Kelsey Ray (Colorado Independent)- Former U.S. Interior Secretary Ken Salazar identified himself as a lawyer for oil and gas giant Anadarko immediately following a fatal home explosion in Firestone last month, International Business Times and MapLight are reporting.
Investigators say an improperly abandoned flowline attached to an Anadarko well caused the blast.
Salazar, also a former Democratic U.S. Senator who weighed a 2018 bid for governor but decided against it, spoke with Democratic Gov. John Hickenlooper’s top attorney, Jackie Melmed, about the explosion, according to an email IBT and MapLight obtained. That email is dated April 26, the same day Hickenlooper’s Colorado Oil and Gas Conservation Commission and the Frederick-Firestone Fire Department linked the explosion to an Anadarko well nearby.
Click here to read the full story in the Colorado Independent.
David Sirota, Lydia O’Neal, Andrew Perez (International Business Times)- Former U.S. Interior Secretary Ken Salazar has been working for a major oil and gas company as it has sought to limit political damage after a deadly explosion near one of its Colorado wells, a spokesperson for Colorado Democratic Gov. John Hickenlooper and emails obtained by International Business Times and MapLight say.
One of his state’s most powerful Democrats, Salazar was in touch with Hickenlooper’s office after the blast on behalf of Anadarko Petroleum — a company Salazar helped when he ran the Interior Department under former President Barack Obama.
Salazar, a corporate lawyer, has previously said he would honor federal ethics laws by walling himself off from matters in which he was involved at the agency. Emails show he has been working for Anadarko in Colorado though he has not registered to lobby for the company there, state records show.
Click here to read the full story in the International Business Times.
One year after Ethics Watch published its Shark Attack report on predatory lender spending on Colorado politics, the industry has significantly reduced its profile. With no bills affecting the industry on this year’s legislative agenda, industry participants do not appear to have spent any money on lobbying as of the April 15 reporting deadline. Political contributions were also down during the 2016 election cycle, with only about $13,000 spent by industry participants.
Jon Murray (Denver Post)- Denver city leaders are moving closer to adopting ethics code reforms and revamping lobbyist and gift disclosure rules that will make it easier for citizens to see who’s wooing officials with meals and tickets.
Besides discussion Tuesday of a new dollar limit on event tickets from each donor with a city interest, the most significant proposed changes also may be the simplest: Make elected and appointed officials’ gift disclosures available online, and do it more often — every six months instead of annually.
Click here to read the full story in the Denver Post.
Erica Meltzer (Denverite)- Elected officials in Denver have to file documents every year that lay out their financial interests — where they earn their money, what property they own, to whom they owe money — and disclose any gifts they’ve received from people outside their family.
But it’s not so easy for the public to see those documents.
“These are things that are on paper and in a file cabinet,” said Peg Perl, senior counsel for Colorado Ethics Watch. “Someone has to go and ask for them during business hours.”
Click here to read the full story in the Denverite.
Mike McKibbin (Colorado Statesman) – Monthly lobbyist financial reports required by the City and County of Denver, designed to help the public know who is lobbying City Council members on what issues, are commonly submitted with no reported expenditures, a review of the documents by the The Colorado Statesman has found.
While no wrongdoing or rules violations are thought to have occurred, the city ordinance that regulates lobbyists by requiring registration and the reports does not identify specific oversight. Like many other areas of municipal and state regulations, it is basically a self-reporting arrangement that is only investigated upon complaint, according to Assistant City Attorney David Broadwell.
Click here to read the rest of the story in the Colorado Statesman.
Mike McKibbin (Colorado Statesman)- Annual and monthly disclosure reports by elected officials, city employees and lobbyists registered with the City and County of Denver would see several changes under proposed regulations from the city clerk and recorder.
The City Council’s Finance and Governance committee took a first look at the proposed changes from Clerk and Recorder Debra Johnson at its Oct. 4 meeting and asked for several revisions Johnson will present in November.
Click here to read the full story in the Colorado Statesman.
This week, Ethics Watch Senior Counsel Peg Perl presented public comment at the Denver City Council Finance and Governance Committee in favor of two transparency bills sponsored by Denver Clerk and Recorder Debra Johnson. Colorado Common Cause also spoke in support and both groups were included in stakeholders consulted by the Clerk during the development of the bills.
The first bill would transition financial and gift disclosures filed by Denver City Officials into a more efficient electronic filing system, require annual financial reports to be filed every January for the prior year (instead of August), and require City Officials to file gift reports quarterly, like state officials. Quarterly gift reports would be proactively published on the Clerk’s website for public viewing each quarter, and annual financial reports would remain public records subject to disclosure upon request. The reform bill would also eliminate a provision requiring the Clerk to keep a log of public requests for viewing of these reports and to notify a City Official whenever a citizen viewed their reports.
The second bill streamlines and enhances transparency for lobbyist reports filed by those who lobby Denver City Officials. The reforms would move lobbyist reporting from a paper system to electronic filing and the Clerk would post on the City website both lobbyist registrations and bimonthly lobbyist reports. The bill also clarifies the details required to be reported by a lobbyist with regard to the clients they serve and gifts provided to City Officials for purposes of lobbying.
