WILLIAM “BILL” SIMON

William “Bill” Simon of Durango and Silverton, Colorado, passed away peacefully on Jan. 5, 2025 under the care of the doctors and nurses of the Mercy Hospice House. He will be remembered for his selfless dedication to understanding the water quality issues of the upper Animas River watershed, and his uncanny ability to bring disparate groups together to cooperatively tackle the problems.

Simon was born on Nov. 27, 1944 in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, to Jim and Jane Simon. When Bill was three years old, the family moved to Loveland, Colorado, and started a farm. At a young age, Bill and his brother largely took over the farm and raised sheep, learned animal husbandry, gardened, and ran a trapline. Bill grew up hunting, fishing, skiing, and jeeping all over the region and worked for a summer on a Wyoming ranch with his good friend John Siedel.

Simon attended Western Colorado University in Gunnison, where he raced on the alpine ski team, before transferring to the University of Colorado, Boulder. After graduating with a bachelor’s degree in botany, he went to Berkeley on a NASA fellowship to pursue a doctorate in evolutionary ecology. He helped start the Environmental Studies College there, and was on the founding board of Earth Day.

But when the military started taking an interest in Simon and the work he was doing, the young scientist, who had also been active in the anti-Vietnam War effort, decided it was time to go. He took a “permanent leave of absence” from Berkeley, met his wife Arlene, and the two of them landed in the bustling mining town of Silverton, where they opened a candle-making, leather-working, and crafts business.

Simon also worked underground at the Sunnyside Gold Mine before breaking out on his own as Alpine Mine Construction. He did large-scale welding, operated heavy equipment, and did reclamation work for various mines. Oftentimes, after completing whatever work he was hired to do, Simon would clean up some of the junk from the old mines and even plant a few trees. He also began to wonder whether the streams, which the state had declared “dead” due to mining pollution, could actually support fish.

In 1984 Simon was elected to the San Juan County Board of County Commissioners. It provided him an opportunity to test his fish question. With a group of miners, who were also anglers, he hiked into the backcountry carrying packs that held thousands of tiny brook and cutthroat trout, donated by the state Division of Wildlife, and poured them into the healthiest-looking streams and lakes.

To nearly everyone’s surprise, many of them survived, proving that, with adequate cleanup, some segments of stream could support a fish population.

In 1994, Simon and other volunteers worked with the state to create the Animas River Stakeholders Group to address water quality issues with a community-based, collaborative approach. Simon was chosen to be the coordinator. “We figured we could empower the people in the community to do the job without top-down management,” Simon said. “Giving the power to the people develops stewardship for the resource, and that’s particularly useful in this day and age.”

For the next two decades, the ARSG thoroughly researched the Animas River watershed, educated the public, and, with the cooperation of industry and regulators, worked on dozens of projects aimed at improving water quality. Within ten years of ARSG’s founding, the Animas River grew cleaner, and trout populations and diversity increased. Simon and his ARSG colleagues also pushed Congress to pass “good samaritan” legislation that would allow volunteers to clean up draining mine adits without incurring liability. President Biden finally signed the bill into law in December.

Simon featured prominently in numerous stories about the ARSG and mining-related pollution, including the nonfiction book River of Lost Souls, by Jonathan Thompson. And the sixth episode of Acid Mine Nation, a series of documentaries by filmmaker Tom Schillaci about the Upper Animas watershed and the ARSG, is dedicated to Simon.

Simon and the ARSG under his leadership were awarded many honors, including the U.S. Forest Service’s Rocky Mountain Regional 2007 Partnership of the Year Award, and the U.S. Interior Department’s Cooperative Conservation Award. The Mountain Studies Institute honored Simon and his ARSG co-founders, Peter Butler and Steve Fearn, with a sculpture along the Animas River for their dedication to improving water quality. Simon also received a Lifetime Achievement Award at a Sustaining Colorado Watersheds Conference.

Somehow Simon found the time for his many hobbies, including skiing (he and his friends pioneered many San Juan backcountry routes in the 1970s), gelande ski jumping, ice skating, gardening, drumming, traveling, and making jewelry. He was also a member of the Durango Gem and Mineral Club. Simon spent the last years of his life enjoying the farm in Hermosa, the fruits of a 50-year dream that he and Arlene worked for, tirelessly, where they gardened, raised sheep, and maintained an orchard.

Bill is survived by brothers Bobby and Don, His wife of 52 years, Arlene, daughter Heidi (Matt, Lindsey and Paige Rettner), daughter Brook, and Grand-daughter Whitney. Those who wish to do so can make a donation in Simon’s memory to the Davis Phinney Foundation for Parkinson’s Disease.

A Celebration of Life will take place in the spring.

Obit written by Jonathan Thompson