A Session Wrap-up
May 30, 2003
What an unbelievably successful four months!
The 64th General Assembly made significant improvements for the citizens of Colorado. We will be going back to the basics in auto insurance, we made significant reforms in health insurance, we now have a state-wide concealed carry permitting system, we passed several significant water bills, and we passed an historic school voucher bill. We did all this while dealing with an unprecedented revenue shortfall. It was a great year.
Your automobile insurance premiums will most likely be going down as we have returned to a tort based system of auto insurance. Thirty seven other states currently use this system, including Nebraska, and their premiums are considerably lower than ours. The biggest change that you will notice is that medical related expenditures may no longer be covered if you are involved in an accident. Be sure to purchase a modest amount of medical coverage if you don’t have health insurance.
We passed significant health insurance reform that should lead to either lower premiums, on average, or at least a reduction in the increases that we have been seeing. Put that reform together with tort reform for doctors and I count this as a very successful year in the medical field.
Early in the year, we passed a state-wide concealed carry permitting law. The new law still treats firearm possession as a privilege instead of a right, but the change is significantly for the better in many parts of Colorado.
You can expect to see more storage built for water in the future and more flexibility in temporary changes of water usage. We saw many water bills in the legislature this year. Most of them were veiled attempts to take water away from its rightful owners. Those bills were successfully opposed, and we passed four bills that either increase the opportunity for building storage or allow for temporary changes of use. The temporary changes will give many farmers options to improve cash flow other than selling their water. We did pass SB03-73 which will eventually allow the well users along the South Platte to run their wells this summer. While this bill took too long to make its way through the legislature, it will likely be remembered as the law that establishes the final rules governing the use of water along the South Platte.
We passed a school choice law that starts a pilot program allowing parents with modest incomes to choose where their kids will go to school. This is a huge step toward introducing competition in education.
We had to deal with ever decreasing revenues to the state. These are truly uncharted waters. Total revenues fell over 15% last year and at least an additional 3% this year. Think of that in terms of your own family budget. It is tough to decide what to cut when expectations are for ever increasing expenditures. I am sure that the legislature cut enough programs to upset everyone.
On a personal note, I had a great year.
I carried legislation that reduced a farmer’s chance of getting sued if someone gets hurt on his place. HB03-1003 was crafted to give farmers and ranchers limits on liability when they have friends and guests on their places. It is unfortunate that we have to pass legislation for this purpose, but we live in litigious times.
I was the House sponsor of a bill that will reduce possessory interest taxes on state land board leased land. SB03-167 will change the way these taxes are assessed, making this bad tax somewhat more equitable with real property taxes.
I carried a bill to make sure that any future TABOR refunds are paid for with money from the year they were collected, instead of borrowed out of the next year’s excess revenues. HB03-1238 changes the accounting standard used when calculating the manner in which TABOR excess revenues will be refunded to the tax payers. This change will keep future General Assemblies from finding themselves in the bind that the 63rd was in last year when they had to pay for the fiscal year 2000-2001 TABOR refund with money from the 2001-2002 fiscal year. They started in a hole that they were never able to recover from.
I carried five other bills during the session. I lost two of them, my freight equity bill being the hardest loss to take. I’ll have to bring that one back some time. I am looking forward to representing you again next year.
Greg Brophy (R-Wray) represents the Counties of Crowley, Cheyenne, Kiowa, Kit Carson, Lincoln, Morgan, Washington, Yuma and part of Adams. He can be reached via e-mail at greg@gregbrophy.net or in his office at 970.332.5766.