Senate Finance [Apr 14, 2026]

Good afternoon. Welcome to Senate Finance. Ms. Rudebush, will you please take the role?

Present. Bright.

Excused. Polker.

Excused. Simpson.

Here. Marchman.

Here. Good afternoon, everybody. We are going to be hearing four bills today, HB 26-1188, HB 26-116, HB 26-049, SB 26-155. I do want to let everybody know that 116 and 49 both have strike blows. If you need a copy of the strike below to know whether you still want to testify, please reach out and we'll attempt to get you one. Okay. And with that, we are going to start with Senator Colker on HB 26-1188 Sunset Process Securities Regulation.

Please. Take your time. Please.

And please let the record reflect that Vice Chair Marchman and Senators Mullica and Frizzell are both here. And do we have questions for our bill sponsor? Okay. Well, you must have done a good job of answering everything right up front, but we'll see what we have. We do have one person signed up for who's remote, and we do have two people for questions only, somebody from the Division of, from DORA, from Department of Regulatory Agencies. Oh, no, we have two people from DORA, one from the Division of Securities and one from the COPRRR, which I don't know what that is off the top, but we'll make sure that they introduce themselves and tell us. And if anybody else is wanting to testify, there are empty seats up front. Come on down and we will get you to sign up later. But this is your first and last opportunity to testify. So we are going to start with Mr. Neal Marks online, if he is there. and just so you know because of the volume of people we have to testify today who signed up we are doing two-minute testimony so mr. marks um please unmute and proceed

Yes, please proceed.

hold for questions and I don't know if Mr. Tobias is online. If he is, can we please bring him in? And Commissioner Chan, would you like to introduce yourself and at least tell people what you are able to answer questions about? That would be helpful.

And if you wanted to give testimony, that's fine too. Thank you, Senator Kipp.

Thank you so much. Please hold for questions. And Mr. Tobias, I have you marked for questions only, but please feel free to introduce yourself. And I don't know what COPRRR is. You can tell us that and tell us what questions you'd be able to answer as well. That would be helpful. Thank you so much.

Thank you so much. Members, do we have questions for our esteemed panel? Senator Benavides.

Yes.

Commissioner Chan. Thank you, Chair Kipp. Thank you for your question, Senator Benavides. The anti-fraud provision under the Securities Act is under 505, and it gives us authority to basically stop fraud. I can when I have a case I can do a number of things One of them as I mentioned is I can refer to the AGs and that will happen in cases where it will go to the district court So we actually go to court I would be the plaintiff on behalf of the state, and the attorneys would go through the entire court process, which, as we all know, can take several years. I can also refer to criminal, to the criminal district attorneys and prosecutors, and of course, then it goes to the criminal process which is slightly different than civil. And then the third option that I have is to go through the administrative side and that's where cease and desist come in and summary suspensions. Summary suspensions are only for licensees. So of course that would not be for everyone. It would be just if they violate their licensing requirements. And then the cease and desist would be anti-fraud for securities only. So this statute only deals with fraud for securities. We've seen that this, so what that means is if something's not a security, then it would have to be taken up by somebody else. So if we do a cease and desist order, we would have an inquiry by the investigators, and probably the auditors would spread the money transactions to see where it was going, and if we believed that there was enough evidence, we would issue a preliminary cease and desist. It would be similar to a TRO in the sense that what we'd want to do is it would be an urgent matter to ask that the target stop whatever they're doing, including dissipating funds. That tends to be in securities the most difficult part. If we delay, the target can dissipate funds, and then by the time we get to the process, there isn't anything left. So that's why there is an urgent preliminary cease and desist in order to in some ways parallel what you can do in the civil courts, which is issue a TRO. In the civil courts, you issue a TRO, and then everything freezes, and then you have the trial. The idea is we're going to try to make sure there's no further dissipation of assets. Thank you.

Thank you. And so I understand from that. It's more of a timing issue like a TRO, that you need something to stop right away, as opposed to summary suspension.

I'm sorry.

So summary suspension is a parallel structure. If we have a licensee who is dissipating funds, as you know, our licensees actually custody investor funds, so they could actually be holding all those funds. And if we feel that their violations are such that they could be dissipating those funds, we would order a summary suspension, which is similar to a preliminary cease and desist order, which would tell them to, you know, stop. You're suspended from doing anything until we have a hearing.

Thank you. So then my other question was the definition of person in here, and I had asked that before this. And so I'm still trying to understand, because the fiscal note talks about licensing of securities firms. So the response I got that if there was a suspension, that the suspension could be against the firm or it could be against the individuals. And if it's only against the firm, the individuals that work for that firm would still have their license licenses and could still operate. Is that correct?

Follow-up?

Senator Benavidez.

Thank you, Senator Kipp. Thank you for your question, Senator Benefitis. Yes, that's correct. Thank you.

Thank you, Madam Chair. Commissioner Chan, just quickly, the next repeal is 11 years away, where we came up with 11 years instead of something different. When was the last one? Did we change? Have they been on 10-year programs? That's my only question.

Mr. Tobias.

Thank you very much. Any additional questions for this panel? Okay. Seeing none, thank you so much for answering all those questions. We really appreciate all of you testifying and answering questions today. So let us bring back up our bill sponsor for the amendment phase.

Okay. Members, do we have any amendments? Seeing no amendments, the amendment phase is closed. Senator Kolker, wrap up.

Thank you. Any other closing comments? Senator Kolker, an appropriate motion would be to the committee, sadly on appropriations.

I forgot the bill number. It is Bill 1188. Thank you.

Thank you. Ms. Reudba, should we please take the roll?

Yes.

No.

Aye.

Aye.

Madam Chair.

