Dear Editor, Please identify the organization Americans for Prosperity. It is the voice of the Koch Brothers. It is not a grassroots organization. It has no roots in Colorado. It should not be able to present its agenda in a public forum without disclosing its ownership. 

Every columnist should be identified by his employment as a starting point. 

Good luck on your new venture. Dolores Kopel

Dear Editor,

As a citizen of Colorado and a supporter of TABOR I see no problem with allowing taxpayers the option of giving their refund back to the state as a gift. However, wouldn’t just signing it away to the state be foolish? That would violate the principle TABOR was founded upon. The check off box for the gift should designate the money to the school system, or perhaps one or two other specific areas. The amount of the gift back to the state should not decrease the amount of funding normally allotted to the particular service. This should be a bonus to the area stated, and not a way to shift funds around in order to circumvent TABOR. William F Hineser, DPMArvada

Dear Editor,

In the early 1970s I had the honor of serving for a short time as president of the publishing company of The Colorado Democrat, the predecessor of The Colorado Statesman. Pat Geddes was the publisher and we both learned from her great predecessor and mentor, Fred Betz. I have subscribed to and read the paper ever since. I want to compliment the new leadership for the quality of the writing, substantive journalism, historical references and the lesser emphasis on gossip, fluff and attack politics. Keep up the good work.                                               Michael Henry

Dear Editor:

Thank you for reporting on the Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP) trade agreement in your recent article, “Trans-Pacific trade agreement supporters, opponents spar.”

I would like to make an important clarification to that article, which references the ability for foreign countries — through state-owned enterprises — and foreign companies “to sue the U.S. government”. That lawsuit provision, referred to as the Investor-State Dispute Settlement (ISDS), already exists in previous trade deals, such as NAFTA.

What’s new in the TPP is the provision for those foreign entities to directly sue U.S. states and municipalities (counties, towns, ports, etc.) in global courts, entirely bypassing U.S. court systems, and trashing the concept of U.S. sovereignty.

We already know, from witnessing ISDS lawsuits under NAFTA, that many of these lawsuits are frivolous, many of their outcomes are clearly unjust, and the mere cost of combatting such a lawsuit in global court could cost a town millions of dollar — dollars that they can ill-afford to spend.

Our states and municipalities do not have the manpower, let alone the expertise, to argue cases in global courts. And the court system itself is somewhat of a farce. These secret global tribunals are made up of three attorneys who take turns acting as judge and prosecutor. When acting as judge on a current trial, they can make a ruling that becomes a new part of the TPP, thereby favorably affecting the outcome of the next case which they’ll be prosecuting, a few months hence.

Yes, these rulings change and add to the Trans Pacific Partnership. And the defendants have no opportunity to appeal the rulings.There are currently $6 billion of NAFTA ISDS lawsuits against Canada, 63 percent of which target existing environmental protections and resource management programs. Germany is also suffering under similar litigation, and, along with France, is now trying to renegotiate a recent trade deal between the European Union and Canada, in order to change its harmful ISDS provisions.

ISDS has the potential to turn Colorado cities and towns into Detroit-like wastelands after just one loss in global court. What happens when a $300 million judgment is levied against Denver County? If the money is not in the county’s bank account, what does the global court take? Our museums? Our parks? Our land?

There are many solid reasons to oppose the Trans Pacific Partnership trade agreement. But you don’t really need ten reasons. You only need one: the Investor-State Dispute Settlement has proven to be destructive, expensive, and cedes U.S. authority to global courts. It is completely unacceptable, and needs to be removed from all future trade agreements.

Sincerely,

Crista HuffDouglas County

Dear Editor:

Secretary of State Wayne Williams, in conjunction with Colorado County Clerks, is developing and testing what they call a “uniform voting system”. Initiated under SOS Scott Gessler, it is currently being tested in the live May 2015 Denver election. More counties will test the system in live November 2015 elections.

Members of Colorado Voter Group say that the public needs to take heed. Uniform Voting System (UVS) is a catch-phrase designed to capture the imagination. However, UVS is not a system, and it is not uniform.

UVS will not end the problems with ballot anonymity, voter verification, chain of custody, canvassing, watchers, administration, transparency, security, certification, etc. Unless these problems are satisfactorily resolved, Colorado faces the threat of causing a failed election which will require a costly and embarrassing re-do.

UVS is being designed by people who are not system designers. It is tightly controlled by government folks whose interests often conflict with the interests of voters and election integrity advocates. Routinely, public suggestions and criticism are not responded to or discouraged. Management accepts accountability only to themselves rather than to the public.

It’s nearly impossible to communicate with UVS management and staff. UVS team members seem not to understand the principles of system design, development, and testing. Oral and written debate is disallowed.

UVS is being presented as the new voting component of Colorado’s “election system” which includes other components such as: voter registration, voter verification, vote interpretation, and vote counting. It’s not clear what problems UVS is intended to fix.

People need to encourage SOS Williams to open the process to rigorous debate and to defend the details. The UVS Pilot Election Review Committee next meets at 1:30 p.m. on May 28th. Project documentation is available on the Secretary of State’s website, www.sos.state.co.us.

Al Kolwicz, TrusteeColorado Voter Group

Dear Editor

Our democracy is in a crisis now with big money and big media crowding out the people’s voice, and more citizens dropping out of the political process because they think it’s rigged for the rich. And they’re right. 

So what do legislators do to fix it? Instead of working to bring more transparency to the financing and publicizing of elections and candidates, they attack Colorado voters directly in SCR15-002 which would hinder and conflict with the provision in our Constitution which says “The first power hereby reserved by the people is the initiative…” Restricting and bureaucratizing that power means it would be more difficult and costly for we the people to assert one of the few rights we have left to make our voices heard above big money and big media.

One of the reasons people don’t trust politicians nowadays is that so many politicians of both parties don’t trust the people. SCR15-002 is a perfect example of that. Did the idea to restrict the initiative process come from a people’s movement, or did it come from groups that already have too much power over our political process?

Our populist forebears saw how big money was debasing our political system when they wrote our Colorado Constitution over 100 years ago, and they knew what they were doing when they included the initiative process.

“The first power hereby reserved by the people is the initiative. . .» 

So state senators, as well as representatives, should leave any possible changes directly to The People.  Eliza CarneyFt. Collins