Colorado’s legislators wrapped up their work for the year just before midnight on Wednesday after tackling some of the most monumental measures in years, notably passing a sweeping response to the fentanyl crisis and adopting a record-breaking spending plan. 

Here are some of the major bills lawmakers passed: 

Fentanyl

The most significant bill of the 2022 session wound up being about public safety, a priority for both parties, but the issue that dominated the session wasn’t on the radar of lawmakers when they gaveled in on Jan/ 12. The February deaths of five Commerce City residents, who allegedly did not know they were taking fentanyl, pushed lawmakers to spend three months coming up with a solution to the spiraling crisis.

House Bill 1326 was among the last bills of the 2022 session to cross the finish line following a week of back-and-forth between the House and Senate over incompatible differences. A conference committee finally came up with a solution with five hours to go in the session, and the two chambers passed the bill with less than two hours before lawmakers are constitutionally required to conclude their work for the year.  

When Polis signed legislation affirming the right to an abortion in Colorado in April, supporters described it as a bulwark against a potential U.S. Supreme Court decision to overturn Roe v Wade. That possibility inched closer to reality a month later, when Politico published a leaked draft of an opinion striking down both Roe and the high court’s ruling in Planned Parenthood v. Casey in 1992.

Known as the Reproductive Health Equity Act, House Bill 1279 establishes a fundamental right to continue a pregnancy and give birth, or to have an abortion. The bill also says fertilized eggs, embryos and fetuses do not have independent rights under the law, and it prohibits state and local public entities from denying or restricting an individual’s right to use or refuse contraception, or to either continue a pregnancy or have an abortion. In guaranteeing that right, Colorado became the second state this year to adopt a law protecting legal access to the procedure.

Fiscal relief

Polis and his allies in the Democrat-dominated legislature pursued several strategies to offer fiscal relief to Coloradans who face spiking inflation and soaring energy prices, and on the last day of session, lawmakers approved a proposal that sends $400 – or more – in Taxpayer’s Bill of Rights refund checks to residents. 

House members amended Senate Bill 22-233 to allow the state to refund up to 85% of the TABOR surplus, which could make the money higher if revenue forecasts hew to Democrats’ expectations. However, if state revenues fall short of expectations, the refund checks would be lowered to avoid overpayment.

A spokesman for House Democrats told Colorado Politics on Tuesday that, based on conversations with the Department of Revenue and the governor’s Office of State Planning and Budgeting, the rebate checks will increase to at least $500 for single filers and $1,000 for joint filers.

Taxpayers will receive equal payments, regardless of income.

Not every proposal lawmakers conjured during the 2022 legislative session made it across the finish line.

Here are some of the most notable bills killed by the General Assembly:

Flavored tobacco ban

House Bill 1064, one of the most high-profile bills of the session, sought to curb youth tobacco and nicotine use by prohibiting the sale of flavored products, such as vapes, e-cigarettes, menthol cigarettes and chewing tobacco beginning in 2024. Lawmakers earlier amended the bill to exempt hookah products, premium cigars and pipe tobacco.

But it met an unceremonious end when the Senate Appropriations Committee voted, 5-2, to shut the bill down. The meeting featured no public comment and little debate, unlike the other six votes on the bill that saw hours of discussion and dozens of community members testifying in support and opposition to the measure.

The vote came after Gov. Jared Polis said he opposed the bill, spurring concerns of a veto. Though Polis said the issue is better left to local governments, the ban would have slashed funding for his new universal preschool program funded by state tobacco and nicotine taxes. Polis’ office declined to comment on the bill.

Hand-held cellphones while driving

A casualty of the end of session crunch in the House, Senate Bill 175 died despite winning bipartisan votes at nearly every stage of the legislative process.

Under current law, adult drivers are allowed to use cellphones for calls but they cannot text or browse the internet. If passed, the bill would have prohibited all hand-held cellphone use. Drivers under the age of 18 are already prohibited from all cellphone use, including hands-free.

Though the bill passed the Senate in a 24-10 vote in April and the House Transportation Committee in a 12-1 vote on May 2, the House Appropriations Committee failed to schedule the bill before Tuesday’s midnight deadline. 

Recycling

Another bill that went down to the wire was House Bill 1355, a controversial attempt to boost the state’s abysmal recycling rate. The measure would have set up multiple non-profits with authority to levy “dues” primarily to retailers and beverage companies, but it exempted out a long list of materials and companies that use them that critics said made the bill unfair to those who are left.

The measure also would have allowed the non-profit to levy fines to companies, which critics pointed out is not a role of non-profits and which could fine out-of-state companies who don’t participate in what’s called the “producer responsibility organization.” The bill had a long lead time, with full implementation not expected for several years. 

Alternative transportation for workers  

As drafted, House Bill 1138 would have required businesses with over 100 employees to provide alternative transportation options for employees, offer cash allowance in lieu of parking spaces and also transportation fringe benefits. The bill would have also created an income tax credit to incentivize businesses of all sizes to provide alternative transportation options.

But the legislative proposal, which has been in the works in other sectors of Colorado’s state government, faced a tough reception before the House Finance Committee. The panel panel voted to indefinitely postpone the measure.

Metro district reform

Senate lawmakers late in the session opted to indefinitely postpone House Bill 1363, a measure that at first prevented, then allowed, then again prevented metro district developers from owning their own public financing.

The bill began its life by attempting fix a number of perceived issues with metro district operations but scaled back to only the provision dealing with developer-purchased bonds. It left the House with a last-minute amendment added on the floor that allowed the practice, but failed to remove the provisions that prevented it. In the Senate committee, bill sponsors managed to land a vote to strip the House floor change before moving to a final vote to end its progress.

Implicit bias in jury selection

The attempt from a pair of the most progressive members of the Colorado Senate’s Democratic caucus to combat implicit racial bias in jury selection also failed to advance.

The measure from Sens. Pete Lee, D-Colorado Springs, and Julie Gonzales, D-Denver, would have altered the protocol for allowing attorneys to excuse, or strike, potential jurors in a criminal trial. Most controversially, Senate Bill 128 listed several reasons associated with race – but are not explicitly racial – that would be presumably invalid justifications for striking a juror.

In the face of opposition from all 22 of the state’s district attorneys, Lee and Gonzales opted against moving forward with their proposal, asking instead that the Colorado Supreme Court exercise its rulemaking power before the next legislative session.

Marijuana and employment

House Bill 1152 from Boulder Democrat Rep. Edie Hooton generated internet buzz early in the session before ultimately meeting the same end as the five previous iterations of the legislation.

As originally written, the bill would have allowed people to use marijuana outside of work and allowed card-carrying medical marijuana individuals to use the drug during work without negative professional consequences.

But lawmakers in the Colorado House Business Affairs and Labor Committee unanimously opted to completely rewrite the bill, replacing it with a proposed task force to study medical marijuana use in employment, before ultimately voting to kill it.