The Big Winners From Colorado’s 2019 Session

By: Kyle Huelsman, SiX Colorado State Director

Working Women Will Benefit from the Equal Pay for Equal Work Act

Senator Jessie Danielson and Representative Janet Buckner have been pushing the legislature to address the gender pay gap since 2016 and finally this year they found a path with SB-85, the Equal Pay for Equal Work Act. Women in general, and women of color in particular, will soon have the opportunity to file formal complaints of wage discrimination through the state, bringing us one step closer to creating an economy that guarantees equal pay for equal work and a system that holds discriminatory employers accountable.

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And just for a bit of fun: here is Republican Senator Vicki Marble thanking white men for their contributions to the state legislature before voting against the Equal Pay for Equal Work Act.

Voters Will See Increased Ballot Access through Automatic Voter Registration

Senator Steve Fenberg has been quietly improving Colorado’s election system over the past three years, but the 2019 session marked a transformative moment for our state’s democracy. Automatic Voter Registration passed through the Senate in the last week of session, ushering in one of the nation’s most expansive registration programs. Of course, the ceaseless Fenberg did not stop there. He helped guide HB-1278 through the legislature as well, which will place polling locations on college campuses and allow 17-year-olds to vote in the primary if they would turn 18 by the general. But don’t take in from us, as Colorado Public Radio’s Sam Brasch wrote in his April 24th headline, "Youth Voter Turnout is Already Ridiculously High in Colorado. State House Democrats Want it Even Higher."

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Working Families Will See Wage Increases through Local Wage Option Legislation

Representative Rochelle Galindo of Greeley and Sen. Dominick Moreno came out swinging this year with HB-1210, which made Colorado one of the first states in the country to repeal a state ban on cities setting their own minimum wage. These top leaders within Colorado’s Latino Caucus understand the impact of wage stagnation in the face of the ever-increasing cost of living, especially in Latino communities. This bill will provide local governments with a powerful tool to provide dignity and fairness to hard-working Colorado Families.

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WHAT IS LEFT FOR 2020?

Paid Family and Medical Leave

After two years of Colorado’s Paid Family and Medical Leave program sailing through the House only to be killed in the Republican-controlled Senate, Sen. Faith Winter believed that 2019 was the year for paid leave in Colorado. Yet pressure from the 215 paid business lobbyists fighting against the bill, debate over the financial solvency of the program, and a slate of potential Republican amendments, Sen. Faith Winter chose to turn the bill into an implementation plan that would study the financial solvency of the program and provide results just before the start of the 2020 session. Expect the sponsors to come back stronger than ever next January.

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State Retirement Savings

Some might say that a legislative study is not a hot news tip, but Sen. Kerry Donovan has been angling since 2016 to have Colorado officials study state savings plan models. SB-173 creates the Colorado Secure Savings Plan Board which will present an official recommendation on how to create a portable, state-sponsored retirement savings plan before the 2020 legislative session.

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Fighting for Families Means Improving Access to Long Term Care

As part of SiX’s 2018 #FightingForFamilies Week of Action, Michigan Rep. Jon Hoadley (D-Kalamazoo), wrote a guest blog on the importance of supporting our country’s aging population by improving access to long-term care for seniors and ensuring caregivers are paid fair wages.


 

By Michigan Rep. Jon Hoadley

By 2030, Michigan’s senior population will double, meaning that in just over ten years, one in five Michiganders will be over the age of 65. Those shifting demographics are not unique to Michigan, of course; in every state, the number of Baby Boomers reaching retirement age is in-creasing the percentage of older adults and increasing the potential long-term care needs of our country. If we want a state where families and communities truly thrive, the coming decade presents an opportunity organizers, advocates, and elected officials to build the kind of care infra-structure that works for seniors, people with disabilities, paid care workers and family caregivers, and Michigan is at the forefront of building the systems we need. During the State Innovation Exchange’s Fighting for Families Week of Action, it’s crucial to recognize that fighting for families means supporting our country’s aging population, and family member’s ability to secure paid leave to care for ailing parents and grandparents.

To make the strongest case for the policy changes that will ensure that all seniors have access to affordable long-term care, it was clear to me that we first needed to gather comprehensive data about the current state of care in Michigan, and that we needed to model the proposed benefits programs against that data to create something robust and economically sustainable. This legislative session, the study bill I introduced as a member of the Michigan House has won support from both sides of the aisle, and if it passes will present our legislature with long-over-due analysis of the state of aging in Michigan and offer possible paths forward.

Perhaps most important to me is creating a system in the coming years that allows seniors to remain in their homes as they age, rather than moving to care facilities or nursing homes. There is certainly a need for those facilities, of course, but far too often, seniors wind up in those set-tings as a result of a failure in the care system. Medicare, the program that helps older adults meet their health care needs, generally does not pay for home and community based long-term care —but it does pay for care in a facility. Too many families are forced to choose between remaining at home and paying out-of-pocket for home care, or moving to a care facility, where Medicare pays the bill but where seniors are often not nearly as comfortable as they were in their own homes. A key component of the new system we must create is ensuring that caregivers are paid a fair wage. The work of caregiving must be treated with dignity and respect, which means ensuring that paid caregivers earn enough to provide for their own families as they take care of others.

Other states are beginning to take on these care challenges, too. In Hawaii, the Kupuna Care-givers program took effect last year, which helps provide a care benefit so that family caregivers can remain in the workforce and ensure their parents receive the home care services they need. And the Washington legislature just held hearings on a proposal to create a long-term care in-surance program, to create a sustainable and universal guarantee of access to long-term care as Washingtonians age.

Instead of waiting for federal solutions, Michigan is helping imagine new ways to meet the needs of our changing population. As our work continues, I hope to be able to work with legislators across the country to apply what we’re learning in more and more statehouses over the coming decade.

Michigan Rep. Jon Hoadley (D-Kalamazoo) is currently in his second term representing Michi-gan’s 60th House District.