State lawmakers killed a bill that would have codified 41-year-old case law by making the legislature’s political party caucuses subject to the Colorado Open Meetings Law, but it also would have exempted all affinity caucus meetings from the law’s notice and minutes requirements.
State and local boards, councils and commissions would be required to livestream many of their public meetings and offer remote public testimony under a bill, endorsed by a Colorado legislative committee, that is designed to improve access to government for people with disabilities.
Citing the separation of powers as “a core tenet of our democracy,” Gov. Jared Polis signed into law a bill that narrows the definition of “public business” in the Colorado Open Meetings Law as it applies to the legislature and lets members of the General Assembly communicate by email and text message without it being a “meeting” under the law.
State lawmakers sent a bill to Gov. Jared Polis that narrows the definition of “public business’ in the Colorado Open Meetings Law as it applies to the legislature and lets members of the General Assembly communicate by email and text message without it being a “meeting” under the law.
A committee of state senators endorsed major changes to the way the open meetings law affects the Colorado General Assembly, approving a bill that narrows the definition of “public business” and lets lawmakers communicate by email and text message without it being a “meeting” under the law.
The town board of Del Norte violated the Colorado Open Meetings Law by censuring a fellow board member during a closed executive session, the Colorado Court of Appeals ruled, reversing a judge’s decision and invalidating the censure.
Denying a Pagosa Springs lawyer legal standing to sue a school district because he doesn’t live within its boundaries “would drastically and substantively alter the protections” of the Colorado Open Meetings Law, not only for him, “but for all persons,” the Colorado Freedom of Information Coalition and the American Civil Liberties Union of Colorado say in a court filing.
The state’s second-highest court affirmed a judge’s order to disclose video surveillance footage showing three Woodland Park school board members talking with a candidate for superintendent after a public meeting in December 2022.
A Pagosa Springs lawyer who routinely sues school boards around the state for violations of the open meetings law is defending his role as a “private attorney general” in a case now before Colorado’s second-highest court.
Colorado lawmakers’ use of an anonymous private survey to prioritize bills impacting the state budget “thwarts the entire purpose” of the Colorado Open Meetings Law because it shields the public “from knowledge that it would otherwise be entitled to know,” a judge found.
