Selected Good Government Reforms For Colorado

I Voted.

Today, I cast my Denver primary ballot (by mail). 

There are only two contested races. There was a very marginal challenge to our incumbent Democratic Congresswoman of many years, in which I supported incumbent Diana DeGette, and there was a race between two candidates for CU-Regent for our Congressional Democrat, in which I voted for Johnnie Nguyen, a former employee of mine (he worked for me only briefly, but he's a good guy, even though is opponent is also a good person).

Selected State and Local Good Government Reforms

This makes it as good as time as any for my periodic call for select good government reforms to Colorado's electoral system.

One reform that I strongly favor is reducing the number of elected offices and shortening the ballot, in order to reduce the informational burden on voters and the risk of bad decision making in low profile elections about which there is little information and about which partisan politics should play a smaller role.

Fewer Ordinary Elected Officials

State Offices

If I had my way, all of the following state offices, which are now elected offices, would be appointed offices:

1. Colorado Secretary of State (this would be a civil service appointment)

2. Colorado State Treasurer (this would be a civil service appointment)

3. Colorado Attorney General (this would be a political appointment of the Governor not subject to legislative approval) (if any of these offices were to remain elected, this would probably be the best one to retain as an elected post as it creates a de facto independent prosecutor, but an attorney general who structurally owes full loyalty to the Governor as an employee at will, when the Governor is already the AG's chief client representative in an attorney-client relationship with the state anyway, and AG is still a hard post for voters to evaluate well).

4. Colorado State School Board (a state board appointed by the state officials with a say in funding the system would be better)

5. University of Colorado Regents (a state board appointed by the state officials with a say in funding the system would be better)

This would leave a Governor-Lieutenant Governor ticket, the State Senate, and the State House as the only statewide elected offices. Vacancies in these offices would be filled in the same manner that they are now.

As is the case now, state house elections would be held every two years, state senators would be elected to four year terms half every two years, and the Governor-Lieutenant Governor ticket election would be held in midterm years.

Local Offices

If I had my way, all of the following local offices, which are now elected offices, would be appointed offices:

1. County Coroner (this office, in addition to being a civil service appointment, rather than elected, should be transferred from county government to state government since small counties don't have the resources to have an adequate coroner's office).

2. County Clerk and Recorder (it would be a civil service position)

3. County Treasurer (it would be a civil service position)

4. County Assessor (it would be a civil service position)

5. County Surveyor (it would be a civil service position)

6. County Sheriff (it would be a political appointment of the county elected officials) (if any of these offices were to remain elected, this would probably be the best one to retain as an elected post since it is not merely ministerial and citizens are fairly well informed about it, but the virtues of having elected officials who can fire a bad sheriff quickly outweigh the benefits of giving citizens an independent say in an election to this post).

I would also make the board of county commissioner have five members elected on a non-partisan basis from single member equal population districts elected to four year terms in midterm elections, rather than three elected at large (typically to four year terms with two in off years and one in on years), since three member parties elected at large aren't that democratic, in all counties that are not city and county governments and don't have such small populations that districts don't make sense. A five member board limits the harm that can be done by any one bad board member.

This would leave county commissioners and district attorneys as the only local county or judicial district elected offices, and district attorneys as the only partisan local government officials.

I would retain non-partisan Regional Transportation District elections, city council elections, mayoral elections, and city auditor elections.

Elected special district offices other than local school boards (discussed below) would be reviewed on a case by case basis. There aren't many such offices now, but I think that I have omitted a few, and I'm not familiar with all of them. Special district elections would be held in midterm general elections (without primaries) and would be non-partisan. 

Municipal elections would be held at a time separate from the general and midterm elections (as they are in Denver) and would be non-partisan, so that public attention would not be distracted from them.

Vacancies in these offices would be filled in the same manner that they are now.

Local School Boards

I would replace public school boards elected by the general public with school boards elected by the parents or guardians of students on a one student, one vote basis. The have better access to information, more reason to pay attention, and ultimately the schools impact their children more than anyone else. Local school board elections have historically been low information races which makes for bad decision making by voters.

All property tax funding of local school boards would end, and public Pre-K through 12 education would be entirely state funded. As a result of funding being handled by the state, voter participation in tax levies and debt offerings by school boards would end as well

Direct Democracy

I would end the requirement for public votes to retain revenues earned under existing tax laws under TABOR. TABOR refunds of excess revenues would be replaced with rainy day fund contributions for the taxing entity.

In general, I would retain citizen legislative initiatives on the basis that they are allowed now. But, I would end the ability of initiatives (as opposed to referendums referred by elected officials) to impose new taxes, limit taxing authority, authorize new spending, or limit the authority of elected officials to spend, although initiatives could de facto cause governments to incur de minimus new spending to administer a basically non-fiscal measure.

I would end ability to petition to put newly passed legislation up for vote as a ballot issue if the body passing it did not refer it to the voters in the first place.

I would retain the ability to have citizen proposed constitutional amendments or local charter amendments, although they would be harder to pass than legislative initiatives as they are under the status quo. 

But, I would transfer a significant share of matters set forth in the state constitution to statutes, and a significant share of matters set forth in most municipal charters to municipal ordinances, to reduce the scope of matters that amend the state constitution and municipal charts requiring voter approval, so that voters don't have to vote on administrative and "house keeping" charter amendments and constitutional amendments any more than absolutely necessary.

