, signed by Gov. Jared Polis last week, will create a board to license providers of applied behavior analysis, with unlicensed practice classified as a misdemeanor. The new law also allows the state to treating at least three children.

Applied behavior analysis, known as ABA, involves breaking down skills step-by-step and rewarding children for desired behaviors. Parents of children with severe autism have credited it with helping them learn to communicate and perform self-care, while autistic adults sometimes describe it as damaging to their mental health.

The ABA sector has grown rapidly in recent years, fueling concerns about whether states have enough oversight of what their Medicaid dollars are buying. A federal audit found Colorado may have paid nearly $80 million to providers without documentation to prove they provided the services — a concern auditors also raised in other states. The new law, however, doesn’t specifically address billing and documentation.

About 500 clinics operate in Colorado, with roughly 2,000 analysts and 8,000 technicians, . Analysts have a master’s degree and develop a child’s care plan, while technicians, who provide most of the hands-on therapy, didn’t have to complete specific training before the bill passed.

In a signing statement, Polis said the bill would protect children and ensure staff safety.

“This bipartisan bill is an example of how we can come together, listen and collaborate to solve difficult issues. I thank the sponsors, advocates and parents for doing the hard work to find the best path forward,” he said.

The fiscal note estimated the bill would cost between $2.3 million and $3.1 million each of the next three years, and require between 19 and 25 employees to implement.

Spending on ABA has shot up nationwide since the federal Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services began requiring state Medicaid plans to cover it in 2014, with greater increases as private-equity firms began buying centers.

Former employees of practices bought by private equity reported pressure to spend less time developing individual plans for patients and to either see more clients or increase billable hours with each, .

In 2024, Colorado’s Medicaid program , and the state’s Department of Health Care Policy and Financing proposed lowering rates paid to providers and allowing more opportunities to look for improper payments. The legislature ultimately didn’t adopt those recommendations.

An audit by the Office of the Inspector General found Colorado may have overpaid providers by $77.8 million, and could owe the federal government $42.6 million for its share of the Medicaid payments. The inspectors took a small sample of payments and determined most were either definitely or potentially improper, mostly due to a lack of documentation. The state disputes the auditors’ methodology and said Colorado likely owes less, or perhaps nothing.

State-level audits in Nevada and Massachusetts had similar findings, as did one of payments through Tricare, which covers military members and their families. The U.S. Department of Justice also recently with paying kickbacks to parents to enroll children in autism therapy they apparently didn’t need.

The bill’s sponsors said the bill would preserve access to ethical providers, while putting controls on those focused more on profit than children’s well-being.

“Right now, the ABA landscape is uneven,” Rep. Kyle Brown, a Louisville Democrat and one of the sponsors, said during a legislative committee hearing in May.

Representatives for the Colorado Department of Human Services supported the bill, saying it would allow them to investigate complaints, which in recent years included allegations ranging from one center hiring a sex offender to serving children raw chicken and providing excessive medication.

Medicaid will have to pay for services by technicians still completing their licensure for up to 45 days. The Colorado Department of Health Care Policy and Financing, which runs the state’s Medicaid program, asked for a shorter grace period than the 60 days initially included in the bill, while ABA providers wanted at least 90 days.

“We’d like to give people time to move through the (certification) process at a reasonable pace,” said Will Martin, a board member of the . Overall, however, the provider trade association and heads of individual facilities who spoke to the legislature said they supported the bill.

A found the evidence around ABA pointed to improvement in appropriate behavior, intelligence quotient scores and language skills, but that studies were small and prone to bias, allowing for low certainty that it works. Insurance is more likely to cover it than other types of therapy, though, making it the most accessible option for families.

Traci Collins, an autism self-advocate in Colorado, said ABA itself is problematic, regardless of how well-trained the providers may be. While an autistic person’s “meltdowns” may be frightening to people around them, they’re a sign that the person needs something, such as treatment for pain or the removal of something that overstimulates them, she said.

ABA “is something that teaches what we are doesn’t matter, that we are only worthy of love or even affection when we are willing to stop doing the behaviors that are natural to us, that compliance with authority figures is our most important characteristic,” she said in an email.

Last year, the reported 6,116 children were victims of substantiated abuse or neglect, down from 10,779 in 2021, which itself had fewer reports than average because many schools remained remote.

Neglect consistently accounts for the vast majority of those cases, with about one in five involving abuse in each of the last five years. A few hundred children experience both abuse and neglect each year.

The state defines neglect as intentionally not meeting a child’s basic needs, such as adequate food or weather-appropriate clothing. When children go without meals because their parents can’t buy food, that isn’t considered neglect, but if a parent refused to feed a child, it would be. Some situations aren’t as clear-cut, with parents attempting to meet their children’s needs, but falling short because of mental health problems or substance use.

While the department can’t rule out changes in reporting, the number of calls about possible abuse or neglect has increased since 2021 and has held relatively steady since 2023.

But during that time, the share of calls flagged as meeting the standard to investigate child maltreatment dropped from about one-third to one-quarter. Counties can offer referrals to resources or abuse-prevention programs if a call suggests a family is struggling, but the problem hasn’t reached the level of abuse or neglect.

The state has tried to get upstream from abuse and neglect, raising awareness of resources and encouraging the general community to support families, said Thomas Miller, director of children, aging and community services at the Colorado Department of Human Services.