Thank you, Madam Chair, and I want to first publicly say thank you for all the time you've afforded me as a sponsor to wrestle the many moving parts of this to the ground and the condition that they're in today. It's been a long road. If I may, I wanted to speak briefly first to the elements of the introduced and a little bit about the why and then how we've landed here. The introduced of 116 sought to do four different things, all unified under the broad umbrella of property tax. One, I think maybe most clear cut, sought to make permanent the two-year experiment that we did starting in 24 for portability of the senior homestead benefit. Lack of portability is written into the Constitution. We all know about the challenge. it can pose something of an obstacle to seniors who might like to downsize. And then there are second order effects like if seniors could downsize, you know, that's that much more housing stock maybe opens up for a new family. Bluntly, the March forecast kind of killed that. I hope maybe we can return to that issue next year. It did not seem right now fiscally responsible to create an ongoing obligation in the general fund to that effect. Another element of the bill was to try to add a little bit of operational uniformity to the question of statutory town lodging tax. Right now, home rule municipalities have inherent home rule authority to issue a lodging tax if they go to their voters. That was never in the bill. Counties have statutory authority to do something similar. We revised that just last year, I think. There was a House bill, which leaves statutory towns, which for a quarter century or more have been operating kind of by a hack. Statutory towns do not have specific statutory authority for a lodging tax. They do have authority for an occupation tax. Again, they have to go to the voters like anybody does under Tabor. a 2000 Supreme Court case blessed the use of the Occupational Tax Authority to issue a tax on the occupation of lodging, if you will. So that's the world that we've been in, and a number of sections of the introduced sought to create a more clear and state-collected and more uniform mechanism for doing that. ultimately that kind of ran aground on just some city-county tensions about which tax would yield to the other in the case where you might have them both going on. Again, maybe the legislature returns to that in the future. Maybe we don't. Frankly, I decided to cut bait on it for the year in the interest of time and the many other problems pressing down on us. Another part of the bill sought to address the question of taxation of business personal property. I think we all know about what this tax is In 21 the legislature in a bill that I was a co on increased the ceiling on the exemption of business personal property from to relieving a significant number of payers of business personal property tax of the obligation to file anything at all Also unloaded some work from county officials responsible for that kind of tax and set into place a backfill mechanism by which we calculate the difference. The treasurer would send warrants to counties for onward distribution to other local governments. Then there was an inflation adjuster set on that $50,000. It's right now $58,000. That part of the introduced bill proposed to curtail that make-hole payment, which was about $19.5 million in the most recent data point we have, spanning over all property tax local governments in the state. not a gigantic amount perhaps. Obviously important to those who are getting it. Reason being BPP is a very lumpy tax. You go from $7,900 to $50,000, there's just not that much tax revenue in there. That was part of why we increased the ceiling back in 21. A lot of the distribution of BPP is very much at the high end, the biggest taxpayers, utility companies can be among those. obviously you don't do something like that if you want to be a popular person in this legislature and experience has borne that out but frankly that was in the bill out of a sense of obligation to the state fisc and things like minimizing all the cuts that we are about to participate in discussing with the long bill tomorrow folks on IDD wait lists and many many others personally I'm not optimistic about the state's fiscal picture next year, net of a lot of things, and who knows. Which brings us to the fourth and last part of the introduced bill, the dreaded Section 4, which dealt with the slightly wonky issue of the income approach to valuation for lodging property. The premise I start from is comparable property should be taxed comparably. I know that there are those who would question my premise, but that was the premise that I was starting from. I won't go too far down the rabbit hole here because it's coming out of the bill. But I would just say that the question of how property in particular is to be taxed is quite old, older than this country, because property is maybe the first form of wealth. We just talked about securities. Those are much newer. members want a ripping good time some night when you can't sleep, check out the Statute of Uses passed by the English Parliament in 1536 during the time of King Henry VIII. They called it Uses, we would call that an interest in real property. The Statute of Uses was the English Parliament trying to address, frankly, the evasion of taxes when there was an emphasis on the condition of the FISC of the English Crown at that point. So here we are 490 years later. At any rate, what is in L5, the strike below, is two small things. Section 1 are some technical changes to the senior property tax portability statute. Credit where it's due, the division of property taxation identified the need for some technical changes here. B24, 111, which I know is personally familiar to one of the members of this committee, set in place this two-year experiment, and it is coming to a close. This section does not, for the reasons I stated, continue it. But what happened in the original bill is there were end dates in one of the sections implicated, and there weren't end dates in the other. It was kind of a ghost open period, so what we're doing is specifying some matching end dates in Section 1. It's meant to be technical in nature. Section 2 goes into the BPP statutes and simply takes off the inflation correction so that we are writing into statute the present value that the $50,000 from 2021 has inflated up to. It's now $58,000. It will remain there going forward. The state will continue to have the obligation to backfill at that value. what we are doing thereby is at least not increasing the obligation in the state general fund as we have now cut approaching $2 billion in the last two years and face some onward challenging prospects. So as winnowed down by L5, I hope the committee might support what's left, and I'd be happy to take questions. Thank you.

Thank you, and thank you for your creative financing. I appreciate it. I am curious why or if there is an opportunity to revisit the $58,000 statutory limit, either through a sunset or a comeback and look at it, or why not? I would like to understand.

Senator Snyder.

Senator Weissman.

unless you have a fiscal memo, Senator Wiseman. Senator Wiseman.

Thank you, Madam Chair. I move L-005 to Senate Bill 116.

I just have a process question just based on kind of the comments that were made. So we are in the amendment phase before the witness phase, and then we're not making a motion at this point because it almost sounded like a motion was happening. I was thinking what we should do is go ahead and be unusual and adopt the amendment at this phase, because I think there are people who are signed up to speak who might choose not to testify if we have adopted the strike below, which doesn't include so much of what the introduced version of the bill included. And so going slightly out of order, but yes.

I want to be clear. We're not making a motion from the committee. We're still going to have a witness phase. Yes, we are still going to have a witness phase. We're not telling anybody they can't testify. We're giving people more certainty about what they're testifying to.

and it had to do with the portable senior exemption. Those individuals who have already qualified, that's not going away for them, as I understand it. They just won't be accepting any new applications in that program, essentially sunsets. Senator Weiss.

Do I understand that correctly? Senator Weissman.

And because 111 is effectively going to sunset, as it always was, if there had never been an SB 116, the state backfill obligation as to the portable property class also goes away after PTY 25 and 26. Senator Fruvall, would you like to follow up?

Yeah, that's a really great question. We do have a fiscal analyst on the bill. Would it help to bring her forward? Senator Wiseman?

Yeah, and that was what Ms. Uddebush just pointed out. Mr. Erfmeyer is here for questions only, so why don't we let him answer that question? But with that, shall we move to the amendment phase, or are there further questions for our bill sponsor? Okay. And again, if anybody would like a hard copy of the strike below, please let us know. But I'm going to just start calling names. Mr. Dwayne Nava, Jenna Wells, Rebecca Hernandez, Megan Wagner. And I believe those folks should be here in person. Okay, we have one. I'm going to keep calling names until we get a full panel. Rebecca Hernandez again. Doug Price. I believe the rest of these people are remote. Jacqueline Villegas, Ken Watkins. Apparently three of the people are online, so I'm going to just call the rest of the names and hope that we get a full panel here. Jeffrey Thermosgaard, Patrick Walton, Cynthia Eichler, Olivia Asave, Joe Rowan, Elizabeth Haskell, and Mr. Erfmeyer, why don't you go ahead and come on up. And if there is anybody else in the room who wishes to testify on the bill, I think we will be able to do this in a single, large-ish panel. Okay. Thank you, everybody. So why don't we go ahead in this case and start with Ms. Wagner on my left,

Thank you very much. Ms. Haskell. Good afternoon, Madam Chair and members

though, and we'll move to monitor with the amendments. Thank you. Thank you. Mr. Erfmeyer, would you like to go ahead and introduce yourself and tell people who you are and what kind of questions you could answer. And perhaps you'd like to go ahead and answer Senator Frizzell's question as your testimony, if you wish.

I think we will have more questions for you, but we will come back for the questions portion, and then we're going to go online to Mr. Ken Watkins. Please introduce, unmute yourself, introduce yourself, and you have two minutes.

Thank you. Mr. Rowan, you are up next.

Thank you. And I noticed Mr. Thermosgar dropped off. Is he still there at all? Okay, I'm sorry. He put his hand up midway through that last testimony, so I don't know if he had a specific time limit. If we can get him back, we will allow him to testify. Members, I know I have questions, but I want to give everybody else an opportunity first.

Mr. Rowan. Thank you, Madam Chair and Senator Marchman. Thank you for that question. As I said, the strike below came to our attention yesterday. And so we really haven't had it as an organization. We haven't had an opportunity to consider that in greater detail. Our biggest concern, though, was with the original build, or I shouldn't say our biggest concern, but one of our concerns was the business personal property tax issue. And that, again, does not change in this amendment. So I would say that we were at best, I would suggest that we'll probably be in an amended position based on the amendment, provided that the references to the business personal properties tax be stricken from 116 in a further amendment.

Okay, additional questions?

Will they maintain their status as a property tax exemption, or are you saying they won't anymore?

Madam Chair. Senator Snyder, yeah, my understanding is that that will go away for them. This was a two-year program for the tax years 25 and 26, reimbursable in 26 and 27. It established a new class of property known as the Qualified Senior Property Tax Exemption, or portable, as it's often called. We were stuck with a situation where it established two years for the classification but there was no end dates for the rebate or the reimbursements or anything like that So one of two things had to occur We either had to end date all of the rest of the program to coincide with those two years or we had to extend those two years into perpetuity in the future which would have allowed them to continue and assessors would have continued collecting the applications and things like that. The strike blow as it reads now would end the program after the two years and effectively end the classification and everything that goes along with it.

Mr. Erfmeyer. Madam Chair, Senator Snyder, that's correct. They would have to qualify under the longstanding constitutional senior property tax exemption as we know it.

So don't we open ourselves up to somebody who detrimentally relies upon that move and that status? I'm just very concerned about this. Mr. Erfmeyer.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Sorry, Madam Chair, just doing some quick calculations. No, I appreciate you digging into this, because I think there are several of us who are somewhat alarmed by this.

