Schools must accept gift of defibrillator
Public schools in Colorado would be required to accept donated automatic external defibrillators under a bill signed into law Tuesday.
Gov. Bill Owens said Senate Bill 170 would help save lives.
“For people who have $2,000 and want to make a life-saving contribution, give it to your favorite school, and we’ll start to get them in place,” Owens said.
The bill, called David’s Law, is named for David Brooks, who died a decade ago at age 12 while at summer camp. His parents, Paul and Laurie Brooks, were told that an AED probably would have saved their son’s life.
Last year, they tried to make a donation from their son’s memorial fund to help buy AEDs for public schools, but some officials resisted. So they pursued a law to compel schools to accept them.
“I cannot begin to describe to you how painful it is to lose a child,” Paul Brooks said. “If by donating an AED we can save even one other family the heartache and the pain, it will be worth the effort.”
Sudan divestiture urged for pensions
An activist group wants state pension plans to divest from companies that do business in Sudan to encourage the Sudanese government to put an end to alleged war crimes in the Darfur region.
Citing the success of a similar campaign against apartheid in South Africa, the Colorado Committee on Africa and the Caribbean is pushing for economic pressure on the Sudanese government.
“We have the same type of model in place,” activist Larry Borom said, pointing to recent Sudanese divestiture by Harvard University.
Several states are considering it as well, he said.
In Colorado, the activists are pushing for action from the Public Employees’ Retirement Association of Colorado and the Fire and Police Pension Association of Colorado, which together are invested in about 60 Sudanese companies.
They hope to see a bill introduced at the Capitol calling for Sudanese divestment but expect that might not happen until next year.
