2016 LEGISLATIVE SESSION WRAP-UP 

Working for You

I sponsored 9 bills this session and got 6 bills passed.  Most of my bills came from issues raised by El Paso County residents.  Here is a summary of my bills that passed:

• Support our Military Installations Requires the CO Department of Transportation to include transportation needs of our military bases in the state Transportation Plan.  This helps protect our bases from future closures.
• Improve our State Transportation process Two bills to increase local/regional views on transportation priorities within the state transportation funding process.
• Strengthen Colorado laws to fight human trafficking Expands state and local enforcement tools to shut down human trafficking operations in El Paso County and statewide.
• State Occupational Licensing Reforms  Requires state occupational licensing agencies to give credit for military training towards licensing.  Help veterans move quickly into civilian jobs & expand local skilled labor pool.
• Correcting an injustice to our 100% Disabled Veterans The Colorado Constitution includes a property tax exemption for 100% Disabled Veterans.  Unfortunately, Colorado passed a badly-worded law in 2007 that conflicted with this constitutional provision, creating a bureaucratic nightmare.   My bill corrects this injustice.

• Reduce Student Testing. Increase Local School District flexibility on testing; revoke state law that requires Colorado to participate in PARCC (Common Core)
• Data privacy. Comprehensive review of government databases:
  1. what personal data is the government collecting beyond what is needed to do the government function,
  2. who is the government sharing the data with, and
  3. is the government doing sufficient cybersecurity to protect the data
• Disabled Veterans. Improve current contract preference for service-disabled veterans

Work to do: Increased transportation funding continues to be a top priority.  I supported amendments to the state budget to increase transportation funding.  Unfortunately, those amendments did not pass.  I was very disappointed that bills failed to pass on increased transportation funding, a presidential primary, and construction defects litigation abuse. I am committed to working with other state legislators of both parties to find legislative solutions to these issues.