It’s no secret that student loan debt is a growing national problem, and Colorado is no exception; more than 761,000 Coloradans owe $24.75 billion in student loans in our state alone.

As the cost of college continues to rise, and the burden of paying for school falls on students and their families, more and more Coloradans turn to student loans to cover tuition expenses – especially students of color and those from lower-income backgrounds. Yet as borrowers and their families work to make  good on the investment they put into their college experience and themselves, the very entities meant to fairly manage the repayment process – loan servicers – can end up making that process much more difficult.

Not only does student debt significantly burden our state’s economy, student loans are also still the only type of major loan that doesn’t require the people who service them to be licensed, nor do they have to follow rules on par with mortgages, credit cards, or car loans. That lack of oversight opens the door for routine misconduct. In fact, the largest servicer in the country, Navient (formerly Sallie Mae), faces multiple lawsuits for defrauding 1.5 million borrowers and adding over $4 billion to the cost of student borrowers’ loans. Coloradans increasingly report that many student loan servicers inappropriately and inaccurately discourage borrower-friendly alternative payment plans that could save borrowers money; fail to respond to questions and payment processing errors, and fail to provide sufficient information to borrowers regarding payments, interest rates, and eligibility for benefits such as loan forgiveness.

To make matters worse, the Department of Education under Betsy DeVos has rolled back even the most basic protections for borrowers – including the elimination of a guideline simply stating that borrowers should be able to expect “timely and accurate responses to inquiries and complaints, and transparent resolutions when problems occur.” Could the bar get any lower?

Failures within the student loan servicing industry are eerily similar to those prevalent within the mortgage industry that precipitated the Great Recession of 2008. Why then, are we sitting back and allowing these servicers to fail Colorado consumers?

Veterans groups, consumer advocates, teachers, and young borrowers have banded together to seek solutions to this issue at the state level. State Rep. Faith Winter, with support from Attorney General Cynthia Coffman, introduced legislation last week to bring sensible oversight of loan servicers in line with every other kind of consumer loan provider in the state, including licensing servicers and ensuring they follow basic ground rules for interacting with borrowers. This measure would increase transparency and ensure that borrowers can access the quickest, least costly repayment methods on their student loans, allowing Coloradans to more effectively balance repaying student loans with other investments, such as home ownership, that build our economy.

To be clear – this effort won’t solve the student debt crisis. This won’t eliminate debt or make school more affordable, just provide the basic assurance that the process of repaying loans will be fair and transparent. Consistent, market-wide oversight at the federal level would ultimately be more effective than a patchwork of state efforts like ours, but DeVos has made it clear that she’s more concerned with servicers making a profit than she is about protecting 44 million borrowers.

It’s high time for us Coloradans to step up and take matters into our own hands. As the largest youth mobilization organization in the state, we consistently engage tens of thousands of young voters across the state – from Greeley to Durango to Fort Collins, Grand Junction to Denver and Boulder. These voters consistently name student debt as a top issue area where they want to see their elected officials take more aggressive action. This bill, HB18-1415, is a small step, but a definitive step in the right direction and one well worth taking.