Whether you’re a happy couple applying for a marriage license, a teen getting ready to register your first car or a citizen preparing for voting day, you’ll be using the Grand County Clerk and Recorder’s Office, which provides essential services for residents during their Life’s Big Moments. These services include: recording/maintaining real estate documents, filing vital records such as birth death, and marriage certificates, titling and registering vehicles, issuing driver’s licenses and conducting the election process.

Sara Rosene, the current county clerk, is retiring after 31 years of service this year and is leaving big shoes to fill for an office that encompasses so much. Two candidates who believe they are up for the challenge are Democrat Abby Loberg and Republican Jolene Linke. Loberg answered some questions for Sky-Hi News so voters can learn more about her. (We’ll give Linke the same treatment on April 4.) Residents will be able to cast their votes for either candidate during the June 28 primary elections.

“I’m a longtime Grand County resident,” said Loberg, who has been here since 1992. “This is my home; this is where I’ve raised my kids. This is a community that matters to me.”

Loberg has taught at East Grand Middle School since 2001, and is currently enlightening eighth graders in civics, the constitution, law and U.S. history. But with her youngest son graduating this year, she decided it was time to retire. Her timing was auspicious. Before the Grand County Democrats held their assembly, they approached her, hoping she would be interested in running for county clerk as a democrat. “At the time, nobody had put their name in running yet, as a democrat or republican. I thought, ‘I can do this!'” Loberg said.

Loberg has both educational and real-world experience to bring to the table. She graduated with a degree in political science, and teaches her students the importance of constitutional law and civic duty, such as voting.

She also has experience dealing with real estate documents and valuing property. “Before I was a teacher, I worked for a year and a half at the county assessor’s office…so I’m familiar with who does what at the courthouse,” Loberg said.

Last but not least, Loberg has elections experience. “I was an election worker at one of the Grand Lake spring special elections. I wanted to go through that process so that I could teach my students hands-on how elections in the county work,” she said.

This experience showed Loberg how the county clerk is entrusted with upholding a fair voting process. Loberg was a democrat election worker who counted the ballots alongside a republican worker.

“I liked how transparent, correct, and efficient it was,” she said. “I was really impressed with Sara Rosene, our county, and the chain of custody…I thought, ‘I feel really good about this process!’ The clerk’s office does everything…but the elections and voting process is the most important part.”

Loberg stressed that the clerk and recorder should be fair and objective, not swayed by political affiliation. “I’m a democrat, and Sara is a republican, but it shouldn’t matter,” Loberg said. “Sara didn’t run it in a partisan fashion…that’s something I certainly wouldn’t want for Grand County.”

Other county clerks around the country, and even in Colorado, have allowed partisan politics to compromise the integrity of elections. One example that made national news is Mesa County Clerk Tina Peters, who is being investigated for election fraud.

“I’ve never ever worried that Sara wouldn’t be following the law,” Loberg said. “There are state laws and federal laws that everyone follows…Rather than a ‘D’ or ‘R’ next to anyone’s name, it should be ‘P’, for professional.”

Loberg added she doesn’t plan to shake-up the department if elected. “I’ve never felt like, ‘Wow, someone needs to change this.’ Sara has done a great job,” she said. “The Grand County clerk’s office has won awards for various things.” In 2021, the Colorado Secretary of State awarded Rosene the NASS Medallion for her work in conducting a successful election through both a pandemic and the devastation of the East Troublesome Fire, for example.

Loberg added she is thankful that Grand County is a small community to serve, and the clerk’s office runs smoothly. “I’ve been going to the courthouse now for close to 30 years. I tell people, ‘I had to renew my license or get my kid’s driver’s license, and it only took 10 minutes.’ And they say, ‘Are you kidding? I live in Fort Collins, and it took me 4 hours!'”

If elected as clerk and recorder, Loberg plans to continue the legacy Rosene has created over the last three decades.

“The Republicans did put a candidate up the week after the Democrats did. That’s good because now people have a choice. I really don’t think that (Jolene Linke) and I will be that different from each other, to tell you the truth,” Loberg said. She added that, if elected, “I would treat every person that walked in the door the same…regardless of political affiliation. We’re all part of the same community here, the same family.”

To learn more about the services the Grand County Clerk and Recorder offers to the community, please visit: http://www.co.grand.co.us/1081/County-Clerk-Recorder. To check your voter registration status or edit your voter information, visit: http://www.sos.state.co.us.