As metropolitan areas like Denver grow into forested areas prone to devastating wildfires, two Republican lawmakers representing the region are advancing more legislation to bolster local firefighting efforts.

Sen. Mike Kopp, R-Littleton, and Rep. Rob Witwer, R-Genesee, announced plans today to launch a legislative inquiry into ways to improve wildfire mitigation throughout the state--with added input from community members most affected by the fires.

Kopp and Witwer are introducing a Senate Joint Resolution this week to create an interim committee investigating wildfire issues in areas where urban and wildlands collide.

"This is an issue we care deeply about, and we intend to give these communities all the tools we can to fight these devastating fires," Kopp said. "For me, it's a commitment that goes back to my own days as a firefighter, and I want to ensure the people of the Front Range that we are here to help." 

A GOP bill that would allow environmentally-conscious motorists to contribute money to a state-run carbon offset program-- and officially display their contribution on their cars--won bipartisan support today in the Senate Appropriations Committee.

Senate Bill 186, part of the GOP's legislative agenda for 2008, creates the Colorado Carbon Fund special license plate for people who make donations to fund a carbon offset program.  The bill does not specify the amount neccessary to qualify.

"I'm really happy to see this bill's progress," Senate sponsor Steve Johnson, R-Fort Collins said.  "It gives people a chance to show they care about the environment.  Besides, I want new plates for my car."

A Republican proposal making it illegal to sell pornography to a minor, as well as a felony to use pornography to lure minors, was killed today by ruling Democrats on a Senate committee only moments after both sides agreed on the need for the measure.

After the vote, Republicans on the Senate Appropriations Committee chided committee Democrats for their party-line opposition to Senate Bill 125, which the Democrats said the state could not afford.  However, the committee majority then approved an unrelated Democrat bill and paid for it out of what was ultimately the same revenue source. 

“There is an appropriate, unexpended, unaccounted for funding source,” said Sen. Steve Johnson, a Fort Collins Republican on the committee who was outraged at the failure to pass the measure.  

“I’m a little confused. We say we want to protect kids, and this bill is needed – then, we reject it,” said Johnson, who also represents the Senate GOP on the powerful Joint Budget Committee.

Two groundbreaking Republican proposals that aim to ease gridlock on the state's congested highways while assuring a sustainable source of funding in the future passed the Senate Transportation Committee today with support from both parties.

Senate Bill 213, introduced in the upper chamber by Senate GOP leader Andy McElhany, of Colorado Springs, would toll motorists along a chronically clogged portion of Interstate 70 west of Denver to pay for expanding the highway's capacity. The Metro Denver Chamber of Commerce supports the proposal, underscoring how that stretch of the aging interstate is a notorious chokepoint in the state's traffic flow and a major impediment to Colorado commerce.

Senate Concurrent Resolution 2, also introduced by McElhany, would ask voters to secure all revenue from auto-related sales and use taxes in the state constitution so the money only could be used on transportation.

The measures advanced in the absence so far of any significant transportation proposals from the administration of Gov. Bill Ritter despite a year of study by a commission the governor appointed to look into transporation.

"Colorado cannot afford to do nothing," McElhany said after the committee vote. "Some of our state's major traffic arteries are too often in gridlock, and that is like a ball and chain on our economy."

Amid a firestorm of debate over the drafting of new rules governing the energy industry, three lawmakers representing energy-rich southern Colorado have joined forces with a political advocacy group representing the interests of farm and ranch counties to demand a seat at the negotiation table.

Republican Sen. Ken Kester, of Las Animas, partnered with Democrat Sens. Abel Tapia, of Pueblo, and Gail Schwartz, of Snowmass Village, to urge the Colorado Oil and Gas Conservation Commission to include representatives from southeastern Colorado in their discussion of the new rules currently being written.  The rules will dictate how the energy industry can conduct business across the state. 

"It's just wrong to not to include the communities most affected by these rules," Kester said. "This commission has the potential to affect the livelihood and well-being of many great citizens in southern Colorado."

Republicans on the Senate Business, Labor & Technology Committee fought back an attempt by Senate Democrats to pass another measure pushed by organized labor.

Critics charge House Bill 1170--now turned into a mere call for a study, under a Republican amendment--originally sought to expand the ranks of union electricians by changing the basic rules governing their employment and their qualifications.

