EL PASO COUNTY, Colo. — Staring out over the expansive prairie and mountains of rural El Paso County, Duke Phillips III looks out over his home.
"It’s just humbling to be able to be outside in a landscape as beautiful as this," Phillips III said. "It’s amazing how beautiful it is."
Its 86,000 acres are home to countless birds, 1,500 head of cattle, and for the past 24 years, the Phillips family as well.
"It’s always felt like a forever home," said Duke Phillips IV, the elder Phillips's son.
"There’s sand dunes out east, there’s a creek that goes through the whole length of the ranch," said Tess Leach, the elder Phillips's daughter.
Leach and the younger Phillips moved here when they were 13 and 11. The family knows this year will be their last at the Chico Basin Ranch southeast of Colorado Springs.
"We don’t have an option to stay. We don’t have any other option besides leaving really," the younger Phillips said.
In 1999, his father signed a lease with the state land board. For more than two decades they’ve cared for this land, ranching here while also opening it up to birdwatchers, artists, school children and their entire community. They focused on conservation and thought they’d be here forever.
"It was a 25-year lease that is ending at the end of this year," the elder Phillips said. "We had an option in the lease that we agreed on with the state land board at the very beginning that stated if we were both happy, that there were no problems, that the lease could be extended. I felt like if we met that, if we did our part, that we would be here for an indefinite amount of time."
The state land board awarded the new lease to a different family that submitted a more lucrative offer. The board has the power to award these leases to whichever bid they choose, focusing on both money and also conservation. The Phillipses said they put so much emphasis on opening the land to the community and conserving the natural beauty of the ranch that they hoped they’d be awarded the lease yet again. At this point, they’re searching for a new ranch to move to anywhere in the western United States.
"The only thing that could knock us out was someone coming in and bidding a huge number, which actually is what happened," the elder Phillips said.
Every part of the Phillips family will now move at the end of the year. The destination is unknown.
"When you pour yourself into a place like that, you can’t help but develop a special connection with it," said Madison Phillips, the younger Phillips's wife, as she worked in the leather shop on the ranch.
"On an emotional side, it’s a part of us that we are leaving behind. It’s not something that we would do if we had a choice," Leach said. "We do feel really excited about what’s to come next. I’m to a place now where I’m able to rest in that energy instead of sadness."
The Phillips family will be moving out. There’s no stopping that. They hope they leave a legacy of sharing their home with a community that loves it as much as them.
"We’re very thankful to have been here," the elder Phillips said. "It’s been a dream come true for us, really."
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