The Thunder River Theatre Company — operating as the Karen Chamberlain Poetry Festival under the direction of Valerie (Haugen) Nuzzo — made the first presentation of the Western Slope Poet Laureate title in the festival’s second year. When the Chamberlain Festival shut down in 2014, the Telluride Institute’s Talking Gourds Poetry Program took on the project and made the biannual award at the Telluride Literary Arts Festival – a collaboration of several arts groups (public & private). That festival ended in 2019 and now the selection is made by the Talking Gourds program in collaboration with a committee of poets and poetry organizers around the region and presented in Grand Junction, the Western Slope’s capitol city.

Covid put us on hiatus, and our laureate at the time, L. Luis López, agreed to add a year to his term. In 2023 we partnered with the Grand Valley Creative Alliance to present the award in Grand Junction at the Center for the Arts.

From the County Website:

The San Miguel County Board of County Commissioners (BOCC) created the honorary position of Poet Laureate of San Miguel County in 2006 in accordance with the authority granted by Section 30-11-107 (1) (cc), C.R.S. The Poet Laureate of San Miguel County will run for two years, and the office of Poet Laureate of San Miguel County will be a way to honor a member of the local community who has demonstrated significant literary achievement.  The Poet Laureate will provide leadership in the literary community, create opportunities to expand the literary community in the county, and educate the young in the community-building powers of the arts to provide vision as well as beauty and entertainment to the people of the county.