How has the 2023 General Assembly performed? Democrats have a supermajority in the House and a strong majority in the Senate, but leadership of both chambers has held tight to the political “center.” Did that leadership save us from anarchy, tyranny and/or catastrophe?

Let’s do firearms first. The chambers passed HB23-1291, a waiting period to deliver a firearm; SB23-170, extreme risk protections order petitions; SB23-169, increasing the age to purchase firearms; and SB23-168, gun violence victims’ access to judicial system. The House State, Civic, Military and Veterans Affairs committee killed HB23-1044, the Second Amendment Preservation Act, and House Judiciary killed HB23-1230, the Prohibit Assault Weapons in Colorado Act. SB23-279 on unserialized firearms and firearms components is in progress in the Senate.

All House State, Civic, Military, & Veterans Affairs (SCMV) committee Democrats agreed to kill the “Second Amendment Preservation Act” sponsored by GOP Rep. Kenneth DeGraaf. House leadership held onto Rep. Elisabeth Epps’s “Prohibit Assault Weapons in Colorado Act” until late last week. That bill received a marathon 12-hour hearing with its fate determined by three Dems who voted with Republicans. Leadership and the governor were cool to the bill. This centrist position will allow the purchase and possession of military-style assault weapons to continue in the state.

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Perhaps the legislators who voted against the act should prepare for next year’s session on this legislation by reading the article in the recent NY Times Magazine on what the Sandy Hook Elementary School crime scene looked like. The principal, school psychologist, behavioral therapist, special ed teacher, 30-year-old substitute teacher and 27-year-old classroom teacher along with 20 children in first grade were spread across the school’s halls and crammed into closets, bathrooms and classrooms and shot at close quarters. The description of the devastation by the military-style Bushmaster XM 15-E2S rifle shooting 154 bullets in under five minutes takes breath away. The killer, however, didn’t use the Bushmaster against himself. Instead, he put his Glock 10 mm pistol to his head.

Many argue Sandy Hook and its Bushmaster violence was anarchically catastrophic and, in the case of assault weapons, the “center” should not hold. Those arguments will no doubt continue next year.

Next, onto the environment with many bills in progress. HB23-1265, the Born To Be Wild License Plate For Wolves, is moving along. But, as an aside, if it passes and you buy the plate, don’t drive in certain rural mountain communities.

Mobile home parks may get clean water protections with HB23-1257. Oil and gas drillers may have to do their digging with less water, but the environmental community will have to hustle to get HB23-1242 through both chambers before the end of session. SB23-016 on reducing greenhouse gas emissions will probably pass as it’s cleared the Senate and is onto its second committee in the House.

The tyrannical environment bill for the GOP and the energy development industry was HB23-1294, regarding pollution protection measures. The bill set out to make the Air Quality Control Commission and Air Pollution Control Division at the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment clamp down on oil and gas operations’ contribution to the state’s serious air pollution problems. These two agencies of the state have resisted implementing strict air pollution requirements as established by SB19-181 four years ago. Clearly, the governor has influenced this reluctant effort as the two entities are under the executive’s authority. The bill’s sponsors, Democrats Jennifer Bacon and Jenny Willford, agreed to revise the bill’s most assertive initiatives so this is a work in progress, but the representatives are not happy about the amendments.

We’ll see how noxious the ozone gets this summer with this in-the-center policy. Drilling is progressing at full speed and the Suncor refinery will churn out gas, oil, diesel and asphalt. Is it just too bad eadership’s centrist approach to air pollution makes some people sick?

Now to education. Once again Joint Budget Committee centrist chair Rachel Zenzinger happily announced deficit spending on public schools will decline. The difference between what the state is supposed to spend and what it will spend is about $171 million this year, but the total deficit since 2008 is currently well more than $10 billion dollars. That’s 15 school years when students haven’t received full funding for their schooling even with the documented problems of the COVID pandemic. Zenzinger has made no indication the $10 billion will arrive in education coffers anytime soon. All she offers is an enthusiastic hurrah to the tepid fact this is the “largest commitment to public education in Colorado’s history.”

HB23-1025 to extend charter school application deadlines sped through the chambers and is on its way to the governor. Polis and his Democrats for Education Reform (DFERs) allies joined in with the GOP on charter bills. The legislature had a chance to reform its state assessment and standardized testing programs with HB23-1239 but chose to kill that bill because Polis, DFERs and the GOP don’t want changes that will ultimately support and improve traditional public schools.

Perhaps DFERs should check out what’s going on in Woodland Park School District if they want to know the ultimate result of their charter school policies. In that small district, the interim superintendent, Ken Witt, and his GOP allies on the school board want to rid the district of traditional public schools and their teachers and replace them with charter schools and their teachers. Further, Witt wants the schools to focus exclusively on his version of academics, conservative American Birthright Social Studies standards, and everyone’s favorite after-school activity, the Shooting Club! He’s told teachers to shut up about their concerns. District teachers and administrators have quit en masse. He’s stuffed the State Board of Education’s social studies standards without a peep from that elected body. This is all good and motivating, according to Witt.

Whether this super majority Democratic House and strong majority Senate have achieved the voters’ wishes will be decided in 2024. Meanwhile, the GOP, the business community, charter-school aficionados, and Second Amendment fans have our centrist leaders protecting their central interests. Their center did hold, more or less, for better or worse.

Paula Noonan owns Colorado Capitol Watch, the state’s premier legislature tracking platform.