August 2010 - 2nd half
Month:
August
Year:
2010 BACK TO SCHOOL, NOT SESSION
It’s around this time of the year, when kids are going back to school, that people start wondering when the Legislature goes back into session. Not until January! The Legislature is in session only 5 months a year, from January to May. We can’t be in session right now, because the general election is in November. All 65 seats of the House of Representatives are up for election, and half of the Senate seats are too. Most of my colleagues are busy campaigning.
NEXT TOWN HALL MEETING
Don’t forget to attend my monthly Town Hall Meeting on this Saturday, August 21, at the Standley Lake Library, 8485 Kipling Streetfrom 10:30 a.m. to noon. The presenter will be Lorez Meinhold, Director of Health Reform Implementation for Governor Ritter. If you want to find out how the national “health care reform” will affect us in Colorado, then come join us on Saturday!
WHAT I’VE BEEN DOING AS YOUR SENATOR
This is what I have been doing as your State Senator since the last newsletter went out:
- Held my monthly Legislative Coffee.
- Participated in the monthly meeting of the Colorado Commission on Higher Education (CCHE) as an Advisory member.
- Went to the back-to-school event sponsored by Jefferson County Administrators Association (JCAA) [see article below].
- Attended a workshop on Redistricting and Reapportionment given by the legislative legal staff at the Capitol [see article below].
- Went to the Westminster City Council’s “Dessert and Conversation” meeting.
- Held the monthly meeting of the Economic Opportunity/Poverty Reduction’s work group on education.
- Participated in the Endurance Challenge to benefit Ralston House.
BACK TO SCHOOL WITH JCAA
JCAA’s back-to-school event featured Karyn Ruth White, Motivational Comedy for Stressful Times, who presented her Tips on Living and Laughing with Less Stress. She had the audience laughing for an hour and a half straight. Here are her key tips:
- Cherish your sense of humor. Adults laugh very little compared with children. Humor helps build effective relationships, diffuse tension, and improve morale. We need to ask ourselves “Is there anything funny about this situation? Would this be funny if it were happening to someone else?”
- Stop your mental flogging. When life presents you with a challenge, don’t beat yourself up. Just remind yourself that you’re “having a human moment.” At really bad moments, remind yourself of 3 things you’re grateful for.
- Acknowledge and reward your personal victories. We never allow ourselves to feel like we’re done. Celebrate when things are crossed off your to-do list.
- Look for opportunities to find the humor in things. In life, you get what you look for. As Mel Brooks said, “ Tragedy is when I cut my finger; comedy is when you fall into an open sewer and die.”
REDISTRICTING & REAPPORTIONMENT
Two kinds of lines are re-drawn every 10 years for voting, based on the Census data, the Congressional Districts (CDs) and the state legislative districts for the House and Senate. The Legislature draws the new CDs – this is called “redistricting.” The re-drawing of state legislative districts is called “reapportionment” and is done by a commission appointed by the Governor, the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, and leaders of the Legislature. After redistricting and reapportionment are complete, the County Clerks re-draw the precinct lines. All of this must be finished in time for caucuses in February 2012. The Census data is expected to be ready by March 2011. In April it will be merged with “political data” – which is the voters’ political affiliations. But by then, there will not be enough time for the Legislature to finish Redistricting before the legally required end of the 2011 session; therefore, there will definitely be a Special Session in 2011 to do Redistricting. The tentative plan is to have that occur in November 2011, which will allow for public input on preliminary plans prior to the Special Session. I’ll be providing a lot more information on this as the process begins taking place.