staging.rockymountainvoice.com

Menu

The Sum & Substance

Business leaders win key votes on two environmental bills
No Comments
State, The Sum & Substance

Business leaders win key votes on two environmental bills

By Ed Sealover | The Sum & Substance Colorado legislators pushed backed against environmental activists in two ways Thursday, rejecting a bill to require extensive emissions reporting by large corporations and advancing a plan to study how to consider more fully the impact on jobs of future climate regulations. The dual decisions by the House Energy and Environment Committee marked an eye-opening change in direction after legislators have spent most of the past six years passing increasing emissions regulations. And Democratic legislators who sided with Republicans and business groups on the bills stated it is time to think more about the economic impact of state rules and to avoid adding burdensome regulations that could have negligible effects on the state’s air quality. REA...
Read More
New bill would boost safety, background-check requirements for TNCs like Lyft, Uber
No Comments
State, The Sum & Substance

New bill would boost safety, background-check requirements for TNCs like Lyft, Uber

By Ed Sealover | The Sum & Substance Seeking to protect Uber and Lyft customers, a group of Democratic lawmakers unveiled a bill Friday that would boost steps companies must take to perform background checks on drivers and ensure unauthorized persons are not picking up rides in place of those drivers. The bill, sponsored by Reps. Jenny Willford of Northglenn and Meg Froelich of Greenwood Village, also would ensure transportation-network-company drivers work no more than 10-hour shifts and would require each ride to be continuously recorded via video and audio. It also would allow people injured by violations of the bill to file civil lawsuits against a TNC or a driver, and it would make violations of the proposed law deceptive trade practices under the Colorado Consumer Protectio...
Read More
New effort to ban ‘junk fees’, HB 1090, shifts focus to different industry
No Comments
State, The Sum & Substance

New effort to ban ‘junk fees’, HB 1090, shifts focus to different industry

By Ed Sealover | The Sum & Substance Colorado Democrats once again are seeking to ban “junk fees” that get added without option onto the advertised prices of goods and services, but their focus this year has shifted largely from hotels and ticket sellers to landlords. Following a four-hour hearing Wednesday, the House Judiciary Committee advanced House Bill 1090, which seeks to define the kinds of fees that are deceptive pricing practices and offer protection to consumers through a new private right of action. HB 1090, sponsored by Democratic Reps. Emily Sirota of Denver and Naquetta Ricks of Aurora, passed on a party-line vote and may be debated by the full House as soon as next week. Ricks first brought the bill last year, saying she wanted to stop add-on bill charges l...
Read More
Legislators introduce divergent bills addressing construction defects
No Comments
State, The Sum & Substance

Legislators introduce divergent bills addressing construction defects

By Ed Sealover | The Sum & Substance Gov. Jared Polis and a bipartisan group of lawmakers rolled out the latest effort to reform construction-defects laws and jumpstart the condominium market Wednesday — a day after opponents introduced a conflicting bill that sets the playing field for this year’s debate. House Bill 1272, which has bipartisan support, would make it more difficult to file lawsuits over reputed defects in owner-occupied multifamily housing, would offer developers more affirmative defenses against such suits and would prioritize repair over reparations. It mirrors a bill that died in the House last year in some ways but also seeks to re-focus specifically on lower-cost condominiums and “de-risks the market” by providing owners more pathways to resolve disputes more...
Read More
Struggling Colorado restaurants seek legislative help in rolling back key regulation
No Comments
State, The Sum & Substance

Struggling Colorado restaurants seek legislative help in rolling back key regulation

By Ed Sealover | The Sum & Substance A Colorado restaurant industry battered by increasing costs and regulations will ask legislators Thursday to help it in a way that officials believe can make a huge difference — reducing wage requirements on its already highly compensated bartending and wait staff. In doing so, groups like the Colorado Restaurant Association will find themselves in a decidedly different position than they’ve occupied for several years, when they’ve rallied sector workers to fend off proposed regulations like the 2023 “Fair Workweek” bill. And in seeking proactive help, they’ve amassed a coalition that includes both conservative small-government Republicans and liberal pro-labor Democrats who believe the existing stream of eatery closings will grow into a ragin...
Read More
For the first time, Colorado legislators push forward a bill to boost nuclear energy
No Comments
State, The Sum & Substance

