UPDATED: Wark, Hubbard have given $2K to GOP candidates, groups since 2016
Hubbard twice donated to sitting Weld County commissioner under maiden name
UPDATE: 5:30 p.m. Monday, April 28, 2025
Weld County Commissioners Kevin Ross and Perry Buck have responded to the Gadfly’s stories noting two people they and the Weld board appointed to the county’s new commissioner redistricting advisory committee gave campaign contributions to them.
“In no manner did the fact that Julie Cozad or Zo Hubbard having given [sic] me political contributions weigh in on my decision to support their addition to this committee,” Ross emailed through a spokesperson Monday afternoon. “We were presented the names by our attorney, and the Board of Commissioners as a whole decided upon the individuals that were chosen from the entire list of applicants. Julie and Zo are both highly qualified and capable individuals just like the other members that were chosen.”
Buck was much more succinct in her response.
“Contributions were not a consideration in the selection process,” Buck emailed through a spokesperson.
The Gadfly will follow up with Ross and Buck about Monday’s revelation that both donated to the political campaign of a third person they appointed to the committee, Adrienne Sandoval.
You can read more below.
UPDATE: 2:05 p.m. Monday, April 28, 2025
The Gadfly has learned that Fort Lupton Mayor Zo Hubbard isn’t the only person who has previously donated to sitting Weld commissioners who also was appointed to the county’s new commissioner redistricting advisory committee Wednesday.
Julie Cozad — one of the Republicans appointed, and herself a former commissioner — also has done so.
Cozad donated $200 to At-Large Commissioner Kevin Ross’s campaigns in 2019 and 2022, and she donated $250 to At-Large Commissioner Perry Buck’s campaign just this past year.
Note: The Gadfly received comment from Ross and Buck around 5 p.m. Monday. Their comments can be found above. The original story can be found below.
Two Weld County residents registered to vote in Colorado as Unaffiliated or under a third party who on Wednesday were appointed to Weld’s new commissioner redistricting advisory committee have donated a combined $2,050 to Republican candidates or groups since 2016 and have given no money to Democratic candidates or groups in that same timeframe, according to the Gadfly’s review of Colorado records, and one of them donated to a sitting commissioner’s campaign.
Brandon Wark of Greeley and Zo Hubbard of Fort Lupton will be two of the nine committee members who this summer will be tasked with suggesting new boundaries for the county’s three commissioner districts following a ruling from the state Supreme Court that Weld violated the law in 2023 when the commissioner board drew new district boundaries for themselves nearly in secret and without taking demographic information into account.
The new committee, formed to satisfy the late February court order, is made up three Democrats, three Republicans and three Unaffiliated or third-party registrants, according to state law. But past political donations by Wark and Hubbard paint the duo as far from independently minded.
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