The bill would have changed current practices to require apprentice electricians working in Colorado to be registered with U.S. Department of Labor-certified programs; requiring applicants for a master electrician’s license to have a Colorado journeyman’s license for one year, and establishing a continuing education requirement of 24 hours in the prior two years for renewal of a license. The measure also would prevent master electricians from using graduation from a community college as a qualification for their master electrician license.

More controversial, the bill as amended would reduce the number of apprentices an electrician could supervise--from three to two--increasing the need for journeyman electricians on a job site.

“Making wholesale changes to a system that has worked for the past 35 years--without even any input from all the affected stakeholders--just because the union says so doesn’t make sense to me," said Republican Senator Tom Wiens, of Castle Rock, who took the lead in opposing the bill. “The arguments that the IBEW used were non-persuasive."

Ruling Democrats on a Senate committee turned aside a Republican proposal today that would have reached out to high-schoolers who do poorly on the state's standardized testing and helped them improve.

Littleton Republican Sen. Mike Kopp's Senate Bill 199, which died on a party-line vote in the Senate Education Committee, would have been the first statewide effort to address children who fail the Colorado Student Assessment Program test. The CSAP tests have been used for years to benchmark the progress of schools but only recently have been eyed for their potential in helping the students themselves.

"While the CSAP tells us something about the state of our schools, this bill would have made it more meaningful to each student," said a disappointed Kopp after the committee vote. "Whatever assessment measure is used in our schools, we need to actually track and help the individual students."

Kopp said his disappointment was all the greater because Education Commissioner Dwight Jones had expressed support for the effort, and state Education Department staff had assisted Kopp in fine-tuning his bill.

SB 199 was part of the GOP's legislative agenda for education in 2008. 

A Senate committee passed a Democrat measure Monday that would make it even harder for county clerks to purge inactive voters from the voter rolls--leaving some of the state's clerks shaking their heads.      

House Bill 1329, sponsored by Sen. Ken Gordon, D-Denver, would further liberalize the state's already forgiving policy toward voters who don't show up to the polls. The measure would force county clerks to keep voters who have not voted in two general elections on the "active" list and would extend the time period in which clerks periodically purge their voter rolls from six years to eight years. 

The measure drew fire from Republican El Paso County Clerk Bob Balink, who oversees elections in Colorado's largest county and showed up Monday to testify against the bill in the Senate State, Veterans & Military Affairs Committee.  Balink said the measure flouts the historic civic commitment voters are expected to show. 

“We cannot keep promoting legislation which removes personal responsibility from the election process,” said Balink, county clerk for El Paso County.  “It doesn’t take much to keep yourself an active voter in this state, yet the liberal and Democrat voting bloc on this committee believes government must help voters keep themselves active.”

A measure to ensure high school graduates can communicate—in English—won the approval of the full Senate today.

Senate Bill 98 would require high school students to demonstrate their proficiency in the English language before they could get a diploma.  The measure is part of the GOP's legislative agenda for 2008.

Bill sponsor Shawn Mitchell, a Republican senator from Broomfield, said his proposal is necessary because many schools are doing their students a major disservice by not adequately preparing them for success in an increasingly competitive global work force.  He also added that students need English proficiency just to fill out a college or work application.

"It's not just about a piece of paper, receiving a diploma," Mitchell said. "It's making sure students grasp the English language.  Too many schools look the other way and pass students who simply aren't prepared to succeed in life."

"We need to send these kids a rescue boat," Mitchell added. 

In a display of solidarity, Senate and House Republicans joined hundreds of energy-industry workers to send Democrat Gov. Bill Ritter a message--stop alienating the state's largest and fastest-growing industry--energy.

Dozens of lawmakers and energy-industry leaders gathered on the west steps of the Capitol today to warn the governor that his controversial picks for and restructuring of the Colorado Oil and Gas Conservation Commission could have dire consequences for the state. 

Under legislation passed last year by the Democrat-controlled legislature, the commission is conducting a complete re-draft of the rules that govern oil and gas exploration. The upshot is expected to be greater restrictions on energy development.

