President (To Win Colorado)
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(D) Kamala Harris
(R) Donald Trump
80%↑
20%
CO-01 (Denver)
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(D) Diana DeGette*
(R) V. Archuleta
98%
2%
CO-02 (Boulder-ish)
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(D) Joe Neguse*
(R) Marshall Dawson
95%
5%
CO-03 (West & Southern CO)
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(R) Jeff Hurd
(D) Adam Frisch
52%↑
48%
CO-04 (Northeast-ish Colorado)
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(R) Lauren Boebert
(D) Trisha Calvarese
90%
10%
CO-05 (Colorado Springs)
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(R) Jeff Crank
(D) River Gassen
80%
20%
CO-06 (Aurora)
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(D) Jason Crow*
(R) John Fabbricatore
90%
10%
CO-07 (Jefferson County)
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(D) B. Pettersen
(R) Sergei Matveyuk
90%
10%
CO-08 (Northern Colo.)
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(D) Yadira Caraveo
(R) Gabe Evans
60%
40%
State Senate Majority
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DEMOCRATS
REPUBLICANS
80%
20%
State House Majority
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DEMOCRATS
REPUBLICANS
95%
5%
May 07, 2007 09:44 PM UTC
23 Comments
Bernie would be awesome. Curry, second place. Bernie for Gov in 2010!
I mean, Bernie for Gov in 2014! Maybe Ritter could make him Lt. Gov in 2010.
Analysis: Ritter, Penry succeed in ’07 legislative session
By MIKE SACCONE The Daily Sentinel
Tuesday, May 08, 2007
From the largest freshman class of lawmakers since Colorado’s statehood to a range of sweeping reforms passing to the governor’s desk, the 2007 legislative session is one for the books. But as the dust begins to settle beneath the Capitol’s golden dome, several lawmakers, public officials and interest groups emerged as clear success stories and nonstarters in this year’s session.
WINNERS
Gov. Bill Ritter – In his first five months in office, Ritter pushed through a sweeping reform of the Colorado Oil and Gas Conservation Commission and how the state funds public education. While the long-term impact of both proposals is unknown, the Capitol neophyte succeeded in both endeavors where Republican lawmakers, including former House Speaker Russ George, R-Rifle, and former Sen. Norma Anderson, R-Lakewood, had not.
While his proposal on freezing property-tax rates likely will cause some blow-back for moderate Democrats in 2008, Ritter’s plan will help prevent constitutionally mandated funding increases for K-12 education from consuming the entirety of the state budget after 2011. (In a memorable floor moment, House Speaker Andrew Romanoff, D-Denver, likened Amendment 23’s spending requirements to the “Pac-Man in our budget.”)
Ritter also succeeded in pushing through legislation doubling Colorado long-term renewable energy standards for public utilities.
The governor’s only speed bump came as he vetoed a bill that could have made it easier for unions to establish closed shops in Colorado.
Democrats and union backers who harkened back to Ritter’s campaign promise to sign just such a bill lambasted the governor, but Ritter said the process by which House Bill 1072 arrived on his desk was “overheated politics at its worst,” winning him allies on the Republican side of the aisle and in the business community.
Sen. Josh Penry – The freshman senator stepped toward the political center while still burnishing his conservative credentials throughout the session. Penry, a Fruita Republican, was one of the Senate lawmakers who brought the oil and gas industry back to the table on one of the most sweeping reforms of oil and gas regulation since 1994.
Prior to this peacemaking role, Penry had positioned himself in favor of Ritter’s plan to fund education by diverting federal mineral lease money.
But, when the governor’s plan shifted to freezing property-tax rates across the state to fund education, Penry joined the ranks of anti-tax crusaders.
Penry’s proposal to create statewide math and science graduation requirements also received broad bipartisan approval in the Senate before stalling in the House Education Committee. He has promised to resurrect the proposal next year.
Penry’s only significant stumble came as the Joint Budget Committee rejected his plan to allocate more than $45 million of transportation funds into capital construction.
Rep. Kathleen Curry – The 2007 session proved an invariable sea change for oil and gas industry regulation, including a measure recomposing the Colorado Oil and Gas Conservation Commission, giving surface-rights owners an avenue of recourse against mineral extractors and creating more transparency in mineral royalty transactions.
Curry succeeded in pushing through the session’s most sweeping oil and gas reforms despite rigid opposition from Republican lawmakers and the industry.