While a small share of people intend to hurt a child, the majority of abuse cases are avoidable if parents have the right coping skills, the material resources their families need and social support for the inevitable difficult times, he said.

“It’s always better to provide resources that equal prevention,” he said. “I believe that the data supports that we are making an impact.”

Nationwide, confirmed cases of child abuse , except for sexual abuse cases, which happened at about the same rate throughout that period.

Ultimately, the best way to protect children is to strengthen families with , Miller said:

• Increasing parents’ resilience during challenging times
• Offering help with concrete needs such as food and shelter
• Providing social support to families
• Educating parents about normal child development
• Helping children form bonds and regulate their feelings

The department has a to support families, including offering to babysit or run errands, pairing new parents with experienced mentors and donating gently used items. Even a small word of encouragement to a parent who is close to losing their patience with a fussy child can defuse that frustration before it boils over, Miller said.

“What you do, even if it seems like small things, can make a world of difference,” he said.

Families particularly need support during the first years of a child’s life, said Dr. Antonia Chiesa, a pediatrician on the child protection team at .

Over the last two years, 57% of the children the hospital treated for traumatic injuries attributed to abuse were under 1 year old, reflecting both how stressful that time is and that babies are particularly vulnerable to severe injuries, she said.

Studies are mixed on whether educating parents about the dangers of roughly handling a baby is an effective technique in preventing child abuse, Chiesa said.

“Upwards of 90% of people know that you have to be gentle with a baby and that it’s dangerous to shake them or slam them or throw them,” she said.

One of the best prevention tactics is to work with parents and others watching young children to develop a plan so they know what to do when their frustrations are rising, said Alicia Melven, an injury prevention and outreach specialist at Children’s.

That can include checking for possible reasons the child is crying, such as hunger or needing a diaper change; trying out a list of strategies to calm the baby; and designating a spot, such as a crib or playpen, to leave the child for a few minutes while the parent cools off.

“The No. 1 thing that I try to reinforce is that it’s always OK to put your baby down in a safe place,” she said.

Ideally, though, child abuse prevention will extend beyond parents, Chiesa said. Anything that communities can do to reduce families’ stress and isolation will decrease the odds of someone lashing out at a child or turning to a risky coping mechanism such as substance use, she said.

“This just isn’t a family or individual problem,” she said. “This isn’t about bad people. This is about normalizing how hard parenting can be.”

Nate Bustamante, a parent advocate who lives in Georgetown, said support for families struggling with poverty, addiction or mental health struggles can make a significant difference in a child’s life.

He went through more than 20 foster and residential facility placements after his mother lost her parental rights when he was 8, and had to fight to regain custody of two of his children as a young adult. Now, he and his wife have achieved stability for their three kids and are acting as kinship foster parents for a baby and an 11-year-old from their extended families.

Bustamante credited his family’s ability to break the cycle to relationships with caseworkers, staff at the juvenile facility where he stayed and others who believed in him and his wife. His mother, who recently died of complications of alcohol use disorder, didn’t have that help break her addiction and keep him and his brothers at home, he said.

“Along the way, people treated me like a human being. In the system, you can feel like a cog or a piece of paper,” he said. “I think it starts with connection and it starts in those really small moments.”

Lindsay Salas started working as the deputy commissioner of administration at the state’s beleaguered Behavioral Health Administration on Nov. 17, 2025, spokesperson George Laumeyer confirmed Friday. The BHA is part of the Department of Human Services.

Salas had stepped down from her role leading CASA of Adams and Broomfield Counties five months earlier after the organization discovered she was taking donor funds meant for her graduate school tuition and using them for personal purposes.

CASA – which stands for court-appointed special advocates – announced her departure on June 6, .

The nonprofit launched an internal investigation and hired an independent forensic accounting firm after discovering Salas’ alleged misconduct. The findings were sent “to the appropriate authorities,” CASA spokesperson Cathy Lucas said in a statement.

The accusations went public this week when the state sttorney general’s office announced details of a civil settlement with Salas, including that she falsified and forged tuition invoices to pocket approximately $99,000 from a “top donor” who was paying for her graduate degree at the University of Denver.

Salas found out she could pocket the tuition money after she received a $5,000 scholarship from DU that the university sent to her because the CASA donor had already paid her full tuition, the attorney general’s office said. She is accused of altering invoices for larger amounts of money and creating fake invoices.

Under the settlement agreement, Salas will repay $66,000 and cannot work in charity fundraising roles for five years.

State officials said the Behavioral Health Administration followed state policy when hiring Salas, “including a background check, which did not reveal anything concerning.”

“We take any form of fraud very seriously and find this information very alarming. While these events occurred before the employee worked at the agency, BHA is reviewing this matter carefully,” Laumeyer said in a statement.

Salas was hired by former Commissioner Dannette Smith, whose retirement Gov. Jared Polis announced in February shortly before The Denver Post reported on what agency workers described as a toxic, unsafe work environment. That environment included Smith referring to “cutting their throats” during a 2024 meeting about a calendar improperly shared with someone outside the agency.

In the wake of CASA’s investigation, the organization updated financial oversight procedures “to reinforce accountability and stewardship moving forward,” Lucas said.

“Our focus remains on serving children and families in Adams and Broomfield Counties. CASA’s staff, volunteers, and leadership continue their work supporting the best interests of children in the court system,” she said.