Rally participants waved signs reading "Please Don't Count Us Out!" in an effort to compel the governor to rethink his stance on traditional energy sources.  They charged that the new rules will undoubtedly increase energy costs and lower state and local tax revenue, all on the brink of a recession.  

"We all care about keeping our environment clean and healthy," said Sen. Josh Penry, a Grand Junction Republican. "But we also have to ensure that our economy remains robust and thousands of jobs are not jeopardized at this time of economic uncertainty."

The Senate Local Government committee gave unanimous support to a Republican measure intended to help fire departments recruit and retain volunteer firefighters--helping them secure health-care coverage. 

"Many of our state’s 250 fire protection districts rely on volunteer firefighters and there has been a decline in the number of those willing to volunteer," said bill sponsor Sen. Mike Kopp, a Littleton Republican. "By simply de-regulating the insurance market a little we can make a big difference on the cost of health care that our state's volunteer firefighters must pay.”

House Bill 1334 would allow volunteer firefighters to pool their numbers in order to buy affordable health insurance. The bill's advocates say many people are hesitant to become volunteer firefighters because of the high price and difficulty of finding insurance.  

“Volunteer firefighters are the backbone of our organization” Jamie Bumgarner, Fire Chief of the Larkspur Fire Protection District, told committee members. “This is a chance to make a difference, and to change the future (for volunteer firefighters) down the road."

The bleak economic outlook released today by the legislature's nonpartisan research staff leaves a gaping hole in the state's highway budget, Republican lawmakers say, and reaffirms the need for their plan to secure transportation funding in the constitution.

The GOP legislators also say the projected drop in tax revenue to the state--given the impending economic downturn--calls into question Democrat Gov. Bill Ritter's flirtation with a generous new leave policy for state employees that is likely to cost taxpayers millions of dollars.

The new, quarterly figures from the office of Legislative Council show that the flagging economy will cost the state government a bundle in tax revenue. The five-year forecast for revenue to the state's operating budget is $487 million lower than the projection

issued by the office last December. That translates to a drop, since the last forecast of $441 million in the funding allocated to highways under the current budgetary formula.

Republicans point out the statutory formula routinely is held hostage to lawmakers' various other budget priorities and pet projects.

"As it is, the General Assembly has been committing highway robbery by siphoning off transportation money for other programs," said Senate GOP chief Andy McElhany. "With this big drop in revenue on the horizon, we had better move fast to lock up what money we can, or there will be hardly a dime left for highways."

Sen. Mike Kopp unveiled a plan today to reach out to schoolkids who do poorly on the state's standardized testing--and help them improve.

The Littleton Republican's proposal, which he presented to the Senate Education Committee, is the first statewide effort to address children who fail the Colorado Student Assessment Program test. The CSAP tests have been used for years to benchmark the progress of schools but only recently have been eyed for their potential in helping the students themselves.

"For the first time the CSAP will help the kids--as well as the schools," Kopp, a member of the committee, said after the hearing. No vote was taken on his Senate Bill 199, which is part of the GOP legislative agenda for 2008, while Kopp considers some amendments to fine-tune the bill.

Also today, two leading Republican legislative voices on education issues, Sen. Josh Penry, of Grand Junction, and Rep. Rob Witwer, of Genessee, stood with Gov. Bill Ritter and legislative Democrats at the debut of a wide-ranging education-reform measure that will establish new standards for schools, from pre-kindergarten to college.

The Senate gave the go-ahead to a first-of-its-kind Republican measure today that will modernize emergency planning in schools, so students, teachers and first-responders can act fast in an emergency.

“We need to build upon some of the lessons we’ve learned here in Colorado related to school safety,” said Castle Rock Republican, Sen. Tom Wiens, the Senate sponsor of the legislation.

"During the school season, almost a fifth of our state's population is in a school everyday, about 800,000 people. School safety is an important issue that needs close attention," Wiens said. “I recently spent a lot of time talking to school officials, both around the state and in my district, about school safety and ways to keep our kids as safe as possible."

A much-debated ban on strikes by state employees passed the Senate today with bipartisan support--but only after Democrats turned back Republican efforts to make the measure tougher.

GOP senators offered a series of amendments imploring their colleagues across the aisle to "put teeth" into what some call "strike-ban lite" by giving the bill a firmer hand and a longer reach. Republicans said vital public services could be jeopardized if state government workers were to strike. Democrats, however, rejected all of the proposed amendments in party-line votes.

