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Colorado Democrats Push Sweeping New Crackdown on 3-D Printed Guns and Gun Dealer Oversight
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Colorado Democrats Push Sweeping New Crackdown on 3-D Printed Guns and Gun Dealer Oversight

By Lucas Brady Woods and Kyle McKinnon | The Colorado Sun Federal data show ghost guns are increasingly turning up at crime scenes. Democrats in the Colorado legislature are adding to their slate of proposals this year to tighten the state’s gun regulations with measures that would further crack down on 3-D printed firearms and impose tougher rules on gun dealers. House Bill 1144 would add to Colorado’s restrictions on ghost guns, unserialized firearms that are often assembled at home using 3-D printed parts or do-it-yourself kits. They allow people to bypass background checks and are virtually untraceable. Federal data show ghost guns are increasingly turning up at crime scenes. Recoveries of the weapons surged nearly 1,600% between 2017 and 2023,...
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Colorado Regulators Approve Xcel Renewable Buildout But Warn of Rising Costs
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Colorado Regulators Approve Xcel Renewable Buildout But Warn of Rising Costs

By: Mark Jaffe | The Colorado Sun Colorado’s largest power provider is rushing to start before federal tax credits expire that could shave up to 50% from building expenses. Aiming to get energy generation and storage projects started before federal tax credits expire, the Colorado Public Utilities Commission on Jan. 28 approved an expedited list of 1,700 megawatts of projects for Xcel Energy. Still, the commission expressed reservations about the cost and operating efficiency of so many projects and wants more data and analysis. “It doesn’t feel right to me,” PUC Chairman Eric Blank said. “I treat customer money like my own money. … I am looking for a little certainty that we are not going to deeply regret this.” The Trump administration’s tax and spend...
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State Regulators Confront Fallout From Xcel’s Wildfire Power Shutdowns
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State Regulators Confront Fallout From Xcel’s Wildfire Power Shutdowns

By Mark Jaffe | The Colorado Sun State utilities regulators collected testimony from 4,000 businesses, households with lifesaving medical equipment and the merely annoyed as they form rules for public safety power shut-offs. In December, Rainbow Schultz was preparing for Xcel Energy’s announced shutdown of power lines to cope with high winds since her restaurant — the Jamestown Mercantile — had lost $8,000 in the utility’s safety shut-off eight months earlier. Schultz was already reducing her supplies when she was told by Xcel Energy her town of 230 in western Boulder County would not be in the shut-off area and so she stocked up as usual.  Still when the 112-mile-per-hour gust of wind came Dec. 18, Schultz found herself in the dark wi...
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Medicaid Cuts For Disabled Coloradans Advance Without Board Approval
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Medicaid Cuts For Disabled Coloradans Advance Without Board Approval

By Brian Eason | The Colorado Sun State Medicaid officials said they have authority to continue with the plan through an executive order from Gov. Jared Polis and that they will ask again for board approval. When it came time for any of the Colorado Medical Services Board members to make a motion, there was only dead silence.  For two hours, the 11-member board that governs the state Medicaid program heard pleas from parents who provide round-the-clock care of their adult children with severe disabilities. And when the testimony was over, no one on the board would make a motion that would result in cuts to the parents’ monthly pay. The request from Medicaid officials for an emergency rule change that means a 10% pay cut for families of Colorado’s most vul...
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Colorado voters to decide future of police cooperation with ICE
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Colorado voters to decide future of police cooperation with ICE

By Jesse Paul | The Colorado Sun Initiative 95 would amend the state constitution to require that police officers, sheriff’s deputies and prosecutors alert federal immigration authorities if they charge someone whose immigration status is in question if that person has a prior felony conviction or the charge is for an alleged violent crime Colorado voters will decide in November whether to require that state and local law enforcement work more closely with federal immigration officials.  Initiative 95 would amend the state constitution to require that police officers, sheriff’s deputies and prosecutors alert the U.S. Department of Homeland Security if they charge someone whose immigration status is in question if that person has a prior felony convicti...
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Colorado Budget Panel Rejects Prison Expansion Funding Until Plan Is Presented
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Colorado Budget Panel Rejects Prison Expansion Funding Until Plan Is Presented

