sleepystork.com

As the 2026 Colorado legislative session approaches, the General Assembly must make one thing clear: small businesses are not the enemy.

Because time and again, state policy treats them as if they are.

In an increasingly hostile regulatory environment, with a cooling economy and rising costs across the board, Colorado’s small businesses need relief, not another squeeze. Mom and pop shops are still digging out from the damage of the pandemic nearly six years later. Many never recovered. Others are barely hanging on.

At the same time, Colorado continues to rank among the most heavily regulated states in the nation. According to a study by the Colorado Chamber of Commerce, our state ranks sixth overall for regulatory burden, driven largely by environmental and labor mandates.

For large corporations, these costs can be absorbed. For small businesses, they are often the difference between survival and closure. Every new rule brings administrative costs, licensing fees, compliance requirements, and legal expenses. These are not abstract concerns. They are real dollars that small business owners must pay before they can hire another employee, expand their operation, or even take a paycheck themselves.

Yet when these costs inevitably show up in higher prices, some in the legislature accuse small businesses of price gouging. That argument ignores basic economics. Businesses cannot operate at a loss and stay open.

One of the clearest examples of the legislature’s misplaced priorities is the repeal of the vendor fee during the special session last August. The vendor fee was not a loophole. It was not a handout. It was a partial reimbursement for the administrative burden the state places on businesses by requiring them to collect and remit sales taxes on its behalf.

In other words, the vendor fee paid to businesses acknowledged that small businesses are acting as unpaid tax collectors for the state. Supporters of the repeal dismissed the vendor fee as insignificant, claiming it averaged just $60 to $100 per month and insisting that the money belonged to the state anyway.

That framing could not be further from the truth. I heard directly from small business owners who relied on that deduction and who saved as much as $600 per month because of it. For a large corporation, that amount might be negligible. For a family-owned business operating on thin margins, it pays an electric bill, or covers payroll taxes.

Worse still, many business owners did not even realize the vendor fee had been repealed until they went to file their taxes. The legislature made a significant policy change with real consequences, and the people most affected were often the last to know. We were told sacrifices had to be made. Yet instead of meaningful budget reforms, the state quietly raised the tax burden on small businesses that are already struggling to stay afloat. That is not shared sacrifice. That is bad governance.

My perspective on this issue is shaped by experience. During the pandemic, I worked as a banker. I watched PPP funds disappear in a matter of hours. I saw small business owners in tears, desperate to keep their employees paid and their doors open. Many were more worried about their workers than themselves. I also saw how larger corporations, with teams of lawyers and accountants, were able to secure relief that many true small businesses never received.

That experience stays with you. It is impossible to forget the feeling of knowing help exists but being unable to get it to the people who need it most. Since then, state policy has only made things harder.

Energy mandates are another example. As Colorado pushes toward aggressive clean energy goals, the cost of compliance for small businesses is staggering. Electrification, new equipment requirements, and infrastructure upgrades come with massive price tags. Policymakers often talk about these transitions as if they are simple switches to flip. They are not.

A strong economy depends on affordable, reliable energy and a regulatory environment that allows businesses to plan, invest, and grow. When lawmakers accelerate timelines and pile on mandates, small businesses are the first casualties.

I urge my colleagues to reconsider the path we are on. As a member of the House Business Affairs and Labor Committee, I will continue to fight for meaningful relief for small businesses. That includes revisiting the repeal of the vendor fee and pushing back against policies that treat small business owners as a convenient revenue source.

The reality is this: many Coloradans are focused on federal politics while missing what is happening much closer to home. It is state policy, not Washington headlines, that is hitting families and businesses the hardest. If we truly care about affordability, community stability, and economic opportunity, we must stop attacking the very businesses that keep our communities alive.

Ryan Gonzalez is the representative for Colorado’s State House District 50. He is the son of Mexican immigrants and a first-generation American.

Sign up for Sound Off to get a weekly roundup of our columns, editorials and more.

To send a letter to the editor about this article, submit online or check out our guidelines for how to submit by email or mail.

The president’s eleventh hour executive order to keep the coal-fired Unit 1 at the Craig Station in operation is the combination of this administration’s signature way of governing: disregard for science, climate change denial, dismissal of economic impact to rate-payers, misunderstanding of history, attempts to roll back progress, and overall imperiousness.

Unit 1 was on track to cease operations at the end of 2025. While this was a win for the public health and the environment, the five utilities that own it had decided in 2016 that the cheapest option was to retire and replace the aging plant. In the decade since utilities decided to retire Craig 1, they have been busy building new resources to replace the plant. Our Colorado health and safety, as well as affordability of power for consumers, is dependent on making steady progress towards our clean energy goals: retiring dirty and expensive coal plants and moving towards a clean, breathable future.