Yeah, David, come on up. Mr. Hansen, excuse me. Mr. Irfmeyer, would you like to continue to comment?

Okay, thank you.

Does that?

Mr. Erfmeyer. Madam Chair, Senator Frizzell. That is my understanding as well, yes.

Senator Kolker. Thank you, Madam Chair. For Mr. Hansen or Mr. Erfmeyer, the senior homestead exemption, though, was only eligible if we had a TABOR surplus, I believe. Is that correct or am I wrong? because I was original sponsor of 24-111, and that was our intent is when we had TABOR surplus. So if we didn't have a TABOR surplus, we wouldn't be backfilling.

Senator Frizzell. So, Mr. Irfmeyer, and I think that you're the best person to answer this question. If we, as a body, decided that we agree that this program should sunset for fiscal reasons, but we wanted to continue the program, continue the backfill for those individuals who have already qualified during this two-year period. Would that be a reasonable thing to look at?

Thank you.

Mr. Erfmeyer? Yeah, Madam Chair, a couple thoughts. One is keep in mind at the time that this bill went through, it retroactively went back to people that had moved all the way from, I think, 2020 and forward. So by the time it was implemented, I'm going to guess 75% of the people that currently qualify had already made their move. So whether this bill, the previous bill, was the reason for their move, I would say two-thirds to three-quarters it wasn't because they had already moved and then got the exemption retroactively. As far as going forward, the challenge we have right now is for the qualified senior residential property property that's there is no assessment rate we don't have an assessment rate past this year so we those it's not it appears nowhere because it said just for 25 and 26 so starting in 27 if the program continues assessors literally do not have an assessment rate to tie to those particular properties one could logically assume that it would be the same as all other residential but technically in statute one does not exist so if we wanted to add years so that they have their assessment rate and allow those owners to continue to get their program and their money off their tax bill. The question is, is the state going to backfill that and is there any end date on there so that assessors can stop accepting applications at some point if that's the case.

Correct.

further questions. Senator Colker. Thank you, Madam Chair. I'm just going back again and reading the bill summary from 2024. And I have some confusion and disagreement a little bit. I mean, I know what the intent of the bill was for those years. The assessment rate was 7.15. What's the current

And then we would be looking at people that were getting this program at a lower assessment rate. Even though this would fall off, they would get a lower assessment rate going forward, because right now they're on 7.15%. Is that correct?

Even though the bill said 7.15. Correct.

Until we get to next year, then we don't have assessment rates any longer. Senator Colker. Thank you, Madam Chair. And in the bill summary, again, this was our intent as sponsors. It says for state field school years which excess state revenues are required to be refunded pursuant to the Taxpayers Bill of Rights establishes the reimbursement to local government entities as a means of refunding such excess state revenues So that was, you know, if we had an excess, they would get it. If we didn't, they wouldn't. This year we don't. And so that's where would we circumvent that because that's what was in this bill. Mr. Hanson, you said that we would still owe it from general fund, even though the bill

Thank you. But if we have a, if we do not have a TABOR surplus, the General Assembly has in the past, I believe, made the determination to go ahead and pay the money. So I guess what my concern is that people sort of have an expectation as this is essentially built in, even though the entire senior homestead exemption program is something that would technically get turned off if we were not over TABOR, correct? Or am I wrong there?

It is an adjustment that the legislature has to make. It is not dependent on whether or not there is Tabor surplus. And so I guess likewise, if the legislature could choose to change the statute for property tax year 2026, if it wanted to, to make the assessed value reduction for the qualified senior primary residence different than it is now. Thank you. That's very helpful.

No further amendments beyond the strike below, which, again, reflected everything I agreed to cut out of the bill. I would like to speak just by way of cleanup to some of what we just heard. The witness from the fire chiefs I think made an important point Members may know or recall I was pretty significantly involved in the property tax discussions in this building in 22 and 3 less so in 24 and thereafter Through that, I have come to appreciate that fire districts, maybe uniquely among different local governments, have experienced some cost pressures. Recent weeks or months, there's been some national news about antitrust litigation against the manufacturers of fire engines. Maybe that's part of the cost drivers that the folks who run into the burning buildings for us have had to deal with. I just mention that as something that we, the legislature, might pay attention to in the future. To some of the commentary about BPP, I want to be clear. The introduced bill really posed the question of who should, what government should bear the cost of the increased exemption relative to 2021, state or local. We were never going to put that back on business. We have inflation adjusters in some places in statute. We don't have them in other places in statute. We have had an inflation adjuster in this part of CRS for years I'm proposing because we're cutting a billion dollars and trying to injure as few people as possible while we do so that we turn off the inflation adjustment. Respectfully, I disagree that that part of the bill was ever any business. now to the point about the senior property status I think I've heard the committee talk about a reality that was always in the original bill always in 24-111 there was a two-year basically subtraction of basis of value set forth in the original bill 39-1-104.23-S that was in 111. It's not in this bill. It was not in the introduced. It's not in the strike below. As Mr. Erfmeyer noted, that was backward looking and essentially conferred a benefit on folks who had already moved without anticipation of the benefit. Senator Frizzell, to your question, one thought that comes to mind that we ought to at least analyze if we were to proceed as you mentioned would be the special legislation provision. Part of that is a closed class analysis, Article 5, Section 25 of the Constitution. Do we run afoul of legislating to confer a benefit on a closed universe of people? If we leave the universe open, if more people can keep applying into this benefit status, no issue. If we write legislation to confer a benefit on a discrete universe of people, we have an issue. At any rate, members, we've talked about a lot of different stuff today that goes beyond the strike below, which as a closing statement seeks to do two things. Seeks to leave everything in place about how we've been doing business personal property for five years since the 21 bill, with the exception of removing the inflation adjuster. So that hereafter, business personal property schedules up to $58,000 are accepted and above aren't. And that number just remains in statute. And then we fix essentially a drafting issue from the original bill on senior portability which was always only going to run for two years The fact that it terminates after property tax year 26 does not come from the strike below does not come from the introduced bill comes from legislation we all passed two years ago So given all that, I still think the few things that are left here matter, and I hope the committee

at worst confusion um about when people pat when this was passed because and you know maybe it was only me but i thinking maybe it wasn't that when people when we passed this we said for these next two years for those people who decide to downsize, move to a smaller home, they will be given this new, because they might not have otherwise decided not to move, especially those who would have decided not to otherwise move during this two-year period, I believe people thought they were going to get the portability going forward. So when they were grandfathered into it, they believed that they would be getting the senior homestead exemption moving forward, but they had to move and do that during the two-year period. And I think that, frankly, it's a reasonable interpretation because we had heard stories from people who felt trapped in their houses because it's like I live in this big house, but I can't move because I'll lose my portability. So we gave them the portability for two years, and they believed that they would be getting grandfathered in and get that going forward. So I think we have different interpretations of maybe how people interpreted that. Do you think that's correct?

Well, Senator Colker. Thank you. And just going back to the history of the bill originally, and it was never intended for two years when it passed the Senate. There was, in February, we passed it out of Senate Finance, and it wasn't a two-year bill. April 18th of 2024, it was passed out of House Finance and went to House Appropriations, and it was May 6th of 2024 in House Appropriations that the two years was put on, which makes for the understanding of all of us in the Senate thinking that this was going longer because here we are at the end of session. I think a day or two before the end of session it was passed and then it had to be concurred if we wanted this to pass at all. And that had come from, in my recollection, the governor's office saying two years with the idea that we will re-up this in two years and see what things look like. Let's get it started, and that's where we were taking it. Let's get it going. I think the worst-case situation has happened, where that two years has come up and we don't I have the money for this. But we are able to give an exemption for two years for people as they move into their new home. It was, again, started as 2016 was a look back. And we amended it to 2020 because that was too long. So just to give us some context and some history here, I don't like that we're ending this. I would like to see us try to figure that out at that point. But again, since this is a special class, as Senator Wiseman says, are we treating a special class differently? Because as a special class, I would say this would be assumed they would get this if we had TABOR surplus. But again, going into the legal specifics on that, I can't speak to. But just giving everyone perspective on how this bill came about, how the senior homestead exemption portability ended, was a lot different than when it left the Senate. Thank you.

