Between the Colorado House of Representatives and Senate 27 bills were scheduled for third and final readings on Tuesday as well as 13 receiving second readings.
The majority of the bills receiving a third reading in the Senate were held over until Wednesday while all but one, House Bill 1038, which bans corporal punishment in certain public settings, passed.
Included in the bills forwarded from the House to the Senate was the “ballot selfie” bill, which removes the criminal penalty for disclosing the content of an electoral ballot through posting picture to social media, and H.B. 1046 which updates references to persons with disabilities in current statutes.
Senate Bills 60 and 11 passed second reading and will receive a final reading in the coming days.
These bills are concerned with transferring the Colorado Student Leaders Institute to the jurisdiction of the Colorado Department of Higher Education and creating a forum to study and document the effect of advanced technology on transportation access for individuals with disabilities respectively.
Bills that were scheduled for second reading in the House were laid over until tomorrow after a lengthy debate over House Joint Resolution 1013 that requests the rescission of President Trump’s immigration ban.
Nine bills were scheduled for committee hearings including:
S.B. 7 – Repeal Ammo Magazine Prohibition – looks to remove the statute that limits magazines capacity to 15 bullets for private citizens unless they were manufactured and owned before July 1, 2013.
This bill was approved by the Senate State, Veterans and Military Affairs Committee on a 3-2 vote with Republicans voting to for Second Amendment rights.
“We are going to ask that you vote yes for the restoration of the Second Amendment for those millions and millions of innocent and law-abiding gun owners who just want the level playing field,” Sen. Vicki Marble, R-Fort Collins, said to Democrats on the committee.
Sen. Lois Court, D-Denver, said she respected Marble’s stance, but she would be following her constituencies desires.
“I know you’re doing what you know your people expect of you, that’s the beauty of representative government. We all represent our constituencies, and I feel very strongly that the vast majority of my constituents want me to vote no on this bill, so that’s what I’m going to do,” Court said.
This bill will be forwarded onto the full Senate for a second reading and debate
H.B. 1053 – Concerning Orders for Electronic Communications – will require government agencies to provide a warrant or court order when requesting any electronic communication from a communications or computing provider. It also calls for the agency to give notice to customers who have had electronic communications acquired.
Both of these requirements could be waived in extenuating circumstances such as “Risk of death or serious bodily injury to the named person or another person who is in the named person’s company.”
The bill was laid over for a vote until Feb. 9 so that issue with the bill could be resolved. Lawmakers are trying to resolve a situation in which coroners would have to obtain warrants under the original wording of the bill to access information on cellphones to discover identity and time and cause of death.
lperkins@durangoherald.com