By Bente Birkeland | The Colorado Sun In a 4-2 vote, the Democrats on the JBC voted in a bloc to deny the dollars, complaining that the DOC lacked a plan to address the state’s growing prison population. Democratic members of the legislature’s Joint Budget Committee denied a request Wednesday from the Colorado Department of Corrections for money to pay for additional prison beds.  In a 4-2 vote, the Democrats on the JBC voted in a bloc to deny the dollars, complaining that the DOC lacked a plan to address the state’s growing prison population, despite repeated requests for Gov. Jared Polis’ administration to do so. The two Republicans on the panel voted to approve the ask. “The frustration is that we are just at this point where it’s been repeated asks, y...
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Colorado Lawmakers Acknowledge Shared Responsibility for Budget Crisis
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Colorado Lawmakers Acknowledge Shared Responsibility for Budget Crisis

By Jesse Paul | The Colorado Sun Nonpartisan staffers told lawmakers this month that the way they spent billions of dollars in one-time federal funds given to Colorado during the COVID pandemic contributed to the state’s budget shortfall. he Colorado legislature is at least partially to blame for the structural deficit forcing lawmakers this year to cut state programs and services to address a roughly $850 million funding shortfall.  The General Assembly contributed to the deficit through its handling of billions in one-time federal funding that flowed into Colorado during the coronavirus pandemic, nonpartisan staff for the legislature’s powerful Joint Budget Committee told the panel earlier this month. At issue was how some of that money was used...
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EPA Says Colorado Overstepped Law By Using Haze Rules To Close Coal Plants
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EPA Says Colorado Overstepped Law By Using Haze Rules To Close Coal Plants

By Michael Booth | The Colorado Sun The federal government said the coal plants were needed for “grid reliability” and a regional haze-fighting plan violated the Clean Air Act. The Trump administration Friday further eroded Colorado’s longstanding mandate to close coal-fired power plants by 2031, saying the state’s required regional haze-fighting plan goes too far and violates the Clean Air Act. But the regional haze plan covers everything from emissions at the Suncor refinery and Colorado’s three major cement kilns to natural gas power and other pollution sources. In rejecting the entire plan, the EPA may throw many of Colorado’s pollution fighting plans into regulatory purgatory for years. Colorado’s coal plants are needed for “grid reliability,” the federal g...
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Colorado Lawmakers Warn School Meal Taxes Could Return to Ballot Yet Again
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Colorado Lawmakers Warn School Meal Taxes Could Return to Ballot Yet Again

By Brian Eason | The Colorado Sun The $95 million a year voters approved when they passed Proposition MM in November is expected to generate enough to fund the Health School Meals for All program. But it might still go back to the ballot. Just two months after Colorado voted — for the second and third times — to raise taxes for a school meals program, legislative analysts are warning state lawmakers they might have to go back to the ballot for round four. The news reduced Joint Budget Committee Chair Emily Sirota to a three-letter response during a December meeting: “O … M … G …” This time around, the stakes aren’t quite as high. The $95 million a year voters approved when they passed Proposition MM in November is expected to generate enough to pay f...
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Xcel Seeks Gas Rate Hike as Colorado Customers Face Rising Utility Costs
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Xcel Seeks Gas Rate Hike as Colorado Customers Face Rising Utility Costs

By Mark Jaffe | The Colorado Sun Colorado consumer advocate says second rate-increase request in a quarter is testing the will of customers and the Public Utilities Commission. Xcel Energy is aiming to raise its gas customers’ bills by an average $7.59 a month — for a total of $190 million — to pay for safety improvements, rising operating and maintenance costs and investor returns. The company filed the proposed rate hike with the Colorado Public Utilities Commission on Monday. The rate request comes a little more than a month after Xcel Energy filed for a $356 million electric rate increase, which would raise the average residential electric bill 10% to $110 a month. In late November, the PUC also approved a $155 million plan to deal wi...
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