Thank you, Madam Chair, and thank you again, Senator Weissman. I think we talk about two years, but because of the retroactive nature of it, There could be people that moved in 2021 that had gotten the look-back exemption, so they'd already be five years into a new 10-year period. Am I reading that correctly? So I think what this discussion has really reiterated for me, which I felt for a long time, we need to have comprehensive reform here in the area of the homestead property exemption. We should, you know, we have to find a way to, I hate to say it, but means test it, because there are people where this is a vital exemption. And there are other people down in my district, some of the wealthier enclaves around, say, the Broadmoor and others, they don't even notice this on their property tax bills. So to me, it just strengthened my resolve that we come together in some form and put something together and get it on the ballot, get it passed by the voters and clean this up once and for all. Thank you.

It's a lovely subject. Senator Benavides. I just wanted to say I support the bill, and I support your efforts. This, in 24, I wasn't here, but it is not the first time portability has come up and the whole issue around this. And every time, I mean, I know for at least five, six years before that it was coming up, including the means testing was on there And because every time we make a change at the state level to property tax we have to understand we have to pay for it because that property tax is up to the county and if we want to change their tax, then we pay for it. And unfortunately, we don't have the money to pay for it, and that's why it has never passed. When I worked under, I won't say who, in 2009, we had to stop paying property tax, and I think one of the witnesses says bring it down to zero, for two years, because we could not backfill it. And that's what I think this is saying. These are tough situations. And, I mean, I think if it saves us some money, a few million, I didn't get a fiscal note to this, what it means. I think it's worth it. It's not like we haven't discussed this all the time. That's why I struggle with personal property tax and real property tax, because the counties rely on these monies. and if we're going to fiddle with it, with their tax, then we need to pay for it and we just don't have the money to pay for it. So I think this is a good bill in this sense. It doesn't mean in a few years we might be back a little flush with funds and want to do it. But at this point, we don't have it. And I think one witness indicated that roughly two-thirds of the people had already moved before this changed in 24. So I don't know. I didn't hear anybody say the total number of people that are utilizing this portability exception, basically. But, you know, it's an entitlement that shouldn't stay. We've given them extra two years to reach their 10 years, but we just can't keep doing it. So I'm going to be supportive of the bill.

Thank you, Madam Chair. I actually was sitting in House Appropriations in 2024 and remember this conversation vividly, and I was supportive of 111 and, in fact, worked with this bill's sponsors to amend it to make sure that this classification was a priority second only to the property tax exemption when it came to creating the refund. And so I have also been in the county assessor's office when the exemption, the senior tax exemption was revoked the first time and the second time. And it's not a pleasant situation. People have lots going on in their lives. And for us to expect citizens to understand that when they fill out an application and they are granted an exemption, for them to understand that it might just go away, it could go away any time, based on the whim of the legislature is not really top of mind for those folks and having been an assessor we do our very best to educate citizens who participate in exemptions and help them understand that it's not a county decision if that exemption gets zeroed out. but really they're not understanding it until they see the increase in their tax bill. And for the 2,400 households that are participating in this class of property, I think that this is going to be a really big deal, and I would like to see us try to figure this out because... it's going to be a very, very challenging situation that we put our county assessors in and our citizens in. That's what I'm saying about this. Thank you.

Thank you, Madam Chair. I move Senate Bill 116 as amended to the Appropriations Committee. Thank you.

Yes. Wright.

No. Kolker.

Yes. Simpson.

Reluctantly, yes. Marchman.

Thank you. Thank you.

Senator Frizzell. Thank you, Madam Chair. Thank you, committee members. We have all heard about, probably directly from our constituents, about the availability and affordability of homeowners insurance. I know that is a frequent topic of conversation at my town halls and really any time I out talking to folks and in emails Hail and wildfire events continue to drive up costs. And with Colorado currently ranked as the sixth most expensive in the nation for homeowners insurance, it's really challenging to try to thread the needle on how we can cut costs. Many homes across Colorado remain very vulnerable, and there's a clear need to invest in proactive disaster mitigation at the individual property level, and that could be replacing your roof to a hail or a fire-resistant roof. It might be mitigating the area surrounding your property against wildfire. There's lots of different avenues, but strengthening a home against hail and wildfire, that really does help to reduce damage. It lowers the repair costs and can help stabilize what has become a very volatile insurance market. So Senate Bill 49, we do have a strike below you I'm sure you've seen that this is not the bill that that we had introduced we had to make some significant changes to it but what it does is it gives homeowners a financial incentive to protect their homes and then help ensure the availability of affordable insurance as introduced the bill included multiple incentives including an expansion of the natural disaster mitigation enterprise, and we're amending the bill to just better reflect the state's budgetary constraints and focus on an incentive that does not create significant cost. The amended bill creates an income tax reduction for contributions to a catastrophe savings account. A homeowner can use the account to set aside funds to cover insurance deductibles after a disaster and to invest in proactive mitigation projects like impact-resistant roofing. And with that, I'll turn this over to my co-prime.

Thank you. Thank you, Madam Chair, and thank you, Committee, for hearing Senate Bill 49. And as my co-prime sponsor just said, we all know the situation in Colorado. We're the sixth most expensive in the nation for homeowners insurance. It's climbing all over the place. It's going up by 7%, 8% a year. There's new models out there where they're increasing the deductible or tying your deductible amount to the market value of your property. So even a 2% tie-in there on a $500,000 loan, that's $10,000 right there for a deductible. so we will talk a little bit about L004 the strike below but you know cost of living we all hear it every day in all walks of life but we don't hear that much about insurance costs as being a big part of that conversation in 2023 homeowners insurance in Colorado was unprofitable eight of the last 11 years more than any other state the best way to address this risk is by tackling the problem at its source when homes are more prepared to withstand disaster repair costs go down and insurers are more likely to provide coverage which is another issue we're facing where a lot of people they're covered is being dropped, not just because they live in a high-risk area, but, you know, these companies, they'll have a certain number of policies at risk in a certain area, and once they hit that, they'll stop issuing new policies, not based on any higher risk, just they don't want that actuarial risk taken on by their company. And also, we've also seen, and we'll hear, I think, today that with a program like this, which has been successful in at least seven other states, most successful maybe the state of South Carolina, which much of our strike below is kind of drafted upon. It's had that effect. It has lowered property, homeowners insurance premiums once they have used this money to to do the mitigation, the better resilient products and others. Importantly, because as I mentioned, the deductibles seem to be going up as rapidly or more rapidly than the policies, this bill would allow for this savings account, tax-free savings account money to be used to meet that deductible. And there's many others which we're happy to get into. And this approach really came, if you remember last year, I think right in this same room, Senator Mabley and I brought a bill that would have created a homeowners resilient roofing enterprise and others. And the committee ultimately voted it down. They were not into increasing fees, which I understand completely. So what I like about this is there is absolutely no fee increase involved in this bill whatsoever. There is also, it's completely voluntary. There's no mandates on insurance companies, on homeowners, or anybody else. We're just trying to offer an opportunity for people to set some money aside tax-free so that they can do many of the things that are contained within this bill. So with the Chair's indulgence, I'd like to talk a little bit about L004.