The Gunnison Democrat joked during a March 22 floor vote that she would “start working on water and not oil and gas” if her reforms made it through.
It seems she might get to take the General Assembly up on her promise next year.
Open records enthusiasts – With the signature of Senate Bill 45, the maximum that public agencies can charge per page of public records is 25 cents, down from $1.25.
That 80 percent drop in copying fees undoubtedly will make journalists and citizen watchdogs (and their wallets) happy for years to come.
LOSERS
Colorado’s rainy-day fund – Lawmakers, including Rep. Bernie Buescher, D-Grand Junction, were forced to choose between the creation of 43 new judgeships or doubling the state’s statutory reserve funds after an ultimatum from Senate Republicans.
At the end of the day, the rainy-day fund fell casualty to Republicans protecting transportation funding.
As a result, Colorado will have to wait at least another year to augment its savings from its current two weeks of operating expenses.
The guy cracks me up
I’ve sort of gotten the impression over the years that once you’re on the JBC, you’re stuck there. Not that it’s a bad place to be, since it deals with money, but do JBC members typically go on to leadership positions?
here on the western slope and throughout Colorado. He has great respect from both sides of the aisle for his nonpartisan, what is good for Colorado approach to governing. I’m sure there have been overtures from our local Republican party to flip him at some point. He is that good. But he is also a principled man. And knowing that the Mesa County Republican Party has been usurped by extremist insurgents, I’m certain an honorable man like Bernie would have nothing to do with them.
Bernie stands in stark contrast to the mean-spirited extremist ideologues like Janet Rowland and Josh Penry. He defeated the likes of Shari Bjorklund who told us she would put her religious beliefs ahead of the needs of western Colorado voters. And he did it in a heavy Republican district. Make no mistake, there are intelligent, respectable, sane Republicans here. They have just fell asleep at the wheel and allowed their party to be hijacked by these extremists.
We can tell by the press releases put out by Wadhams and posts here that they are making a concerted effort to rehabilitate the image of Josh Penry, painting him as more of a moderate than the extremist he truly is because their bench is so paltry and Republicans have little to offer for our future. No one should fall for their ploy. Hell, it was only a few short months ago that Republican Governor Bill Owens was writing our local newspaper in an admonishment to Penry and pointing out how badly he misrepresents facts. And now they want us to think that Penry is their future? You better start earning your paycheck, Wadhams, instead of trying to feed us garbage.
I will and did support honest Republicans like Gayle Berry who worked for our community and were not wed to extremist ideology like Penry, Rowland, Bjorklund and Meis are. Until our local Republicans stand up to these extremists and Wadhams starts an honest attempt to restore sanity to the state party, expect Colorado voters to give you what you deserve.
Bernie Buescher is not only a decent man who would make a great Speaker of the House should he so chose but he would also be an outstanding gubernatorial candidate after Governor Ritter’s eight years pass. All this of course, in my humble opinion.
Then the Dems will be in good shape. I’m Rep, but I like/appreciate that Romanoff is not always a partisan Dem. The day Dems have a leftie nut as speaker is the day they start to loose their majority
Let’s see a robust resurgence of these people:
“Make no mistake, there are intelligent, respectable, sane Republicans here. They have just fell asleep at the wheel and allowed their party to be hijacked by these extremists.”
Penry the “right wing idealouge”, come on guys, your material used to be better than that. He was insturmental in the oil and gas deal that was struck late in the legislative session and key to the defeat of Ref. C and D in Mesa County. Given where Penry and Buescher were on Ref. C who is more in touch with Mesa County voters? You are right, Bernie is fortunate that the Republican party here can’t seem to nominate good candidates for HD 55, but to pick off Bernie all it would take is a moderately good R to step up and Penry on radio and TV picking BB a part just like he did to Ref. C. The Sentinel called Penry Colorado’s next Governor so they had to give Bernie the same patronage…ignore the rag all together I say! Bernie beware! Your vote to raise my property taxes could have sealed the deal for your honeymoon to end.
Get a grip. It has been law for a long time. What’s next? Whimper and moans about that law which gave women the right to vote a few years back? Josh “junior Tony Soprano” Penry couldn’t even come up with a viable alternative to Ref C. Like you, all he could do was whine and snivel and make a fool of himself. It is easy to throw temper tantrums like “junior T.S.” did. The real test of character is in coming up with solutions like Gov. Owens, Buescher and Ron Teck did. Penry can slobber all over himself as much as he wants. But he is still clueless when it comes to solutions. I know that uber-con extremists like you and Penry will not be happy until you see children begging in the streets and dictators running things. But just because you and “junior T.S.” wanted to turn Colorado into the Bangladesh of the United States does not mean the sane people of our state swallow your myopic extremism.
