The Right to Repair extended to Ag Equipment, The First Lot of Education Bills for the CO Assembly, and Another Run at TABOR (for the children of course).
And a bonus on the TABOR one.
The right to repair tractors.
I am not sure if you were aware, but John Deere (and possibly other manufacturers) had made things such that farmers and independent mechanics could not work on their own equipment.
The ability to work on things yourself, or take them to a third-party shop, can be vital things to making farming affordable. I don't run a farm myself, but I can tell you from personal experience that life would be much harder for me if I were not able to work on things myself. DIY is a hobby, but it's also a financial necessity for my current budget.
For farmers and ranchers, this is much more the case; it's could be survival of their operation due to either cost or the logistical difficulty and downtime to take equipment to an authorized dealership.
Couple bits of news on this front.
The first link below details how a farming group recently reached an agreement with John Deere to allow farmers and third-party shops to get access to the things they need to repair John Deere tractors. This one's been a long time coming and I was glad to see it.
Closer to the home front a bipartisan group of Colorado legislators have introduced a bill to solidify the "right to repair" ag equipment regardless of manufacturer here in Colorado (this follows a bill last session to allow same for electric wheelchairs).
If you wanted to advocate on the bill, I included a link under the 9News story.
I think I might speak up on this on myself.
https://www.9news.com/article/news/nation-world/john-deere-tractors-right-to-repair/507-703aae46-2621-45be-9275-232cc09852b7
https://leg.colorado.gov/bills/hb23-1011
The first education bills of the Assembly Session.
Not much to write here. I happened upon the article below which gives links and a brief summary of some of the first education bills to pop up in the Assembly Session.
If education is a passion of yours, give them a look and share with any others that might also be interested.
There was not much here, frankly, that caught my eye either way. There were a couple I thought worthy of special mention on my part though (if you find one in there that sparks a reaction, please feel free to share in the comments).
SB23-003 linked second below was noteworthy to me because I have a soft spot in my heart for non-traditional students (and this includes non-traditional HIGH SCHOOL students). I do have some minor concerns about the cost of the program and that it provides a whole lot of things not directly related to education, but I think that, on balance, it's a worthy bill. Since it's bi-partisan with a well-known Repulican sponsor, I don't think it'll suffer too much trouble and thus I don't think I will spend my finite time supporting it. I.e. I think it'll do fine on its own.
SB23-008 is somewhat similar. I like the idea that students will be part of the process of standards setting, but I'm a little concerned about the process. In particular, I want to make sure that there is geographic diversity enforced in the choice of students appointed (two students are chosen by the Commissioner of Education).
As I understand it (see the screenshot) there is a suggestion to make it such that one student on the board is from an urban area and one rural, but this is not a requirement (and there is no mention of which "rural" area--Aspen's a far cry from Yuma).
This I think might be one I advocate on because of this concern. I've had enough of boards being stuffed by Front Range Progressives and we need more than a suggestion as to who's appointed if this is to take place.
Updates on that as I have them.
https://co.chalkbeat.org/2023/1/10/23549275/2023-first-education-bills-colorado-general-assembly
https://leg.colorado.gov/bills/sb23-003
https://leg.colorado.gov/bills/sb23-008
One more on education, but this time it's taking away TABOR refunds "for the children".
Two assembly Democrats (see the article below) are supposedly coming out with a referred measure** to ask voters to waive future TABOR refunds and dump the money into the pockets of the education bureaucracy, oops, I mean to teachers. You know, for the children. Just like every other increase has been. You know how we continue to pay more and more into schools and see no proportionate increase in achievement.
I've been on record more than once saying that I'm open to revisiting how we fund education and teachers. What I am not a supporter of is tossing more money into the machine. We've done that. It's not working.
The money we spend needs to be better targeted than what we've tried so far.
I'm going to add this one to my list of things to watch and will update as I have something to share.
One last thing. Something for the "irony that's richer than cream" file. To quote the article:
"Kipp and other Democrats who support the legislation, which is expected to be introduced as soon as this week, will also likely be called hypocrites since they celebrated TABOR refunds last year ahead of the November election. Polis held multiple news conferences during which he enthusiastically publicized the checks Colorado sent to taxpayers. Kipp even voted for a bill the legislature passed in 2022 facilitating the refunds and making them a flat rate as opposed to being tied to income levels as prescribed in law. The bill also prompted the state to pay out the checks in August and September rather than in April 2023, which is when they would normally be distributed."
**In case you're not familiar: a referred measure is when the Assembly writes a law that will go on the ballot for voters' approval. It need not have the Governor's signature to make the ballot and the Democrats easily have enough votes to get it sent to the ballot.
https://coloradosun.com/2023/01/11/colorado-tabor-refunds-education-funding/
AND THE BONUS:
Related: an op ed on the proposed referendum.
A quote: "Colorado Democrats campaigned as fiscal conservatives and TABOR advocates and won. Now, with their power over state government secure, they are wasting no time in once again reversing course on TABOR and stabbing taxpayers in the back."
Remember when they did this with Oil and Gas?
https://pagetwo.completecolorado.com/2023/01/13/murrey-taxpayers-bill-of-rights-refunds-in-democrats-crosshairs/