Find Montezuma County Marriage and Divorce Records

Montezuma County Marriage License Office

Marriage licenses in Montezuma County are handled by the Montezuma County Clerk and Recorder, not by the state court clerk. The county office is led by Kim Percell, Clerk and Recorder, and the official office duties include recording, motor vehicle, vital statistics, Clerk to the Board, and elections. For a marriage license, use the Clerk and Recorder office at 140 West Main Street, Suite 1, Cortez, CO 81321. The listed phone is 970-565-3728, the fax is 970-564-0215, and the public office hours are Monday through Thursday, 7:45 a.m. to 5:30 p.m.

The Clerk and Recorder contact page lists a 4:30 p.m. daily cutoff for marriage licenses. That cutoff matters for Montezuma County marriage records because a late arrival may not leave time for staff to process the license the same day. The Colorado Judicial Branch Montezuma County page also tells couples to obtain a marriage or civil union license before contacting the courthouse for a ceremony. Courthouse ceremonies are separate from license issuance. They may be scheduled with Montezuma Combined Courts during regular business hours by appointment, with no charge during regular business hours.

Apply for Montezuma County Marriage Records

The researched county sources did not publish a Montezuma-specific online marriage application or a complete local field list. Use the official county contact channel rather than importing fields from another Colorado county. The safest process is to call the Clerk and Recorder before the visit, confirm current application requirements, and arrive before the posted cutoff. If the couple also wants a courthouse ceremony, that request goes to the state court only after the license exists.

1. Contact the Clerk and Recorder at 970-565-3728 or visit the office during posted public hours to confirm current marriage license requirements.
2. Go to the Clerk and Recorder office at 140 West Main Street, Suite 1, Cortez, before the 4:30 p.m. license cutoff.
3. Complete the local marriage or civil union license process with the county office. The official online sources reviewed did not list the full application fields.
4. Ask the Clerk and Recorder how certified marriage record copies are issued or purchased for the completed license record.
5. For a courthouse ceremony, contact Montezuma Combined Courts after the license is issued and request an appointment during regular business hours.

The Colorado Judicial Branch Montezuma County page is the source for the ceremony channel, not the license application. It gives the court phone and email for scheduling a ceremony after the license has been obtained. That distinction prevents a common error: divorce decrees and court ceremonies involve the court, but marriage licenses and license records start with the county Clerk and Recorder.

Montezuma County Marriage Application Fields

Phase B calls for a marriage license application field inventory, but the official Montezuma County pages reviewed did not publish one. The table below preserves that research gap. It identifies only the local request path and the fact that the county office, not the court, controls the application details. This avoids turning general Colorado marriage assumptions into Montezuma County facts.

Note: The missing field list is a research gap, not a blank to fill from another jurisdiction.

Montezuma County Marriage and Divorce Fees

The research file did not locate a Montezuma County marriage license fee, a certified marriage copy fee, or a divorce decree copy fee in the official local sources reviewed. It did locate state court payment channels and a Colorado Judicial fee list, but those sources should not be stretched into unsupported marriage-copy pricing. Divorce case filing and copy costs should be confirmed with Montezuma Combined Courts or the current Colorado Judicial fee list before filing or ordering.

Search Montezuma County Marriage Records

For recorded county documents, the Clerk and Recorder offers EagleWeb as the online document search. The EagleWeb page says online searching is provided by the Clerk and Recorder, that official county records are located in the office, and that documents may be viewed and purchased in person at 140 West Main Street, Suite 1. The page also lists office hours and directs questions about recording or copies to the Clerk and Recorder phone and fax lines.

The county research does not show EagleWeb as a full public marriage certificate download system. Treat it as a recorder index and office access point. If the search goal is a certified Montezuma County marriage record, call the Clerk and Recorder or visit the office. If ordinary counter service does not fit, the county CORA form may be used for county records, subject to open-records limits and fees.

The Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment vital records page says county clerk and recorder offices are the source for marriage records. That state guidance matches the Montezuma County split: marriage records begin with the county Clerk and Recorder, while divorce records and decrees are court records.

The CDPHE vital records page explains the state split between county marriage sources and court divorce sources.

This state source is useful when a user is deciding whether to contact the county Clerk and Recorder, CDPHE, or the District Court clerk.

Find Montezuma County Divorce Records

Divorce and legal separation are District Court matters in Colorado. In Montezuma County, the courthouse contact is Montezuma Combined Courts at 865 North Park Street, Suite 100, Cortez, CO 81321, phone 970-565-1111. A divorce file may include the petition, response, financial material, parenting plan, child support worksheet, temporary orders, decree, and permanent orders. Some parts may be public, while financial information, child information, protected addresses, and sealed filings may be restricted.

The Colorado Judicial divorce and legal separation instructions say either spouse must have lived in Colorado for at least 91 days before filing a divorce case. For cases with children, the children must have lived in Colorado for at least 182 days or since birth. For divorce, the case is filed in the county where either spouse lives. Civil union dissolution has a separate residency rule when the civil union license was issued in Colorado.

For hearing dates, use the Colorado Judicial docket search with Montezuma County and a date plus another filter. For decrees, certified copies, or case-file documents, contact Montezuma Combined Courts or use the Colorado Judicial online records request. For broader court case search steps, the local Montezuma County court records page explains the difference between docket calendars, registers of action, and official document requests.

The official divorce instructions from Colorado Judicial are the source for the state residency and filing-county rules.

Those rules help route Montezuma County divorce records to District Court instead of the county recorder office.

Colorado Verification and Confidentiality

CDPHE can issue verifications of marriage, civil union, and dissolution for eligible requesters. A verification is not the same thing as a certified county marriage license record or a full District Court divorce decree. The CDPHE order certificate page is the state channel for eligible vital-record verification orders. Use it when a limited state verification is the right product, not when the request needs a full divorce case file or a certified copy from the county office.

The CDPHE research data page states that Colorado vital records are confidential under C.R.S. 25-2-117 and are not searchable online through the state vital records office. That is why a public web search is not the same as a state vital-record lookup. Eligibility, proof, and the correct record type matter.

CDPHE's certificate-order source identifies the state channel for eligible marriage, civil union, and dissolution verification requests.

The state order channel supplements county and court offices, but it does not replace local certified copy requests.

CDPHE's research-data source explains why Colorado vital records are not open online indexes.

That confidentiality rule is the main limit to broad online Montezuma County marriage and divorce record searches.