The bill creates the government youth apprenticeship stipend program (program) in the state work force development council (council) to provide grants to certain nonprofit organizations to enable the nonprofit organizations to provide stipends to governmental entities that offer government youth apprenticeships. The bill specifies that governmental entities include the state and any state agency or institution, including the judicial and legislative departments, a county, city and county, incorporated city or town, school district, special improvement district, and authority. The bill specifies the dates by which a nonprofit organization must apply to the council for grant money and dates by which the council is required to award and distribute the grants to one or more nonprofit organizations. The nonprofit organizations that receive a grant are required to use the grant money to distribute stipends to governmental entities that apply for the stipend. The bill specifies limitations on the amount of the stipend that may be provided to a governmental entity for a single government youth apprenticeship. The bill also specifies limitations on the number of stipends that may be provided to a single governmental entity in any calendar year. In addition, the bill specifies that a nonprofit organization that receives grant money is required to use at least 20% of the total amount awarded to provide stipends to governmental entities located in a rural area. A governmental entity must apply to a nonprofit organization that received a grant to receive a stipend for its government youth apprenticeship. To be eligible to receive a stipend, a governmental entity is required to satisfy certain specified criteria, including the contribution of at least $2,000 toward the costs of a government youth apprenticeship. A governmental entity that receives a stipend is required to use the money from the stipend, as well as the $2,000 that the governmental entity contributes to the government youth apprenticeship, only for certain specified purposes. The bill creates the government youth apprenticeship stipend fund (fund) in the state treasury and requires the state treasurer to transfer $2 million from the general fund to the fund in the 2019-20, 2020-21, and 2021-22 state fiscal years. The council is required to submit an annual report on the program as part of the Colorado talent pipeline report that is prepared and submitted to the governor and the general assembly. (Note: This summary applies to this bill as introduced.) Read More
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State water plan - grant program - appropriations. Section 1 of the act: Creates the water plan implementation grant program (program); and Specifies criteria for expenditures by the Colorado water conservation board (board) for the program. The act appropriates: $8.3 million from the general fund to the department of natural resources (department) for use by the board to finance grants; and $1.7 million from the general fund to the department for use by the board for stakeholder outreach and technical analysis to develop a water resources demand management program.(Note: This summary applies to this bill as enacted.) Read More
Public hospitals - boards of trustees - membership - acquisition of real and personal property by lease. Under current law, not more than 4 of the 7 trustees of a public hospital board of trustees (hospital board) may be residents of the city or town in which the associated hospital is located. The act removes this restriction. Current law states that a hospital board may acquire real and personal property by lease only with the approval of the board of county commissioners. The act clarifies this requirement and creates an exception to it; that is, a hospital board that has designated its public hospital as an enterprise for purposes of section 20 of article X of the state constitution is not required to obtain such approval. (Note: This summary applies to this bill as enacted.) Read More
Colorado mountain college - authorization for baccalaureate degree program - local college district annexations - funding. The act changes the role and mission of Colorado mountain college from authorizing no more than 5 baccalaureate degree programs, as determined by its board, to authorizing a limited number of baccalaureate degree programs, as determined by its board. Colorado mountain college should confer with regional education providers to determine the feasibility of cooperative delivery of new bachelor's programs in adjacent localities. If a local college district annexes a school district or group of school districts into the local college district, for at least 5 years after annexation, the act requires the Colorado commission on higher education to consider annually recommending increases to the direct grant amount appropriated to a local college district to reflect increases in resident enrollment. Prior to recommending the increase, the commission shall consult the affected local college district. (Note: This summary applies to this bill as enacted.) Read More
Early childhood development service districts - creation - powers and duties. The act authorizes the creation of early childhood development service districts (districts) to provide services for children from birth through 8 years of age. Early childhood development services are defined to include early care and educational, health, mental health, and developmental services, including prevention and intervention. Districts are authorized to seek voter approval to levy property taxes and sales and use taxes in the district to generate revenues to provide early childhood development services. The district must be organized pursuant to the "Special District Act" as modified by the act. All eligible electors in the proposed district, rather than only property owners, are able to vote on the organization of the district and related ballot issues. The service plan for a proposed district is not required to be submitted to the planning commission for each county in which the special district is proposed to be located, and instead is submitted directly to the board of county commissioners (board) for such counties. In addition, the board is not allowed accept or act upon the request of a person owning property in the proposed service area to have his or her property excluded from the special district. The court conducting a hearing for the petition is also directed to not accept or act upon such a petition to exclude property from the district. The districts are governed by the "Special District Act"; except that they are not subject to provisions concerning the inclusion or exclusion of property, procedures for the levy and collection of taxes, the certification and notice of special district taxes for general obligation indebtedness, property tax reduction agreements, and public improvement contracts. A district is authorized to contract with or work with another district or other provider of early childhood development services to provide services throughout the district. (Note: This summary applies to this bill as enacted.) Read More
