The Colorado Sun

State bill rewrites how Colorado decides school vaccine mandates

The Colorado Sun, Approved, State / / , , ,

Colorado lawmakers have quietly moved to shift the state’s school immunization requirements away from the recommendations of a prominent federal committee, in response to Robert F. Kennedy Jr. taking over the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.

The move comes in an amendment to a bill, House Bill 1027, currently awaiting Gov. Jared Polis’ signature. The amendment makes a change to how Colorado decides which vaccines to require.

State bill rewrites how Colorado decides school vaccine mandates Read More »

Colorado’s backlog leaves sexual assault survivors without answers, without closure

The Colorado Sun, Approved, State / / , , ,

It’s a situation Miranda Spencer never thought she’d find herself in. The Denver mom was going through a divorce in November of 2023, when she decided to try a dating app for the first time. She used Bumble. 

“That’s one I thought was safe,” she recalled.

After a few uneventful first dates, Spencer agreed to meet a man who had been persistently messaging her. 

“So I let a friend know, ‘hey I’m gonna go out,’ and the exact words that I used were, ‘on this pity date. You can come over afterwards and hang out.’”

Those ended up to be fateful words. She said she only remembers the first twenty to thirty minutes of that date.

Colorado’s backlog leaves sexual assault survivors without answers, without closure Read More »

Taxpayers could foot the bill—twice—for Democrats’ lawsuit to dismantle TABOR

Approved, State, The Colorado Sun / / , ,

Colorado taxpayers may foot the bill twice if Democratic lawmakers manage to pass a resolution directing the legislature to sue the state in an attempt to invalidate the Taxpayer’s Bill of Rights. 

That’s because not only will taxpayers likely be responsible for paying the lawyers hired by the legislature to bring the case, but they’ll also be on the hook for the costs incurred by the Colorado Attorney General’s Office to defend against the legal challenge to TABOR, a constitutional amendment voters approved in 1992. 

If House Joint Resolution 1023 passes as expected, the General Assembly’s nonpartisan Office of Legislative Legal Services would likely hire a group of attorneys to file the lawsuit. In the past, the legislature’s third-party legal bills in much smaller cases have cost taxpayers tens of thousands of dollars.

Taxpayers could foot the bill—twice—for Democrats’ lawsuit to dismantle TABOR Read More »

Ghosted by USPS: Crested Butte faces losing its only post office

The Colorado Sun, Approved, Local / / ,

For three years, the town of Crested Butte has labored to find a new place for its overwhelmed U.S. post office. The town bought a parcel and began negotiating with builders, offering plans that involved the town either leasing the land to the Postal Service so it could build its own facility, the town building a new $12 million post office and leasing that to the service or even selling the land outright to the Postal Service. 

Ghosted by USPS: Crested Butte faces losing its only post office Read More »

Trump greenlights AI data center at Colorado’s NREL to ‘win the AI race’

Approved, National, State, The Colorado Sun / / , , , ,

The Trump administration is looking to locate a private data center and power plant on land owned by the National Renewable Energy Laboratory as part of a broader plan to site such facilities at 16 national laboratories.

“Private data center companies, that’s where the capital is, that’s where the investment is and on federal land, we make a commercial arrangement with them,” Energy Secretary Chris Wright said at a press conference Thursday at NREL.

Trump greenlights AI data center at Colorado’s NREL to ‘win the AI race’ Read More »

Lawmakers propose risky PERA maneuver for voter-approved police funding amid budget shortfall

Approved, State, The Colorado Sun / / , ,

Something’s missing from the Colorado state budget proposal — and it’s a biggie. The Joint Budget Committee last week finalized its budget package without deciding what to do about Proposition 130: the voter-approved requirement that the state spend $350 million to support law enforcement.

Lawmakers propose risky PERA maneuver for voter-approved police funding amid budget shortfall Read More »

Rural Colorado school districts that once served students online could see brunt of major state budget cuts

Approved, State, The Colorado Sun / / , , , ,

As Colorado lawmakers try to solve a state budget crisis, Gov. Jared Polis’ office is advocating for a new set of changes to student averaging that would significantly impact a handful of rural school districts and charter schools that found a lifeline for their budgets by enrolling online homeschool students.

Rural Colorado school districts that once served students online could see brunt of major state budget cuts Read More »