As Sunshine Week 2026 draws to a close, it's worth measuring the distance between the ideal it represents and the reality of open government in Colorado.
The ideal is simple: public business is the public's business. In Colorado, those rights are enshrined in the Colorado Open Records Act and the Colorado Open Meetings Law, giving residents the legal right to request records and observe government conducting public business.
That right has never mattered more.
According to the Pew Research Center, just 22% of Americans now say they trust the federal government to do the right thing – down from 73% in 1958 and near the lowest reading in decades. Trust in the news media is similarly eroded, with Gallup reporting confidence in newspapers and television news has fallen to historic lows. When people trust neither government nor the institutions that cover it, access to public records becomes the foundation of an informed citizenry and a healthy democracy.
That foundation has real weaknesses the Colorado legislature has shown no urgency to fix. There is no meaningful penalty when a government body misses a CORA deadline. According to the Colorado Freedom of Information Coalition, the Court of Appeals ruled last year that CORA’s response deadlines are not enforceable in court, even when missed by months. A law without teeth is more suggestion than statute.
The administrative burden on governments is also real. Local agencies are processing record numbers of requests with limited staff and budgets. For three consecutive years, legislation has been introduced to extend response times from three working days to five. The sponsors argued – not unreasonably – that records custodians are overwhelmed. Two of La Plata County’s legislators – Sen. Cleave Simpson and Rep. Katie Stewart – supported Senate Bill 25-077, the most recent version.
But Gov. Jared Polis vetoed it, and his objections cut to the heart of why good intentions can become bad policy. The bill gave custodians too much power to define who qualifies as a journalist and created unequal timelines for identical requests. “All legitimate requests for public transparency under CORA should be treated equally under the law,” Polis wrote. The Herald’s editorial board agrees. The most recent version died in committee March 5 – a victory the Colorado Freedom of Information Coalition rightly celebrated.
The answer to administrative strain is better resourcing, not longer delays. The city of Durango deserves credit for purchasing a roughly $10,000 automated system that, according to City Clerk Faye Harmer, cuts processing time by half or more (Herald, March 15). Not every local government has that capacity, but Durango’s investment points toward the right solution.
Where the Legislature’s record becomes harder to defend is on open meetings. In 2024, Democrats passed Senate Bill 24-157, effectively exempting state lawmakers from open meetings requirements. The Colorado Freedom of Information Coalition said it permits “an endless series of sub-quorum discussions of pending legislation via emails, texts and phone calls” with no public notice or record. Gov. Polis signed it during Sunshine Week 2024. Legislators gave themselves a carve-out they would never extend to local governments and school boards.
The costs of secrecy are real. The ethics case against former Infrastructure Advisory Board member John Simpson turned, in part, on CORA (Herald, Jan. 14). A district court found Simpson violated the law when he withheld emails sought by the Herald and claimed his communications were immune from records requests. To date, the city has paid an estimated $177,379.81 in legal fees.
A bipartisan ballot initiative backed by the Independence Institute and the League of Women Voters of Colorado would insert a “fundamental right to know the affairs of government” into the state constitution (Colorado Newsline, March 15). If the Legislature won’t strengthen transparency from within, voters may mandate it from without – as Coloradans did in 1972 when they passed the original Sunshine Law.
The sun shines whether government welcomes it or not. Coloradans deserve representatives who welcome the light, not those who seek to dim it.
