No sooner had U.S. Rep. Jared Polis announced his plans to run for Colorado governor next year than we hear that activist and businessman Ken Toltz will seek Polis’ seat in Congress from the 2nd Congressional District.

Toltz has been a player in Colorado politics for awhile, but he’s perhaps best known as the founder of Safe Campus Colorado, a citizens group opposed to concealed weapons on college campuses. He was one of the founding board members of the well-known Colorado Ceasefire, a gun prevention group.

Toltz was the 2000 Democratic nominee in the 6th Congressional District, when he lost to Tom Tancredo, 54 percent to 42. The leftward tilt to the Boulder County-centric 2nd Congressional District should be a more favorable to a Democrat such as Toltz.

A native of southeast Denver and a third-generation Coloradan, Toltz has lived in Boulder since 2013.

He was a board member for Colorado Conservation Voters, known today as the environmental titan Conservation Colorado, as well as a former board member of the Front Range Economic Strategy Center, which supports a politically left-learning approach to economic development. He also has logged service on the Denver Chamber of Commerce’s Labor Task Force-Metro Denver Network and the chamber’s Public Affairs Committee.

He goes back a ways in Democratic campaign politics. In 1984 Toltz was the deputy national finance director for Colorado Sen. Gary Hart’s presidential campaign, and he’s worked on congressional campaigns for Democratic candidates over the years.

Toltz also worked in the legislative department of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee in Washington, D.C., then was director of the Washington PAC. He is a founding Colorado member of the National Jewish Democratic Coalition, and remains active with AIPAC and J Street, both of which support closer ties between and U.S. and Israel.

Toltz has served on the boards of the Denver-Boulder Better Business Bureau, the Anti-Defamation League and the Corporate Alliance for Better Air,  as well as on the Citizens Advisory Panel for the Colorado Department of Health and Environment.

His business resume is nearly as extensive as his political activism. Toltz is formerly the president of Dependable Southwest Inc., which owned and operated a chain of Dependable Cleaners stores in southwest Denver, Lakewood, Littleton and Evergreen.

He’s also has been in management roles with United Banks of Colorado and Brothers Gourmet Coffees, he said.