Most years I send out an email about the measures on your ballot. This year I’m focusing on what NOT to vote for. The ballot is an exceptionally long one with 14 statewide measures plus city, county, and special district measures. In fact, there’s almost never been a longer ballot. The only time we’ve had a longer ballot was in 1912!
Many folks have asked why we seem to have so many measures on the ballot in recent years. And there’s actually a very clear answer.
Republicans and conservatives have found themselves in the political wilderness in Colorado over the past ten or so years. They don’t have a credible path towards regaining a legislative majority and—unless there’s a bigger exorcism vote than I’m aware of—they don’t have a shot at winning the Governor’s Office either. This has led their funders and supporters to resort to using the only tool left in their toolbox: ballot measures.
Many (if not all) of these measures are supported by far-right dark money groups like Advance Colorado and much of the funding has come from out of state. Keep in mind that these measures are written intentionally to mislead Democrat-leaning voters to approve what voters in a state like Colorado would otherwise never support. Some of these measures might touch upon an issue that does indeed warrant attention from our elected officials. But to hand over the pen to write the laws—let alone to enshrine them in our constitution—on some of the most important issues in our state is a recipe for unintended consequences and bad outcomes.
Of course, there are a few measures on your ballot that are not part of this set of politically cynical right-wing measures. I’m not going into those in detail here, but these measures (including 7A, NN, 137, and 87) are all measures that by law need to be voted on by the people because they’re tax-related.