After numerous questions, but general support from City Council members on the committee, the Clerk will be making revisions to the bill. Video of this week’s committee meeting is available for viewing here (public comment begins around the 38 minute mark). The committee stated that it intends to take action on the revised bills in November. Ethics Watch believes these reforms would increase transparency in Denver City Government and enhance citizen trust in their local leaders.
Ethics Watch’s years of experience using legal tools to enforce accountability have taught us that legal action alone is not always enough – sometimes the laws themselves need to be changed. During the 2016 legislative session, we worked to craft and support legislation in all three core areas of our work: government ethics, money in politics, and public records transparency. Of the five bills we prioritized this year, two passed and are awaiting the Governor’s signature, while the other three were killed in the Senate State Affairs Committee on party-line votes.
The majority of the bills we championed this session had supporters from across the political spectrum and many had bipartisan legislator teams as sponsors. So why the differing results? It seems this year’s general assembly was more willing to pass good government measures only when they affect other people but refused to advance measures that would affect the accountability of legislators themselves.
Transparency wins for Colorado voters in some arenas
The two bills which passed this year both targeted transparency of political spending outside of the context of legislative races: school board elections and ballot measures.
Our major win for Colorado voters this year was the passage of HB16-1282 (Align Regular Biennial School Elections & Fair Campaign Practices Act). Building off our work tracing, tracking and charting the spending in 2015 school board elections, we worked to eliminate loopholes in campaign finance disclosure law which previously allowed political ads regarding school board candidates to remain hidden from the public record. The bill also increases the frequency of reporting for state-wide political committees and other political players who spend money in school board elections in order to provide that information to voters before they cast their ballots (instead of months after the election). Bipartisan sponsors (Reps. Becker & Pettersen/Sens. Todd & Tate) and support from the Secretary of State led to unanimous passage of this bill in both chambers. These changes are a major improvement in Colorado and will provide needed transparency in school board elections for 2017 and beyond.
We also supported SB16-186 (Small-Scale Issue Committees) which passed this year. This bill was crafted as a response to the 10th Circuit Court of Appeals decision in CSG v. Williams holding that the $200 threshold for ballot issue committee registration and reporting was unconstitutional as applied in certain circumstances (Ethics Watch was an amicus in the case supporting the Secretary of State’s defense of the law). We worked with Colorado Common Cause and the Secretary of State’s office to create a two-tiered reporting scheme in the law for those supporting and opposing ballot issues as a temporary fix while the State sought review of the case from the U.S. Supreme Court. Bipartisan sponsors (Sen. Tate/Rep. Lontine) helped pass the fix through both chambers after the court case was decided during session. This measure avoids a complete free-for-all of undisclosed and untraceable political spending when Colorado voters consider a number of state-wide ballot measures this year.
Accountability fails when including legislative branch in its scope
Three bills supported by Ethics Watch and other coalition partners would have increased transparency and accountability across the state government, including the legislative branch. Each of these bills were killed in the Senate State Affairs committee, even when supported by bipartisan coalitions.
Our biggest disappointment was the failure of the General Assembly to support the independence of the Independent Ethics Commission, which has jurisdiction over legislators, in HB16-1216 (Facilitate Administration of IEC). The centerpiece of this bill was to remove the Attorney General’s office from providing legal counsel to the IEC and instead authorize and fund a separate, independent, in-house attorney for the IEC to support its mission as ethics arbiter for all state government. Legislative sponsors (Rep. McCann/Sen. Steadman) worked with stakeholders across the political spectrum and both the Secretary of State and Attorney General offices testified in support of the bill. Nevertheless, after passing the Colorado House, the bill was killed without explanation on a party-line vote in Senate committee.
A similar fate was met by SB16-37 (Public Access to Digitally Stored Data under CORA). Ethics Watch was part of a group of stakeholders who worked with the legislative sponsors (Sen. Kefalas/Rep. Pabon) to address the problem of government agents refusing to provide digitally stored documents and data in electronic form when processing Colorado Open Records Act requests. As we highlighted in our 21st Century Sunshine report, CORA provisions are in desperate need of updating to reflect the modern technological age of public record generation and storage. Despite testimony from a range of organizations across the political spectrum in favor of the bill, it was killed in its first committee hearing in the Senate, where legislators stated concerns about how the bill would affect CORA requests on legislators. We will participate in an official working group convened by the Secretary of State’s office this summer to craft solutions to this problem for future legislation.
Finally, our attempt to prevent a minor loophole in campaign finance public disclosure from becoming a major problem was stymied when HB16-1343 (Disclosure of Party Communication Activity) was killed in Senate State Affairs Committee. This bill would have required public disclosure and “paid for by” statements for ads that are run in the final weeks of an election to support or oppose a political party or candidates from one political party and spending at any time of the year that urges the viewer to vote for or against candidates from a particular political party. The wording of current law in Colorado only triggers these transparency requirements when a specific candidate is named, thereby creating a loophole for groups wishing to remain in the shadows while trying to influence voters to vote for one party’s ticket. Legislative sponsors (Reps. Kagan & Becker/Sen. Carroll) passed the bill through the Colorado House, but the Senate State Affairs Committee killed it on a party-line vote without much discussion.
The reluctance of the General Assembly to pass legislation that increases the transparency and accountability of the legislative branch operations and campaigns to the voters is troubling. This is the reason why many ethics, money in politics and sunshine laws are passed directly by the people through ballot measures.