The Democrat proposal adopted by the Senate, House Bill 1189, was prompted by Republicans last fall after Democrat Gov. Bill Ritter issued a controversial order granting collective-bargaining power to labor unions. Republicans said the governor's order gave state workers a new incentive to strike--which was already legal--by letting unions for the first time ever haggle over labor contracts at the bargaining table.

In response, Republicans demanded a strike ban, and Ritter and his party's legislative allies relented. Yet, Republicans said the ban that emerged was half-hearted and that its weak penalties will do little to stave off labor unrest.

"We wouldn't be having this debate in the first place if the governor hadn't opened up this can of worms with his executive order," said the GOP's Sen. Shawn Mitchell, of Broomfield. "We need to clean up Bill Ritter's labor mess."

Two awaited Republican measures that aim to break the logjam on Colorado highways made their public debut today--in the continued absence, Republican leaders noted, of any major transportation proposals by ruling Democrats or the governor.

Senate GOP leader Andy McElhany, of Colorado Springs, and House Republican chief Mike May, of Parker, met with the Capitol press corps to disclose details of a highway-funding proposal they first announced last fall as part of the GOP's legislative agenda for 2008, along with another proposal they are sponsoring that just emerged.

A McElhany-May resolution that could be introduced in the Senate as soon as today would ask voters to secure all revenue from auto-related sales and use taxes in the state constitution so it only could be used on transportation.

The two veteran lawmakers also will introduce a bill that will toll motorists along a portion of Interstate 70 west of Denver to pay for widening that stretch of the highway as well as the Eisenhower Tunnel.

"We cannot address all of our state's transportation needs at once, of course, but we can take some meaningful steps," McElhany said. "These two proposals represent a couple of big strides in the right direction."

A couple of gubernatorial picks for a key commission ran into a hail of fire today from Senate Republicans, who charged the new appointees will undermine Colorado's largest and fastest-growing industry--energy--just as a recession approaches.

The Senate approved a total of six appointments by Democrat Gov. Bill Ritter to the Colorado Oil and Gas Conservation Commission, but it was two of those in particular that divided the upper chamber along party lines after stirring heated debate over the commission's new direction. Environmentalist Richard Alward and Garfield County Commissioner Tresi Houpt, both nominated to partisan Democrat slots on the commission, came under criticism for upending the commission's mission of balancing the need to tap Colorado's energy reserves with the need to protect the environment.

"We are teetering on the verge of a recession," said the GOP's Sen. Greg Brophy, of Wray, who led the charge against Alward and Houpt. "We face the prospect of damaging our biggest industry."

It was the second time in the 2008 session that Democrats pushed through a controversial appointment by the governor that Republicans said would jeopardize Colorado's traditional energy economy--and dampen the nation's hope of stabilizing soaring energy costs by boosting supply.

A Republican measure targeting the flow of drugs and illegal immigrants into Colorado has gained the full approval of the Senate, but only after Democrats blocked a GOP effort to ensure illegal immigrants do not jump bail.

Prompted by reports from local law enforcement officials that the Denver metro area is the fourth largest methamphetamine hub, Sen. Mike Kopp, R-Littleton, and Rep. Frank McNulty, R-Highlands Ranch, put forth Senate Bill 134 in an effort to curb the amount of drugs coming into Colorado.  The bill raises the bond amounts for meth traffickers to a high statewide minimum and allows local authorities to keep half the bond if the defendant is known to be in the United States illegally and skips bail.

"This bill helps ensure that those facing trafficking charges do not slip out of the justice system," Kopp said.  "Otherwise, victims and their communities are denied the opportunity to ensure the safety of Colorado's families."

Kopp added, "This bill gives law enforcement agencies and prosecutors a powerful tool in the battle against methamphetamine traffickers."

The chairman of the powerful Joint Budget Committee has acknowledged on the record that a sweeping statewide property-tax hike pushed through last year by his fellow Democrats will subsidize new social programs--not just schools, as originally promised.

Democrat Bernie Buescher, of Grand Junction, said in a JBC meeting this week that some of the millions raised by the controversial tax hike will be used on Democrat Gov. Bill Ritter's "Building Blocks" program expanding low-income health care coverage.

