May 15, 2015 11:25 AM UTC

Get More Smarter on Friday (May 15)

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• by: Colorado Pols

“When the wolf is trying to get in, you gotta stand in the doorway.” RIP B.B. King. 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…

► Work on the debacle of a project at the VA Hospital site in Aurora may stall after Congress failed to come to agreement on a plan to fund construction yesterday. Once again, we remind you, that Congressman Mike Coffman (R-Aurora) is the Chairman of the House Veterans’ Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations. Maybe he’ll actually do something about this…some day.

► U.S. Education Secretary Arne Duncan finished a two-day visit to Colorado on Thursday.

► State Senator Ellen Roberts has been floating her name for U.S. Senate or CD-3. She’s also trying to draw on pro-choice credentials that she no longer possesses.

Get even more smarter after the jump…

IN CASE YOU ARE STANDING NEAR A WATER COOLER…

► Governor John Hickenlooper is resisting calls to fire Reggie Bicha, the Colorado Director of Human Services. From the Denver Post:

Gov. John Hickenlooper defended his Human Services director Thursday in the face of a no-confidence letter signed by more than 80 lawmakers, saying the Cabinet member has as “tough a job as there is.”

Hickenlooper’s office released a four-page rebuttal to the letter, which called on him to “correct or replace” the highest levels of leadership because of problems in child welfare, youth prisons and programs for people with disabilities and mental illness.

In his response to lawmakers, Hickenlooper made clear he has no plans to replace executive director Reggie Bicha. Instead, he said he intends “to continue with executive director Bicha to innovate and improve” Human Services.

We’ll agree with Hickenlooper on at least one point here: Directing the Department of Human Services is absolutely one hell of a tough job.

► Gov. Hickenlooper was in Fort Collins on Thursday to sign a handful of bills and tout the area’s renewable energy industry; along the way, Hickenlooper also talked about the prospects of expanding I-25. In Western Colorado on Wednesday, Hickenlooper signed SB-282, which provides tax incentives for economic development in rural Colorado.

► The Colorado State Board of Education continues to be very screwy, as the Denver Post explains:

The state Board of Education grudgingly agreed Thursday to let high-school seniors know how they did on state science tests they took last fall but took the unorthodox step of barring education department officials from crunching the data to compare districts and schools.

After putting it off for two months, the board set so-called cut scores on the tests, grouping student results into four categories starting with “distinguished” and bottoming out at “limited command.”

But the board refused to establish those tiers on social studies exams — even though state statute requires it — or release those results.

The majority of board members have grave concerns about the validity of the tests and the impression the results will leave.

U.S. Education Secretary Arne Duncan, who was visiting Colorado this week, said he had never heard of a state failing to establish tiers on these exams. Yay! We’re first…at not doing that?

► Veto predatory lender legislation, consumer groups tell Governor John Hickenlooper.

► Taxable income from marijuana sales continues to show strong increases.

► The mother of Denver Mayor Michael Hancock asked that her name be removed from a list of endorsements for a candidate in District 11.

► There was plenty of emotional testimony on Day 13 of the Aurora Theater Shooting Trial.