Ed Dwight recently returned from space aboard one of Jeff Bezos’s Blue Origin rockets, 63 years after NASA first promised him a trip into orbit which they never offered. We can safely assume this black test pilot had “The Right Stuff” Tom Wolfe wrote about in 1979 and Hollywood valorized in a 1983 movie about America’s first astronauts. The longtime Park Hill resident departed the space program to pursue a successful career as a nationally acclaimed sculptor. For several decades I encountered him and his late wife Barbara every election year at Denver Democratic assemblies. He is a modest, unassuming man of obviously varied talents. Whatever resentment he may feel for the racist snub directed his way all those many years ago, he appeared a happy man when he emerged from his space capsule as the oldest man to ever travel to and return from space.

Bezos offered a similar trip to William Shatner in 2021 also in his 90th year, yet a few months younger than Dwight. Whether Blue Origin continues to shuttle nonagenarians into space, it’s heartening to learn it is possible. The Canadian Star Trekker was born two years before Dwight. I also happened to meet him 30 years ago at a farmer’s market in Beverly Hills where my son was living at the time. Shatner was churlish and nasty to a pair of young fans seeking his autograph, which left me wondering why someone whose success and riches flow from being a celebrity would be unwilling to tolerate the nuisance of admirers? I much prefer Ed Dwight’s modesty.

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If you were paying attention to the recently concluded legislative session, you should have noticed the procedural traffic jam during its final week — more than 300 bills awaiting hearings in the final days. Simple math predicts the necessity for a massive slaughter. It has long been true several contentious bills arrive at the close of a session as the palavering among stakeholders runs up against the reality of a deadline. The pooling of dozens of bills burdened with a fiscal note in each chamber’s appropriations committee is a recent phenomenon. Since the advent of term limits, precedent has been reduced to an 8-year timeline. Memory lapses became evident in January with the “discovery” of flagrant disregard of the legal prohibition against secret meetings among legislators which spilled into the open.

Protestations of bipartisan innocence premised on the fact such conclaves had become routine when the current crop of legislators arrived at the Capitol — only to have become a matter of habit rang hollow. Legislative leadership has become a policy of learning as you lead. Senate President Tom Norton and House Speaker Chuck Berry had served six and eight years respectively in their positions when term limits kicked them to the curb in 1998. Since then, only a single speaker, Andrew Romanoff, has served for four years, although Julie McCluskie may become the second next year. On the Senate side, where members serve 4-year terms, Joan Fitzgerald, Brandon Shaffer and Leroy Garcia each won two elections as president. Just two years in leadership, making it up as they go, has become the rule.

One long-serving lobbyist explained to me the sluicing of bills into catchment basins at the appropriations committees is intentional. “Leadership doesn’t like to say ‘NO’ to members, particularly those serving in the majority. Consequently, bills rarely get killed in committees of reference today,” she explained. Legislators can report to supporters their bills have passed out of committee and are now being held in Appropriations until the budget “long bill” is adopted. During the fat years when COVID moneys were pouring in from Washington, this delay provided little obstacle to eventual passage. There was plenty of money to pass around. As the fiscal tap closed, several large bills devoured most of the available discretionary dollars — with little left for legislation, much of it important, that in many cases required trivial appropriations. These bills died right along with much of the flotsam that mattered little to anyone other than special interests.

Most likely to be victimized are freshmen legislators, who have yet to learn their referrals to Appropriations are not a cozy waiting room but more like a stockyard holding pen. The greater the seniority a legislator has, the more likely his or her bills will survive this culling. Appropriation panels are accountable to leadership mandates and their decisions, including end-of-session traffic congestion, is intentional. The governor’s office also has its fingerprints on some of the triage that ensues. With lean budget years predicted ahead, backbenchers are grumbling about putting pressure on leadership candidates to drastically restructure this process. Several strategies are available for reducing gridlock and allowing bills to advance even if a mechanism is required for recalling legislation when obligations bust the budget.

The current arrangements have to be even more distasteful for minority legislators. Though Democrats have been more willing to kill Republican bills in the committees of origin, those that survive this gauntlet and proceed to Appropriations have nearly zero chance of securing funding whatever their merits. Speaker McCluskie may be best positioned to initiate a reform conversation, whether she actually has the stomach for another two years in the speaker’s chair or not. Current rules were designed for yesterday’s circumstances. Tomorrow’s challenges demand the flexibility to adopt new rules. Waiting for November would be a mistake. Now, before there is perceived advantage in the status quo, is the time to tinker with the rules. The present is the time to do the right thing.

Miller Hudson is a public affairs consultant and a former Colorado legislator.