"This is not who we are as a Party," the 17 Republican officials wrote to Vickie Tonkins, the El Paso County GOP chairwoman, in a scathing email obtained by Colorado Politics, after she asked in a social media post if the coronavirus pandemic could be a plot to deceive the public.
If things go according to plan, Justin Everett will be up late next year, reading every word in every bill introduced in the Colorado House of Representatives, and when the legislation comes up for a vote, he'll give a good share of it a thumbs down.
The governor pointed out that his top priority has been to lower the cost of health care, including health insurance.
Colorado leaders from both parties had hoped to invest hundreds of millions of dollars each year to help catch up to $9 billion in needs over the next decade.
The rules "further promote the part-time, citizen legislature by providing crucial flexibility when a declared public health crisis renders it unsafe to meet to consider and debate legislation" the majority opinion stated.
Senate President Leroy Garcia of Pueblo presided over a chamber Monday morning where something happened that he said has never happened before in state history: a lack of a quorum to conduct its business.
Democrats for Education Reform announced Monday morning that the former speaker of the Colorado House would be its New York state director.
At 10 a.m. both chambers will gavel in. But in the likelihood that neither chamber will have a quorum — and that appears to be what legislative leaders want — they'll adjourn for three days. In that time, they hope that the Colorado Supreme Court comes back with an answer on the question the General Assembly asked on March 14: whether the session's 120 days are consecutive, or, if under a public health emergency, the calendar was paused and the days are counted separately.
The lawmakers said "it is unacceptable that a contracted health agency could somehow ignore the will of a majority of our elected and accountable Douglas County Commissioners."
The Colorado General Assembly will not resume what’s left of its 120-day session on Monday, but how that will happen is still very much up in the air.
At issue: when the General Assembly adopted a resolution putting them into recess from March 14 to March 30, whether the lawmakers lost those 16 days from the 120-day calendar.
Senate Bill 83 prevents civil arrests at courthouses. The legislation was sponsored by Sen. Julie Gonzales and Rep. Leslie Herod, both Denver Democrats.
Backers of the repeal claim it has been used disproportionately against African-Americans. Those who opposed the repeal pointed to cases like that of Christopher Watts of Frederick, who murdered his wife Shanann and their two young daughters in 2018.
“While I am still feeling very sick from this other coronavirus, I am relieved to know that I haven’t inadvertently exposed anyone at the Capitol or in my community to COVID-19,” Jenet said.
"I feel fine," Smallwood told Colorado Politics.
Gov. Jared Polis Friday signed into law House Bill 1031, which renames the holiday after the Catholic nun who started several charitable organizations in Colorado, including the Queen of Heaven orphanage in Denver and a summer camp for girls that is now the home of the Mother Cabrini Shrine.
She is the first legislator known to have contracted the novel coronavirus. "While I have had a confirmed case of bronchitis for much of March, my doctors have told me that it’s likely I contracted COVID-19 in the last few days," she said.
Joey Bunch: "You can call necessity the mother of invention, or you can call it mission creep, but sick time and paid family leave are fast becoming an expected part of the workplace, like the 40-hour week and holidays off."
"The budget situation today is very different" from the one in January, said Speaker of the House KC Becker, and that means new programs, grants and other spending that isn't immediately tied to the pandemic are not likely to happen.
The big question is just what they will have time to work on, and whether there's any money to put toward new programs.
At issue: whether the 120 days must be consecutive or, if under a legislative rule, whether the assembly can take a time out without losing any working days.
Virtually any ideas about new programs in the 2020-21 budget are likely now gone. In Gov. Jared Polis' budget request, that means early childhood education, increases to the statutory reserve that gives the state a cushion against recession and $52 million to pay down the state's debt to K-12 education.
“Right now there are too many small-town programs that are struggling,” said Sen. Jeff Bridges, D-Greenwood Village, one of House Bill 1229’s sponsors. “No matter their ZIP code, those who are dedicating their lives to protecting our safety need to be invested in.”
This is Colorado Politics’ daily digest of news about ongoing pandemic’s impacts on the Centennial State.
Joey Bunch: "Money runs out before the compassion ever does under the golden dome of the state Capitol in Denver. It's probably that way in your household budget. That’s evident looking at an entirely worthy piece of legislation passed by the state Senate on March 10, bound for the governor's desk."
