On the front porches of Colorado Senate District 26, people want to talk about the presidential election pitting Donald Trump against Hillary Clinton, of course. Many of the residents don’t know that the race to fill the seat of outgoing Democratic state Sen. Linda Newell, D-Littleton, could well decide whether Democrats win a majority in the state’s upper chamber, and with it, likely control of all the legislative levers at the Capitol.

“They’re watching politics at the national level and they’re sick of it. They don’t like the candidates they have to choose between,” said Nancy Doty, Republican Arapahoe County commissioner and former Arapahoe County clerk who is running for Newell’s seat. She’s trying to change their focus. “I tell them, ‘Life doesn’t happen to us in Washington D.C.; it happens to us right here.'”

Democrat Daniel Kagan, state representative for House District 3, which makes up half of Senate District 26, is running against Doty. I talked to Kagan during the Republican National Convention, the day after Trump delivered his party’s nomination acceptance speech, a nearly hour-and-a-half stemwinder in which Trump let loose a fearsome vision of a country in distress and crisis.

Kagan exhaled audibly at the thought of the conversations he has been having in his district. He was concerned but, like Newell, he was also upbeat. In fact, he said he was surprised that voters seemed on the one hand to be as at a loss with national politics as they are on the other hand attuned to certain practical challenges of everyday life – challenges they believe state lawmakers can and should work to address.

“Residents see on the national stage a divisiveness and bitterness and dysfunction that threatens the very workings of our political system, but they are also talking less this year about guns and immigration,” hot button topics of past years, he said. “They are talking more about managing growth – economic growth and population growth. They’re talking about how that growth is impacting transportation infrastructure, the price of homes, college affordability for the middle class. There are many, many people who are finding it hard to afford housing, finding it hard to get around. There is perplexity about why incomes are rising generally, but not for them individually. They are concerned that their wages and salaries can’t keep pace with the rising cost of living.”

Doty also said that development was a high priority among the voters she has spoken to – development and the cost of health care.

“I’ve been out knocking doors and taking notes,” she said. “The Senate is so close. Some voters know it. Some voters don’t. People aren’t paying a whole lot of attention so far to state politics.”

One to watch

When Doty says “people,” she means voters – men and women with jobs and kids and pets and slow and crowded daily commutes. The Senate District 26 race may have yet to catch the attention of most voters, but it has already generated much interest among state politics watchers.

Indeed, the race will likely be one of the most expensive legislative races in the state. In 2012, Newell and her opponent, Greenwood Village City Council member Dave Kerber, spent nearly $350,000 combined. This year, Kagan and Doty similarly enjoy big and small donor support and at this point are virtually tied in the money race. Kagan in June reported raising $91,850, with $68,405 cash on hand. Doty reported raising $89,437, with $69,503 cash on hand.

This Arapahoe County Senate district sits in part just north of conservative bedrock Douglas County. It’s dotted with the names of familiar Denver Metro-area cities – Aurora, Centennial, Cherry Hills Village, Englewood, Greenwood Village, Littleton and Sheridan. Redrawn after the 2010 census, the district now leans Democratic, but just barely.

District voter rolls are nearly evenly divided into three slices. The secretary of state reported this month that among SD26 active voters, 29,858 are registered Democrats; 27,136 are Republicans; and 28,909 are unaffiliated.

In 2008, the year President Obama defeated John McCain to win the White House, now-term-limited Newell won a crucial unexpected victory in SD26, taking the seat by just under 200 votes. In 2012, she won reelection in the redrawn district by nearly 6,000 votes.

Kagan has served eight years representing people in the district from the House – but only by surviving repeat close elections. He won in 2014 by 445 votes. He won in 2012 by 2,500 votes.

Greetings and (re)introductions

Kagan said he is spending time at this stage of the campaign in the northeast section of the district – in the precincts that fall outside his House District 3.

“I’m doing more listening than talking,” he said in his distinct British accent. He has been a U.S. citizen for more than 30 years, working variously as an attorney, business owner and flight instructor. His arguments stand out at the Capitol. He speaks with a catchy cadence and with memorable turns of phrase.

“I want to get the feel of the new folks I’d be representing,” he said. “We want to make sure to do it properly, get out there and make sure people know us and have the opportunity to make a clear choice in November. We’re talking to almost everyone – Republicans and Democrats – but more to the unaffiliated voters, because they are the ones least likely to know exactly where we stand on the issues.”

Doty speaks in a heartwarmingly flat all-American accent. She comes across as casual and relaxed but she has long been praised as a plucky politician.

“I’m just introducing myself to voters at this point, you know,” she said. “I’m looking at the district as a whole, but I’m also visiting pockets … In our district, you have to win the middle, the unaffiliated voters.”

Doty talks about the benefits of small government, the need to “reduce regulatory roadblocks” that can stall economic development. She said her message to voters is about how she will take their concerns to the Capitol. “After all, it’s your government,” she tells them.

Kagan says one of his top priorities would be to loosen the “knot” of constitutional tax provisions passed decades ago – including the Taxpayer Bill of Rights and the Gallagher Amendment – that he says have gummed up the state budget and short-changed public services.

“I tell residents we have a realistic plan, one that without a tax increase will alleviate the budget pressure being exerted on our schools and our infrastructure. I say we can begin to unlock the potential that resides in our growth if we can succeed in removing the constitutional blockages forcing us to provide only small tax refunds – enough for each taxpayer to buy a meal, but not enough to alter any of our quality of life. We’re saying, let’s use that revenue to address larger problems to the benefit of all of us.”

Ideology and commonsense

That’s the argument that dominated talk at the Capitol this year.

Kagan supported a bill to reclassify Colorado’s hospital provider fee as an enterprise fund. The move would have allowed the state to keep hundreds of millions of dollars in revenue. Small-government opponents of the move argued it would have gone against the Taxpayer Bill of Rights – in spirit if not in fact – and that the move would only forestall efforts to address larger structural budget issues.

“These are accounting problems,” Kagan said. “This year we met with resistance when a minority of lawmakers opposed a solution out of dedication to ideology.”

Kagan said he doesn’t believe voters in swing SD 26 are much taken with political ideology.

“This is a diverse district – in its ethnicities, its political leanings, its income levels,” he said. “You can’t faithfully represent it if you veer off to the left fringe or the right fringe. The voters in this district are looking for a commonsense approach.”

Doty and Kagan will be both making the case that they have established a record in office, stretching back years, that demonstrates they can take that kind of approach.

“I have worked across the aisle to get things done. I hope to continue to do so,” said Kagan.

“I’ll represent my constituents’ concerns,” said Doty.