Is Gov. Jared Polis listening? It sure doesn’t seem like it.

Local governments everywhere are vigorously opposing the latest power-grab move by Polis and legislative Democrats, through SB23-213. The governor has made it his pet project to eradicate one of the most critical reflections of Colorado’s lifelong principle of local control – the power of local governments to control their own zoning and land-use issues.

The whopping 105-page bill would set a new zoning rules baseline of “flexible minimum standards” that municipalities can adopt unless they opt for the full state-developed model. As The Gazette recently editorialized, “all would march to the same drummer under the Polis plan in communities as diverse as Boulder and Colorado Springs; Fort Collins and Pueblo; Vail and Aurora.”

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This includes home-rule municipalities, such as Centennial and Colorado Springs, that are specifically chartered by voters to empower the city with even more latitude to conduct their own affairs. Plus, the bill goes so far as to overturn covenants in HOA-governed communities, dismantling their ability to control local quality of life.

“When you go into a neighborhood in a community, you move into there with an expectation of what you’re gonna have for consistency in your community and what you’re looking for in that community,” Centennial Mayor Stephanie Piko said on my 710KNUS radio show Saturday. “To take that away from people who agreed, going into a homeowners association, as to what that neighborhood was gonna look like – that is just an unfair breach of contract for what people agreed to when they bought their property.”

Piko is right: The reason we have municipalities and counties in the first place is to address issues of the most local concern, in ways individual communities believe will work best. Everyday quality-of-life issues aren’t handled under the golden dome in Denver; they’re handled in town council meetings and on local water boards.

By trampling upon the right of municipalities, counties and even local HOAs to chart their own path on something so foundational as how their communities are set up – such as whether multifamily housing should be permitted in single-family neighborhoods, or auxiliary dwelling units should be built – Polis seeks to undermine the fundamental purpose of local government.

“They’re preempting local control of land use. It has been determined repeatedly that land use decisions are made best when they’re made locally,” Piko said. “We understand what the infrastructure needs are, what goes on in our city, and what problem the community is trying to solve with our land use.”

Remarkably, by pushing one of the most egregious, extreme breaches of local control ever, Polis has galvanized local political groups across the state and across political lines – nearly unified in opposition.

As CoPo reported Tuesday, the Metro Mayors Caucus – representing mayors in 39 municipalities in the Denver-Metro region – was the latest organization to announce its firm opposition to Polis. Of the 28 mayors who voted on their letter, all but Polis’s hometown mayor, Aaron Brockett of Boulder, supported it.

The Colorado Municipal League, covering 270 cities and towns, and Colorado Counties, Inc. oppose SB213. And though the bill supposedly seeks to treat the Front Range a bit differently from Colorado’s resort communities, local leaders in mountain towns are confidently pushing back, too.

Polis claims he’s taking a “data-driven approach” here, all in a scheme to boost access to new housing. This condescendingly implies all the mayors and city councils who oppose his bill aren’t already considering data in their own policies. If anything, the governor and the legislature are the ones who aren’t doing their homework.

As Piko noted, Arapahoe County has 108,000 units approved for building already – nearly half of what the state says is needed. Cities like Centennial are a part of that, increasing density as needed and possible, and in accordance with the wishes of their residents. Meanwhile, the bill won’t really have an impact for maybe five years. Has Mr. Data (apologies to Brent Spiner) even assessed what’s already being done – before stepping in to extraordinarily wrest away local control?

Polis presumptuously assumes that, even after forcing multifamily homes or auxiliary dwelling units on local communities, cities can somehow accommodate the additional services necessary. Yet he ignores the fact Colorado’s utility infrastructure is generally managed by special districts, such as water boards. (Centennial, for example, has 12 water districts whose boards would have to magically coordinate with the city).

Nothing in SB213 will actually bring down costs of new housing. It avoids further fixes to construction liability laws that would encourage new construction. And by inevitably opening the floodgates to new litigation concerning land use, things are likely to get more expensive. Local governments can’t set their own construction standards. Neighborhoods would have no say.

There is nothing “moderate” about eradicating Colorado’s constitutional precept of local control in an unprecedented, state takeover of land-use policy. Polis is choosing to disregard local realities and the widespread pleas of his counterparts in local governments statewide – all in a radical, conceited effort to subordinate local officials to his own foolhardy, one-size-fits-all vision.

Jimmy Sengenberger is an investigative journalist, public speaker, and host of “The Jimmy Sengenberger Show” Saturdays from 6 a.m. to 9 a.m. on News/Talk 710 KNUS. Reach Jimmy online at JimmySengenberger.com or on Twitter @SengCenter.