It is good to see you contradicting Wadhams and confirming WST’s post that Penry is in no way a moderate. But, your misquoting of what the Daily Sentinel said is a sorry attempt at spin. The paper did not call for Penry to be Colorado’s next Governor. He is more like the lunatic fringe’s pick for Governor. But please, please, please do run him against Ritter in ’10. Penry lacks the cojones for it first of all. But just like you uber-cons were touting Janet Rowland as the savior of the lunatic fringe last year, after Colorado voters see Penry for the extremist he is, he will meet the same political demise as Rowland. Will Janet Rowland be Penry’s campaign manager again? We can only hope so.
Ditto. Penry is so full of himself. He’ll get at least his own vote if he runs against John Salazar, but would lose big time.
Isn’t she running herself next year for Mesa County Animal Control Dept. Director? Gotta work on preventing that inter-species mating……
Well put.
He works hard. He’s smart. He is moderate. He works to make Colorado a better place. As a Democrat in a very conservative district, he has learned well to steer to the middle of the road. His experiences prior to becoming a legislator are the main reasons he has done so well. Working in the Romer administration (As the State Fair Director and as the Director of the Dept. of Health Care Policy and Financing), he learned a lot about politics. He also has had a lot of good business experience on the Western Slope.
Hate to break it to you Garcia, experience matters. No 21 year old legislator could do what Buescher has done. Period.
Get a grip folks!
Bernie had the campaign of his life having to out-spend (nearly 4-1) his no-name, stumbling, bumbling opponent who had no money and no name recognition. In addition, Bernie was in trouble during the worst GOP election year in history. You add the fact that he just supported a tax increase with the fact that a VERY VERY well know Mesa County Republican is committed to running against him next cycle, and Bernie has some serious baggage to overcome let along becoming speaker.
I heard the same thing, Chad. My brother-in-law lives in GJ and he told me that he’s had a couple of conversations with someone that is indeed a VERY, VERY credible candidate to run against ol’ Bernie. Remember what happened last cycle. Bernie ran against a bumbling bafoon in the best election year for democrats in decades — and ran scared the entire race. Get ready, Bernie. You’re about to regret that vote on hiking our property taxes.
My husband and I go to the same church as Bernie and his wife. Most people we talked to found the front picture embarassing and over-the-top. But if Colo Pols is going to make a fuss about the Sentinel talking about Bernie being a leader, how about when GJDS talks about PENRY BEING GOV??!!
GRAND JUNCTION DAILY SENTINEL
Penry beginning to look like his presidential icon
Sunday, April 22, 2007
Some of the most interesting insights into what makes any aspirant for public office tick are often found in the old newspaper trope of a political personality profile.
That’s the hoary journalistic convention in which candidates are asked such miscellany as their most embarrassing moment, their proudest accomplishment, their favorite book, their favorite adult beverage, their favorite musician, you name it.
After all, any voter who doesn’t find something very instructive between Candidate A, who professes a fondness for Barry Manilow as his or her favorite musician, and Candidate B, whose preference is for Bob Dylan, probably shouldn’t be allowed to go near a voting booth.
In a profile published during the run-up to last November’s election, then-Senate candidate Josh Penry averred that his favorite president was none other than Theodore Roosevelt.
I considered Penry’s admiration for Teddy Roosevelt surprising, inasmuch as the 26th president’s activist “national greatness” agenda and seminal role in founding the modern conservation movement had fallen out of favor with most contemporary Republicans, John McCain and a handful of others excluded.
Let’s put aside TR’s conservationist bona fides for the moment. Roosevelt’s other distinguishing characteristic was how he came to embody energy and dynamism in public office, particularly the executive. As far as those personality traits go, Penry, a former small-college All-American quarterback who ran up and down the gridiron with as much brio as TR and the Rough Riders galloping up San Juan Hill, is a mirror image of his presidential idol. One need not agree with a single one of Penry’s policy positions to recognize that.