Buescher was responding to a challenge moments earlier from Republican Rep. Al White, the House GOP's member on the committee, who had expressed frustration that

the new tax revenue was being diverted from statewide education funding. White was the only Republican to support the tax hike, which Ritter and his legislative allies call a "mill-levy freeze." It will cost taxpayers $3.8 billion over the next 10 years. 

"I personally did not vote for the mill-levy freeze for that purpose--to be able to free up $25 million for new programs," White, of Hayden, told fellow committee members.

Other legislative Republicans said they were dismayed but not surprised.

"This is turning into more and more of a shell game," said Senate GOP chief Andy McElhany, of Colorado Springs.

After a spike last year in the number of convicts who are paroled, Republicans on both House and Senate Judiciary committees are demanding an official explanation from the Colorado Parole Board.

After hearing from the Department of Corrections that discretionary parole releases have jumped dramatically in the last year--tallies vary from 40 percent to 80 percent--Sen. Josh Penry, R-Grand Junction, said he and fellow GOP lawmakers decided to seek an audit of the policies and practices of the state's parole board.

"Coloradans depend on the parole board to keep violent criminals out of their neighborhoods and off their streets," Penry said.  "You have to start asking hard questions when there is a sudden surge in the number of people who are being released.

Penry added, "We have to make sure the public is not being exposed to increased risk by convicted criminals who are not ready to return to society."

The Senate's Republican leader alerted small-business owners today to an array of Democrat policies that he said would undermine their best interests.

Speaking to members of the National Federation of Independent Business gathered at the Capitol, Sen. Andy McElhany warned the business owners to look past a handful of helpful , modest measures pushed through by the ruling party--to the underlying dangers in the Democrat agenda.

"There are some things going on in this building that are very troubling for businesses great and small," McElhany told the group, adding that the only good news for many businesses might be that the Democrat governor and his legislative allies appear to be holding off of action on some of their costlier proposals.
"Last year was the year of the study," he said. "This year is the year of talk."

McElhany then launched into a litany of bad-for-business measures that boil down to, "Political payoffs to trial lawyers, labor unions and extreme environmentalists." He said a lot of the policies either have been imposed already by the govenor and the legislative majority in the past couple of sessions or are now pending.

A legislative push by Democrats to go easier on youth offenders could backfire on Colorado with a higher crime rate. That, say Senate Republicans, is the upshot of numbers compiled by the legislature's nonpartisan research staff.

The statistics from the office of Legislative Council strongly suggest a direct correlation between lower incarceration rates and much higher crime rates, as evidenced by a years-long trend afoot in Colorado. In the face of that evidence--and over the objections of prosecutors--Democrats aim to ease up on juvenile punishment on the premise that they are too young to grasp the gravity of their actions. 

Democrat Sen. Suzanne Williams' Senate Bill 66 would let some teens in felony-murder cases enter the Youth Offender System rather than serve time as adults. Democrat Rep. Claire Levy's House Bill 1208 would let judges second-guess prosecutors on whether to try some teen offenders as adults. Democrat Rep. Cheri Jahn's House Bill 1142 makes it easier to declare a juvenile incompetent to stand trial as an adult.

Republicans say that entire approach is a wrong turn. 

"Many young people who make a mistake may well deserve another chance, but it shouldn't come at the expense of public safety," said Sen. Josh Penry, a Grand Junction Republican who sits on the Senate Judiciary Committee.

Democrats on a Senate committee have approved a measure that would allow anyone to register to vote online--a trial balloon that immediately drew fire from the elections chief of the state's largest county.

Sponsored by Senate Democrat leader Ken Gordon, of Denver, Senate Bill 40 would give anyone with a computer the ability to register to vote online with a click of a mouse.  The proposed measure directs the Secretary of State’s Office to create an online form for people to register to vote and require the Secretary of State to match the signatures of citizens that register to a set of databases specified in the bill.

Several people testified against the bill at the committee hearing Wednesday, including the clerk and recorder from El Paso County, Bob Balink, and a representative from the Secretary of State’s office.  Representing the most populous county in Colorado, Balink said he believed the bill would erode the election process by undermining voting security.