Because as my co-prime sponsor mentioned, originally we were looking to expand the eligible recipients for the Hazard Mitigation Fund and perhaps not surprisingly, those already on the list were not willing to expand the list to include other entities. And that's a very successful program, so we thought we could tie into that. So L004 takes that out entirely. It's really all about the tax-free savings account. And we're making sure that the updated language that you'll see in L004 to ensure that catastrophic savings accounts are clearly defined and properly administered. The amendment adjusts the timeline so that taxpayer contributions to the account apply beginning January 1, 2025 instead of January 1, 27. Expensive repeal date by 10 years, December 2047. Now realize the program will actually, the ability to put money into a tax savings account will expire in 2037. But as we've learned, people need time to spend monies they may have saved in that account, So that's why the program's absolute drop dead date is in 2047. The strike below also defines a qualified taxpayer as a Colorado resident who holds an insurance policy for legal residents in the state and clarifies how contributions limits apply to joint filers It outlines the requirements for establishing and maintaining an account Very strict reporting requirements They work with a tax administrator. We've put as many safeguards as we can, could think of in here. And I know I have yet to see the perfect bill. And now, coming to the end of my eighth year in the legislature, I would not say our bill is going to be the first one that I would call a perfect bill. Inevitably, there's a little bit of a, you know, let's take a chance. We really can't afford to leave anything off the table right now. You know, I think we have to look at all opportunities. You know, this bill also, we work very closely with insurance companies and with financial institutions. We're not requiring the financial institutions to monitor or report on these accounts. It's really between the tax administrator, which is defined right at the beginning of the strike below, and the homeowners to work together, qualify, make sure that the projects you're doing are qualified as under the catastrophic enterprise rules. And then we also limit a little bit of the Department of Revenue's ability to set additional reporting requirements beyond standard accounting procedures. So with that, I really think this is the kind of bill that we'll be looking at going down the road as we realize that we don't have money as a state. We also don't want to put any extra burden on taxpayers right now when they're already facing incredibly rapidly rising costs. So this bill, I think, fits both of those requirements, and I'm happy to talk about it further, answer any questions, but it's a good bill, and we're hoping to get your support today. Thank you.

Senator Snyder. Thank you for the question, Madam Chair. we're going to have to go to appropriations no matter what because of the potential reduction in tax revenues that could come result from this bill. We have worked hard to make sure with the Department of Revenue that there are no hard costs that they'll be incurring. So we've added a lot of flexibility into the strike below L004. and basically instead of them having to automatically reprogram the gen tax system, which is often a driver of costs, we have a provision here that allows them to do some kind of random sampling of the number of people that establish these accounts and use that as their guide as to the efficacy of it. So I think we're keeping the actual cost to the state down, but we will have to go to appropriations because of the revenue. But we're happy to bring the fiscal analyst up. It's been kind of a work in progress, so he may have the latest and greatest, or she, the latest and greatest information.

Chair and committee, my name is Emma Donahue. I'm here on behalf of the Colorado Municipal League. We are currently in an amend position on this bill, but with this amendment that was spoken about by the sponsors today, we will be moving to a neutral position. We want to thank the sponsors very much for working on this issue with all of us and being able to get to a point where we could be – get to a bill where we could be okay with it. So thank you very much for your time.

Good afternoon. Thank you, Madam Chair and members of the committee. I'm Eagle County Commissioner Matt Schur speaking today on behalf of Eagle County and Colorado Communities for Climate Action. CC4CA is a coalition of 48 local governments that advocate to the state of Colorado to adopt strong climate policy. We support amendment two as written, and if this committee adopts that amendment today, we'll support the committee in moving this bill forward. CC4CA has financial concerns about this bill as originally proposed. The Disaster Mitigation Fund, which was created with CC4CA's support, is an oversubscribed program that already lacks the funding to meet statewide needs. For example, in January of 25, 26 local governments applied for the funding for a total of $17.7 million, and only eight applications were awarded for funding available, a total of $4.8 million. CC4CA would be pleased to support the bill if the fee that funds the program is increased to support both community-scale mitigation and homeowner efforts, while ensuring that the amount available to local governments is no less than current levels of funding that comes from the $2 fee per policy. This would allow the program to expand the types of eligible entities for grant funding without affecting much-needed funding for much-needed local government mitigation efforts. Part of these more significant changes, Amendment 2 alleviates CC4CA's concerns with the bill, and we support this committee in adopting the amendment. Thanks for your time and consideration today.

Mr. Watkins, you're up next. Yes, thank you, Madam Chair Kipp, members of the Senate Finance Committee. As I said earlier, my name is Ken Watkins, serves as the Executive Director for the Colorado State Fire Chiefs. The State Fire Chiefs represents the leadership of over 300 fire departments and fire districts throughout Colorado, and collectively these departments have contained nearly 12,000 career and volunteer firefighters dedicated to protecting our state. Under the introduced bill, the state fire chiefs are in an amend position and based on our concerns to expand eligible applicants for the Natural Disaster Mitigation Enterprise Fund. We are grateful to Senator Snyder and Senator Frizzell for considering our concerns and preparing an amendment that would eliminate that concern. Should this amendment pass, Colorado State Fire Chiefs are prepared to change our position from amend to monitor. I would like to say just a couple points, and Mr. Shearer mentioned it the fund being over committed already and we believe that adding additional eligible applicants would create additional problems for the fund We do like the fact that the eligible entities currently are local Colorado governments such as municipalities, counties, school districts, and special districts, and these entities are required to create and maintain planning documents, such as community wildfire preparedness plans and hazard mitigation plans. Homeowner associations are already eligible to partner with local governments when applying for the grant funds. In my time as a fire chief, we worked with our local wildfire coalition and a number of homeowner associations to secure funding and make these communities safer. The key was partnering with the HOAs in an organized manner through planning and government oversight. So, again, we thank you for your time. We thank you for the sponsors for the bill and taking a look at our concerns. And we would be prepared to change to a moderate position if the amendment passes. Thank you.

Thank you, Madam Chair, committee members. Excuse me. Rachel Beck, I'm the Executive Director of the Colorado Chamber of Commerce Foundation. Our work is guided by something we call Vision 2033, which is our 10-year roadmap toward making Colorado's economy better and ensuring that our state remains a great place to live and do business. One of the focus areas of that plan is addressing the costs of living that are threatening Coloradans' ability to make a good life here. The cost of auto, home, and business insurance, which is risen 30% from 2019 to 2023, has played a big role in our skyrocketing costs. Rates in Colorado's largest cities increased an additional 16% in 2024 alone. Multifamily residents have seen even more pronounced increases in costs, in some cases doubling or even tripling in a single year. We will not address our goal of more affordable and dense housing options if we do not address the challenges of increasing insurance rates. As Senator Snyder noted, increasing regulatory burdens, litigation, and increasing natural disasters have led to insurance companies in Colorado losing money eight out of the last 11 years, and that is not a sustainable business model. So we face the increasing possibility that insurance companies will leave Colorado, leaving homeowners with few and very expensive options that provide minimal protection when disaster strikes. I don't say that as a scare tactic. That is something that we have seen play out in states like California and Florida. We're already seeing a disturbing trend here of companies sort of quiet quitting the market. And what I mean by that is if you have a policy, you may get renewed. But if you try to shop for options, you're probably not going to be able to get a different company to cover you. And that's particularly true in the wildland-urban interface where 50% of Coloradans live. So, Senator Snyder mentioned we pulled together a group of industry experts in insurance, housing and financing to look at both short and long term solutions to this. ideas in this bill they contributed to. These are small initial steps that we can take immediately to begin to bend those curves of unsustainable rate increases, prepare homes against the increased risk of natural disasters brought by climate change, and stabilize an industry that underpins

Thank you, Mr. Penn. It made me think of something else quick. I did find it a part where it says savings or money market at the beginning. But, again, that's a savings or money market that doesn't have a registration like an IRA would have a custodian or 529 would have a custodian. It would just say the individual's name, checking or joint checking or joint savings. And so my concern is, you know, that's not, that's going to have to be kept track of by you, by the department, which bank it's in, what's the account number, and then what's going to prevent the person from depositing it, showing the deposit, and then transferring that money to a brokerage account to invest it, and then depositing it before the end of the year, coming back, just to make sure it's theirs for your last month's statement.

by examiners. Last question. Last question. Just that makes me think of, you know, as long as the money's put in, say, January 1st, let's say it's $50,000, and you'd have to look at, check every monthly statement, because if they took it out, used it to invest, and then by the end of the year put that $50,000 back in, there's nothing wrong. I mean, it's still $50,000. It just didn't earn that much interest. I mean, there's nothing wrong with that. It's just that you're getting a tax action on money that you're using to invest somewhere else for a period of time. I mean, what would be your response if you saw that?

