Greg Kolomitz concedes that some colleagues doubted his credentials to run Bill Ritter’s gubernatorial campaign.
And it wasn’t just because the 38-year-old political operative had never run a statewide candidate’s race.
Some of them doubted that Kolomitz, a partner in the well- connected Denver-based municipal lobbying firm CRL Associates, was even a Democrat.
After all, Kolomitz had contributed $1,500 to Republican U.S. Rep. Bob Beauprez’s re-election campaign in 2004. Beauprez is the Republican nominee for governor.
So to prove his true-blue bona fides, Kolomitz hung historic Democratic Party campaign posters on a wall of his office.
Even one from Michael Dukakis, one of the biggest losers in the party’s history, is tacked to the wall.
“Some people didn’t believe I was even a Democrat,” Kolomitz said. “So I put those up there.”
With Ritter leading in the polls, it is hard to find someone to publicly doubt Kolomitz’s credentials now.
That’s not to say the Ritter campaign has been without stumbles. Kolomitz has overseen a staff dealing with rough patches on gay marriage and plea bargains with immigrants.
But unlike his counterpart at Beauprez’s campaign, Kolomitz has shunned the spotlight, directing damage control from behind the scenes. Evan Dreyer, a former Denver Post city editor, is the campaign’s public voice.
Dreyer said Kolomitz played a “strong role” guiding the campaign staff through the bumpy process that led his Republican opposition to accuse Ritter of flip-flopping on gay marriage.
The issue flared after Ritter, during an editorial board meeting with The Post, said he would consider signing a bill changing the legal definition of marriage from the union of one man and one woman. He had previously supported the law as written.
The campaign is scrambling to respond to revelations that Ritter plea-bargained about 150 cases with immigrants in a way that helped avert deportation.
Kolomitz presides over daily meetings of senior staff and consults regularly with senior advisers and pollsters. Kolomitz describes his job as “keeping all the balls in the air.”
“One of Greg’s biggest strengths is his ability to execute a plan,” said Democratic strategist Michael Dino, who was an early supporter of Ritter. “There are a lot of people out there with great ideas, but not many who can execute those ideas.”
So far, Kolomitz has run a generally positive gubernatorial campaign. But he has not always been a paragon of purity. In 2004, he apologized for using “bad judgment” for a campaign stunt that backfired.
As manager of the campaign to promote a tax increase for the Regional Transportation District’s $4.7 billion FasTracks transit plan, he had a staffer submit a letter to state officials opposing the plan.
The letter, which was designed to influence the ballot summary that would be distributed to voters, was a ruse to highlight the “outrageous and inaccurate” claims of the plan’s foes, he said.
Kolomitz grew up in La Junta, where his father was a lawyer and later a district judge and his mother retired as director of child-development services for the local junior college.
He moved to Denver as a Re gis University student and graduated in 1990 with a degree in political science and sociology.
For several years, Kolomitz bounced around campaigns in Colorado and Wyoming.
In 1992, he worked for U.S. Sen. Ben Nighthorse Campbell – “when he was a Democrat,” Kolomitz said. In 1994, he worked for Bob Schuster’s failed effort to win Wyoming’s lone congressional seat.
Back in Denver, Kolomitz worked on all three of Wellington Webb’s successful mayoral campaigns. In 1999, Kolomitz served his only stint as campaign manager – Webb’s cruise to a third term as Denver mayor.
Dino credits Kolomitz’s organizing skill as a key to Webb’s previous victories. Kolomitz helped organize the famous walks around the city that helped Webb bounce back during tough campaigns.
“It had always been a long- term career goal to run a gubernatorial race in Colorado,” Kolomitz said. “But I wanted to do it for the right kind of person, for the right kind of candidate.”
Some consultants whispered that Kolomitz wasn’t qualified to run a high-profile gubernatorial campaign – a charge that top Democrats reject.
“It’s nonsense to make that suggestion, and I know people have,” said former state Sen. Michael Feeley, Ritter’s campaign treasurer. “Over the last 30 years, Democrats have had hit-or-miss success, so to suggest that there’s a go-to A-team is nonsense.”
Staff writer Mark P. Couch can be reached at 303-954-1794 or mcouch@denverpost.com.
Other players on the Ritter team
Evan Dreyer, the campaign spokesman and former city editor for The Denver Post, handles the media.
Shaylisa Hurte, who served as U.S. Sen. Ken Salazar’s state finance director in 2004, works to raise money.
Stephanie Villafuerte, a chief deputy district attorney who led the prosecution of serial rapist Brent J. Brents in 2005, took a leave of absence to guard the campaign from attacks on Ritter’s record.
Sheila MacDonald, chairwoman of last year’s Vote Yes on C&D campaign and veteran of the successful initiatives to pay for Denver’s new jail and the metro area’s expanded light-rail line, is deputy in charge of field operations.
