With the work of the Colorado General Assembly over, though a possible special session is looming, Colorado Politics looked back at the five issues that shaped the last five months at the state Capitol.

The budget

A $1.2 billion shortfall in general funds — the discretionary dollars lawmakers spend on obligations and new programs — meant the 2025-26 budget would be fiscally tight. The shortfall resulted in part to Medicaid over-expenditures that the state is required to cover, regardless of the health program’s budget.

The Joint Budget Committee (JBC), the body that drafts the annual spending plan, received the governor’s proposal on Nov. 1, which the lawmakers regarded with skepticism. Gov. Jared Polis wanted to change how student counts are made in K-12 and disapproved of increases in provider rates for Medicaid services, which have long been an interest to JBC members.

Neither of those proposals went well with the JBC. The panel hiked provider rates — again — to avoid losing companies that say the rates they’re paid don’t cover the costs. As for the change in how K-12 students are counted, which has been done on a rolling average over four years, the governor sought a single-year “students in the actual seats” count, which led to protests from parents and teachers at the state Capitol.

The budget cuts were painful, and at times, lawmakers pushed back. Some lamented that, despite the shortfall, lawmakers still pushed for spending. At least one legislator warned that next year’s budget woes would be much worse.

The JBC offered 63 “orbitals” — bills that travel along with the main budget measure and make statutory changes to balance the budget. House lawmakers initially rejected three: A bill to repeal a $50,000 rural behavioral health voucher program that JBC staff indicated was duplicative; a $90,000 bill to repeal a kidney disease prevention task force 15 months ahead of schedule; and a bill to take $30 million out of the marijuana tax cash fund and move it to the general fund.

The behavioral health and kidney disease bills failed before the budget bill was finished, requiring the JBC to find other ways to cover those savings.

The marijuana tax cash measure became a bigger problem. The budget bill had already gone to the governor and a $30 million hole in the budget would have meant the budget was out of balance, which the state Constitution prohibits.

Members of the Black caucus and progressives in the House pointed to those dollars as a priority for communities of color who, they said, are starting marijuana businesses.

“We can’t afford this,” JBC members told the House.

The bill failed anyway.

The arm-twisting was on by the chairs of the appropriations committees, who both serve on the JBC, and the governor’s office. Several hours later, the House voted to reconsider the bill, and on the second try, kept the $30 million intact to achieve the balanced budget.

Colorado House puts state’s balanced budget in limbo after surprise vote creates $30 million hole

The headaches over the state budget in 2025-26 are far from over. Congress is currently working on a budget bill that could cut funds from Medicaid and the food assistance program, SNAP. In Colorado, that could mean another $1 billion hole in the state budget before the summer is over.

If that happens, the JBC will likely return to determine where to find those dollars, and lawmakers could be called back for a special session to make hard decisions.

The federal government is expected to provide $7.8 billion for Medicaid premiums in the 2025-26 budget, out of the program’s total cost of $13.3 billion. This year, the Department of Health Care Policy and Financing, which manages the Medicaid program, overtook K-12 education as the agency with the most significant percentage of state spending, at $18.1 billion, out of the $43.9 billion budget for 2025-26.

Meanwhile, the state didn’t have to go back into debt for K-12 education, a specter that hung over the General Assembly as the budget moved through the process. K-12, a top priority for lawmakers, got a $150 million boost in its budget, raising the per-pupil spending to $8,691. Lawmakers also made changes in the School Finance Act that they believe will protect K-12 from debt in the future.

All told, the spending plan for the next fiscal year stood at $3.5 billion more than the current’s year budget plan. Among the spending items were salary increases for state workers and a per diem hike for legislators.   

Colorado Senate strips added funding for 19 rural schools

Affordability

Gov. Polis mentioned affordability a dozen times in his Jan. 12 State of the State address, with most comments directed toward housing.

After a bumpy start in 2023 to address the state’s 100,000-unit housing shortage, lawmakers pushed forward bills in 2024 on “accessory dwelling units” or ADUs and “transit-oriented” communities. They also prohibited residential occupancy limits and dealt with grants and tax credits for affordable housing. What didn’t make it in 2024 were changes to “construction defects” — the current statutory landscape that many blame for effectively halting condo construction — and a bill requiring a single stairway to serve multifamily housing of up to five stories.

Both of those issues reached the governor’s desk in 2025. The governor signed into law the changes to the construction defects law for middle-market housing on May 12; Polis approved the single stairway bill the following day.

What didn’t make it was the “Yes in God’s backyard” bill. Backed by the Polis administration, it would have allowed churches, schools, colleges, and universities to build affordable housing on their land. Supporters vow to bring that back next year.

Senate Republicans put forth an array of bills that they said would save Colorado families an average of $4,500 per year. They targeted for repeal laws on grocery bag fees, cage-free eggs, retail delivery fees, garbage disposal fees, gas and electricity fees, passenger ride and car rental fees, two previous laws that they claimed raised rental prices, and a bill to reform construction defects. None of those measures was adopted.

Meanwhile, the governor signed a bill on May 9 to prohibit what sponsors described as “price-gouging” on necessities, such as groceries and toiletries. The bill was substantially watered down to enact that prohibition only during a declared disaster and define “price-gouging” as a price increase of more than 10% during a 90-day period.