Thank you, Madam Chair. Senator Culker, for any distribution that we saw on a statement, we would require them to prove to us that it was a qualified, that it was, the distribution was used to pay a qualifying expense. And so if they couldn't substantiate how that distribution or withdrawal was used for a qualifying purpose, we would trigger the add back. We would require them to add back the amount of that distribution.

Mr. Penns.

Okay, thank you. And I do have a question for Mr. Abrams, and perhaps Mr. Penn would be able to weigh in too, but I am concerned that this bill will still drive a fiscal note, and given the year we're in, I know perhaps you haven't had a chance to do the fiscal on the strike below, Mr. Abrams, but do you have thoughts on that?

Okay, do you have an idea of, like, the magnitude of the fiscal?

Thank you, and I assume that would include impacts to revenue, correct?

Right, so the revenue and then the cost of the Department of Revenue.

Okay, thank you.

Thank you, Madam Chair. I agree with Mr. Abrams. At a minimum, we'll have gen tax programming and form changes just to add the deduction to the form, but there will be costs beyond that. Thank you.

Oh, I'm sorry. Senator Benavides.

And yes, Senator, that is absolutely being considered. I mean, I think when we looked at this language originally, it's hard to know who that administrator would be. Our assumption would be is the default is the Department of Revenue. Now, if the Department of Revenue is able to find a partner and is able to sort of help us to understand what that contracted cost would be to employ a third-party administrator, that's what we would include in our fiscal note. But that will come through in our conversations with the department. But somebody must administer as your conversation is borne out.

Thank you, Madam Chair. Thank you, Mr. Abrams. Looking at the March 2nd fiscal note that you prepared, It looks like, to me, the bulk of the cost came from the natural disaster mitigation enterprise, and with that removed, you know, fully two-thirds, three-quarters of the fiscal note seems to be going. I recognize there will be some incidental costs. We've tried to fashion this bill so that it would not have impacts or necessitate a Gentex reprogramming. And I realize if the program's successful, those are things that will probably have to happen. But I just wanted to make sure we're on the same page, that there will be costs, but it won't be anywhere near what you had published on March 2 with the natural disaster mitigation enterprise.

Thank you, Madam Chair. And, yes, absolutely, Senator Snyder. All of those costs disappear. There are no real costs in the first out budget year, even for the Department of Revenue. once this tax policy is implemented, there will be costs for the department, and that's what we will try to suss out for a revised fiscal note for the Appropriations Committee. Thank you.

Madam Chair, I move L-004 to Senate Bill 49.

I have been looking, Madam Chair. Please. I've been looking forward to going into detail line by line on this. And word by word. Thank you.

Well, I just want to say that you can tell, hopefully it's obvious that this comes from a lot of back and forth and really good stakeholding with DOR, with the insurance industry, with the banking industry. And, you know, it really is a result of a good process in that way. I'd be happy to go through it in more detail. But suffice it to say, it strikes the first section. There's no relationship to the natural disaster mitigation enterprise. And it really is a new approach that I think is going to be successful And I know we had some concerns about a lack of safeguards and other things And we do have safeguards in here We've put in all the language we can to try and avoid and keep that fiscal note down. But I think it's important to remember that several, at least seven other states, Alabama was mentioned. I mentioned South Carolina. There are several other states that have done this, and they haven't had any of these problems. I know as an attorney, sometimes you're trained to look at the worst case scenario, but I don't want to borrow trouble. And I realize if there's unscrupulous people out there, they're very smart at finding ways to game the system and tax avoidance. But I don't think that in this space, that's what we're going to be seeing. I think this is a genuine opportunity. And I think just to set the record a little bit straight, I know we're talking about the amendment. But Mr. Lady, I think, had some inflated numbers. My understanding that a hardened IBHS-certified roof is about $5,000 or $6,000 additional. So if you say you have Allstate or one of the other farmers, one of the other insurance companies, your roof gets destroyed by hail. They're going to come out and say, okay, pay us your $5,000 deductible or $6,000 or whatever it is, and we'll put the same exact roof on for $20,000, the one that just got destroyed by a moderate hailstorm. I think instead, with this savings account, one, you'd be able to meet that deductible without breaking the family's budget if you were able to save for it. I don't think people are going to be putting $50,000 a year. Most of the families, as Senator Colker mentioned, are barely getting by. If they were able to put a couple of hundred or $1,000 a year into this, it would build up. And then they also could use that money to pay that $5,000 or $6,000 and put the more resilient roof on. So that's what this amendment does, is really clarifies some of those issues, and I would ask for a yes vote.

Senator Frizzell? Thank you, Madam Chair. I move Amendment L-005 to Senate Bill 049.

Mm-hmm.

Yes. Thank you, Madam Chair. This is just an amendment. This really came from the banking industry that on page 3, line 10, strikes that attachment levy garnishment phrase and just substitutes attachment. So this is just in response to a request that came from our friends in the banking industry. Thank you.

No.

Senator Feazell. I have a lot of personal experience with wildfire mitigation. I actually lived for a very, very long time in the southwest area of Douglas County in a subdivision that backs right up to Pike National Forest. And we were, in fact, evacuated for the Hayman Fire way back when. And that was a sobering thing for our community and really caused us to jump into action when it came to mitigating all of the area. And thank goodness we did, because it is a wildfire-prone area anyway, but it just makes things more affordable from an insurance standpoint. Even when I sold that house, I had to pay to have many trees right around the house taken down. And certainly having kind of a backup like is provided in this bill where we had saved up and had an account that we could use to draw down to offset those expenditures, that would have been great. I've also been in a subdivision in Castle Rock where the entire area had to have their roofs replaced because of hail damage. And this is an issue in the state of Colorado. It's not going away. And while this bill is not perfect, and I agree with my co-prime sponsor, I feel like it's a small and meaningful first step. So I would request your aye vote, and I appreciate all of the lively conversation and questions that we've had today. Thank you.

Thank you, Madam Chair, and thank you to the committee and all the witnesses who came and testified. I think we heard that the opposition that we had initially had with the introduced bill have all stood down. And I think there's a real opportunity here to change the dynamic because, like I said, the state doesn't have the money, and we don't want to increase costs on homeowners and policyholders. This is an opportunity to really find a third way for people to meet these rising costs, these rising results from more and more catastrophic events here in Colorado. We are all living through it right now. And I think this is the kind of program that allows us people to get ahead of it. I realize that it does seem to be favoring wealthier people who probably have more, earn more income and might have the ability to put more money into one of these tax-free savings accounts. But I don't want to overstress that because there are many people that live much closer to paycheck to paycheck, what have you, but if they recognize that this is coming and that they can prepare for this potential in the future, I think they will. And we'll have to see what the uptake is. I would like nothing better than to be back here two years from now telling you we need to do X, Y, and Z because the program has been ultra successful. But I think it's well worth giving a shot, and I hope you'll find a way to vote yes.

giving you more information ahead of time because I just was able to go over the strike below today. For that reason, you know, seeing what's on it, I'm not for this bill. It just, it doesn't pass the smell test for me. It, you know, I sit and I meet with clients who are month to month, and we're trying to get them to save three months of their pay. And if they put that and they have one place to put it it would be a savings account not an extra place where that if they had to use it because their car broke down or for some other reason they losing that tax benefit They don have the money to do that. So that's why it smells to me as something for someone who has $50,000 and is looking for a tax deduction and can put this in. And knowing that eventually they could use it, because it's not just for claims, my understanding. And correct me if I'm wrong, it's for if they want to put a new roof on. So it doesn't have to have a claim to put a new roof on. And so they can take this tax deduction and put a new roof on if they knew they were going to do it anyway. So unless I'm wrong, I mean, is this only for claims or is it for if they do the mitigation ahead of time?