DU officials confirmed Salas graduated from the university with a master’s degree in business administration.

“DU previously cooperated in the government’s investigation of this matter,” spokesperson Jason Gruenauer said in a statement. “Due to student privacy laws, the university cannot comment on any internal action taken by DU related to Ms. Salas.”

Salas did not respond to a request for comment.

Salas’ case is the latest in a slew of problems facing the Colorado Department of Human Services, which is being investigated by an outside firm after high leadership turnover and multiple formal complaints. The department paid nearly $3 million to former employees since 2019 to settle accusations of pay, age, gender and disability discrimination, whistleblower protection violations, and retaliatory firings.

One such accusation resulted in a federal lawsuit filed in September in which the former head of the Colorado Division for the Deaf, Hard of Hearing and DeafBlind alleged DHS management humiliated and discriminated against him before forcing him out of his job.

Colorado forced out the longtime head of its department for the deaf and hard of hearing because he was “too close” to his own community, the ex-leader alleges in a federal lawsuit.

Cliff Moers, who is deaf and spent nearly two decades with the , alleges management within the humiliated him, discriminated against him and stripped him of his professional dignity towards the end of his tenure.

In the complaint, filed in September in U.S. District Court in Denver but not previously reported, Moers said he warned leadership in 2022 that the department risked running out of funds to provide critical services to Colorado’s deaf community. To cut costs, management told him to suspend legal interpreting and translation services for rural areas, Moers alleged.

These services, however, are required under the . This put Moers in an “untenable situation,” he said in the lawsuit: either violate federal law or go against his directives.

Ultimately, the department ended up overspending to provide those accommodations, prompting disciplinary action for Moers and his staff, according to the lawsuit.

The following year, amid further budgetary issues, a department outreach consultant mistakenly told vendors and members of the deaf community that services were going to be definitively stopped, instead of telling them there was simply the potential for a temporary suspension of services, the complaint states.

Human services leadership, in December 2023, got word that the state legislature would be considering additional funding for the commission “due to pressure” from the deaf community and their advocates, according to the lawsuit.

The leak caused consternation from department brass, Moers alleged, who were not happy that his commission had circumvented proper channels to receive emergency funding. The higher-ups believed Moers to be the culprit due to his “being too close” to the deaf community, the suit alleges.

Soon after, leadership demoted Moers from his director position. In July 2024, he resigned, saying he felt like he could no longer work for the agency he had built from the ground up.

“This experience was incredibly difficult for me,” Moers told The Denver Post in an email Thursday. “I’ve always believed in the mission of empowering others, especially in my own community, which is why what happened felt so personal. To feel dismissed and judged by the very department that����ap supposed to uphold those values, especially within a department that often struggled with consistent standards and efficiency, was deeply upsetting.”

What made it harder, he said, was how his situation was characterized.

“It didn’t reflect who I am or the work I’ve done over the years to build the division, and that took a real toll on me, both professionally and personally. It eroded my confidence in a way I didn’t expect,” he wrote.

Department of Human Services officials declined to comment on the lawsuit, citing pending litigation. In court filings, the agency denied Moer’s allegations and argued he voluntarily resigned from his position.

Moers has long been one of Colorado’s most prominent advocates for the deaf.

He founded the , a preschool through 12th-grade charter school in Denver, and previously served as the president of the .

News of the lawsuit comes at a turbulent time for the Department of Human Services.

Current and former workers at the Behavioral Health Administration alleged a toxic and unsafe work environment under former commissioner Dannette Smith, The Post reported in February. The state hired an outside firm to investigate one incident in which Smith referenced “cutting their throats” to staff.

Earlier this year, the state once again hired an external organization to probe complaints about the Department of Human Services’ leadership amid high turnover, a cascade of formal complaints and millions of dollars in settlements with departing staff, The Post reported this week.

The newspaper found the department had paid out nearly $3 million to settle claims with employees over pay, age, gender and disability discrimination, whistleblower protection violations, and retaliatory firings, among other accusations.

The state in January contracted with , a Denver firm that specializes in probing workplace issues, to investigate complaints within the department, according to a copy of the agreement obtained through an open records request.

While the department declined to elaborate on the nature of the $25,000 investigation, a review of internal complaints and interviews with seven current and former agency leaders and workers paint a picture of a toxic work environment that impacted the mental health of its staff. Leadership was abusive, inappropriate and demeaning, employees told The Denver Post. Several high-ranking members of the agency left under strained circumstances, with the state paying them money to avoid litigation.

“Not only are they ruining people’s lives,” said one former employee, speaking on the condition of anonymity because they still work for the state, “they’re destroying the state’s second-largest agency.”

All told, the Department of Human Services has paid departing employees nearly $2.8 million in settlement agreements since 2019, when Gov. Jared Polis’ administration took the reins. These cases have concerned alleged pay, age, gender and disability discrimination, whistleblower protection violations, and retaliatory firings, among other accusations.

“That place is a trainwreck,” said Mark Schwane, an employment attorney who frequently represents state workers. “It’s a disaster.”

Department of Human Services officials declined an interview request for this story and did not respond to a list of questions from The Post. In a statement, a spokesperson said the department does not comment on personnel matters, including any investigations tied to individual employees. The external probe remains ongoing.

