Colorado legislature updates on housing, land use, energy, taxes

The Colorado legislature began its mad rush into weekend work on Friday as the end of the 2024 session comes into sight, with plenty of major legislation still unfinished. Lawmakers have until the end of the day Wednesday to finish up bills on gun regulations, housing, land use policy, transportation, property tax reform and other priorities.

This story will be updated throughout the day.

Updated at 5:32 p.m.: Two bills to address construction defects appear destined to doom in the final days of the legislative session.

Senate Bill 106 was aimed at creating a middle ground between lawsuits and the chance for builders to remedy problems in condo and home construction, with the ultimate goal of lowering insurance costs and spurring more building. House Bill 1230, on the other hand, was designed to give homeowners a longer window in which they could sue over shoddy construction.

“In-the-building politics trumped out-of-the-building concerns,” said Sen. Rachel Zenzinger, an Arvada Democrat who ran the bill aimed at lowering insurance costs. “… You’d think we were trying to attempt to make people live in shoddy huts or that we’re rolling over for the developers. It’s fascinating how the conversation changes down here when you have lobbyists that are paid to keep their jobs.”

That bill was scheduled for a House committee Friday afternoon, but Zenzinger said the sponsors were going to let it die because it lacked support in the more progressive chamber. It had gone through substantial amendments in the Senate, where it passed with bipartisan support. She lamented what it would mean for future homeownership opportunities if builders continue to prioritize for-rent construction, like apartments, over for-sale construction projects like single-family homes and condos.

Sen. Lisa Cutter, a Jefferson County Democrat, said HB-1230, aimed at giving homeowners more time to seek remedy, was likely to die on the calendar in the Senate. It passed the House, albeit with some Democrats joining Republicans in opposition.

Advocates argued the bill was aimed at stronger consumer protections for what is often people’s biggest investment. Now, they have limited timelines to find construction defects to fix them.

Cutter said backers weren’t able to find a compromise on the bill, and ahead of the end of the session on Wednesday, there wasn’t enough time left to find common ground.

“I think we raised some issues in the public and created some conversation with it, because there are some issues that homeowners deal with that they shouldn’t have to deal with,” Cutter said.

Updated at 3:12 p.m.: Colorado lawmakers on Friday killed a heavily amended bill that would have set up a task force to study how to better protect police whistleblowers. Lawmakers have heard testimony from officers who faced retaliation for reporting misconduct — including a former officer from Edgewater who ended up on the attorney general’s “bad list,” she said, for reporting her own sexual assaults by a superior.

The House voted 33-31 to defeat the police oversight legislation after a rancorous floor debate that turned on invocations of legislative procedures and accusations of failing to seek support from law enforcement leaders. It reflected narrow division on display Thursday evening in a vote that nearly killed the bill, but opponents fell one vote short of the chamber’s majority threshold that time.

“We need to start from scratch. … This has been too rushed,” Rep. Ryan Armagost, a Berthoud Republican, argued in rallying opposition.

Sponsors of House Bill 1460, responding to law enforcement leaders’ concerns, removed all the provisions of their original bill, which would have required investigations of alleged police misconduct, established a misdemeanor crime for failing to report misconduct by fellow officers and boosted protection for whistleblowers, among other things. Rep. Leslie Herod, a Denver Democrat, made last-minute changes Friday that would have directed a task force to study state policy and make recommendations to lawmakers next year.

“All we are asking is that we get it in writing that this is going to happen,” said Rep. Jennifer Bacon, the assistant majority leader and a bill co-sponsor.

But in the end, the bill failed, with opponents mustering the barest majority possible in the 65-member chamber to kill a bill.

Later Friday afternoon, Herod and Bacon issued a statement expressing frustration after they had whittled down their bill to a task force — and still saw that defeated. “What happened is wrong,” Herod said, given that lawmakers widely seemed to see a problem.

“It is unconscionable that so many mobilized to silence the voices of victims and upstanding law enforcement officers,” she said. “They will have to try to sleep at night with that on their conscience.”

Updated at 1:19 p.m.: Amid a busy day in the House, the chamber passed House Bill 1447, the much-talked-about, and rewritten, bill to reform the Regional Transportation District.

The bill passed 42-22. It no longer proposes to revamp the board’s composition, a particularly contentious measure that was watered down before being stripped entirely. But it would still require better fixed-route coordination with the Denver Regional Council of Governments; coordination on specific routes for special events, like concerts or sporting events; and improved budget transparency. It would also create a subcommittee to study RTD’s governance over the next several months.

The measure now heads to the Senate, which is also weighing a bill that would direct millions of dollars to RTD and other transit agencies via a production fee on the oil and gas industry.

Updated at 11:58 a.m.: At long last, House Bill 1313 — the measure that would encourage and then require denser residential development near transit-rich areas in Front Range cities — is heading to the Senate floor.

The bill passed the Senate Appropriations Committee on Friday morning, after being bumped from that committee’s calendar 24 hours before. Sen. Julie Gonzales, a Denver Democrat whose soft support helped the bill pass its first Senate committee, backed it again Friday, along with several other Democrats. Sen. Rachel Zenzinger, a moderate Democrat who’s a land-use reform skeptic, voted no.

The committee added amendments allowing for more areas to be exempt from local governments’ required density calculations, at the request of Democratic Sen. Jeff Bridges, who was skeptical of a similar policy last year. The bill was also changed to improve anti-displacement and anti-gentrification measures as more development occurs in cities, a priority for Gonzales.

The bill now heads to the Senate floor, where two other land-use reform bills — one to allow for more accessory-dwelling units (ADUs) to be built, the other to eliminate minimum parking requirements — are languishing amid opposition from Republicans and moderate Democrats.

The parking bill has been considered and delayed repeatedly in recent days. On Thursday night, Sen. Barbara Kirkmeyer, a Brighton Republican, announced a slew of amendments that would weaken the bill. But then Sen. Robert Rodriguez, the Senate’s majority leader, moved to delay the bill again.

An amendment already added to the bill allow local governments to require minimum parking on certain developments, so long as those governments check several boxes to prove the development needs the required parking. More changes appear to be coming.