What can we do to make Colorado a better state, with a better functioning government? That question is central to the nonprofit organization Building a Better Colorado. The group, which is also carefully nonpartisan, is traveling the state and plans to meet in 30 to 40 cities over the next few months asking residents for their takes on issues important to Colorado.
On Monday, the group was in Durango, and a couple of the ideas that emerged from its session are interesting. Chief among them is changing Colorado’s term limits from eight years to 12.
Building a Better Colorado drew more than 30 local people to its meeting at the rec center. Topics included constitutional spending mandates, Colorado’s changing demographics and the cost of health care.
The discussion was not limited to term limits. Also proposed was the ingenious idea of requiring two distinct votes of the people to amend the state’s Constitution. Regardless of whether they are being looked at from a left- or right-wing position, a great many of Colorado’s problems have stemmed from the ease with which its Constitution can and has been amended.
That is particularly true in that there is no requirement that a proposed amendment would either directly repeal or work with an existing provision. The relationship between the TABOR amendment and Amendment 23 are a case in point.
But term limits affect all government all the time. And there is little or no evidence they do any good.
There is quite a bit to suggest they are at least potentially harmful to good government. Consider just a couple of local examples: State Sen. Ellen Roberts and District Attorney Todd Risberg. Both are term-limited. Risberg will leave office after next year’s election. Roberts was re-elected last year, but when the Legislature reconvenes after the 2018 election, it will be without her – regardless of what she wants to do and in complete disregard of what the voters might wish.
Whether either Risberg or Roberts would want to continue is beside the point. (And most emphatically, this has nothing to do with the merits of Christian Champagne, who has announced his candidacy to succeed Risberg.)
Term limits were enacted in response to dissatisfaction with government and, in particular, with Congress, where powerful congressmen and influential senators can hold office for decades. But they also assume that taking elective office involves little or no learning curve, that a citizen can simply take office and get things done.
But just try to understand the state’s budgetary process, parliamentary maneuvering or the intricacies of school finance. It cannot be done quickly. Nor can learning the idiosyncrasies, ideological weaknesses or personal strengths of all the other players. How much more effective might a senator be in the last four years of a 12-year stretch than in the first?
And how much might a district attorney learn over eight years about the real-world impacts of different policies? What might be the value of being able to tweak those policies accordingly over another four years?
Doing away with term limits entirely is probably not possible politically. And it may not be wise. Even the possibility of life tenure really is a bad idea.
But raising the term limit from eight years to 12 could buy the state a wealth of knowledge at little cost. Some turnover is valuable, but experience can be, too.