Employees have a variety of resources to address workplace concerns, including submitting grievances or complaints to leadership, requesting mediation or submitting discrimination or workplace violence reports, said Haysel Hernandez, a department spokesperson.

If an investigation finds that a staff member violated policies or the law, the department takes “immediate action to remedy the situation,” she said in the statement.

“The Colorado Department of Human Services strives to establish a respectful, healthy workplace where all employees are valued and treated fairly,” Hernandez said.

‘So many concerns’

The Colorado Department of Human Services is a sprawling state agency with more than 4,800 employees, trailing only the Department of Corrections in size.

It’s the department of “people who help people,” leadership says, responsible for providing services to children and families, the disabled, and older adults. The agency also manages the state’s child welfare system, 12 youth detention and commitment centers, and two state mental hospitals.

The department’s first stated value: people first. But individuals who worked there say the agency’s own staff don’t seem to get that same treatment.

Those who have been interviewed as part of the outside investigation told The Post that the questions have largely centered on one person: , deputy executive director for operations and strategy.

Morrison referred to her leadership style as “slap and tickle,” which employees who spoke to The Post said made them uncomfortable. She also made inappropriate comments about people’s work statuses, staff said, reminding them that they could be fired at any time.

One staff member said Morrison told them they lacked “executive presence” and recommended they dress in such a way that required them to go beyond the organization’s official dress code. Others said the leader was known for making fun of others in team settings.

“She was very abusive as far as I’m concerned and used her power to intimidate people,” said the former employee who spoke of leadership ruining people’s lives.

Two former high-ranking department members specifically called out Morrison in internal complaints after leaving the agency.

AnneMarie Harper, the department’s former director of communications, cited “hostile and inequitable working conditions” that Morrison created and maintained “through a pattern of inconsistent expectations, inappropriate conduct and professional undermining and communication failures,” she wrote in an appeal and dispute form before the , which was obtained by The Post.

Harper declined an interview request for this story.

In January, another top official filed a complaint with the department’s Civil Rights Unit, alleging Morrison and two other leaders forced her to retire by creating an “intimidating and psychologically harmful (workplace) such that it affected her physical well-being.”

Kristen Withrow, the former associate director for the , which operates the state’s juvenile commitment and detention facilities, said she was left out of meetings, publicly humiliated and scapegoated for safety issues that went on in the youth centers. Her treatment at the end of her tenure was so bad, she wrote, that she applied for family and medical leave for the first time in her 30-year career to care for her health.

“I have so many concerns in the last nine months,” Withrow wrote in a February email included in her complaint. “…I’m just so sad about all of this.”

Withrow declined to talk to The Post about her departure.

Employees say they chose to work for the Department of Human Services because they cared deeply about the agency’s mission to help those less fortunate. But the longer they worked there, the more they realized that their own mental health suffered as a result.

Multiple people told The Post that their sleep suffered while in the job. Others began going to therapy to deal with all the work stress. One former staffer said they burst into tears during a job interview when asked why they left the department.

“The values espoused and printed all over the place, we don’t seem to know how to live those out,” said a current employee, speaking on the condition of anonymity because they still work for the department.

While Morrison received the bulk of the attention from the outside investigators, many of the former staffers said her boss, , also bore responsibility for the department’s toxic culture.

“If you’re not stopping it, you’re part of it,” the current employee said. “I think she is complicit. Katy can only do what she’s allowed to do.”

Barnes and Morrison, through a department spokesperson, declined interview requests for this story.

Millions in settlements

Barnes has also overseen the agency’s practice of paying out high-dollar settlements to departing staffers who challenged their terminations or brought claims in court or with the state personnel board.

The Post obtained all settlement agreements involving the Department of Human Services that concerned monetary payouts to employees since Polis took office in 2019. The department, during that span, reached financial agreements with at least 69 staffers, paying out a total of $2.8 million.

Those agreements spanned $500 on the low end to more than $400,000 to settle claims with a worker who filed a federal lawsuit.

In that 2020 suit, a psychologist working at the at Fort Logan alleged that her supervisor demonstrated “abusive and authoritarian behavior” toward the female psychologists at the facility and used false claims to demote her and go after her professional license.

In a 2019 federal complaint, the director of nursing at a Wheat Ridge facility for those with intellectual and developmental disabilities said she was paid less than her white and non-Asian colleagues for the same work. The director, who is Asian, said leadership retaliated against her after she brought grievances over the discriminatory pay.

The Department of Human Services ended up paying her $383,750 to settle the nursing director’s claims.

Over the past two years, the department has reached 26 agreements with staffers to avoid litigation. Many did not involve money and only dealt with whether an employee’s departure was designated as a termination or resignation.

Fourteen of these deals, though, involved state payouts, to the tune of $381,900. Only the Colorado Department of Corrections paid out more money — $502,702 — to its workers during the last two years.

Harper received $95,000 to resolve her claims. Another worker got $26,500 after alleging their termination was discriminatory. A third person negotiated $122,000 after saying his separation was retaliation in violation of the . One staffer obtained nearly $40,000 to resolve civil rights and charges based on disability discrimination.

Some, though not all, agreements involved nondisparagement clauses, which prohibit the sides from making negative statements about each other. Several also included nondisclosure language, mandating that neither side discuss the settlement negotiations with a third party.

