Morning headlines from DenverPost.com

---

Today's Front Page News

Feds deny permit for project to pipe water from Wyoming's Flaming Gorge to Colorado's Front Range
Conservationists are casting a project to pipe water from Wyoming to Colorado as dead after federal authorities Thursday nixed an entrepreneur's pitch for a preliminary permit.  

• Colorado lawmaker kills own health care bill for retired public employees as PERA issues pile up at Capitol
• Husband held as Northglenn duplex set ablaze with kids inside
• Budget compromise may spell layoffs for hundreds of Colorado state workers
• Englewood police fatally shoot driver in Walgreens parking lot
• Two weeks after dog bite, 9News' Kyle Dyer feels lucky

---

Today's Local Politics

Budget compromise may spell layoffs for hundreds of Colorado state workers
Hundreds of state employees — including state troopers, mental-health workers and caregivers for the developmentally disabled — would be laid off if a deal approved by the legislature's Joint Budget Committee stays in place.  

• Panel approves name change to Metro State University of Denver
• March 17, 2005: Evaluation slated for benefits system: Owens announces six-week review
• Lawmaker kills own PERA bill, committee delays action on another retiree measure

---

Today's Business

Colorado home prices declined in 2011; only Fort Collins saw gain
Home prices across most of Colorado continued to decline last year, according to a report released Thursday from the Federal Housing Finance Agency.  

• CU Denver, chamber launch "Boots to Suits" for vets returning to job market
• Dish to close 500 Blockbuster stores in next six months
• New jobless claims stay at four-year low
• Parker: Sears closing doors of The Great Indoors
• Vail Resorts' deal for California ski area expands holdings to seven

---

Today's Sports Headlines

Woody Paige: Walsh's Meardon twins deserve a chance to play college basketball in Colorado
Walsh may be the best little schoolhouse in Colorado. The 75-student high school in a tiny farming community has remarkable academic achievement in environmental science, chemistry, calculus and world history classes.  

• Ryan Braun's exoneration doesn't cool controversy of baseball's drug testing
• Stanford cruises past Colorado 74-50
• Fernandez misses fourth straight game
• Spurs rip listless Nuggets 114-99
• Rockies' Giambi arrives to revised role

---

Today's Entertainment

Colorado Ballet ready to fly with Michael Pink's "Peter Pan"
When choreographer Michael Pink's "Peter Pan" debuted two years ago, it was the kind of hit the ballet world wishes it saw more often. Packed audiences, critical raves, standing ovations.  

• Theater review: From mists of time, "Brigadoon" charms in Littleton
• Movie review: "Act of Valor" a surreal recruitment film
• Bar: Colorado details keep District Meats' setting bold and tasteful
• Movie review: Slightly mechanical "Wanderlust" is funny, but not a great comedy
• Boulder Philharmonic Orchestra reaches out in ways that befit its unique hometown

---

Today's Style

Look of the Day, 2/23/2012

Photos of people at events, on the street, runway shows and on the red carpet.  

• Look of the Day, 2/24/2012
• People & Places: Denver pianist Purnell Steen at Onofrio Piano

---

Today's Opinion

Marcus: Santorum's Title X flip-flop
I was getting ready to write something nice about Rick Santorum. Then Rick Santorum talked me out of it. The nice thing was about the former Pennsylvania senator's self-described support for Title X, the federally funded family planning program that provides contraceptive services for low-income women.  

• Guest Commentary: Further study of Pinnacol restructuring is the best option
• Harsanyi: Aren't high gas prices great?
• Ditmer: Saving a piece of history
• Editorial: The right fix for benefits system?
• Guest Commentary: The future of Colorado's rivers