“This is simply a bad bill,” Balink said after the hearing.  “There is nothing in this bill that requires verification to determine whether or not a person is legally eligible to vote.”

A bipartisan bill that would create a new funding source for the 9Health Fair Fund, which provides health screenings to a growing number of Coloradans, passed the full Senate today. The health fair offers the screenings at a nominal cost or free to those who cannot afford the lab fees.

The bill's sponsor, Republican Assistant Senate leader Nancy Spence, of Centennial, says the legislation would give much-needed support to a program that helps bridge the health care gap.

Senate Bill 16 would add a line to state income tax return forms allowing individuals to voluntarily make a contribution to the 9Health Fair Fund.  The tax checkoff would create a more sustainable public-funding mechanism for the non-profit health care organization.

"Many people who don't have health insurance are served by the health fair," Spence said. "It's important to discover health issues in their early stages before they become emergencies. The 9Health Fair fills that void." 

The Senate Local Government Committee unanimously embraced a Republican measure Tuesday that will modernize emergency planning so students, teachers and first-responders can act fast in an emergency.

“We need to build upon some of the lessons we’ve learned here in Colorado related to school safety,” said Castle Rock Republican, Sen. Tom Wiens, the Senate sponsor of the legislation.

"During the school season, almost a fifth of our state's population is in a school everyday, about 800,000 people. School safety is an important issue that needs close attention," Wiens said. “I recently spent a lot of time talking to school officials, both around the state and in my district, about school safety and ways to keep our kids a safe as possible."

Senate Bill 181, which is part of the Republicans' 2008 legislative agenda for education, requires that teachers and school staff take a brief online course intended to help them and their schools better prepare for a wide range of possible incidents--from natural disasters to violent acts--in order to prevent or minimize loss of life.

Republican Sen. Bill Cadman of Colorado Springs was joined by Democrat legislators and the spokesman for a well-known civil rights group to announce his plans to introduce legislation to give poor consumers a voice in the debate over oil and gas regulation.

Cadman and Rep. Wes McKinley, D-Walsh, unveiled their resolution urging the Colorado Oil and Gas Conservation Commission to consider the impact that a new layer of regulation on the energy industry has on low-income families.  The commission is currently drafting new rules to expand environmental oversight to a degree that industry observers say could restrict energy exploration.

"You really have to ask who gets hurt the most when the energy industry is over-regulated in the name of environmentalism," Cadman said. "Working-poor families simply cannot afford all the lofty ideas being proposed by environmental elitists--we have to ensure energy stays afforadable for these families."

Though they control both the General Assembly and the governor's office, ruling Democrats are embracing some key Republican reforms as "reality sets in" on some of their own party's earlier proposals, Senate GOP leader Andy McElhany said today.

"We have some compelling ideas, and I think they have had to admit it," McElhany said.

Yet, he also said he was disappointed the Democrat majority has voted down some other policy initiatives championed by Republicans--despite a lack of viable alternatives being offered by the governor and his legislative allies on those issues.

McElhany, assessing his party's legislative record as the 2008 session neared the halfway mark, said he welcomed the degree to which Democrats are showing interest

in the GOP plan of action.

"It looks like they're warming to our ideas--at least, some of them," said the veteran Colorado Springs lawmaker.

"That's probably not so surprising when it comes to an area like K-12 education because the governor and a few legislative Democrats, including the Senate president, long have shared our own priorities in areas like higher standards and performance pay for teachers," McElhany said. "What seems more telling is that some of our proposals for transportation and health care are also moving forward."

Republican Senate Leader Andy McElhany of Colorado Springs was recognized by the Colorado Press Association for his support of open government, access to public records, and freedom of information.

At the 130th Annual CPA Convention last week, McElhany was presented with a commemorative plaque acknowledging his efforts to foster a transparent environment of trust and accessibility between the news media and Colorado government.  He was honored for his efforts including his longtime championing of the Colorado Open Records Act.

"It is of course gratifying to receive this award from an organization representing the same media that cover us elected officials on a day-to-day basis," McElhany said. "Yet, this isn't just about supporting media access to government records. What is really important is that all of the public, including every voter and taxpayer, has access to government and the records it keeps. Government's business is the public's business."