With just three days left in this year’s legislative session, Colorado lawmakers have already begun their end-of-session back-patting.
Democratic House Speaker Andrew Romanoff on Friday put out a press release calling it the most productive session in recent memory.
Whether or not the new Democratic majority deserves the self-acclaim is up for partisan debate. House Minority Leader Joe Stengel last week called it “the worst session in seven years.”
But there is no question legislators have been busy.
Last week, lawmakers worked well into several nights, finalizing bills governing issues including sexual discrimination, seat belts, health care and identity theft.
Social agenda split
Shot down by the Republican majority for years, the gay-rights community won two key battles in the newly Democratic-controlled legislature.
House Democrats killed a ban on gay marriage, and both chambers approved a bill that would make it illegal for employers to discriminate against gays and lesbians.
Before the legislature’s scheduled adjournment Wednesday, Democrats also hope to finalize a proposal to make attacks on homosexuals hate crimes.
But it remains unclear whether conservative Gov. Bill Owens will sign the proposals into law.
The Democrats lost on another divisive and emotionally charged social issue when Owens vetoed a bill that would have required health- care providers to tell rape victims about emergency contraception. House Democrats were unable to garner enough votes to override the governor.
Owens contended that the bill violated the religious freedom of Catholic hospitals.
Family leave for school
Democrats, under pressure from the business lobby, withdrew an ambitious parental- leave bill that they had been touting as critical for working parents.
The bill would have allowed parents 40 hours of unpaid leave over the academic year to attend school activities. Parents would have been limited to two hours a day with no more than five hours a month.
House lawmakers weakened the bill significantly and shortened the leave time to 15 hours a year for parent-teacher conferences.
House Democrats, who publicly fretted over being labeled “anti-business,” killed the bill, leaving Democratic Senate sponsor Peter Groff lamenting that his colleagues had let business interests trump working families.
Alcohol-abuse curbs
State lawmakers attempted to crack down on underage drinking this session with a package of bills that targeted everything from keg sales to new vapor devices that dispense alcohol without the liquid.
The legislature outlawed the vaporized-alcohol dispensers, continued a prohibition on Sunday sales at liquor stores and raised the penalty and fines for underage drinking and providing alcohol to a minor.
Minors caught with alcohol would face a $1,000 fine – a punishment that could be waived if the minor has called 911 for another underage drinker needing medical attention.
Another bill – approved by the House and the Senate – calls for suspending the driver’s licenses of adults convicted of buying alcohol for minors.
State senators rejected a bill that would have required retailers to tag kegs to help law-enforcement officials track down the adults who buy the alcohol.
Several senators said the keg tags would cause more problems than they could cure. Such a law, they said, would encourage young people to turn to hard liquor because the sales could not be tracked.
Consumer protection
To help stem identity theft, the state’s No. 1 consumer crime, legislators want to give Coloradans better control of their personal and credit data.
Lawmakers have passed and sent to the governor a bill that would let consumers freeze access to their credit reports.
Proponents say the bill is among the most progressive in the nation for protecting consumers from data theft.
New driving rules
Officers in Colorado may soon have two more reasons to pull you over.
Before adjourning, the legislature is poised to approve a law that would let officers stop drivers for not wearing their seat belts. Currently, drivers can be ticketed for not wearing a seat belt only if they are pulled over for a separate offense.
Legislators also agreed to outlaw open containers of alcohol in motor vehicles.
Although some lawmakers complained that the law is too vague and could cause drivers to get in trouble for drops of beer in the bottom of a discarded bottle on its way to the recycling bin, proponents say it is a public safety necessity.
Health care
Democrats gave up their effort to create a backup insurance program for small businesses, but they are still tussling over a proposal that cuts the costs of prescription drugs.
The bill calls for Colorado to join other states in negotiating better drug prices for patients on Medicaid, the government- funded program for the poor.
Democrats also are pushing to create the Colorado Cares RX program, which would let middle-income residents without prescription coverage buy medications at the lower state-negotiated rates.
The bill also includes a provision to establish a preferred drug list so that the state can join the multistate pool.
Balancing the budget
If this session has a legacy, it surely will be the budget.
When lawmakers convened in January, the state had serious problems. Years of cuts had left the state $1.1 billion leaner. There had been no general- fund money to build or repair roads and bridges for several years. More than $175 million had been cut from the state’s colleges. And lawmakers were staring at several hundred million dollars more in cuts.
The problems were evident. The solution was not.
Democrats had promised voters they would use their newfound majority to find and pass a solution. But party leaders quickly realized that selling any proposal would be hard without Republican support.
Enter Owens. Negotiations began. They talked. They fought. They called each other names. And after a few months of sometimes sophomoric behavior, they signed a deal.
The great St. Patrick’s Day compromise will ask voters to give up about $3.1 billion in tax refunds over the next five years. The money, supporters say, will be spent on roads, colleges, health care and other vital needs. The alternatives, they argue, include shutting down colleges, kicking the elderly out of nursing homes and closing state parks.
Opponents say the state hasn’t done enough belt-tightening to warrant the money.
So lawmakers will adjourn this week and start their summer jobs: stumping for or against November’s ballot questions.
Staff writer Chris Frates can be reached at 303-820-1633 or cfrates@denverpost.com.
Staff writer Mark P. Couch can be reached at 303-820-1794 or mcouch@denverpost.com.