The Get More Smarter Podcast - A Weekly Show About Colorado Politics
Oct 5, 2026 · 28 min · 15 segments
Send us a message! Really! This week in a special episode of the Get More Smarter podcast, we run through every one…
Ian SilveriiHostJason BaneHost
One is through the normal legislative process, where 120 days a year from January to May, the House and Senate gets together and deliberates and debates and puts things through committees and through public hearings on the floor of each chamber, and then they go to the governor, and the governor either signs it or vetoes it or lets it become law without a signature.
This is a contemplative process that allows experts and witnesses to come in and bipartisanship to take place, and folks who don't necessarily disagree on things get together and hammer out a deal to make good policy.
The other way, and Colorado is all too familiar with this, is through the ballot.
Now, there have been some very good ballot initiatives that Jason and I have supported over the years.
Like for instance, 2022's Free School Meals initiative or the Paid Family Leave initiative or the minimum wage.
In fact, this year I'm working on one of the initiatives that will be on your ballot to change the way Colorado's tax system works by creating a graduated income tax so that people who are making a ton of money pay a little bit more, everybody else gets a tax cut, and we get more money for the things we all care about, like schools, childcare, and healthcare.
They didn't bring them all, but they bring a lot of them to try and use the ballot as an end run around the legislature because they just can't win elections in Colorado anymore, and that's a lot of what's going on here.
13 of them came through the, quote-unquote, "citizen-initiated process," but six of them were from the billionaire initiative process, and we'll talk about those in a little bit.
There was one referral, so the legislature actually put a measure on the ballot.
That's Prop NN, and you can tell as a voter which one the legislative referred-- legislature referred, because those have letters, and which ones people put on the ballot, because those are numbers.
About 14-- Actually exactly 14 of those submitted signatures by the deadline, and 13 of them were certified.
One is through the normal legislative process, where 120 days a year from January to May, the House and Senate gets together and deliberates and debates and puts things through committees and through public hearings on the floor of each chamber, and then they go to the governor, and the governor either signs it or vetoes it or lets it become law without a signature.
This is a contemplative process that allows experts and witnesses to come in and bipartisanship to take place, and folks who don't necessarily disagree on things get together and hammer out a deal to make good policy.
The other way, and Colorado is all too familiar with this, is through the ballot.
Now, there have been some very good ballot initiatives that Jason and I have supported over the years.
Like for instance, 2022's Free School Meals initiative or the Paid Family Leave initiative or the minimum wage.
In fact, this year I'm working on one of the initiatives that will be on your ballot to change the way Colorado's tax system works by creating a graduated income tax so that people who are making a ton of money pay a little bit more, everybody else gets a tax cut, and we get more money for the things we all care about, like schools, childcare, and healthcare.
They didn't bring them all, but they bring a lot of them to try and use the ballot as an end run around the legislature because they just can't win elections in Colorado anymore, and that's a lot of what's going on here.
13 of them came through the, quote-unquote, "citizen-initiated process," but six of them were from the billionaire initiative process, and we'll talk about those in a little bit.
There was one referral, so the legislature actually put a measure on the ballot.
That's Prop NN, and you can tell as a voter which one the legislative referred-- legislature referred, because those have letters, and which ones people put on the ballot, because those are numbers.
About 14-- Actually exactly 14 of those submitted signatures by the deadline, and 13 of them were certified.
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