Law-abiding Coloradans fed up with the epic crime wave of the past few years would be justifiably angry if they knew that a lot of the criminals who do wind up going to prison in our state don’t stay there long.

Felons typically can be considered for parole after they have served as little as half their sentence. That’s after subtracting “earned time” — credit given for participating in prison jobs, job training, literacy classes and assorted other activities that jailers want to encourage — as well as credit for the time spent in jail while the inmate was a defendant awaiting trial.

As a result, hardened criminals often leave prison all too soon, and many, of course, go on to commit more crimes.

A crackdown is long overdue for the state’s lax parole standards. But it’s unlikely to come from the Capitol’s ruling Democrats, many of whom are smitten with the “justice reform” dogma fashionable among the party’s “progressive” wing. They’ve gone soft on crime and aren’t coming back to reality on their own anytime soon.

Stay up to speed: Sign up for daily opinion in your inbox Monday-Friday

In fact, one of the Legislature’s leading criminal coddlers, state Rep. and House Judiciary Committee Chair Mike Weissman, D-Aurora, quashed legislation that attempted just such a crackdown this year.

Among its other provisions, HB24-1127 would have required offenders convicted of murder, kidnapping, sexual assault and a number of other serious crimes to serve 85% of their sentence before they could be eligible for parole. Weissman and his fellow partisans on the committee voted the proposal down.

So, there’s all the more reason to cheer news last week that a citizens’ initiative to fix our state’s broken parole system has qualified for the November ballot. The proposal from citizens-advocacy group Advance Colorado would require the state’s most violent criminals to serve 85% of their sentences before being eligible for parole.   Upon a third offense, inmates would be required to serve 100% of their sentences.

In other words, Advance Colorado’s “Truth in Sentencing” initiative aims to ask voters in November to do what the legislative majority didn’t have the guts to do — demand accountability of criminal convicts.

The fact that nearly 200,000 Colorado voters felt compelled to sign petitions on behalf of the ballot proposal speaks volumes about how far out of touch the state’s ruling political class is on law-and-order issues.

Advance’s proposal isn’t a mere feel-good bid to “get even” with criminals. And it isn’t just about making them atone for their wrongdoing though that certainly is a worthy principle in its own right.

Rather, Initiative 112 is a practical and sensible effort to stem the very real and, often, tragic consequences of free-and-easy parole.

Look no further than the case of Kenneth Dean Lee, who was sentenced to 40 years in prison last year for a sexual assault on a 7-year-old girl in Aurora in 2021.

It turned out Lee had been paroled the previous year for a 2014 conviction on charges involving almost identical incidents; only the victims were different. He was supposed to be serving 23 years to life but instead was released after only six years — to prey on Colorado’s children again.

Will he stay put this time and do his time, at long last? Evidently, that’s not a safe bet.

Colorado voters need to pick up the ball where the Legislature dropped it — and enact “Truth in Sentencing” this November.

Colorado Springs Gazette Editorial Board