"We don't know if a two-week recess is going to be enough," said House Republican leader Patrick Neville. "We don't know if it would be advisable to come back after that point, so we need the Supreme Court to weigh in."
The Colorado House has taken the first step to shutting down business for two weeks in light of the growing COVID-19 outbreak: a resolution to pause the session and a request to the Colorado Supreme Court on a constitutional question about what happens when they come back.
The bill granting more time to county assemblies to conduct their election business went from a 52-9 vote in the House on Friday to preliminary approval by the state Senate by close of business later in the day.
The leaders of the Colorado General Assembly offered a resolution Friday to adjourn the legislature for two weeks, beginning after Saturday's session. Lawmakers would return at 10 a.m. on March 30, according to the resolution.
House Bill 1223, moving easily through the statehouse, would create grants between $2,500 and $10,000 for rural artists starting this summer and continuing annually. Rural is round-about-defined as all those outside the seven metro Denver counties.
“Today, we showed the political climbers and career politicians what a true grassroots campaign looks like,” the mediation attorney and professional negotiator, said in a statement.
Shoshana Lew, the executive director of the Colorado Department of Transportation, will give a major speech on accountability and transparency as the foundation of the governor's 10-year priority plan on the Western Slope Friday morning.
The bill is in response to growing concerns over public health and a desire to avoid requiring party delegates to attend county assemblies that often draw hundreds of attendees.
The bill will change Columbus Day to Frances Xavier Cabrini Day, giving Colorado its first paid state holiday honoring a woman.
Joey Bunch: The Colorado highway director Shoshana Lew's outlook comes from the intersection of infrastructure and finance, first at the Office of Management and Budget and then as the top transparency office in how the recession's stimulus money was spent on transportation, before a stint as the Rhode Island highway department's chief operating officer.
One bill, SB20-069, allows Coloradans with a disabled veteran's license plate free access to state parks.
Senate Bill 130 authorizes a study to look at how to raise money for equipment, benefits and other expenses for the more than 2,800 search-and-rescue volunteers who collectively do an average of about 3,600 missions a year.
A Colorado bill allowing electric vehicle manufacturers to sell directly to consumers passed a key legislative committee, clearing the way for a compromise with auto dealerships.
John Santistevan says the size of your paycheck should not determine the value of your life. He is one of the public and private leaders in Colorado trying to craft a health care system everybody can live with.
The endorsements come two days after gun safety champion Gabby Giffords, a former Arizona congresswoman and shooting survivor, backed Hickenlooper at a rally in Aurora near the movie theater where Sullivan's son Alex was killed in a 2012 mass shooting.
“Colorado supports modernizing NEPA review and making it more efficient and streamlined," Weiser said. "The proposed rule, however, would restrict our state’s ability to take into account the indirect and cumulative impacts of projects and ignore the effects of climate change in infrastructure and resource planning, and that could threaten Colorado’s health, economy and way of life.”
State highway director Shoshana Lew paints the fullest picture to date about the outlines of the 10-year priorities of her boss, Gov. Jared Polis, this week in a podcast with former state Sen. Mike Kopp, president and CEO of the Colorado Concern business group.
The bill also says the State Board of Education must review and adopt revisions to reading, writing and civics standards that incorporate media literacy by June 30, 2021.
Democrats this week are pushing for a bill that would increase the chances that Colorado workers have a safety net to fall back on once they hit retirement.
Democrats this week are pushing for a bill that would increase the chances that Colorado workers have a safety net to fall back on once they hit retirement.
The bill adds dispatchers to the list of first responders who can take time off after hearing a traumatic event on the job, the expansion of legislation that passed in 2017.
A quartet of Democrats made their opening pitch Monday for health-based air standards, backed up by a fleet of environmental groups.
The new holiday would be Frances Xavier Cabrini Day on the first Monday each October. Colorado would become the first state with a paid holiday honoring a woman.
House Bill 1307 doesn't actually ban the use of the defense, which has been used to justify murders and assaults, such as in the 1998 murder of University of Wyoming student Matthew Shepard.
Joey Bunch: "The old rules of engagement in the public square are blurred beyond recognition, based on what I’m seeing these days in the headlines, at the state Capitol or over at the City and County Building in Denver."