Thank you, Madam Chair. Thank you for the question. It's both. Yep. But I'm having a hard time seeing why somebody would pay out of pocket for a new roof. Well, one, let's assume they need it, whether from a natural disaster or just age and wear and tear. You know, they're going to go through the insurance, homeowners insurance policy, which, as we've said, deductibles are going up skyrocketing. I've heard 5% of your market value of your home as a high end for that. That's incredible. On a $500,000 home, that's $25,000. But it's both, to answer your question.

Thank you. Senator Benavides.

Thank you Other comments before we Vice Chair Marchman I sent this to you and I send it to you too but I talked about our claims my family claims on this before and I found the documentation

Okay, thank you. I will just weigh in briefly before we vote. I do want to say I really appreciate the intent behind this bill, and I think your challenges and appropriations are challenging, and I'm sure some of the things that people have brought up here could be fixed. So I will be yesterday, but I am unclear as to whether we will see this bill on the floor because I think that the chances of getting through appropriations are really difficult, given what we've heard. But I do appreciate the efforts that you guys have put in to this. And with that, who would like to move the bill?

That is a proper motion. Ms. Rudebush, will you please take the roll?

No.

Yes.

Yes.

Respectfully, no.

Yes.

Yes.

Snyder.

Marchman.

Madam Chair. Yes, congratulations. I'm sorry that you're on your way to appropriations. Seven to two. Thank you, committee. That brings us to our final bill of the day, and we will bring up our final sponsor, Senator Molica for SB 26155. Oh, and Marchman. Okay. We'll get that amendment made. Thank you. Okay Welcome to our final bill of the day Senator Mullica Thank you Madam Chair I didn know if we ever get there but we are here now and so excited to be here and appreciate the opportunity to present Senate Bill 155 to the committee