The Department of Human Services needs wholesale change at the top, said Schwane, the employment lawyer. The department rewards loyalty over quality of work, he said, which results in anyone giving negative feedback being pushed out.

“They’re reliable sychophants,” Schwane said.

Settlement agreements are used for a variety of reasons, and do not necessarily indicate wrongdoing by the department or employee, Hernandez, the agency spokesperson, said in a statement. These deals “ensure a fair process, and, when needed, a reasonable opportunity to resolve disagreements or provide a supportive transition out of the agency,” she said.

“The department continues to welcome feedback from staff and is committed to a positive, productive and successful workplace culture that helps employees conduct their best work,” Hernandez said.

Heather Wilcox, a 20-year state employee, said she was administratively discharged��from her communications job with — part of the Department of Human Services — after she took an extended leave following the deaths of both her parents and one grandparent.

Her supervisors questioned her about her leave and rejected her accommodation requests when she tried to return to work, she said in an interview.

Wilcox lost her hearing as a child and received cochlear implants — a fact that made her deaf but “not deaf enough” for some in the community, she said. A job helping Colorado’s deaf and hard-of-hearing was a dream come true. Until it wasn’t.

“The whole thing was horrifically abusive,” Wilcox said. “My own community did this to me.”

Wilcox lost health insurance for her and her daughter. She says she feels blackballed as she applies for other jobs.

She filed a claim with the state personnel board, alleging her discharge was discriminatory. In March, the state agreed to let her resign, removed disciplinary memos from her file, and paid her $40,000 plus attorney fees to avoid a protracted legal dispute.

Wilcox wonders how she became so disposable after spending her entire career in public service.

“How do you treat people like that at CDHS?” she said.

Since opening about two years ago, the residential facility — which houses people transitioning from a hospital setting in a pair of adjacent buildings — has had dozens of police runs. Some of those have been for violent incidents, Mayor Meredith Leighty said.

“We recognize and support the critical need for expanded mental health services,” she told The Denver Post in an email. “But good intentions on their own are not enough, and cannot be enough, when the safety of our communities is at stake and the state does not take those concerns seriously.”

Before the facility opened its doors at 11255 and 11275 Grant Drive, a group of Northglenn citizens rose up in opposition to the state’s plan to house some sex offenders in the 32-bed facility.��The state backed down after the outcry.

But there are still too many problems at , said Leighty, who declined an interview Tuesday because of an illness. In an email, she wrote that since the facility opened in 2024, police have received 78 calls for service.

“That far exceeds what we would expect from comparable residential settings,” she said. “These are also not minor incidents. They include disturbances, assaults, and repeated welfare checks, each placing a sustained and growing strain on our officers and surrounding neighborhoods.”

The most alarming incident, Leighty said, came in January when one resident of the transitional facility stabbed another and then tried to attack responding police officers. The two-building complex is close to an elementary school and a playground.

“This was not an isolated failure,” the mayor said. “It exposed deeper systemic issues: inadequate screening, insufficient on-site supervision and an overreliance on law enforcement to manage complex behavioral health crises.”

Stephanie Fredrickson, a spokeswoman with Colorado’s Office of Civil and Forensic Mental Health, said her agency was taken aback at Northglenn’s ire. Negotiations over how to handle things at the facility are still underway, she said. The office is under the Colorado Department of Human Services.

“The state has extended and memorialized its statewide internal policy to not admit individuals who are required to register pursuant to the Colorado Sex Offender Registration Act… for at least the next five years,” Fredrickson wrote in an email.

Bonnie Wright, the division director for the Mental Health Transitional Living Homes program, was not available for an interview Tuesday.

The facility is part of a program that the legislature created in 2022 to help people with mental illnesses transition from hospital settings to a lower level of care as they reenter the community. The legislation called for the state to create, develop or contract with providers for 125 beds statewide covering different levels of care.

The agency, Fredrickson said, had been working with Northglenn officials to draft an agreement to implement safety protocols and improve operations at the mental health transitional home on Grant Drive. She said the latest discussions were last week.

“The state has engaged in these meetings in good faith and considered them productive interactions, which have addressed all of Northglenn’s stated objectives,” she said. “The state remains committed to working with the Northglenn community to provide excellent service for those in need of transitional services, and would appreciate the same commitment to good faith collaboration from the city.”

Lawmakers at the state Capitol that would bar any sex offenders from being housed in a mental health residential facility that is located within 1,000 feet of a school. Stukey Elementary is less than 1,000 feet from the Northglenn transitional living home.

“I’ve never seen the community engage on an issue as much as this one,” said state Sen. Kyle Mullica, an Adams County Democrat and a co-sponsor of .

Codifying the sex offender prohibition in state law, he said, is necessary to establish safety in the community.

“The question comes back: Why not codify it and make it permanent?” Mullica said. “I think the community has a right to ask for that.”

One of the people to testify in favor of the bill during a hearing Tuesday was Northglenn Police Chief James May. There’s not enough accountability being asked of the clients at the Northglenn transitional home — to the detriment of the community, he said.

“If you don’t give them structure, they’re going to do what they did that led them in this direction,” May said. “They need to do a better job of core management.”

The bipartisan effort to tweak Colorado’s competency laws is backed by major players in the criminal justice system who hope the 197-page will plug gaps in the state’s competency system, but it’s opposed by mental health advocates and competency experts, who say the proposal is misguided and unlikely to actually solve the underlying problems in the state’s system.

