant and Darcy are very much bullies,” she added.

Schoening responded that Shook has disparaged her and her family online as well. Asked about that, Shook replied: “I’m pretty certain that I have said nothing more than she is a low-vibrating human.”

A sign in the Woodmoor neighborhood.

Buc-ee’s opponents enlisted Integrity Matters, a Colorado Springs watchdog group. The organization, along with other plaintiffs, sued Palmer Lake in January asking that the annexation decision be reversed for alleged violations of open-meetings laws, among other issues.

Around this time, Malone heard about the fight from Austin, the manager of his land preservation foundation. “The citizens were stirred up,” the billionaire said. “If they put enough heat on their political representatives, maybe something can be done to convince Buc-ee’s to go somewhere else, which we would certainly prefer.”

Malone said he has offered to foot legal bills for opponents if needed, and to buy the land in question rather than have Buc-ee’s develop it. He called the Buc-ee’s beaver mascot “an invasive species from Texas” in a local newspaper guest editorial written with Ken Salazar, a former Colorado senator and U.S. secretary of the interior.

In February, Waller said he got a call from Austin, wanting to meet about the Buc-ee’s deal. “At the end he said, ‘By the way, we are very opposed to what you’re doing and we’re going to use Mr. Malone’s vast resources against you,’” Waller recalled, adding that he never agreed to a meeting as a result.

Austin acknowledged the call but denied making any threats or referring to Malone’s resources.

‘Nothing but grifters’

The opponents—led by Integrity Matters—launched new challenges, including a recall petition against Stern and two other Palmer Lake trustees who had voted for the annexation eligibility. In March, Buc-ee’s withdrew its annexation request, citing technical errors, but soon resubmitted it.

Integrity Matters and others also made a written request asking Colorado’s attorney general to investigate dozens of cases of alleged harassment of anti-Buc-ee’s activists. This included “stalking of two plaintiffs’ homes by the same car, a yellow Mercedes with a black stripe, slowly driving by each of their homes, on the same day, and taking photos.” A spokesman for the attorney general’s office declined to comment.

Stern, who said he and the other trustees did nothing wrong, calls Integrity Matters “a hired gun to come in here and make trouble.” Schoening called the group’s attorneys “nothing but grifters” in an email blast. (Integrity Matters had issued a warning notice to Schoening and others not to harass citizens who signed the recall petition.)

Havenar said Buc-ee’s supporters, including herself, have had their tires slashed and have been threatened online.

Dana Duggan, president of Integrity Matters, said the nonprofit works pro bono and she questioned the tire-slashing reports, since only one is on file with police. “‘Twin Peaks’ was one of my favorite shows,” she said in an email. “I wondered if there was a beauty queen who had been murdered and a log lady running around in Palmer Lake. I have never seen anything like it.”

On May 29, the trustees again decided the Buc-ee’s land was eligible for annexation and the matter is being sent to the planning commission for a report. A final vote is expected this summer. Havenar won’t be there. She resigned as mayor after Schoening made their texts public on social media in early June, following a personal dispute between the two women. The texts were referenced in the lawsuits against the town. Stern was appointed mayor in her place, in a process the Buc-ee’s opponents also disputed.

“We are being cyberbullied day in, day out over a gas station,” Havenar said in an interview before the texts surfaced and she stopped returning calls. “This is something out of a movie, craziness going on.”