Photo by Joshua Lawton

Will Shafroth, ?second from left, talks with Colorado state Rep. Paul Weissmann, D-Louisville, as his daughters, Gianna Weissmann, 4, and Marisa Weissmann, 6, stand nearby before Shafroth’s 2nd Congressional District campaign speech in Louisville last week.

Will Shafroth didn’t flinch.

Not when 78-year-old Ruby Jones plowed through a pile of mail on the couch of her Thornton home, barely looking at the candidate as he told her why she should vote for him in the 2nd Congressional District.

Not when “Wheel of Fortune” blaring from the TV in Jones’ oppressively hot living room tried to drown him out.

Not even when one of the ubiquitous TV commercials touting political opponent Jared Polis’ run for the same congressional seat began playing over Shafroth’s shoulder.

“Have you picked a horse in this race yet?” he asked Jones over the ruckus, ever mild-mannered and patient. “I’m trying to be an independent voice in Washington. What do you think about that?”

While it wasn’t at all clear that Jones even knew a congressional race was underway, she did manage to sound off on high gas and food prices before finally saying the words Shafroth had been hoping to hear.

“I’d be willing to vote for you,” she said, reaching out to shake the candidate’s hand.

Whether or not he ultimately gets Jones’ vote in the Aug. 12 primary, the tall and lanky Boulder Democrat said he loves the process of walking the neighborhoods and finding out what voters are thinking.

“I love the human-to-human interaction with people who are real people, getting them to come out and open up to me about what’s really a concern to them and realizing that I can be in Congress and able to help them out,” he said on a recent morning in the verdant backyard of his Mapleton Street home in Boulder.

It’s one of the reasons, he said, that he chose to petition his way onto the primary ballot instead of going through the party caucus and assembly process that opponents Polis and Joan Fitz-Gerald followed.

Shafroth calls that decision — plus the fact that he has accepted little money from political action committees and injected less than $7,000 of his own money into his effort — a “grass-roots statement” that sets his campaign apart.

The idea that Shafroth, 51, is the consummate outsider running against establishment candidates has become a bit of a mantra for his candidacy, despite the fact that his family is no stranger to Colorado politics.

Shafroth’s great-grandfather, John Shafroth, was the state’s governor from 1909 to 1913, in addition to serving as a U.S. House representative and a U.S. senator from the state. His father ran in the very same district 46 years ago while his grandfather vied to become Colorado’s attorney general and U.S. senator.

But Shafroth points out that he has never run for public office, instead devoting his career to habitat conservation and land preservation.

Flashing green creds

“I would be the very first professional conservationist ever elected to Congress,” said Shafroth, who has run a pair of heavy-hitting land conservation organizations over the last 15 years. “And to bring that set of skills and knowledge and relationships would be a really good thing.”

Being a conservationist is a badge Shafroth wears proudly, and it’s one that he thinks will do well for him among the left-leaning and environmentally minded voters in the district.

“We’ve been well-represented here for the last 34 years by Tim Wirth, David Skaggs and Mark Udall, all of whom had strong conservation credentials,” he said. “So it seems to me that I’m the best fit to carry on that legacy of leadership.”

He talks about making the district, which plays host to a university, green businesses and a collection of federal research labs, the “Silicon Valley of renewable energy.” Not only would developing alternative energy technologies benefit the environment, but it could provide an explosion of high-paying jobs in the area, he said.

Despite his obvious enthusiasm for policy details, like a cap-and-trade system or raising fuel-efficiency standards — he recalls getting 43 mph in a Honda Civic driving his brother to college nearly 30 years ago — the Colorado native is careful to point out that his work in the conservation field has hardly been that of a strident tree-hugger unwilling to deal with competing interests and perspectives.

Whether it was his eight years heading up Great Outdoors Colorado, where Shafroth helped preserve 275,000 acres with $250 million worth of state lottery funds, or his seven years as executive director of the Colorado Conservation Trust, where he raised millions of dollars to further set aside acreage in the state, he said he spent much of his time balancing diverse interests and “keeping the peace” among ranchers, environmentalists, county commissioners and developers.

“I’ve never really had the luxury of being partisan,” he said. “My work has required me to figure out how to work with a lot of different kinds of people.”

Ruth Wright, one of the GOCO board members who voted to hire Shafroth as the organization’s first leader in the early 1990s, said his ability to arrive at a consensus on thorny issues is a skill that will serve him well in the nation’s capital.

“He is a master at that,” said Wright, a former Colorado state representative. “I think it’s absolutely essential in the Congress. We can’t just be shouting at each other.”

She recalled a compromise Shafroth reached with the state parks department that committed the agency to using its portion of lottery proceeds to purchase more land for protection in addition to using the funds for maintenance projects.

John Fielder, the well-known Colorado nature photographer who also served on GOCO’s board, described Shafroth as a “convener and collaborator.”

“He got important and influential people to do what he needed, which was land conservation,” Fielder said.

He said those abilities will be just what is needed in a body such as the U.S. House of Representatives.

Greg Walcher, executive director of the Colorado Department of Natural Resources under Gov. Bill Owens and a former GOCO board member, said Shafroth always “got the details right” even if he didn’t see eye-to-eye with him on many occasions.

More than a one-man band

Shafroth knows he runs the risk of being identified as a one-issue candidate, and he is deliberate about addressing issues that go beyond the environmental realm.

Earlier this year, he took a public pledge not to go on the taxpayer-funded congressional health plan until comprehensive health-care reform is passed.

“It seemed hypocritical to me that Congress had a very generous health-care package when 50 million Americans or so don’t have health insurance,” Shafroth said. “Until Congress feels this kind of issue at a personal level, it’s not likely to make much of a change.”

He also touts his role as a father of three children who attended or are attending Boulder Valley public schools. He said he is the only candidate in the race who has served on local school committees and been personally invested in what goes on in the classroom.

In any case, Shafroth said he has come a long way since April 2007, when he became the first person — an admitted “dark horse” — to announce his candidacy.

His campaign’s contact with more than 6,000 registered voters throughout the district since then has increased his name recognition, he said. And television ads that just started running last week are designed to make Shafroth more of a household name over the next month.

“I think I’m very well positioned at this point,” he said.