Citizen approved initiatives would require supermajority legislation to modify for the first four years (reducing the incentive to propose constitutional or charter amendments merely to protect them from immediately legislative modification). 

End Recall Elections

I would end recall elections in all non-municipal posts. 

This is something that is made more desirable and workable by the fact that the only non-legislative, multimember board elected officials above the municipal level would be the Governor, Lieutenant Governor, and District Attorneys. All twenty-five of these officials could be impeached by the state legislature. 

District attorneys could also be removed from office by attorney regulation officials of the Colorado Supreme Court if a DA's license to practice law was suspended or a DA was disbarred for ethics violations. But giving elected DAs who have acted ethically slightly more insulation from public opinion when enforcing the laws is a good thing.

Elections happen often enough for legislative body officials, usually every two year or four years, to make them unnecessary in such bodies (as opposed to situations when there is an elected executive branch official accountable to no one). 

The Colorado House and Colorado Senate, respectively, can also expel members by supermajority vote for misconduct.  

Recalls for municipal and special district offices would be governed by municipal charters or state law, but not by the state constitution. I would be inclined to allow recalls of these officials under the relevant default state laws, as these recalls are much more manageable and less burdensome on the overall electorate, and the risk of a bad slate of officials in a very small municipality or special district is much greater in practice.

Judicial Retention And Removal.

I would end judicial retention elections, which voters routinely complain that they are not qualified to vote in for lack of adequate information, which remove very few judges (on the order of 1% or less). Usually judges can be removed in cases that lead to non-retention by other means anyway.

Retention elections could be triggered for any judge, by the state legislature, with a simple majority of both houses in the Colorado General Assembly required by not approval by the Governor, and in the case of a trial court judge, a majority vote of county legislative bodies with a majority by population in the district served would also be required. These triggers, if met, would simply put a retain or not retain issue on the ballot for a judge which voters would weigh in upon, and could only be done at the time when retention elections are held now. 

Recall petitions would not be allowed for judges, although state level impeachment would still be an option. I would also strengthen judicial ethics oversight body powers, and would allow this body (subject to appeal to the Colorado Supreme Court), or a 5 out of 7 judge supermajority of Colorado Supreme Court of its own initiative, to remove any lower court judges. Judges could also be removed by impeachment.

I would require all judges to be attorneys, but would grant the four remaining sitting county court judges who are not lawyers admission to the bar by special legislation. It could be that some of them have already retired.

Municipal Courts And Local Ordinance Authority

I would abolish municipal courts, vesting all jurisdiction that they had in county courts. Municipalities hire and fire their own judges to not give rise to sufficient judicial independence. Municipal parking violation bureaus which are not currently handled by municipal courts anyway, could continue, subject to county court review.

I would also end the authority of municipalities and local governments to create ordinances punishable by incarceration, something that would then only be possible for violations of state laws, although a few state laws might need to be added to the state criminal code to address offenses now covered primarily by municipal ordinances where incarceration is really appropriate.

Fines for violations of traffic laws would be payable primarily to the state government, with only a small amount of such fines remitted to local government in amount only sufficient to cover all or most of the actual costs of traffic law enforcement.

Election Administration Details

Overall, the way Colorado elections are run is a national model, but I would make some modest changes.

I would have postage prepaid for all mail in ballots.

I would discontinue the process of putting uncontested races on ballots, allowing voters to focus more easily on what they really had to decide.

I would create a create a government office in every county charged with maximizing voter registration. 

Prison inmates should be counted for redistricting purposes as residents of the place they were before being incarcerated, not where the prison is located.

Redistricting would be limited to Congress, State Senate (but see my proposal below), State House, and County Commissioner posts (excluding municipal and special district offices), which isn't that much different from the status quo.

In all single member district elections (federal, state and local), I would require a majority of the votes validly cast for a candidate to win, with a runoff of the top two candidates if no candidate received a majority.

Ballots would be much shorter, and would be limited to higher information races (in most cases, with partisan label cues that are sufficient for most voters to make a choice by themselves). This would probably increase voter turnout, would increase voter participation in races on the ballot as opposed to leaving them blank, and would reduce vote counting disputes and voter error.

In Presidential election year general elections, in addition to the Presidential race there would be one to two federal offices, and one or two state legislative offices for a total of three to five candidate races (only some of which would be close) following up to five partisan primary election races. 

In midterm election year general elections, there would be one to two federal offices, the Governor's race, the DAs race, one non-partisan county commissioner's district race (outside consolidated cities and counties),  and possibly one non-partisan special district race, for a total of three to five candidate races (only some of which would be close) following up to four partisan primary races. 

There would also be in even year general elections citizen initiatives (state legislative and constitutional amendments and county legislative initiatives) and referred measures (constitutional or tax or debt related), all of which tend to increase public interests. 

Municipal ballot issues (legislative initiatives, and tax and debt referred measures, and initiated and referred charter amendments) would be on the ballot at the time of municipal elections (perhaps in odd year general election times). Other ballot issues would appear on the ballot only at general elections every two years.

Party List State Senate Representation Considered

Personally, I'd like to replace single member district state senate elections with a proportional representation, party-list based election for the entire state senate at once every four years in an off year  election (ending that opportunity for gerrymandering and making third-parties much more viable since they'd need only about 3% of the vote to get at least one seat). It would also shorten the Presidential election year ballot and create more interest in otherwise duller midterm elections.

But that might be too bold relative to the other innocuous good government reforms already suggested.