Newsletter for March 8

Honoring Mayor Cathy Noon

Today we we passed a Joint Resolution in the House and Senate Honoring Mayor Cathy Noon for her extraordinary life and dedication to the City of Centennial.  Her family attended in person as the Resolution was read aloud in the Senate.  We will be scheduling an event open to the public at Centennial City Hall in the weeks to come (date to be determined).

Highlights of My Week at the Capitol

Thursday was Disability Rights Advocacy Day at the Capitol, the Capitol saw a crowd form to support Representative Ortiz, as they demanded justice for being treated equally. Rep. Ortiz left the day with the message that the community needs to demand change otherwise nothing will evolve. I am committed to advocating for bills that would help put people with disabilities on an equal playing field. (More about these bills below.)

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This past week we celebrated the paying off of the Budget Stabilization Factor (BS Factor) for public school funding. This BS Factor caused Colorado to divert funding from children’s programs and K-12 education for many years. The elimination of the BS Factor is a huge step in funding schools, however, this is just the beginning as the elimination of the BS Factor from the budget would only raise the Education budget to levels equivalent to 1989.  We celebrate this victory, and in the same breath must start to bring awareness to the hard reality that it’s still far below acceptable limits.  Look for a fun year-long 1989 campaign from me so that we keep this important funding on everyone’s agenda.

 

  HB24-1235 - Reduce Aviation Impacts on Communities, passed with an 11-0 vote in the Transportation, Housing & Local Government Committee on Wednesday night. I am extremely proud of the work Representative Kyle Brown and all of our legislative partners. We’re not finished and still have work to do to make sure that our constituents are heard and understand where we are in the process. We’re still early in the process - Finance Committee, Appropriations, to the Floor of the House and then repeat all in the Senate.  We will be substantially addressing the transition from leaded aviation fuels and doing our part to reduce noise. Monday I am hosting a virtual discussion on the bill, please see the flyer at the bottom of the newsletter for the link if you wish to join.

 

Here are some other important bills passed through the House that I want to shed light on. I co-sponsored HB24-1072 which aims to strengthen criminal rape shield laws by eliminating exceptions allowing evidence of a victim's prior sexual conduct. It also aims to prevent the use of irrelevant factors like what they were wearing against victims in court.

 

HB24-1002 would create new pathways for out-of-state social workers to gain professional licensure to practice in Colorado. This bill aims to build the "Social Work Licensure Compact", which creates an agreement between Colorado and six other states where licensed social workers in member states can obtain and easily transfer a license from another member state. This link will show other states trying to join the Compact.

 

Keep up for further updates on the progress of introduced bills and ongoing legislative efforts.

Let's Talk about Housing

HB24-1313 My current position on this bill: “KILL IT! KILL IT! KILL IT!” Legislation that will have major impacts in our community passed through committee this week and surprisingly seemed to have some support from Arapahoe County Commissioners (if amended).  This bill is a housing density bill that is somehow magically supposed to build housing within newly designated “transit-oriented communities” (TOC). I think we need a regional approach to where we put dense housing, prioritizing areas where it can best be supported.  In my opinion, this bill truly does nothing to help us build starter homes or affordable housing in our community and I question how it will help us really add housing at all - any incentives in the bill are overshadowed by an approach that seems to be tone deaf to many checklist items that we’d need to handle before building anything.  I am against any bill that doesn’t have a major focus on ownable housing. I do agree that we need some density in areas to help us balance the housing equation, but despite my best efforts to get information and understand how this bill is supposed to help our district, it just doesn’t make sense.  This bill does hold a big stick with threats to HUTF funding that our communities desperately rely on for road repairs. We have 6 “TOCs”  that would be designated in our district, I believe that is more than any other district in the state facing this legislation. This bill's aim is to expedite the building of housing and use the land that is currently unoccupied, but the best that I can tell all it will do is build expensive for-rent units that will fill up immediately and leave no opportunity for purchasable housing.  We still have no link to how these will get built or who will build them or how it makes anything “affordable."