Hospitals - healthcare affordability and sustainability enterprise board - annual hospital expenditure report - hospital report card and hospital charge report recommendations. The act requires the department of health care policy and financing (department), in consultation with the Colorado healthcare affordability and sustainability enterprise board, to develop and prepare an annual report detailing uncompensated hospital costs and the different categories of expenditures made by hospitals in the state (hospital expenditure report). In compiling the hospital expenditure report, the department shall use publicly available data sources whenever possible. Each hospital in the state is required to make available to the department certain information. Prior to issuing the hospital expenditure report, each hospital referenced in the report has 15 days to review the report and submit clarifications or corrections to the department. Additionally, the department is required to provide a statewide hospital association any information it receives from hospitals in the development of the hospital expenditure report. The department is required to submit the hospital expenditure report to the governor, specified committees of the general assembly, and the medical services board in the department by January 15, 2020, and each year thereafter. The department is also directed to post the hospital expenditure report on the department's website. The act requires the department, in consultation with the department of public health and environment and the division of insurance, to determine whether the hospital report card and the hospital charge report that exist under current law require any structural or substantive changes. Any such recommendations to that effect are required to be made to the general assembly by November 1, 2019. (Note: This summary applies to this bill as enacted.) Read More
Joint Budget Committee. The bill requires internal process changes in connection with the procurement process for major information technology (IT) projects as follows: Delegation of authority to sign contracts: The state controller is authorized to delegate to state agencies the ability to sign contracts involving the payment of money by the state. Currently, the state controller chooses not to delegate such authority to the office of information technology (office) for IT project contracts. The bill requires the state controller to delegate the ability to sign contracts for major IT projects to the office and specifically to the chief information officer or the chief information officer's designee. Major IT project definition: The definition of major IT project currently applies to all state agencies. The bill exempts the department of education from the definition through June 30, 2019. Project plan for IT projects: The project plan for any major IT project by a state agency is required to include certain criteria. The bill specifies that in addition to current requirements, such a project plan shall include a planning and analysis function to be performed by the office to ensure that the state agency's desired major IT project solution is in accordance with the office's technology standards and to ensure that the scope and budget of the major IT project are vetted by the office. IT vendor selection: On or before December 1, 2018, the office is required to establish policies and procedures regarding a vendor selection standard to be used in selecting a vendor for any major IT project. The vendor selection standard is required to include a process for resolving differences of opinion between the office and the state agency in the vendor selection for any major IT project. Additionally, in 2017, the general assembly enacted legislation that required the state auditor to enter into a contract with an independent consulting firm to evaluate state IT resources. The bill expands the scope of the current contract to include a review and evaluation of the procurement process for the human resources information system, also known as HRWorks, and to provide objective findings and recommendations that could help the procurement process for major IT projects in the future. The consulting firm is required to submit a report, containing specified findings and recommendations, to the legislative audit committee, the joint budget committee, the joint technology committee, and the office of information technology. After receiving the report, such committees, the office, and any other office or department that was the subject of recommendations made in the report are required to meet to discuss the implementation of the recommendations made in the report. (Note: This summary applies to the reengrossed version of this bill as introduced in the second house.) , Read More
The chief information security officer in the governor's office of information technology (OIT), the director of OIT, the department of state, and the executive director of the department of regulatory agencies are required to take certain actions to protect state records containing trusted sensitive and confidential information from criminal, unauthorized, or inadvertent manipulation or theft. The chief information security officer is required to: Identify, assess, and mitigate cyber threats to state government; Annually collect information from all public agencies to assess the nature of threats to data systems and the potential risks and civil liabilities from the theft or inadvertent release of such information; In coordination and partnership with specified agencies, boards, and councils, annually assess the data systems of each public agency for the benefits and costs of adopting and applying distributed ledger technologies such as blockchains; Develop and maintain a series of metrics to identify, assess, and monitor each public agency data system for its platform descriptions, vulnerabilities, risks, liabilities, appropriate employee access control, and the benefits and costs of adopting encryption and distributed ledger technologies. The director of OIT is required to consider the annual metrics from the office of the chief information security officer to recommend programs, contracts, and upgrades of data systems that have good cost-benefit potential or return on investment. In addition, OIT and the office of the chief information security officer are required to consider developing public-private partnerships and contracts to allow capitalization of encryption technologies while protecting intellectual property rights. The department of state is required to consider research, development, and implementation for encryption and data integrity techniques, including distributed ledger technologies such as blockchains. The department of state is required to consider using distributed ledger technologies when accepting business licensing records and when distributing department of state data to other departments and agencies. The executive director of the department of regulatory agencies or the director's designee is required to consider secure encryption methods, including distributed ledger technologies, to protect against falsification, create visibility to