With a white-hot campaign season leading to a blue-wave election, 2018 was an exciting year for news of politics and policy in Colorado.

And the staff of Colorado Politics has been proud to bring it to you.

We’ve tracked burning issues like health care, transportation, energy, marijuana and water. We’ve followed bills and policies through the legislative session, looked behind the scenes at the gubernatorial campaigns, and crisscrossed the state to talk to rural Coloradans.

And now, we’re revisiting some of the best work of our reporters and editors — Joey Bunch, Ernest Luning, Marianne Goodland and Dan Njegomir — and our contributors.

On behalf of all of us at Colorado Politics, thanks for joining us in 2018 in print and online. Here’s hoping that you have a happy and healthy 2019, and that you’ll stay with us as another fascinating year of Colorado politics unfolds.

– Mark Harden, Managing Editor

BEST OF COPO 2018

> Our look back at the year in politics

> What Polis’ record in office reveals about the governor-elect

> Exit interview: Hickenlooper looks back, ahead

> High health insurance prices mean ill winds in Colorado’s high country

> Inside the Polis campaign

> Profile: Jared Polis

> Colorado’s dark horses: What makes non-major-party candidates run?

> John Hickenlooper’s legacy of water

> Rural electric cooperatives look at cutting the cord

> What we learned about the ‘U’ Factor

> Illegal pot spreads on Colorado’s public lands

> Uncertain course for Colorado’s ethics watchdogs

> Coffman moves on from Congress and Trump

> The shoe-leather statesman: Wellington Webb’s 5 decades in politics

> Bob Beauprez: Colo.’s partisan past should bend toward the middle

> Dear Governor: Advice for Colorado’s next chief executive

> Imagine a great Colorado: 7 perspectives on how to lift up the state

> What worries rural Colorado?

> Grand Junction shines as D.C. eyes new home for BLM

> Pot goes to school: With marijuana legal in Colorado, student encounters are rising

> Colorado takes on human trafficking