After last week, Penry is beginning to look a lot more like Teddy Roosevelt in another major sense. Namely, Penry is suddenly among a very few number of Republicans in the Colorado Statehouse who are willing to act as champions for the same type of conservationist values that Roosevelt championed 100 years ago.
Whudda thunk it? Non moi. That the most sweeping overhaul of the Colorado Oil and Gas Conservation Commission in the state’s history – an overhaul designed to make the regulatory body something other than a rubber stamp for industry – is destined soon for Gov. Bill Ritter’s desk can be attributed, in large part, to Penry.
While many of his GOP comrades in the Statehouse reacted in horror to a COGCC overhaul bill proposed by new Department of Natural Resources Director Harris Sherman – some going so far as to utter such brain-dead cliches as, “We shouldn’t kill the goose that laid the golden egg” – Penry recognized the need to broaden non-industry representation on the commission. Penry quickly seized upon the opportunity to become the GOP point person in modifying Sherman’s original COGCC overhaul bill in a way that the bill would garner bipartisan support and, if not the support of Kathy Hall and the oil and gas boys, industry’s official neutrality.
Sherman said last week after the revised bill was passed unanimously out of a Senate committee, “Josh was very instrumental in fashioning a compromise … He’s cooperative and creative.”
Sherman, a longtime Democratic power broker who is more than twice the age of the 31-year-old Fruita lawmaker, also expressed an admiration for Penry’s ability to distill an effective message into a three- or four-word, catch phrase or sound byte that virtually everyone can understand and, more often than not, agree with.
“He’s very good at that,” said Sherman.
Penry said last week he is looking forward to voting for the COGCC overhaul bill once it comes before the full Senate. However, he stressed that he took Ritter and Sherman at their word that the Democratic administration has no desire to unduly burden the state’s oil and gas industry. He said he intends to watch the implementation of HB 1341 very carefully.
“For me,” said Penry, “it’s the old Reagan axiom of ‘trust but verify.’ ” He added, “I’m in a position in the Senate to confirm the new (COGCC) commissioners. I am going to take that responsibility very seriously.”
Although he remains fundamentally a conservative Republican, Penry’s short performance thus far in the Senate suggests that today he is much less ideologically focused, as he was during one term as the 54th House District representative, and much more problem focused.
Given the weak bench strength of the Colorado GOP these days, Penry is destined to be among the presumptive GOP frontrunners for governor if Ritter completes a second term seven years from now. In 2014, Penry will be in his late 30s, still relatively young, but no more so than Dick Lamm in the late 1970s.
Besides, Penry’s favorite president, at 42 years and 322 days, remains the youngest occupant of the White House.
holding tea and crumpet brunches is too funny. We need legislators who can formulate solutions and not Martha Stewarts. Playing metrosexual on the cell phone when all the neuron work has already been done is nothing to tout.
I guess we could post all the editorials about how Penry got his “Tony Soprano” nickname but everyone already knows how Penry got his skirt in a wad after a reporter published truths about Penry that he did not want printed. Or we could print the recent D.S. editorial about Penry feigning movement away from his extremist ideology. Or we could reprint Governor Owens’ article that was so critical of Penry. But as the above post has already bored us, we won’t. Republicans think The Daily Sentinel is a yellow rag anyway. So, how about just a little blurb from Colorado’s leading conservative news outlet? From ToTheRight:
PENRY GETS DIRTY
July 22, 2006
“State Rep. Josh Penry,В R-Grand Junction,В has been a strong conservative, but his decision to go negative, hisВ seemingly malicious motives for runningВ and whom he chooses to associate with make it impossible for us to support him in his primaryВ contest with his predecessor, former state Rep. Matt Smith. Penry’s recent public attacks on Smith and former Congressman Scott McInnis only serve to reaffirm our opposition to Penry.”
I guess everyone can tell that Penry is not a Reagan Republican. Speaking ill of fellow Republicans is just part of his “Penry before everyone ego.”
Doesn’t it just fill your eyes with tears that little Joshy wants to be like Teddy if he ever grows up. Of course, we won’t tell him that he can never be like Mr. Roosevelt because even when our nation is begging for young men to serve our country in the military, Penry refuses. He won’t serve in our military even though he supports Bush’s failed Iraq policies. The chickenhawk approach worked for Beauprez for so long, why shouldn’t Penry follow his example? But hey, maybe Joshy can get that feeling of charging up San Juan Hill by donning a fringed Cowboy Bob outfit and skipping up Riggs Hill south of town on his stick horse.