“It creates a whole host of concerns around wholesale warehousing folks,” said Jennifer Turner, executive director of , a state office aimed at connecting criminal defendants with severe mental illness to support and care. “They all have incredibly diverse needs. And responding to people by just throwing them into the same facility with the same care… can create longer-term problems because they may not be appropriately placed in that setting.”

This latest effort to reform the state’s long-troubled competency system follows a high-profile case that drew attention from Elon Musk and Gov. Jared Polis last year, in which a 21-year-old man with an intellectual disability was found incompetent to stand trial in a pair of serious criminal cases in Weld County. He was released from custody with his charges dismissed, and then was arrested again within weeks after authorities said he brought a gun onto a college campus.

The new bill aims to create a clear pathway within criminal cases for such defendants to receive treatment and remain confined until they are no longer dangerous, even when the criminal charges must be dropped. The proposal would also shift some court standards and make it easier for people to qualify for involuntary mental health care.

“What we discovered is that not only do we not have adequate placements for people, we also don’t have the mechanism for civilly committing them,” said Sen. Judy Amabile, a Boulder Democrat and a sponsor of the bill.

There was often a “very long pathway” for some people to get placed in a facility, she added, which is what the bill is trying to address. But she also stressed that the state needs a more robust system “that helps people before they ever enter the criminal justice system to begin with.”

Creating a new pathway to commitment

Colorado’s competency process is designed to protect the constitutional rights of people who are mentally ill or developmentally disabled by ensuring they are not prosecuted for crimes when they are too sick or too disabled to understand the court process and to help defend themselves.

Defendants who are found to be mentally incompetent cannot be tried for crimes — rather, their criminal prosecutions are paused while defendants go through treatment aimed at restoring them to competency. If defendants can’t be restored to competency, the cases against them must be dismissed.

When such criminal cases are dismissed, judges can consider whether the defendant should be ordered into involuntary mental health treatment. Colorado has a narrow definition for who qualifies for civil commitment. The person must suffer from a mental health disorder, and, as a result of that disorder, be either a danger to themselves or others, or be gravely disabled.

Current state law says that an intellectual or developmental disability alone is not enough to qualify a person for civil commitment. The new bill would create an entirely new type of civil commitment, called an “enhanced protective placement,” for defendants who live with permanent disabilities or conditions like traumatic brain injuries or Alzheimer’s disease and who face serious criminal charges but are incompetent to proceed.

Under the bill’s proposal, prosecutors could seek either an enhanced protective placement��or civil commitment for a permanently incompetent defendant if they can prove the defendant has a mental illness or developmental disability, committed either homicide, a crime of violence or a felony sex offense, and poses a substantial risk of serious harm to others.

That would then trigger a process in which the and its would look for a residential placement for the defendant. If the agencies can’t find a bed for the defendant, the person must be admitted to a state hospital.

The bill then sets up judicial oversight for the civil commitment — judges can terminate the commitment if they find the person is no longer a threat to others and is capable and willing to follow the law, or decide to extend a civil commitment if the person still presents a danger to the public.

“For these more dangerous people, it would be much more guaranteed the intervention happens… and the courts are more involved,”�� said James Karbach, spokesman for the .

Bill focuses on involuntary care

The effort is aimed at people like the 21-year-old defendant in the Weld County case — but such people make up just a tiny portion of defendants in competency proceedings, and competency proceedings themselves make up just a small portion of overall criminal cases, so that portion of the bill would likely impact just a handful of people each year.

Between 2021 and 2023, roughly 25 to 40 people went through the court system with cases that might fit the criteria proposed by the bill, said Jessica Dotter, senior chief of legislative policy at the .

The bill is largely focused on involuntary mental health care. Turner said that framing is a mistake, because the vast majority of people who’d be targeted by the bill are willing to accept care voluntarily. In 2025, Bridges worked with 120 defendants who were found incompetent and unlikely to be restored and whose criminal cases were dismissed. A full 94% of those defendants were willing to enter a placement voluntarily, she said.

Bridges found placements for 60% of those people, but could not find placements for 34% of the group because of systemic barriers like regulations and finances, not because the group members were unwilling to receive care. Just 6% of defendants refused care, she said, and those cases included defendants with only misdemeanor charges.

“It’s rare that no beds exist,” Turner said. “We just can’t access the beds.”

The proposed new process, which orders that a placement be found for a defendant, doesn’t do anything to actually solve the regulatory and financial barriers that block people from care, Turner said. The process of finding a placement routinely takes longer than the timeframe proposed by the bill.

“It����ap assuming the individual is in an involuntary space, and all we need to do is order them into a placement and a placement will magically exist for them,” she said.

Bridges workers have spent 21 months trying to find a placement for one client — someone who would be a target of the proposed bill — and that person has been turned down by 64 facilities, Turner said, noting there is an “entanglement of state, federal and local regulations that inadvertently support risk-averse decision making by agencies which are meant to be society’s safety net.”

“That person is in their mid-30s, they are mortified at what happened, they have voluntarily agreed to live in locked memory care for the rest of their life,” she said. “…Even though this person has really proven they will be stable in the appropriate care, even though they are agreeing to something that is a heavy-duty version of a life sentence, they’ve still been refused care at 64 facilities. This bill does nothing to address the barriers that individual is facing.”