 

In previous newsletters, I pointed out that Colorado has an insurability problem for condo construction that has almost eliminated the condo construction market. Due to unintended consequences of legislation passed in 2007 and 2010, building condos in Colorado is far more risky for construction companies to build rather than apartments. The handful of companies that still build condos are already talking about pulling out because it isn’t a viable option for them to build.   

Bills That I Have Nonstop Attention On

 

AIRPORTS - HB24-1235 - Reduce Aviation Impacts on Communities, is mentioned above. Please read for my comments. 

 

TRAP- HB24-1324 - Attorney General Restrictive Employment Agreements, TRAP agreements are typically used for higher-skilled professions; medical careers, lawyers, engineers, pilots, etc., and typically involve a payment plan or period of time to work with an employer to satisfy repayment for training that is paid for by an employer (basically a student loan provided by an employer). However, it is becoming increasingly common for employers in low wage industries to use this type of agreement to “TRAP” their employees in unfavorable employment positions, requiring large payments to the employer if the employee leaves for another job. The proposed bill standardizes the process for recovering these expenses, treating them similarly to other forms of consumer and student debt. HB24-1324 Passed Committee 10/0 to go on to the House floor. This bill addresses problems that we have nationally as well as problems within our own community.
 

Accessibility - Moving forward with our bill that works to create a resource for Colorado local governments to go to with questions or advice on how to support local businesses with ADA requirements. Coloradans with disabilities represent a large portion of Colorado's economy and spending power. Right now there is no resource for businesses to go to with questions or advice on ADA requirements.  This bill would allow the Department of Local Affairs (DOLA) to act as a resource to collect and share information with all businesses looking to increase their accessibility to customers with disabilities.  (We may be changing this bill from it’s original intent to be a function of a new agency we are creating.)

 

Colorado Disability Opportunity Office (CDOO) - HB 24-1360 Rep. David Ortiz and I are co-prime sponsoring legislation to create a new government office within the Department of Labor and Employment to serve as a resource for State Agencies, Private and Non-Profit Organizations, and he public concerning disability issues in Colorado.

JYACAP- For youths who are tried and convicted as adults in our state, the path to freedom is notoriously diff).ult.  This bill hopes to reduce a very serious bottleneck in our system by removing the need for the governor's signature from parole board decisions. This measure was originally put in place when there were doubts about how Juvenile Parole would function and is no longer necessary - the change streamlines the process. Even the Governor thinks that Juvenile Parole can be managed without his oversight.


State Employee Deductions Bill -Quick update this bill has been passed by the House. It's now being taken up in the Senate!

Town Halls

March 9th I'm having a town hall at the Hindu Temple of the Rockies. Our district has the highest population of South Asian in any district of Colorado, and it is important for me to hear your voices if you can come. There is of course an open invitation to anyone who would like to come. Keep an eye out for more townhalls in the coming weeks.

Monday night at 7PM I'm having a virtual discussion on the new aviation bill that passed it's first committee: HB24-1235.

 

Please join if you want to talk about how it affects Centennial Airport and it's surrounding neighborhoods.

Residents of Centennial welcome! March 30th, 3-5 pm I am excited to hold a town hall to hear your thoughts. Come to share your thoughts on what matters to you, I will be there to address any questions or curiosities you have about my thoughts and goals with our community.

 

 

March 26th, 6-8 pm I am hosting a town hall for all residents of Greenwood Village at City Hall

(6060 S Quebec St) in the community room. I know there is a lot of questions going around in our community and I want to be able to answer as many as possible. It's important for us to be on the same page and the best way to do that is to have a conversation. So please come and share your thoughts.

In the News

Take a look at some news clippings from this week

 

(Education) https://www.denver7.com/lifestyle/education/colorado-teachers-celebrate-proposed-elimination-of-budget-stabilization-factor
 

(Airports) https://coloradocommunitymedia.com/2024/02/23/centennial-airport-future-development-part-150-housing/

 

(Airports) https://coloradocommunitymedia.com/2024/02/21/cherry-creek-schools-not-renew-contract-charter-school-centennial-airport-colorado-skies-academy/


 

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Please reach out to tell me about any issues I should keep my eye on or things you are passionate about. Use the button below and I or someone on my team will be sure to be in contact.

 
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