Colorado has transition plans in place that have been negotiated with our utilities, environmental advocates, workers, and residents. The Public Utilities Commission’s decisions and the energy-generation plans of our utilities are carefully considered to take into account the costs to rate-payers, just transitions for workers, and the necessary steps towards a clean energy future.

The Trump Administration doesn’t appear to care about any of that. As with the recent similarly ill-conceived and heavy-handed veto of the Arkansas Valley Conduit clean water project funding, Trump prioritizes superficial, punitive, Executive actions.

All of us suffer from his callousness and idiocy whether our Congresspeople are from his party or not, whether we voted for him or not. Our beautiful Colorado air, land and water must be protected. Our children don’t deserve record asthma rates, our residents deserve clean drinking water, and our outdoor enthusiasts deserve safe recreation.

Trump’s actions are not well thought-out, careful policy decisions. From dismantling scientific research institutions in Colorado to increasing our utility rates, his revenge tour will have real impacts on people’s lives, including those who voted for him.

It is worth noting that Venezuelan crude oil will not lower energy costs. We are years away from having the capacity to refine this very heavy, dirty petroleum and we do not use oil to power our electric grid.

Our environmental organizations have sought legal recourse and will continue to do so. As Legislators we will also continue to protect our State from his disastrous whims.

Meg Froelich is a state represenative in the Colorado Genearl Assembly and Mike Weissman is a state senator.

Sign up for Sound Off to get a weekly roundup of our columns, editorials and more.

To send a letter to the editor about this article, submit online or check out our guidelines for how to submit by email or mail.

President Donald Trump would like Coloradans to know this holiday season that he wants our governor to “rot in hell” and that he wishes Mesa County’s district attorney, Dan Rubenstein, “only the worst.” All that anger directed at Coloradans is because our justice system is refusing to release a woman who was tried and convicted of fraud in relation to Trump’s illegal attempt to remain in office in 2020.

Trump’s embarrassing temper tantrums would be tolerable if they didn’t also come with real-world actions that hurt Coloradans — costing them their livelihoods, and yes, access to clean drinking water.

Gov. Jared Polis’ and Rep. Lauren Boebert’s responses to Trump give us hope that Americans can unite after Trump leaves office, as required by the U.S. Constitution, in January 2029. Trump will not succeed in his effort to divide Coloradans who love one another despite our political differences.

Trump is hurting our more liberal-minded residents in Boulder County with his decision to first cut dozens of jobs at the National Center for Atmospheric Research and then his pledge to dismantle the headquarters entirely.

And now Trump will hurt more conservative-minded Coloradans with his veto of $1.2 billion in federal funding for a clean-drinking water pipeline to residents in eastern Pueblo County who have been advised for years not to drink well water because of contamination.

Gov. Jared Polis’ response to all of this has been calm, dignified and dedicated to preserving the integrity of our justice system.

“I hope the President’s resolution this year is to spend less time online talking about me and more on making America more affordable by stopping his disastrous tariffs and fixing rising health care costs. Finally, I wish all Americans, including the President and all the wonderful people across the political spectrum, a happy, healthy and productive New Year,” Polis said Wednesday.

Boebert shot back at Trump’s veto of her bill, telling 9News that: “If this administration wants to make its legacy blocking projects that deliver water to rural Americans, that’s on them … Americans deserve leadership that puts people over politics.”

Before the New Year, Trump ordered his administration to move the work at the National Center for Atmospheric Research from Boulder to “another entity or location.”

The administration attempted to blame the move on NCAR’s work studying climate change. The White House issued a statement to The Denver Post calling NCAR “the premier research stronghold for left-wing climate lunacy.”

We disagree strongly with both of the assertions in that statement. First, the global climate is warming, and a vast amount of scientific research indicates that the trend is being driven in large part by the increase in greenhouse gases (carbon dioxide and methane, among others) in our atmosphere.

Second, NCAR’s work is professional, scientifically based and doesn’t carry a hint of the “alarmism” that we see from many politicians who talk about an extinction-level event occurring in a few years.

But we also don’t believe for a moment that “climate change alarmism” is the real reason behind Trump’s decision to dismantle NCAR — a federal agency we must remind the president that was created by Congress and funded by Congress and protected from unilateral termination by the executive branch.

Trump’s decision came rapidly after Colorado officials refused Trump’s demand that Tina Peters be released from jail. Peters, a former clerk and recorder from Mesa County, was convicted of using fraudulent means to give a random man access to the county’s voting equipment. Peters believed Trump’s lies that the 2020 election had been stolen. She stole credentials from one of her employees and brought a man into a secure area where he accessed data from vote-counting machines. Later, she tried to cover up her actions.

The data did not show any evidence of voter fraud.

But that hasn’t prevented Trump from trying to pardon her and now from retaliating against Colorado officials who are merely upholding the work of a jury of Peter’s peers who found her guilty.