Rather than focusing on the “tail end of the legal process,” lawmakers could effect more change by reducing the state’s regulatory barriers, giving financial incentives to providers with existing beds and streamlining access to Medicaid and other benefits, she said.

But others said ensuring that dangerous individuals aren’t set free is a step in the right direction, even if it doesn’t solve the broader systemic issues.

“The timing of this is incredibly hard, but we have to find ways to make improvements,” Karbach said. “We are not going to solve the problem of an inadequate system of care for the mentally ill in this bill completely. But that doesn’t mean we can’t find a way to make some improvements.”

When a long-term care placement can’t be found, the bill would default to sending defendants to the — a facility that is perpetually full and understaffed. The bill would essentially prioritize people committed under the new process over those waiting for competency restoration services, potentially lengthening the competency waitlist, said Jack Johnson, public policy liaison at .

The judicial oversight also raises concern, Johnson said.

“A judge could theoretically overrule the medical professional’s decision and leave you in a world where you are indefinitely incarcerated and no longer receiving treatment,” he said. “That is a huge area of concern for us as it relates to people’s civil liberties.”

The impact on the waitlist might be mitigated by the small number of people going through the new process each year. Across the state in 2025, only five people faced Class 1 or Class 2 felonies, were found permanently incompetent to proceed, and saw their cases dismissed, Turner said. Four of the five were successfully placed into long-term care through Bridges or other legal mechanisms, she said. Only one of those people was released without a plan for care, and that person was not assigned a Bridges liaison, she said.

‘There’s infinite need’

Capacity at the state hospital remains a significant concern, Karbach said.

Amabile said lawmakers are proposing to convert a facility in Pueblo to serve people with intellectual and developmental disabilities. In all, that should create between 15 and 18 new beds. Lawmakers also want to contract with nursing homes and private mental hospitals to open more space as the state needs.

“There’s infinite need, almost, for these kinds of placements,” Amabile said. “It����ap about the level of security. So these most secure placements are what we’re lacking, especially in the nursing home and regional center space.”

Even in a cash-strapped budget year, lawmakers are trying to set aside millions of dollars to fund the bill. Amabile said the money set aside is about $9.6 million this year, $23.2 million next year and about $28 million after that.

But the bill’s current estimated cost far exceeds that. Amabile said the bill, as it’s written now, likely costs “hundreds of millions of dollars.” She said the bill will be amended to narrow its definition so it only captures people with specific needs, which will help trim the costs.

The bill has significant legislative heft behind it: Sen. Cleave Simpson, the Senate’s Republican minority leader, is sponsoring the bill with Amabile. The House’s top Democrat and Republican lawmakers — Speaker Julie McCluskie and Minority Leader Jarvis Caldwell — will take the reins if and when the bill reaches the lower chamber.

Through spokesman Eric Maruyama, Polis declined an interview request this week. Maruyama said the bill was part of the governor’s effort to lower Colorado’s crime rates.

“An important part of that is making sure that those who pose a danger to themselves and others are not released, which is what we want to see in this bill,” Maruyama said. “Governor Polis appreciates the work of the sponsors to protect public safety and improve our competency system, and looks forward to continued conversations to bring this bill to a place that the state can successfully implement.”

The proposed change would prevent the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, formerly known as food stamps, from paying for sweetened beverages unless they contain milk or at least 50% juice. People could still use SNAP to buy chocolate milk, unsweetened seltzers and some juice drinks, but not regular or diet sodas.

Five individuals, including one Colorado resident, last month for approving “waivers” that allowed 22 states to ban SNAP from paying for soft drinks and, in some cases, candy.

The plaintiffs argued that USDA didn’t follow the appropriate process before approving a major change, and that it would harm their health because they rely on sodas to manage low blood sugar or maintain energy during the day.

Staff for the Colorado Department of Human Services told members of the state Board of Human Services at a meeting Friday morning that they wouldn’t bring the proposed change, known as the , for a final vote until they see how federal courts will respond.

Polis acknowledged in an interview Friday morning that he was working on an executive order to end state spending on sugary drinks and alcohol, which he said he would issue in a few weeks. State agencies are still discussing what they can do, within the constraint that executive orders can’t involve spending money. The order wouldn’t involve removing options from vending machines where state employees spend their money, he said.

At the end of the board’s , Department of Human Services Executive Director Michelle Barnes announced, , that Polis was pursuing an executive order so that the state government could “lead by example.”

“We’ve been persuaded this does feel like we’re only doing this to low-income people,” she said of the SNAP limits, according to a recording of the meeting. “We shouldn’t be buying (sweetened drinks) either.”

Polis didn’t directly answer whether he could order the change to SNAP if the board opted not to move forward. Adding a ban on most sweetened beverages would allow Colorado to keep working on other changes, such as allowing SNAP to pay for hot foods, which would otherwise be “dead in the water” at the USDA, he said.

“We are very optimistic that the board will approve the SNAP waiver,” he said.

But the board hasn’t shown much enthusiasm for the waiver, and an unofficial poll at the March meeting found four members opposed, three in favor and two undecided. They opted to delay an official vote and instructed state officials to bring a package of reforms that wouldn’t disproportionately hit low-income people.

The board had initially planned to take that final vote at its April meeting, but it has until August to make a choice.

