May 10, 2016 11:52 AM UTC

Get More Smarter on Tuesday (May 10)

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• by: Colorado Pols

Today is the final full day of the 2016 Colorado legislative session. It’s time to Get More Smarter with Colorado Pols! If you think we missed something important, please include the link in the comments below (here’s a good example).

TOP OF MIND TODAY…

► With the Colorado legislative session nearing its end (Wednesday is scheduled to be the final official day), lobbyists and lawmakers alike are scrambling to get some key bills completed while end-of-session wrap-ups are starting to pop up. Legislation that would move Colorado to a Presidential Primary system, abandoning the caucus process, is still alive but almost out of time; the same is true of a compromise measure to allow grocery stores to sell full-strength alcoholic beverages. Rural school districts are also making a last-gasp effort to fight budget cuts.

The biggest outstanding question for the legislature — the “Hospital Provider Fee” (HPF) issue — appears likely to fizzle as Senate President Bill Cadman tries to run out the clock on the 2016 session instead. As John Frank of the Denver Post reports via Twitter:

W/ 2 days remaining, GOP Senate prez lifts his hold on @hickforco hospital provider fee bill, assigns to two committees #copolitics #coleg

— John Frank (@ByJohnFrank) May 10, 2016

To keep the issue alive, the legislation must make it through two Senate committees and pass the floor on second reading before midnight tonight.

► State Senator Tim Neville just oozes class. Well, maybe not class, but he’s oozing something.

► President Obama will become the first sitting U.S. President to visit Hiroshima, Japan later this month. Obama will deliver a speech on May 27th about nonproliferation of nuclear weapons at the site of the world’s first atomic bombing.

Get even more smarter after the jump…

IN CASE YOU ARE STANDING NEAR A WATER COOLER…

► Who will Donald Trump choose as his running mate? Evangelical Republicans are demanding that he pick someone sufficiently conservative on social issues, or else they warn of sitting out the fall election. Meanwhile, Trump announced that New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie will lead his Presidential “transition team” that will prepare for a theoretical new Trump administration. No word on whether Christie will also maintain his role as a background prop at Trump news conferences.

► A legislative measure intended to reduce tax exemptions for the oil and gas industry won’t get done in 2016. As Ed Sealover reports for the Denver Business Journal:

House Democrats abandoned a plan late Monday to counter a court ruling and change the state’s severance-tax rules, choosing to kill their bill rather than let Republicans filibuster it to death on one of the final nights of the 2016 legislative session.

House Speaker Dickey Lee Hullinghorst, D-Gunbarrel, and Rep. K.C. Becker, D-Boulder, introduced House Bill 1468 Monday in response to an April 25 Colorado Supreme Court decision that seemed to catch most in the Legislature off-guard.

Why is this relevant? Because the State of Colorado owes oil and gas companies a LOT of money. From Peter Marcus of the Durango Herald:

How that will impact local governments that benefit from severance tax dollars remains unclear, though observers say counties such as La Plata will see less money. One estimate from legislative staff says severance taxes will decrease by about 13 percent annually given the ruling…

…BP America filed the case, pointing to technology it created in the 1980s in Southwest Colorado for producing natural gas from coal seams. The company built facilities and transported gas, and so it claimed deductions on the cost of capital associated with transportation and processing, which the state incorrectly prohibited.

► Have you dreamed of becoming a marijuana courier? Then good news: The Colorado legislature has agreed to create a “marijuana transporter” license.

► The Greeley Tribune takes a deep dive into House District 48, an historically conservative district held by Rep. Steve Humphrey. Democrat Annmarie King is running to become the first non-Republican to hold the seat that was created in the last round of reapportionment.

► The Colorado Springs City Council is discussing a proposed moratorium on building construction in “landslide zones.” This seems to make perfect sense, so it is probably doomed to fail.

► Could there be a legislative compromise in the long-running battle over selling full-strength wine and beer in grocery stores?

► You can count the editorial board of the Glenwood Springs Post-Independent among those who are not happy with Congressman Scott Tipton for letting the oil and gas industry write his bills for him:

So it is that Tipton, who has received $39,000 over his congressional career from people associated with SG, which also has worked to defeat his opponents, is representing the Texas-based company’s interests. He can say otherwise, but he just is. SG and a lobbying firm working on its behalf distributed the proposed language last year, and would be more than delighted if its wording were introduced and became law.

And that’s the point.

Tipton’s western Colorado constituents can fairly ask whether their representative in Congress is beholden to his biggest financier to the point of disregarding their input…

…The idea that he needs to further solicit input to presumably reflect constituents’ concerns is more than a little disingenuous.

It could make a casual observer wonder whether the congressman didn’t expect anyone to notice the similarities in his draft bill and the SG proposal and he’s now making the best excuse that he can for conducting business as usual — which a cynic might call pay to play.

► Republican Ryan Frazier has filed a lawsuit as part of his bid to keep his name on the June 28th Primary ballot for U.S. Senate. In a guest column published by the Aurora Sentinel, Frazier declares that he is fighting the good fight against an evil bureaucracy, or something. Frazier also discussed his ballot adventures on conservative radio.

OTHER LINKS YOU SHOULD CLICK

► Democrats appear to be increasingly optimistic about their chances of defeating Congressman Mike Coffman in 2016.

► How do Colorado Republicans convince themselves to vote for Donald Trump for President? Former state Senate President John Andrews has lots of excuses reasons.

ICYMI

► Voters in Nebraska and West Virginia head to the polls to vote in the Presidential Primary races today. What’s at stake today? Not much.    

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