{"id":29744,"date":"2024-01-10T10:00:00","date_gmt":"2024-01-10T17:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/as-lawmakers-return-to-work-cost-of-living-challenges-of-governing-are-top-of-mind\/"},"modified":"2024-01-10T17:00:00","modified_gmt":"2024-01-10T17:00:00","slug":"as-lawmakers-return-to-work-cost-of-living-challenges-of-governing-are-top-of-mind","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/as-lawmakers-return-to-work-cost-of-living-challenges-of-governing-are-top-of-mind\/","title":{"rendered":"As lawmakers return to work, cost of living, challenges of governing are top of mind"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"The
The interior of the Colorado Capitol on March 23 in Denver. (Olivia Sun\/The Colorado Sun via Report for America, file)<\/span>cca<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Lawmakers convene under the backdrop of high national political tensions, international conflicts and the added pressure of an election year.<\/p>\n

Over the next four months lawmakers will introduce hundreds of bills, on every topic that touches public life in Colorado. Legislative rules allow each of the assembly\u2019s hundred members to sponsor at least five pieces of legislation during the session.<\/p>\n

There\u2019s been little leadership turnover in the offseason, although the Senate has a new Majority Leader, Sen. Robert Rodriguez of Denver.<\/p>\n

Leaders in both parties say tackling high costs of housing, and making it more affordable in general to live in Colorado, will continue to be top priorities. What specific policies they\u2019ll propose though, will be revealed in the coming weeks.<\/p>\n

Last year, the governor\u2019s ambitious \u2013 and divisive \u2013 land use package failed on the final day of the session, and elements of that proposal are expected to return in separate bills to try to address how Colorado manages growth.<\/p>\n

While Democratic efforts have generally focused on pushing local governments to allow denser development, Republicans say they want more reforms to Colorado\u2019s construction defects laws, to try to jump-start condo building.<\/p>\n

With larger majorities, Democrats face more internal divisions<\/div>\n

Democrats hold historically large political majorities in the legislature, which means one big question is how far to the left they will be willing to go on policies.<\/p>\n

During the last session, the makeup of some Senate committees was a sore spot for progressive lawmakers. The closely divided panels empowered moderate Democrats, who at times blocked or watered down some progressive priorities. One House member went so far as to nickname the scarlet-walled Senate chamber \u2018the red room of doom.\u2019<\/p>\n

Democratic Sen. Dylan Roberts of Frisco was one of those moderates who served on key committees last year.<\/p>\n

For 2024, he\u2019ll chair the Senate Agriculture Committee and serve as the vice chair of Judiciary. He described the conflicts last session were just growing pains as a result of increased Democratic majorities.<\/p>\n

\u201c (There) are pretty big divisions within caucuses, both ideologically and stylistically,\u201d said Roberts, noting that historically those divisions have largely existed between the two parties.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think what we saw a lot of \u2013 in the House especially, but also in the Senate \u2013 in 2023 was disagreements within the Democratic Party or within the Republican Party between a more moderate wing and a more progressive wing,\u201d said Roberts. \u201cThat has spilled out into not just policy disagreements, obviously, but (also) stylistic and other, larger philosophical debates.\u201d<\/p>\n

In recent weeks, two first-term Democrats resigned from the House, both citing the vitriolic political atmosphere as among their reasons for leaving. And only days ago, the House Speaker took the rare step of issuing a public reprimand to a member of her own caucus.<\/p>\n

Cost of living a universal concern<\/div>\n

While the last regular session of the legislature adjourned in May, lawmakers have seen each other much more recently than that.<\/p>\n

They met for a special legislative session just before Thanksgiving to pass temporary property tax relief for homeowners and larger TABOR refunds and tax benefits for the working poor. Democrats overwhelmingly backed all the bills. Republicans largely opposed them, arguing that the tax relief didn\u2019t go far enough, and that many of the other policies amounted to a wealth transfer.<\/p>\n

Still, while they\u2019re divided on the solutions, lawmakers from across the state agree that the cost of living is a huge challenge facing Colorado.<\/p>\n

\u201cThings from child care to groceries \u2026 have become too expensive for Coloradans,\u201d said Democratic Rep. Leslie Herod of Denver. \u201cIn the next session, we\u2019ll continue to work on that to see what we can do to ensure that we have access to opportunity, economic opportunity, for everybody.\u201d<\/p>\n

Herod said in addition to helping families, lawmakers also need to focus on uplifting small businesses.<\/p>\n

\u201cI have felt and seen a lot of our small businesses right here in Denver close and shutter not to be reopened. Some of them have been legacies in our city and in our communities, and they just can\u2019t seem to make it work anymore.\u201d<\/p>\n

For Republicans, the new session is a chance to make their case to voters, with an eye on building back from their historic minority. Republican Rep. Matt Soper of Delta said he\u2019d like the GOP to be more strategic, and doesn\u2019t think it\u2019s healthy to have one party dominate all of state government.<\/p>\n

\u201cI know that everyone in Colorado \u2013 Republicans, Democrats, unaffiliated \u2013 wants to see the Republican Party of Colorado be competitive again,\u201d said Soper, \u201cbecause we need to be able to restore the balance and we need to be able to be the check on the majority party.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

interior of the Colorado Capitol on March 23 in Denver. (Olivia Sun\/The Colorado Sun via Report for America, file)cca Lawmakers convene under the backdrop of high national political tensions, international conflicts and the added pressure of an election year. Over the next four months lawmakers will introduce hundreds of bills, on every topic that […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":27933,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[120,28,265],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-29744","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-colorado","tag-headlines","tag-politics"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29744","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=29744"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29744\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/27933"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=29744"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=29744"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=29744"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=29744"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}