Hundreds of federal workers in Colorado have already lost their jobs as a result of Trump’s policies. Then those employees who remained suffered under the federal shutdown. Now, Trump is coming again for federal workers, claiming he is trying to reduce the federal debt and deficit. But Trump’s One Big Beautiful Bill added more to the federal deficit than what he has cut so far.

Which brings us to Trump’s most recent retaliatory action against Colorado, which he says was done in the name of cutting the federal budget and “restoring fiscal sanity.”

We cannot argue with Trump that the $1.3 billion price tag to bring clean drinking water to 50,000 residents is steep. But it is not wasteful. This is a necessary and long-awaited public infrastructure project. The project has been thoroughly vetted and is shovel-ready.

Trump’s veto is a black eye on his administration, and his outlandish words and actions only underline why he is wholly unfit to serve as president of the United States of America.

Sign up for Sound Off to get a weekly roundup of our columns, editorials and more.

To send a letter to the editor about this article, submit online or check out our guidelines for how to submit by email or mail.

Following a misleading report on hospital finances, The Denver Post published an editorial that misrepresents UCHealth’s role in caring for Colorado patients and misstates key facts about our financial operations. Despite our efforts to provide accurate information, the editorial board’s column understates UCHealth’s uncompensated care, mischaracterizes our service to Medicaid patients and perpetuates misconceptions about investment income.

These inaccuracies are easily disproven by publicly available data, and we believe it’s important to set the record straight.

UCHealth does more than any health system in Colorado to care for Medicaid patients, and we are proud to do so.

Last year, UCHealth served 30% of all hospitalized Medicaid patients in Colorado, twice as many as any other provider. At our flagship facility, University of Colorado Hospital, we cared for almost 18,000 hospitalized Medicaid patients and provided over $280 million in uncompensated care, more than any other hospital in the state. This is not just a statistic; it reflects our deep commitment to ensuring access to care for those who need it most.

In fiscal year 2025 alone, UCHealth provided approximately $670 million in uncompensated care – an amount that has been growing as more Coloradans become uninsured or need assistance with their health care bills. Unlike some hospitals that receive financial support from local cities, counties, or taxpayers, UCHealth received no such funding last year. Every dollar we earn is reinvested in Colorado – supporting patients, employees and communities across our state.

We agree that health care affordability and insurance premium increases are a real concern for Coloradans, especially as premiums are expected to double for those who buy their insurance from the exchange.

UCHealth is dedicated to making health care accessible and affordable. We provide free care for anyone whose household income is below 250% of the federal poverty guidelines – about $80,000 per year for a family of four – and significant discounts for those earning up to 400% of the guidelines – $128,000 for a family of four. These programs ensure that hundreds of thousands of Coloradans receive the care they need, regardless of their ability to pay.

We also support rural hospitals across Colorado by offering low-cost IT services, advanced medical records and accepting thousands of patient transfers from hospitals unable to provide a higher level of care. These partnerships help stabilize rural health care and keep care local whenever possible.

Despite our total expenses increasing by 9.3% last year, UCHealth’s average reimbursement rate rose by only 2.0%. This gap underscores the financial pressures facing health systems and how providers are working to minimize price increases for patients.

UCHealth is proud to be a Colorado-based nonprofit health system and one of the state’s largest employers. All revenue stays in Colorado and is reinvested to support patients, employees, and communities. Our mission is clear: to improve lives and provide exceptional care for all Coloradans.

The editorial places undue emphasis on investment income, which is highly volatile and includes unrealized gains. Just as a household would not base its monthly budget on the performance of a retirement account, it would be irresponsible for a health care provider to rely on long-term investments to fund operations. These gains can disappear overnight. This volatility is precisely why investment gains or losses should not be used as a measure of financial stability. UCHealth’s financial reserve, which is typical for a system of our size, enables us to care for patients during times of uncertainty, including pandemics, federal government shutdowns that delay or stop payments to hospitals, or dramatic increases in expenses.

The appropriate metric for measuring a hospital’s stability is operating margin. UCHealth’s operating margin last year was 3.5%, a level that provides stability but little excess. This modest margin allows us to maintain high-quality services, invest in technology, provide updated equipment for our patients and recruit top clinicians, all while navigating rising costs and reimbursement challenges.

We welcome thoughtful dialogue about health care costs and access. But that conversation must be grounded in facts. UCHealth’s record speaks for itself: unparalleled service to Medicaid patients, hundreds of millions in uncompensated care, more than $1 billion in total community benefits, and a steadfast commitment to affordability and community health. These are the values that guide us, and they deserve to be recognized accurately.

Elizabeth B. Concordia is the president and CEO of UCHealth.

Sign up for Sound Off to get a weekly roundup of our columns, editorials and more.

To send a letter to the editor about this article, submit online or check out our guidelines for how to submit by email or mail.