The House Appropriations Committee reversed the action taken by the state Senate last week, which could allow the Colorado Bureau of Investigation about $3 million to continue testing a backlog of DNA kits into the 2025-26 budget year.

Whether that change lasts, however, is anyone’s guess.

Senate Bill 105 is part of a package of supplemental bills intended to address changes in the 2024-25 state budget.

SB 105 is the supplemental for the Department of Public Safety, which includes CBI.

At issue: a backlog of DNA tests, with about 10,000 tied to Yvonne “Missy” Woods, a former CBI scientist who allegedly mishandled thousands of cases. She’s now facing 102 felony charges.

According to testimony last month from CBI director Chris Schaefer, half of the CBI forensics staff are now tasked with reviewing about 1,000 of the Woods cases.

But CBI also has a growing backlog of DNA rape test kits, and the average for turning those results around is now more than 500 days.

The Department of Public Safety, which houses the CBI, had sought permission to spend existing dollars on the backlog past the fiscal year deadline of June 30, 2025.

State Sen. Judy Amabile, D-Boulder, a member of the Joint Budget Committee, told reporters last week the department underspent its budget by about $7.5 million — wanting more time to spend those dollars — but had only retested 14 samples in the last six months.

The Joint Budget Committee, however, gave the department a firm “No,” citing the backlog and CBI’s lack of a plan to address it.

When the bill hit the state Senate last week, Democrats overruled the JBC, adding an amendment permitting the agency to continue spending $3 million past June 30.

The bill passed on a 29-2 vote and headed to the House, where the appropriations committees stripped that amendment.

JBC Vice-Chair Rep. Shannon Bird, D-Westminster, told the committee that the budget line for the backlog would direct the CBI to contract with outside labs to move it.

But Elizabeth Newman for the Colorado Coalition Against Sexual Assault argued in favor of allowing CBI to keep those dollars past June 30. “Our top priority is resolving this backlog,” and then work on reform to keep it from happening again. She said there are 1,407 survivors whose lives have been upended, including for the wait for the kits to be analyzed.

Newman said, “This supplemental is needed to ensure the resources available within CBI can be allocated” to address the crisis. There must be oversight, but failing to grant rollover authority jeopardizes clearing the backlog and keeps survivors from the answers they seek, she told the committee.

Last week, coalition witnesses testified in favor of ending the funding on June 30, but Newman said new information has come to light, and they now support allowing the funds to roll over on June 30.

Joel Malecka, CBI’s legislative director, said the agency has come up with a draft plan to address the rape kit backlog. “The urgency CBI has with this particular roll forward is that there are very few labs that can do this work,” maybe 10, with many other states with the same capacity challenges.

CBI fears that waiting until May, June, or July will complicate finding a lab that can take on 1,000 of the 1,407 cases. “CBI is quite frankly terrified that we don’t have the resources to move the backlog at the pace we need to, and if we don’t have a lab with that capacity, months down the road, the problem will continue to roll forward into the future” until CBI finds a lab that can take on those cases.

“We don’t want to miss an opportunity to make a significant gain in the backlog” with the opportunity right now, Malecka said. They can contract now for a small percentage of those rape kits, maybe 100 kits, with a 90-day turnaround that can be spent through June 30.

But they’d like to contract with a lab for an entire year, he said. They have a contract with a lab that is taking on other cases right now, but CBI doesn’t know whether that lab can take on the 1,000 cases in the next fiscal year.

Malecka noted that the agency is also hiring 15 new scientists in the coming year, doubling the size of the lab.

Bird said Tuesday that if the JBC and legislature give CBI roll-forward authority, it must come with guardrails. Taking the amendment off would give them time to determine what those guardrails should be.

According to JBC member Rep. Emily Sirota, D-Denver, a white paper submitted by CBI Monday night said it would take two years to get the turnaround time on DNA testing to 100 days.

“That’s not acceptable and would not serve justice,” Sirota said.

“I find it horrific that we only get a white paper and a plan delivered to our inboxes last night,” said Speaker Pro tem Andrew Boesenecker, D-Fort Collins. “You can see how that does not provide any measure of confidence to this committee or to me in CBI’s seriousness in addressing this issue.”

Boesenecker said he would support an amendment to restore that funding, but “it’s no vote of confidence in CBI’s action in this case,” and hints at delayed and deferred justice for victims or even “no justice.”

Newman asked the committee to keep the roll forward authority in place on behalf of the 1,407 victims awaiting the results of those rape kits.

The committee voted to remove the amendment and passed the bill 9-2. It now heads to the full House.

On Tuesday afternoon, House Speaker Julie McCluskie, D-Dillon, told reporters she intends to support the JBC’s position on the matter when the bill comes up for debate Wednesday. This could potentially thwart efforts to reinstate the amendment to allow CBI the authority to continue spending those dollars into the 2025-26 fiscal year.