The annually doomed bill to repeal Columbus Day as a state holiday in Colorado has a twist this year: It would create a commission to forge mutual understanding about heritage between Coloradans of Italian and American Indian descent.

The same approach was used to settle disputes over American Indian sports mascots at schools in Colorado in 2015.

House Bill 1231 still passed the House Local Government Committee by only 7-6 vote, and the outcome wasn’t along party lines.

Rep. Steve Lebsock, D-Thornton, proposed the latter addition to the bill. He said he didn’t want to deprive Italians or anyone else of the opportunity to celebrate their heritage. He initially proposed celebrating Italian Heritage Day instead of the day to celebrate Italian explorer Christopher Columbus.

“How can I vote yes on this bill and not feel like I’m taking away someone else’s heritage and culture?” he said. “I don’t see why people would be adverse to calling it Italian Heritage Day.”

And it was Rep. Jim Wilson, R-Salida, who proposed in the hearing that both sides get together and bring a solution to the legislature. Colorado’s Columbus Day Parade has been in dispute, sometimes violent, for more than two decades. The turnout for the event has dwindled, organizers said. Denver and other cities have done away with the holiday.

Committee chairman Jonathan Singer, D-Longmont, joked that the hearing should have been before joint meeting of the House Education Committee, as well, because much of the three and half hours of testimony involving differing historical accounts about Columbus.

American Indians see him as villain, who brought conquest, savagery and illnesses to their ancestors. Italians see him as a hero, a great explorer credited with discovering America. Colorado was the first to make Columbus Day a state holiday in 1907, long before it became a national holiday in 1937.

Tony Polisi, one of the organizers of the parade, said the Columbus Day is a time he celebrates with his family, building floats and enjoying big dinners together around the holiday.

“Don’t take this away from me,” he said. “This is my heritage. This is an excuse for my family to get together. We work all week long building these things, we have dinners. If you take that away, I’m going to lose.”

Shana Oliver on Denver described herself to the committee as a “survivor and descendant of the genocide known as the Long Walk of the Navajo.”

“We should not be celebrating people who was not honorable,” she said. “There are plenty of other holidays the Italians could celebrate.”

The committee heare impassioned arguments from both sides.

Talk and compromise seemed the best and, perhaps, the only progress that could be made to heal the scars of the decades-long conflict in Denver, said the bill’s sponsor Adrienne Benavidez, D-Commerce City.

“Whether they are proponents or opponents of this bill, there is a very emotional, very visceral belief that their position is the right position,” she said. “… I don’t see how we in this body are ever going to solve this. I think the amendment provides at least one way.”

Benavidez said facilitators could help guide those discussions, if her bill becomes law.

She said removing Columbus Day is not “putting the cart before the horse” is forging a better understanding over heritage between Italians and American Indians.

“It’s a way of saying there are victims out there.” Benavidez said. “There are people who feel real pain, and if we can stop that, we can let others who have more expertise than us to work through to reach a resolution. That may be the only way we can get there.”