Shortly after Steve Swinney and his partners founded Kodiak Building Partners in 2011, they acquired two local companies that they viewed as core to the success of the building materials holding company. By 2017, those firms had added a combined 200 new jobs.
Since 2017, however, those two companies have shed a combined 60 positions, reflecting the lower demand for their services as construction in the state has slowed. Swinney, the CEO of Highlands Ranch-based Kodiak, chalks that up in no small way to increased regulation that’s chilled the business atmosphere in Colorado — something he hasn’t seen in Texas or Florida, where his company also has a large presence.
On Tuesday, the Senate Finance Committee will consider a proposal, Senate Bill 137, that takes aim squarely at the concerns of Swinney and other business leaders that Colorado has overregulated itself to the point of job loss without improving public safety and health. During a session in which legislators have sought to boost regulations on areas from football-stadium pricing to the use of surveillance data by online retailers, it presents an opportunity to re-examine and maybe roll back some rules that business leaders despise.
What is interesting about a bill that’s being touted by groups like the Colorado Chamber of Commerce as “a practical approach to addressing Colorado’s burdensome regulatory environment” is that it doesn’t actually nix any existing rules. Instead, it requires state agency heads to review regulations at least once every five years, present their findings to joint legislative committees and let legislators consider whether to perform audits or sunset reviews on rules of interest.
Why legislative and business leaders are backing the bill
Senate President James Coleman, the Denver Democrat who is sponsoring the bill along with House Speaker Julie McCluskie and the minority leaders in both chambers, said the bill is written to generate inquiries and conversations rather than mandatory actions. But he believes that out of it can come not only the pathway to remove rules that are overly burdensome and outdated but a chance to reassure voters that legislators are willing not only to pass laws but to double back and make sure they are working as intended.
Senate President James Coleman speaks to “Colorado Chamber Office Hours” in March.
“The real intent of this policy is to look at measures that right now may be doing more harm than good,” Coleman said on the March 23 “Colorado Chamber Office Hours” podcast. “If it didn’t become law and we never passed the bill, I don’t think anything will change.”
Business leaders say that what’s already changed is that a business atmosphere that used to be considered one of the best in the country has slipped. Colorado is the fourth-most-expensive state by cost of living and ranks in the highest quartile of states in terms of the cost of doing business, according to CNBC. That left it with one of the five lowest job-growth rates in the country last year.
Those same business leaders point overwhelmingly in surveys to increasing regulations as the reason that it is becoming more expensive and less attractive to do business in Colorado, particularly if they have the opportunity to expand elsewhere. A study commissioned by the Colorado Chamber found that this is the sixth-most-regulated state nationally, a distinction that has made it more expensive to operate here.
What the bill would do — and wouldn’t do
SB 137, though, doesn’t demand across-the-board regulatory cuts. Instead, it approaches the question more surgically and asks state leaders to examine what is on the books and then ask several pointed questions about those rules and regulations that aren’t now required to be probed.
The bill would require departments to determine if any rules are redundant, as well as whether rules are outdated and obsolete. It also mandates an inquiry into whether rules are creating administrative burdens on the agency, consumers or businesses without a corresponding public benefit. And it makes executives ask whether there are opportunities to improve the effectiveness of a rule in meeting its purpose, intent or goal.
For many state agencies, there is no set timeframe on which they perform such self-examinations now; SB 137 would require them no less than every five years. Once the reviews are completed, they would have to be presented at legislative SMART Act hearings that launch each session, and legislators could determine from those reports whether they want to do more to consider revision or repeal of some rules.
Though Coleman emphasized that he is “not a big fan of businesses policing themselves,” he said he would hope that business leaders could work with the agencies to point out where a rule may be duplicative or costly without offering commensurate public benefits. The process, he said, could be a collaborative one that goes a long way to helping to create more private-sector jobs — and eliminating unnecessary state expenses during a time of budget shortfall.
Environmental, labor groups blanche at bill
But while the leaders of both parties in both chambers have signed on to sponsor the bill, SB 137 is creating unease among some of the organizations who have asked legislators over the past eight years to boost regulations around workplaces and the environment. These rules, those advocates have said, have been put into place to ensure that workers are being treated fairly and that corporations are not polluting the air and water — restrictions that they don’t want to see pared back.
Several environmental groups — GreenLatinos, Physicians for Social Responsibility and the Sierra Club — have registered in opposition to the bill. So have the Colorado AFL-CIO, the Plaintiff Employment Lawyers Association and Boulder County.
Coleman has been talking to detractors, assuring them he’s supported every ask by labor groups, including giving his backing for the 2025 and 2026 versions of the bill to overhaul the Colorado Labor Peace Act and make it easier to unionize. But he is emphasizing that the state needs to examine whether anything can be done to both increase opportunities for those in the workforce and keep those workers safe and healthy.
“We’re not forgetting them. We’re not changing our perspective. But what we’re saying is we also know is those jobs don’t exist without businesses, and what we have to figure out is: Are there things we can agree on that are not serving anyone well?” Coleman said. “And we don’t know what those are until we sit down and have these conversations.”
Business groups back bill
Supporters of the bill, in addition to the Colorado Chamber, include industry groups like the Colorado Bioscience Association, Colorado Association of Home Builders, Colorado Hospital Association, Colorado Restaurant Association and American Petroleum Institute. Broader business groups like Colorado Concern and the Colorado Business Roundtable are offering backing too, as well as specific companies like Cigna and CORE Electric Cooperative, as well as a host of local chambers.
Steve Swinney is the founder and CEO of Kodiak Building Partners.
Swinney said he hopes that, if passed, agencies can begin their reviews by asking of each rule this question: “What problems are we solving for Coloradans with this regulation?” If such a line of self-examination can point out rules that might be overly burdensome without being generally beneficial, he believes that the changes that can come from SB 137 will send a signal to businesses nationally that they should invest more in Colorado.
“When you create jobs, you create opportunities for people. And, by the way, I think you create an impetus for businesses to need to be better for their employees,” he said. “When there’s a plentiful job market, it’s tough competition to get great people. And so, what do you want to do? You want to create a better environment for people to work in.
“When we’re restricting job growth, which is what all these regulations do, we’re creating an environment that kills jobs. And when we kill jobs, businesses have a much more plentiful workforce to go to. They’re less incented to make a great environment for people,” Swinney added. “So, let’s have our government be about job creation, which is going to ripple down to great environments for employees.”