The Trump administration

Democratic lawmakers sought several measures that, they argued, are necessary to protect the state, its employees and residents from the Trump administration on issues like abortion, transgender transition and immigration.

Democrats also pushed through a bill to set up a $4 million fund, to be housed in the governor’s office, to defend Colorado from the Trump administration’s efforts to pull back or cut federal grants, contracts and other funds that flow from the federal government to the state. The fund would also allow contracting with the Department of Law to defend state officers and employees from criminal charges from the federal government when they act in their official capacity. House Bill 1321 has not yet been signed into law. 

Senate Bill 129 focuses on “legally protected health care,” such as abortion procedures, medication abortions and gender transition services. It prevents Colorado residents and businesses from complying with out-of-state civil, criminal, or regulatory inquiries about individuals or entities involved in those “legally protected health care.” In some states, women who travel to other states to obtain an abortion can be criminally prosecuted, although federal courts have ruled that this could be a violation of free speech. The governor signed the measure into law on April 24. The New York Times reported last year that the number of abortions provided to women who crossed state lines doubled between 2020 and 2023. 

At its core, Senate Bill 276 reemphasized existing state law that precludes local law enforcers from detaining an individual based on an “immigration detainer.” Insofar as jails, the bill prohibits a custodian from delaying a defendant’s release for immigration enforcement. It removes from current state law a requirement that students unlawfully staying in the country status who are seeking in-state tuition file an affidavit stating they would seek legal status. It also prevents governmental agencies and public facilities, such as childcare centers, schools, colleges and universities, health care facilities, and libraries, from collecting a person’s immigration status. It has not yet been signed into law.

Republicans pushed two two bills that would have required law enforcement officers to cooperate with immigration officials and undo Colorado’s “sanctuary” policies. Both failed in their first committee hearings.

The CBI scandal

The state’s growing backlog of rape test kits and other problems arising from a Colorado Bureau of Investigation forensic scientist’s mishandling of more than 1,000 DNA tests prompted lawmakers to tackle three bills.

Senate Bill 170 allows the CBI to use $3 million in rollover funds from the 2024-25 budget to work on the backlog, much of which is now being sent to third-party labs. According to lawmakers, a rape kit currently takes more than 550 days to process. Polis signed the bill on March 26.

Senate Bill 304 creates a board that would oversee responses to sexual assault issues, such as processing of rape kits and victim services. Labs must process kits within 60 days of receipt, and law enforcement must notify a victim every 90 days if they have not received those results. It has not yet been signed.

HB 1275 requires crime lab employees to report misconduct and allows defendants to seek post-conviction relief if their convictions are tied to lab misconduct. It is awaiting action from the governor.

A fourth bill is not directly tied to the CBI but has a connection to the rape kit backlog crisis. House Bill 1291 is intended to beef up consumer protections for those who use ride share companies, such as Lyft and Uber. One of the sponsors of HB 1291, Rep. Jenny Willford, D-Northglenn, said she sexually assaulted in February 2024 by a man who “borrowed” a Lyft platform from another driver; her rape kit was caught up in the backlog at the CBI. Her alleged attacker was charged last week with unlawful sexual contact. Willford was also a co-sponsor of SB 304. 

Willford is now suing Lyft over the assault. Uber, the other major ride-share platform, has threatened to leave Colorado if the bill is signed into law.

Business and labor

Labor and business fought perhaps the biggest battles this year.

They included a bill that sought to strike a key requirement before unions may negotiate to impose dues on non-union members, as well as the fight over tipped wages.

Sought by the restaurant industry, House Bill 1208, as introduced, would have allowed local governments to set minimum wages above the state threshold if they provided a tip offset of at least $3.02 per hour. The bill was watered down in the House to make that optional.

Restaurants pointed to closures, faced with rising costs and wages that exceed the state’s minimum wage, as among the reasons for the bill. 

The restaurant that supported the bill got one-star reviews and faced boycotts.

Meanwhile, Polis, the attorney general and the Senate sponsor of a 2024 law on artificial intelligence regulations in employment, health care, education and government vowed to come up with a fix to address concerns raised by the tech and investment industry. That 2025 measure landed with a thud at the Capitol just 10 days before the session ended. The fix to SB 24-205, as contained in SB 25-305, never happened.

The sponsor, Senate Majority Leader Robert Rodriguez, D-Denver, asked for the bill to be killed on May 5. That means businesses must comply with the 2024 measure that the governor signed “with reservations” by Feb. 1, 2026.

Polis has suggested a special session to address Medicaid cuts, which could also include a call for delaying the implementation date of the AI law.

A deal to allow Pinnacol Assurance to privatize and sell workers’ compensation insurance outside of Colorado failed to materialize. Lawmakers expressed skepticism about the deal, which would have required Pinnacol to pay the state hundreds of millions of dollars to get out from under state authority and pay for its pension obligations held by the Public Employees Retirement Association.

Finally, labor organizations are pressing the governor to sign Senate Bill 5, which seeks to repeal the 80-year-old requirement to hold an election to establish a “union security” agreement at an already unionized workplace. Under that law, once agreed to by the company and the labor group, non-union workers would be required to pay union fees.

At the start of the session, Polis said he wanted a compromise between business and labor. That never happened. Despite the governor saying he would veto it without the two sides striking such a deal, SB 5 went to the governor virtually unchanged from its introduced version.

The governor has not yet taken an official action on the measure.