The legislative effort to make daylight saving time permanent in Colorado took a big step forward Friday, receiving approval from the state House of Representatives. 

If enacted, House Bill 1297 would make daylight saving time year-round if federal law is changed to allow states to do so and if four other states in the Mountain Time Zone also make the switch. The bill now heads to the state Senate for consideration.

“Most people are tired of changing their clocks twice a year,” said Rep. Cathy Kipp, D-Fort Collins. “There’s actually a public health issue. We’re talking more traffic accidents, more mental health issues, more heart attacks, more strokes. There are actual physical effects from doing this.”

The House voted, 50-12, in favor of the bill. This is the first time a bill to stop the biannual switching of the clocks has even reached the floor for a vote.

Colorado lawmakers have tried for more than 30 years to end the flipping back and forth between Mountain Standard Time and daylight saving time, beginning in 1988 with then-Sen. Bill Schroeder, R-Morrison. Since 2015, legislators have offered seven different bills and ballot proposals to make standard time or daylight saving time year-round, all of which were killed in committee.

Though there was little pushback on locking the clock during the floor debate, some lawmakers argued that year-round standard time would be better than year-round daylight saving time.

“For agriculture, I don’t know what the right answer is. I just know this will have an impact,” said Rep. Richard Holtorf, R-Akron. “Farmers and ranchers like to get up at the crack of dawn to get going. In the wintertime, we can get an earlier start because we have that daylight. … The sooner we can get started, the better.”

Kipp said she believes most Coloradans prefer permanent daylight saving time because it will give them more hours of sunlight in the evening for exercise, shopping and leisure activities.

This year, long-time opponents from the skiing and tourism industries agreed to be neutral on the bill with the amendment that four other states in the Mountain Time Zone adopt permanent daylight saving time before Colorado’s change can go into effect. They argued that this would prevent competition from nearby ski industries.

Three eligible states – Utah, Montana and Wyoming – are already on board. This means, if the federal government gives the OK, only one more state has to adopt daylight saving time: Arizona, New Mexico or southern Idaho.