The Colorado Medical Society has spoken in favor of the waiver as a way to prevent chronic diseases. Anti-hunger groups said the change would create confusion and increase stigma against people who use SNAP.

The change wouldn’t save Colorado money in the short term, because recipients would still get the same amount to spend on other foods and beverages.

, based on a possible reduction in type 2 diabetes and other weight-related health conditions, but real-world evidence is lacking, since states only .

Earlier this month, the state Board of Human Services delayed its vote on whether to implement a change preventing the , or SNAP, from paying for most sweetened beverages.

The board had planned to take up the question again Friday, with a final vote scheduled. Instead, the board will now receive a without taking action.

The Colorado Department of Human Services didn’t immediately clarify whether it would bring the plan before the board again.

The change, known as the , wouldn’t allow the federal food assistance program to pay for drinks with added sugar or artificial sweeteners, unless they also contain milk or at least 50% juice.

Chocolate milk, unsweetened seltzers and some juice drinks would remain options, but diet and full-sugar sodas would no longer be eligible. People who receive SNAP funds could still buy those drinks with their other income.

At the March meeting, four members of the nine-person board said they would have voted against the proposal, three were in favor and two hadn’t decided after at least five hours of testimony.

The supported the change as a way to improve health by reducing sugar consumption. Anti-hunger groups said it would make the program more complicated and discourage food-insecure families from signing up.

Mariah Guerrero, senior public policy manager with , called the decision not to move forward with the waiver a “victory for Colorado families.”

“The board listened to the community’s concerns and chose dignity over stigma, and access over restriction,” she said in a news release.

The 56-page complaint, filed Wednesday in U.S. District Court in Denver, alleges children as young as 10 are being confined to prison-like conditions for weeks or months after judges determine they can return to the community, in violation of their constitutional rights.

Colorado officials “warehouse… children in dangerous and harmful detention facilities only because the state fails to provide them with the processes, placements and services to which they are legally entitled,” the lawsuit states.

In fiscal year 2024-2025, Colorado’s kept more than 140 youths in detention for more than 30 days after judges deemed them releasable, the complaint alleges.

Many of these young people remained in detention solely because they were waiting for the state to find them a foster placement. The majority of these kids also have disabilities and require therapeutic care, the lawsuit says.

DYS officials, in a statement Thursday night, said they could not comment on specifics outlined in the complaint due to the pending litigation.

The division said youths accused of committing crimes can only be released when the necessary court-mandated placements or services are available. Until those are fulfilled and a court authorizes their release, youths must stay in their care.

The complaint was filed on behalf of two young people — referred to only as Isaac N. and Tony S — by a group of civil rights organizations, including��, the , , a national advocacy organization dedicated to children navigating the child welfare and juvenile justice systems, and , a global law firm.

Isaac, a 17-year-old suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder and ADHD, has been charged with juvenile delinquency offenses and is being held in a state youth detention facility, according to the lawsuit. He has not been convicted of a crime.

A judge has determined that Isaac is releasable, yet he has remained in detention for almost two additional months because the state hasn’t found him a placement, the complaint alleges.

A treatment provider who assessed Isaac found that he could benefit from a community-based placement with trauma-focused therapy.

He’s currently working on his high school diploma and hopes to pursue a trade, such as HVAC repair, the lawsuit states. He yearns to be released so he can enjoy being a regular teenager and go to the movies.

Isaac “does not understand why he is ‘stuck’ in the detention facility,” according to the complaint.

Tony, a 12-year-old with autism spectrum disorder and cognitive impairments, has remained in detention six months after a judge deemed him releasable, the lawsuit states. He also has not been convicted of a crime.

The is Tony’s legal custodian and is responsible for finding him a placement outside of detention, the complaint says. The state has failed to do so.

State officials have known for decades about this crisis but have refused to address it, the lawsuit alleges. The waitlists for community-based programs remain long. County officials say there are no local placement options, with some sending children to other states that have openings.

The problem is getting worse, the complaint contends.

In 2022-2023, the first year of public state reporting, the Division of Youth Services detained 540 releasable youths. That number increased to 693 the following year.

The most recent reports show the state detained 177 releasable youths in December 2025. More than half of all young people detained in Colorado have been deemed fit to return to the community, according to the lawsuit.

The consequences, advocates say, are severe.

“When the state locks up children after a court has said they may be released, it sends a devastating message that they are problems to be contained rather than young people deserving care, support, and a real chance to thrive,” Nancy Rosenbloom, senior litigation adviser at the ACLU’s , said in a news release. “Instead of locking up releasable kids away from their families, teachers and peers, the state must commit to programs and services that nurture young people and give every child the opportunity to succeed.”

Not only are these young people being housed unconstitutionally, advocates say, but they’re also being kept in facilities with extensive allegations of excessive force, fights and drugs.

The complaint cited several Denver Post stories from the past few years, which documented rampant allegations of excessive force by staff members at the state’s youth detention and commitment facilities, serious injuries sustained by teens while being physically restrained, illicit drugs entering secure facilities, and several allegations of staff members engaging in sexual relationships with youths in their care.

One youth in 2024 died from a fentanyl overdose at a facility in Greeley, while other young people have been hospitalized following drug use inside these facilities.

Staff, meanwhile, have been leaving the department��due to unsafe working conditions and, they say, little support from management.