Colorado Legislative Strategies Updates 4.30.23

COLORADO LEGISLATIVE STRATEGIES NEWSLETTER
 
April 30, 2023

​Introduction
 
Happy Sunday. The final day of April 2023 ended up being a day of rest after the House worked late into Saturday night. The Senate kept up its tradition of not working on the weekend, but as the 2023 legislative session is nearing its end the days are getting longer at the Capitol.
 
When the sun rises on Monday morning, it will be May, and there will only be eight days until the end of session. You could say, Eight Days A Week…
 
This session has certainly been a Long And Winding Road and there are many A Hard Day’s Night still to come in the final week. In the end hopefully everyone will Come Together, but the majority will probably be saying All Things Must Pass while the minority is screaming Help! 
 
Some might say this session has been a Magical Mystery Tour or full of Misery, depending on the issue. There have definitely been a few instances of A Fool On The Hill with some speeches in the well this year. But in The End, With A Little Help From My Friends, We Can Work It Out.
 
However, Yesterday the House was a Day Tripper all Saturday Because the Republicans tried to say You Can’t Do That. The Democrats wanted to just Let It Be, but things are not Getting Better between the two parties in the House. More on all of that drama at the end. 
 
After these eight days there will be Golden Slumbers again, but until then we will Carry That Weight. Anyone at the Capitol should probably tell their family You Won’t See Me. Tomorrow Never Knows because things will be moving so fast, and yet so slow at the same time. 
 
It’s the final countdown until we can say Good Night and Goodbye to this session. So enough with the Beatles for now and here’s the big news from the Capitol this (Long, Long, Long) week.

​This Week
 
The penultimate week of the session was filled with long nights. Several committee hearings stretched very late and floor debates went on for hours and hours. There are still a lot of bills left in the system, some of which are still in the first chamber, and new bills are still getting introduced! Here are some of the highlights (and lowlights) from this week.
 
On Monday night (and early Tuesday morning), the Senate Agriculture and Natural Resources committee considered Senate Bill 192, which is based on recommendations from the Department of Regulatory Agencies (DORA) to extend the current statewide standard for how pesticides are regulated. There’s some debate around this bill because the bill keeps state preemption in place, but environmentalist groups argue that this should be a local government issue. Agricultural groups are in favor of maintaining state preemption because the state has the resources to best manage pesticides use.
 
At the same time on Monday night, House Bill 1161, or Environmental Standards for Appliances, was being considered in a Senate committee. While all eyes were on Senate Bill 192 upstairs in House Agriculture, Water & Natural Resources, an amendment was added to 1161 in Senate Transportation and Local Government that would repeal state preemption of pesticide regulation. The bill sponsors claimed that the amendment fits under the 1161 bill title because it’s an environmental bill. Republicans and Democrats in both the House and Senate were not happy with this maneuver and expressed their outrage at such an attempt to ignore both process and debate. Enough pressure was put on the 1161 sponsors that they agreed to strip the hostile amendment and did so in the Senate Appropriations Committee a couple days later. 
 
On Tuesday, Senate Bill 098, which would increase regulations for gig work companies, was heard in the Senate Finance committee. The committee heard testimony and the bill sponsor requested the bill be laid over for action until Thursday, to allow time for working on amendments. When Thursday rolled around, the bill sponsor requested the bill be laid over again until next Tuesday. This bill is still in the first chamber and is getting very close to not having enough time to make it through, in addition to likely not having enough support. 
 
Also on Tuesday, House Bill 1115 on rent control was heard in the Senate Local Government and Housing committee. The bill would have repealed the state’s prohibition on local governments’ ability to control rent costs. Representative Roberts joined Republicans in voting against the bill, and it was postponed indefinitely on a 4-3 vote. 
 
On Wednesday, the Senate Health and Human Services committee considered House Bill 1202, which would have allowed local governments to operate safe injection zones. Although some Democrats on the committee expressed a need for safe injection zones as overdoses have increased, Senator Mullica, Senator Cutter, and Senator Ginal joined Republicans to postpone the bill indefinitely on a 6-3 vote.
 
On Thursday night, the Senate Health and Human Services committee heard House Bill 1215 on hospital facility fees. The bill as introduced would have been disastrous for access to care and the bill proponents earlier admitted such and largely turned the bill into a study. In committee the prohibition on collecting facility fees for telehealth was removed and the study was further refined. Expect to see this fight at the Capitol again in the future. 
 
On Friday, Senate Bill 213, Governor Polis’ land use bill cleared the Senate and was sent over to the House. Originally, the bill called for state preemption of local government policies related to land use in order to increase affordable housing. After lots of pushback from Republicans and moderate Democrats, the bill sponsor added a strike below amendment in the Senate Appropriations committee that removed most of the state control provisions from the bill and instead assesses affordable housing needs in Colorado. Colorado Municipal League, who has been leading opposition to the original bill, indicated that the amendment added in Senate Appropriations is a significant step closer toward a support position on the bill. 
 
Also on Friday, Governor Polis signed the four bills from his gun violence prevention bill package into law. Although Governor Polis and Democrats received praise for their gun violence prevention efforts, including from White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre, Second Amendment advocates felt differently.
 
Following through on testimony in opposition to the bills earlier this session, Rocky Mountain Gun Owners (RMGO) has filed two lawsuits against bills signed into law on Friday. House Bill 1219, which establishes a three day waiting period before purchasing a firearm, and Senate Bill 169, which increases the minimum age to purchase a firearm to 21 years old, are both being challenged by RMGO. In a statement from RMGO, the group claimed 1219 is unconstitutional and 169 infringes on an adult’s right to purchase and own a gun.
 
Saturday was a long day for the House. After a tense (and late) night on Friday, the House came back in for more floorwork on Saturday. The tension from Friday night spilled into the House Appropriations committee early Saturday morning before floorwork, and it only escalated from there.
 
After a few hours of floorwork, the House went into a very long recess. When they returned, House Republicans gathered in the well to read a letter invoking Rule 24, which is used to officially protest an urgent matter. The urgent matter House Republicans were protesting was a typographical error made in Senate Bill 214 – the state budget. 
 
Their letter was to notify House leadership that Republicans “reserve the right” to have every bill read at length until the budget bill is brought back to fix the error. Technically, the budget bill could still be brought back for discussion because it hasn’t been signed by Governor Polis yet. When a bill is sent to the governor during session, the governor has ten days to sign it. Because the budget bill was sent to Governor Polis on April 21, the ten day period to sign the bill is up tomorrow. 
 
In response, House leadership invoked Rule 14 to limit debate to one hour on the controversial bills left on the agenda for yesterday, while Republicans requested some of the rest of the bills on the agenda to be read at length.
 
Also on Saturday, House Bill 1294, or Pollution Protection Measures, made it through second reading in the House. Because this bill was expected to receive big pushback from Republicans, House leadership limited debate on the bill to one hour only for second reading. The bill has been pared back by the sponsors in hopes of getting the Governor’s office and his regulatory agencies to not oppose the measure but still contains enough language that will have disastrous consequences on the economy that the business community is still opposed.  
 
The Beatles said All You Need Is Love, but the House might need more than that… 
 
Next Week
 
If Saturday and the rest of this past week is any indication, next week is going to be crazy. And there are only a couple hundred bills left for the General Assembly to get through. Get ready for another long week, and it will all be over soon.
 
Have a good rest of your Sunday.