Get involved with crafting Blue Book language (no, you don't need to be an expert). Electrifying oil and gas, the not secret load on our grid. Colorado's Budget and Demography.
Get involved in the language that comes out in our state's 2024 Ballot Information Booklet (commonly called the "Blue Book").
You may not be aware (I wasn't until after last year's ballot was sent in), but you can participate in the writing of the Colorado Blue Book.
Let's talk how, then I want to tell you why I think that, regardless of your expertise on any topic, you should.
The first link below is to a flyer that covers the steps involved in writing Colorado's Blue Book: the who's where's, how's.
Start there and note that there are multiple ways to get engaged. You can not only monitor the language as it proceeds through various drafts, you can also participate by giving feedback.
Feedback here taking the form of either comments made during drafts, or with the process of the analysis itself.
To get involved, you need to first put yourself on the list so you can receive emails. That is the second link below. Click on it and then click on the button (see the attached screenshot) to sign up for updates.
You can choose to be involved in one or more of the referenda or initiatives that will be on the 2024 ballot. I myself chose all.
Why should you do this?
First, if you're an expert or involved in something, you need to add your voice to the conversation. For example, if you're a hunter (esp a big game hunter), you had better get on the list for the initiative prohibiting the hunting of big cats. Add your voice so that people hear more than just what the animal-rights people think.
What if you're not an expert? Well, let me rephrase, what if you THINK you're not an expert? I don't care if you're an expert. You should speak up. Let me explain why.
Voters across this state will be asked to decide on a variety of issues that they may or may not have a lot of familiarity with. What would be helpful to them?
Having someone, somewhere in this state ask the questions they would like an answer to of the people who write the Blue Book. That is, your contribution is in making the people who write the Blue Book address the questions that everyday people would ask.
For example, let's say you sign up to get information on Initiative 145 "Establish Qualifications and Registration for Veterinary Professional Associate". Maybe you know nothing about veterinary medicine or associates. You could read a draft, think what you'd want to know, and send those questions in for inclusion in draft two.
Join in. Speak up. Don't think of reasons why you can't, think of reasons why you can and should. Not an expert? Contribute a question. Short on time? Pick one issue and focus there.
Being upset at the direction of this state, being concerned about a particular ballot issue are both a good start, but they will not effect change. Things like this will.
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1GS__yss95vMrRrFxzSnZN5iMx6a7rt-R/view?usp=sharing
https://leg.colorado.gov/BallotAnalysis
It's not a secret, but it's not really something that gets discussed: our state is electrifying a lot of things and one of them is oil and gas.
I did a whole series of posts about the report that the Colorado Energy Office delivered to the Public Utilities Commission last Thursday.
I wanted to give a bit of a break before touching on one easily-overlooked detail. I linked to the presentation below again so you can see the source material.
One great big problem we'll have to solve as a state is how we will (somehow) get enough electrical capacity to reach our glorious electrified future.
Energy is conserved. If we switch off fossil fuels for heating and transportation, without a loss in our standard of living, we'll have to replace energy for energy. Take out 1 unit of gasoline combustion and you have to replace it with 1 unit of electrical energy.**
It's never been a secret, but there's another bit of energy that those running our state want to switch over to electric, yet another bit of energy our grid would have to make up.
Take a look at the screenshot attached. It's from that presentation. I highlighted what I mean in red and then showed where it is in the graph.
Our state intends to electrify the oil and gas infrastructure: drill rigs, compressors, pumps, all of it running on electric motors instead of combustion engines. As you can see by the ever-growing width of that yellow stripe, that this drain on our grid will start to rival that of electric vehicles and the dream of heat pumps.
Not a secret, but not talked about and obviously not something we can ignore. I hope someone, somewhere is laying aside a lot of electrical wire. Probably the companies that are quietly sitting aside while environmentalists are demanding a switch to renewables are just as quietly investing in electrification infrastructure.
As long as they can make money, they're happy to provide us with whatever expensive thoughtless policy the rabid enviros demand.
**Well, or do with less, something that I think may be coming whether we like it or not if we're to drop fossil fuels.
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1Ad7pjVpdk0bTmIqB49S9uCS3e-7ViCmY/view
Colorado's Budget and Demography
I received the sheet linked first below from the same reader that sent me a rundown on school finance (among other things -- see the second link below for that post if you want context).
I looked this one over and thought it would be worth looking at. As I did in the previous post, I want to note a couple things ...
--First, take note of the footnotes. This writer, like myself, likes to include the sources. If you want to learn more or are curious, check back into the sources.
--Second, there's a fair bit of social commentary in this. Not something I object to (it's what I do too), but just to be clear: my posting this here doesn't mean I agree with every statement made.
Having said that, let me go through the things that caught my eye.
Take a look at screenshot 1. It's the table from the sheet and has a good summary.
Note how the growth of government employees since the Democrats took control of all levers of power in the state has outpaced the growth of the population (red arrows). It is reasonable to assume that more people means more need for government services, but is it reasonable that the rate of growth would be 4X the population?
If you look at the portion highlighted in blue, you'll see how much more our state's revenues (which come from you and business in this state) have grown in that same time frame. Revenue has gone up 43% and spending 36%.
This meant an increased tax burden on individuals and families to the tune of 33% (see the green arrows).
Is this level of government growth and increase in spending (black arrow -- 34% growth) sustainable?
Again, reasonable to say that more people means more spending and more need. For example, more people is more cars on the road and that means more construction and maintenance.
But I ask you to think back 4 years. Are your roads better? Are our students doing better (ignore the horrible academic loss due to COVID)? When you interact with your government, at the DMV say, do you think it's gone smoother?**
We are paying more for (at least) the same outcomes since 2019.
**A quick bit of additional context here. HB24-1467, currently awaiting the governor's signature, and linked third below, would remove merit pay from the state employee system and replace it with a system where employees are paid based on time served not for improved performance or efficiency. See screenshot 2. Golly, put this with unionized state employees and we can't but come out with good service!
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1g9X7WdHpXM1VaFdF2ZrUj4uuXnll19IV/view
https://open.substack.com/pub/coloradoaccountabilityproject/p/denvers-immigration-problem-a-town?utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web
https://leg.colorado.gov/bills/hb24-1467#:~:text=The%20bill%20requires%20the%20director,office%20of%20the%20state%20auditor.