identify external hacking threats, and to improve internal data security. In addition, the bill specifies that institutions of higher education may include distributed ledger technologies within their curricula and research and development activities. The bill also specifies that the university of Colorado at Colorado Springs and any nonprofit organization with which the university has a partnership may consider: Encouraging coordination with the United States department of commerce and the national institute of standards and technologies to develop the capability to act as a Colorado in-state center of excellence on cybersecurity advice and national institute of standards and technologies standards; Studying efforts to protect privacy of personal identifying information maintained within distributed ledger programs, ensuring that programs make all attempts to follow best practices for privacy, and providing advice to all program stakeholders on the requirement to maintain privacy in accordance with required regulatory bodies and governing standards; and Encouraging the use of distributed ledger technologies, such as blockchains, within their proposed curricula for public sector education.(Note: This summary applies to the reengrossed version of this bill as introduced in the second house.) , Read More
The bill directs the department of education to identify geographic areas within the state and specific subjects for which there is a teacher shortage. Under the bill, a rural school district, rural charter school, or rural board of cooperative services (rural local education provider) and a public or private institution of higher education (institution) may enter into an agreement to provide a teaching fellowship program for students enrolled in the fourth year of the approved educator preparation program. The rural local education provider must be located within an identified area or need a teacher for one of the identified subjects and demonstrate chronic hiring difficulty and financial need; the institution must offer an approved educator preparation program. The agreement must include the commitments of both the rural local education provider and the institution, including the commitments of both the rural local education provider and the institution to jointly design an individualized fellowship plan for each teaching fellow that addresses necessary competencies, the rural local education provider's commitment to extend an offer of employment to the teaching fellow when he or she successfully completes the fellowship year, and the institution's commitment to pay a percentage of a stipend to the teaching fellow during the fellowship year. Each teaching fellow receives a stipend of $10,000 to use for costs of attendance during the fellowship year. The department of higher education, based on the rural local education provider's demonstrated chronic hiring difficulties and financial need, will annually select up to 100 teaching fellows for which the state will provide 50% of the stipend through the state financial assistance program. For these teaching fellows, the institution must provide the remaining 50% from institutional financial assistance. If the teaching fellow receives an offer of employment from the rural local education provider for the 2 school years following completion of the fellowship and does not work for the rural local education provider for those 2 school years, the teaching fellow must repay the amount of the stipend. The rural local education provider and institution must prepare an annual report concerning implementation of the teaching fellowship program and submit it to the department of higher education. The department must prepare a summary report concerning the implementation and effect of the teaching fellowship programs throughout the state and submit the report to the state board of education, the Colorado commission on higher education, and the joint budget committee and education committees of the general assembly. (Note: This summary applies to the reengrossed version of this bill as introduced in the second house.) , Read More
Joint Budget Committee. The bill requires the department of health care policy and financing (department) to seek federal approval for a 6.5% increase in the reimbursement rate for certain services specified in the bill that are delivered through the home- and community-based services intellectual and developmental disabilities, supported living services, and children's extensive supports waivers. Service agencies shall use 100% of the increased funding resulting from the increase in the reimbursement rate for compensation, as defined in the bill, for direct support professionals, as defined in the bill. The bill requires service agencies to document the use of the increased funding for compensation using a reporting tool developed by the department and the service agencies, and to submit a report to the department for the 2018-19 through the 2020-21 fiscal years. The department has access to the supporting documentation and may determine that a service agency is not using the increased funding as required. The state department has ongoing discretion to request information from service agencies demonstrating how the agencies are maintaining the increases in compensation for direct support professionals beyond the 3-year reporting period. If the department determines that a service agency does not use 100% of the increased funding resulting from the increase in the reimbursement rate for compensation for direct support professionals, the service agency may take action within a specific time frame to contest the determination or submit a corrective action plan to the department. The department shall recoup from the service agency the amount of funding resulting from the reimbursement rate increase that is not used for compensation for direct support professionals. Once sufficient data is available to assess the impact and outcomes of the reimbursement rate increase on persons with intellectual and developmental disabilities, the department shall include the impact and outcome data, including staff stability survey data, in its annual report to the general assembly concerning the waiting list for intellectual and developmental disability services. The bill requires the department to initiate 300 nonemergency enrollments from the waiting list for the home- and community-based services developmental disabilities waiver in the 2018-19 state fiscal year. The medical services board (board) in the department shall promulgate rules establishing additional criteria for reserve capacity enrollments based on the age and capacity of a person's parent or caregiver. As part of the rule-making process, the board shall solicit stakeholder feedback from persons with intellectual and developmental disabilities and their families. The department shall include in a monthly report the number of persons who were moved off the developmental disabilities waiting list for both nonemergency enrollments and reserve capacity enrollments. (Note: This summary applies to the reengrossed version of this bill as introduced in the second house.) , Read More