Capitol Conversation: Hickenlooper’s State of the State

Credit D. Utterback

Governor John Hickenlooper gave his annual State of the State Address in front of a joint session of the General Assembly Thursday.  

Capitol Conversation Highlights

What stood out in Address

Credit Bente Birkeland / Rocky Mountain Community Radio

 Ed Sealover- Denver Business Journal

“The caution that he took in the way he delivered the speech. Hickenlooper has delivered some of the boldest state of the state’s I’ve ever heard before. Back in 2012, he even called for the end of homelessness in Colorado. This year, he really didn’t put forward a lot of specific policy plans.”

Ivan Moreno- Associated Press

“His state of the state speech did not really have many controversial things in it. He talked about how the unemployment rate is 4.1 percent compared to just over 9 percent when he took office.”

On Fiscal Constitutional Conflicts Between TABOR, Amendment 23 And Gallagher

Credit Bente Birkeland / Rocky Mountain Community Radio

Ivan Moreno- Associated Press

“He really just referenced it briefly. You know, we’re going to have to deal with this, but didn’t really call for any legislative action on it.”

“Going back to TABOR. Maybe he is looking at the long view of things. Maybe he realizes that the refunds that are expected to happen this year; that there’s really no way to go to the voters and ask to keep the money this year. But he has another four years in office and so he has a while to, again, if he wants to, form this campaign to try to tackle these constitutional restraints the state faces.”

Ed Sealover- Denver Business Journal

“He made this speech with an eye toward the fact that he’s dealing with a split legislature, that if you look at the bills that were introduced in the first week, clearly have very different ideas of what they want they want to do with government.”