For the first time, Colorado legislators push forward a bill to boost nuclear energy

By Ed Sealover | The Sum & Substance After years of dismissing the idea of promoting nuclear-energy development in Colorado, some legislative Democrats are coming around on it — and late Thursday, they joined with Republicans for the first time to advance a bill that would incentivize the energy source. House Bill 1040 would redefine nuclear energy as a clean energy, which in turn would make nuclear projects eligible for special clean-energy project financing and would allow utilities to include them in their minimum mandatory clean-energy portfolio. It passed the House Energy & Environment Committee by an 8-5 vote after a lengthy hearing and goes next to the full House for debate. READ THE FULL STORY AT THE SUM & SUBSTANCE
Read More
Liquor and grocery stores are feuding again over who should get to sell what products
No Comments
State, The Sum & Substance

Liquor and grocery stores are feuding again over who should get to sell what products

By Ed Sealover | The Sum & Substance Much like a bar regular returning for happy hour, Colorado’s liquor wars are back at the Capitol, beginning this year with another attempt to limit the growth of grocery stores selling a full portfolio of beer, wine and spirits. Senate Bill 33, which cleared its first committee on Feb. 6 and awaits a hearing Friday before the Senate Appropriations Committee, is the first bill this session to pit varying interests in the alcohol-sales sector against each other, but it may not be the last. And while it got bipartisan support in its first vote, it has a long road ahead of it, much like two liquor-focused bills in 2024 that received early backing only to die late in the session despite numerous attempts to amend them to a consensus satisfaction. ...
Read More
Employers say they need more skilled talent, but there’s a disconnect between workers and employers
No Comments
State, The Sum & Substance

Employers say they need more skilled talent, but there’s a disconnect between workers and employers

By Ed Sealover | The Sum & Substance In less than three weeks, Colorado employers and educators will begin what many feel is a long-overdue process of identifying the greatest shortages in skills for in-demand jobs and working in partnership to create career pathways to fill those gaps. As simple as that collaboration may sound on paper, it is an idea that too many business leaders, as well as many K-12 and college officials, say has not germinated due to a lack of communication between the institutions that train the workforce and those who employ it. And the disconnect between those wanting to work and those wanting to hire workers has never been clearer. Colorado had 134,000 job openings late last year — the highest total of any state, according to the Bureau of Labor Stati...
Read More
Supporters of single-payer health care hope third time is charm for advancing study bill
No Comments
State, The Sum & Substance

Supporters of single-payer health care hope third time is charm for advancing study bill

By Ed Sealover | The Sum & Substance For the third year in a row, Colorado Democratic legislators have begun to advance a bill to study the impact of implementing a single-payer health-care system, though this year’s version of the legislation would carry no cost to the state itself. The Senate Health and Human Services Committee on Thursday advanced Senate Bill 45 on a 6-3, party-line vote to the Senate Appropriations Committee. The bill’s supporters include medical professionals, local government leaders and the Colorado PTA, while business groups and the health-insurance industry are heading up the opposition. SB 45, from Democratic Sens. Sonya Jaquez Lewis of Longmont and Janice Marchman of Loveland, tasks the Colorado School of Public Health with analyzing implementation ...
Read More
Despite concern over specific provisions, legislators advance wage-theft bill without changes
No Comments
State, The Sum & Substance

Despite concern over specific provisions, legislators advance wage-theft bill without changes

By Ed Sealover | The Sum & Substance Sponsors of a bill to ramp up penalties for businesses committing wage theft promised to make changes to it Thursday but weren’t yet ready to offer specific amendments, leading to a partisan split as the bill advanced out of its first legislative committee. House Bill 1001, authored by House Majority Leader Monica Duran of Wheat Ridge and fellow Democratic Rep. Meg Froelich of Greenwood Village, seeks to attack the crime in a different way than their 2024 legislation, which Democratic Gov. Jared Polis vetoed. Rather than focus solely on the construction industry and seek compensation from general contractors when subcontractors fail to pay workers, the new bill takes aim at employers in all sectors, seeking specifically to punis...
Read More