success including seeing insurers come back into the market which also helps bring down the cost of premiums. You often hear the adage that competition benefits the consumer. We will look back at best practices from those programs and structuring our grant program here in Colorado. By investing in impact resistant roofing homeowners can reduce how often their roof needs to be replaced fewer losses mean fewer claims which benefits insurers and homeowners alike and finally hardened homes are easier to insure and can help stabilize rates in hail prone areas of the state in addition to creating the grant program there are two other components in the legislation first section three of the It requires insurers to spend an annual filing that will help stakeholders understand the impact of this program on homeowners insurance rates. We think this is critical in measuring the program's success. Second, as you may recall, last year's legislation was going to set up a wildfire or catastrophe reinsurance enterprise. After ongoing discussions about that concept, we did not include that in Senate Bill 155, but instead the bill directs a study to be undertaken to evaluate the best approaches for dealing with access to insurance for homeowners in wildfire risk areas of the state. That study will be funded through the enterprise. We added this last piece because we know that the availability of homeowners insurance in high wildfire risk areas of the state continues to be a paramount concern. This study will help in finding those long-term solutions to challenges. I want to be clear before I end. This bill will not increase the costs on consumers. There is clear language in the bill that says that this cannot be a surcharge on consumers. Through our stake holding process from the summer into the session, we've worked with the industry and I think that you'll hear in testimony today, there is strong consensus that the way that we have ran this bill will actually lower the cost of homeowner's insurance on the people of Colorado. That was my concern going into this bill last year is making sure that we are not adding costs to the consumers or to the people of Colorado. This bill will not do that and I think you'll hear testimony today that it won't and that we've set it up in a way that the people of Colorado will start seeing lower homeowners insurance rates. I will now turn it over to my co-sponsor, Senator Marchman, who I'm very excited to be on this bill with. Thank you so much. Senator Marchman. And thank you, Madam Chair. I, too, just really want to thank my co-prime, Senator Mullica. he's worked with house sponsors and this huge coalition to really come up with something different than 1302. I found a message that I had sent to the commissioner of insurance on June 12th of last year and I asked for three things because I think this is such an important policy and 1302 didn't pass last year. So the first thing was I said start in the Senate. It's always better start in the Senate. The second was separate the reinsurance structure from the HAL provisions and the third was rethinking the funding with the enterprise model with the fee on insured homeowners. It raised concerns from constituents who were already struggling to afford coverage. When I saw the introduced bill and saw that all three of the things were in there, I immediately asked if I could join. Throughout the entire interim, and in fact my entire time serving in the state senate, I've heard from many constituents about the rise in premiums and the questions around why this keeps happening. I represent SD15, which is Loveland, Wellington, Estes, and La Porte in Larimer County. And then it's Netherland, Lyons, Ward, and surrounding mountain communities in western Boulder County. So my district sits at the intersection of both of the Colorado insurance crises. Larimer County, where I live, is right in the high-risk Kale Corridor. And my western Boulder County constituents are living the wildfire insurance availability collapse in real time Still working through the aftermath of the Marshall fire and watching neighbors lose coverage that they had for decades just by re-upping their plan. I did want to speak a little more about the findings from the division's analysis of hail damage risk and how much it contributes to premiums, which explains why this bill is so important. In Larimer County, over half of the premium is attributable to hail. In El Paso, it's 52.5. In Jeffco, which is mainly wooey with high risk for wildfire, it's still almost 50%. So even for counties that rarely see hail, hail's a premium driver. A resilient roof results in reduced premiums, fewer claims, and increased sales value. Based on studies from Mississippi and Alabama, mitigated homes have increased resale value, with studies showing a 2% to 7% boost for fortified roofs. Other states have also seen real benefits. There were 60% fewer claims post-storm in North Carolina for strengthened homes. Alabama's program has reduced deductibles by 60% and also strongly served as a catalyst with people who didn't even get the grant in selling stronger roofs just to get premium benefits. Oklahoma has seen savings of around $750 per year in premium discounts after strengthening roofs. I also want to speak to an amendment that's going to be coming today on Section 3 of the bill because that's where I spent most of my time before signing on as a co-prime. The amendment that we're going to talk about that's been delicately stake-held is replacing the introduced bill's rate filing language with a specific annual filing requirement. So no sooner than January 1 of next year and upon the commissioner adopting rules, every insurer who writes multi-parallel homeowners insurance would also submit an annual filing reporting the number of policies in force, the number of homes with hardened roofs, the discount applied to the homes, and when inhaled claims frequency and severity for homes with and without hardened roofs. The last piece is the accountability mechanism that this bill needs. When that data is public, we will know for every insurer riding in Colorado whether the claims reduction from resilient roofs is actually showing up as discounts for the homeowners who installed them. Thank you for considering this legislation, and we are happy to answer any questions. Thank you. Do we have questions for our bill sponsors? Seeing none, we do have quite a few witnesses, so we'll go right to the witness phase. I'm going to call up to begin with Carol Walker, Danny Furman, and Chris Ventura. And I'm not sure if the other folks are remote or online, so we'll go ahead and start with Mr. Furman. Oh, okay. You're Carol, okay. Good to know. Mr. Jablan, nice to see you. Okay, well we will start with our in-person witnesses and hope our other one is online. Mr Fuhrman please begin Thank you Madam Chair and members of the committee My name is Daniel Furman I am here on behalf of the American Property Casualty Insurance Association better known as APCIA, whose members provide coverage to homeowners in every community across Colorado. APCIA strongly supports efforts that help homeowners reduce the risk of hail damage. It is the single largest driver of homeowners insurance costs in Colorado. In fact, as you've heard, Colorado ranks second in the nation in hail insurance claims with more than half of homeowners premiums driven by hail related losses. Therefore, making risk mitigation is essential to any affordability strategy. This bill, Senate Bill 155, is focused on prevention. By investing in proven science-based mitigation strategies, including fortified roofing standards developed through extensive testing, the bill recognizes that stronger homes mean fewer claims, less damage, and more stable insurance markets over time. We have seen this approach work elsewhere. states that have made sustained investments in home hardening and roof mitigation have seen losses decline and markets stabilize over time, which ultimately improves long-term affordability and availability for consumers. APCIA is very supportive of the amendments that are before you today. We want to thank Senator Mullica and Commissioner Conway for working with the industry in trying to improve the bill. The amendments help to ensure that the program that's created within the bill is appropriately scoped, it is well-governed, and ultimately is focused on meaningful risk reduction, while at the same time ensuring that the program is implemented in a way that is efficient, workable for the insurance industry and aligned with existing regulatory frameworks. Ultimately, the goal is straightforward. We need to reduce hail losses. We need to strengthen homes, and we need to keep homeowners insurance available and affordable for all Colorado residents over the long term. I'm happy to answer any questions, Madam Chair. Thank you so much. Mr. Jablan, you're up. Thank you, Madam Chair, committee members. My name is Dan Jablan. I'm here on behalf of the Rocky Mountain Insurance Association, or otherwise known as Ramiya. We represent over 85% of the Colorado's homeowners insurance market. We very much appreciate Senator Mullica and Commissioner Conway's engagement in a robust stakeholder process, continuing to work on this important bill with us to help reduce risk for Colorado's number one homeowners insurance cost driver, hail damage. As my colleague just stated, Colorado is ranked second in the nation for hail insurance claims, only behind Texas. And on an average, more than 60% of the homeowners insurance premiums are attributed to hail risk. Rami is in support of the amendments being introduced today that help ensure Senate Bill 155 represents our shared goal of investing in hail mitigation, and getting more fortified roofs in place at scale to ultimately reduce risk, lower insurance premiums, and prevent insurance fraud. The bill is based on successful IBHS fortified mitigation grant programs in places like Alabama, where the crisis on the coast has been transformed into a stable affordable insurance market by doing scalable roof mitigation supported by state grant programs This is an important step to stop looking for insurance solutions to start supporting risk reduction solutions. That's a long-term answer to making our homes safer and more insurable. Thank you for your time today. We'll be happy to answer any questions. Thank you. Please hold for questions, and we will go up to our remote witness. Mr. Ventura, I believe. You have two minutes. Good afternoon. Chairman Kipp, Vice Chair Marchman, and members of the Senate Finance Committee, I wish to thank you for allowing CertainTeed the opportunity to offer testimony on Senate Bill 155. My name is Chris Ventura, and I'm the Manager of Policy and Advocacy here at CertainTeed. Now, operating for more than 120 years, CertainTeed and our affiliates have over 18,000 employees across more than 160 manufacturing facilities throughout the United States and Canada. We're committed to the responsible development of sustainable system-based building solutions because we recognize that climate volatility, escalating insurance costs, and evolving building codes are reshaping homeowner and home builder expectations around product durability and performance. Resilient roofing systems are no longer optional. There are a necessity in regions prone to hurricanes, hail, wildfires, and severe storms like Colorado. We wish, thanks, Senator Mullica, for recognizing the importance of ensuring Colorado families have access to resilient roofing systems through his work on SB 155 and his receptiveness on ways to strengthen this legislation. With CertainTeed's history in developing independent third-party tested resilient roofing solutions, solutions which meet or exceed high wind, high impact, and wildfire standards, We ask that any standards that may be incorporated as this legislation works its way through the process are those developed by recognized standard developing organizations, such as the International Code Council, ASTM, and UL. These referenced consensus standards define accepted methods for testing materials, components, and systems, and help to ensure that what consumers purchase will perform as claimed. If, for example, a class four impact rating comes from a UL test standard designed to evaluate how well a roofing material withstands impacts from hail or debris. Class four currently represents the highest level of performance in these tests. Thank you for offering the opportunity to provide comments on SB 155 and working towards ensuring Colorado families have the ability to make sure their homes are resilient for the climate challenges we're facing today and adaptable for those challenges that will be with us tomorrow. So happy to answer any questions the committee may have as well. Thank you. Do we have questions for this panel? Oh, Senator Kolker. Thank you. Thank you, Madam Chair. Just a question. Since you're all representing insurance, right? Am I correct? The argument has been made to oppose this bill that there's a fee tied to this, that the fee is hidden, the fee is, you know, going into the insurance company. The reason I opposed the bill last year was because the fee was specifically to the policy owner. I mean, how do we account for that? What's your argument to say that the insurance companies are going to take this? Who would like to take that? Mr. Japlan. By the way, nice tie. Senator, they told me this was a one-of-a-kind. Thank you, Madam Chair. Senator Coker, thank you for the question. As Senator Kamalek has stated, it's directly written in. the bill, that we cannot pass these costs through rates to our consumers, much different than last year where there was in the bill a pass-through to the consumers for the cost. So it's not just we can't do it because the statute won't allow us to do it. It just becomes a normal expense. And as you know, rates are determined by losses, frequency, things of that nature. And if you look at what's happened in Alabama, being able to get these kind of roofs and help insurers get these kind of roofs on drive down the severity and the frequency of these hail claims and these roof claims. And they've had great success with the program in Alabama. So I'm confident we'll have great success with the program in Colorado. Do you have a follow-up, Senator Kolker? Oh, Mr. Furman. Thank you, Madam Chair. I think along the lines that Mr. Giblan just mentioned, right, the big difference between this bill and last year's bill is that this bill specifically states that the fee cannot be passed along as a surcharge to the policyholder. But along the lines that Mr. Giblan stated, insurance rates are primarily driven by losses, right? That's the one thing that I don't think we want to lose sight of. And here in Colorado, hail damage is the largest single driver of homeowners insurance costs. This bill and the program that is being set up and the reliance on scientifically based standards for incentivizing homeowners to install these hail resistant roofs, right, The bill is designed to reduce these losses over time by making homes more resilient before any damage occurs. So hopefully the goal is based, especially based on what we've seen in other states like Alabama, that rates will ultimately be reflected because we're seeing these lower frequency of losses attributable to hail damage, which obviously is the number one factor in why homeowners insurance premiums keep going up annually. Thank you for the questions for this panel. Okay, thank you so much. We really appreciate you waiting all day to testify with us. And our next panel is Brian Powell, Jordan Hadler, Elise Shupak, and Jerry Curry. And I believe all of those witnesses are remote. So while we're bringing them up, we will start with Brian Powell. Please proceed. Thank you. Can you guys hear me now? We can hear you. Thank you. Thank you, Madam Chairman and members of the legislature. I'm Brian Powell. I am here to support this bill on behalf of the National Association of Insurance commissioners. My role at the NAIC is to directly support departments of insurance or divisions of insurance and commissioners and directors across the country when we start talking about the establishment of mitigation grant programs. Before joining the NAIC a couple of years ago, I was at the Department of Insurance in Alabama as a deputy commissioner and I also served as the the architect the person that implemented and managed the Strength Alabama Homes Program That the program that we keep referring to on this conversation for over a decade So the lessons that were learned there, I've taken to the NAIC, and I have worked with all mitigation programs that are associated with departments of insurance in the United States. These programs are popping up everywhere. We're starting to see a number of programs move into existence based on the Alabama model. We shortly after starting the Alabama model, we started seeing or developed the Alabama model. We started seeing these programs develop in other states, especially in the southeast where there was hurricane, high hurricane claims. But slowly but surely, these programs have evolved to addressing other insurance losses, such as hail, which was found in severe convective storms. These programs are really designed as a platform to protect consumers and help them find a way to save money on insurance and also to remain in their homes after the storms. which we see somewhere around a 30 percent benefit as far as premiums are concerned to consumers. And we're seeing about a reduction of losses somewhere in the neighborhood of about 70 percent after the storms. There is a significant economic, I'm sorry, economic impact with the roof upgrades by creating jobs and also an influx of revenue into the tax bases of jurisdictions into the state. And then also think about the environmental impacts that these programs prevent, such as waste and additional things that go to the landfill after the storms. So I encourage you to continue to support this bill. And thank you for this opportunity. Thank you, Mr. Please hold for questions. And Mr. Hadler, you're up next. Thank you. Good afternoon, Chair Kipp and members of the committee. My name is Jordan Hetler, and I'm the insurance policy specialist for Climate Cabinet Action. I'm speaking today in support of SB 155. The alarming rise in damages from severe convective storms was one of the most discussed topics at the National Association of Insurance Commissioners spring meeting several weeks ago. During the NAIC's meeting of its Climate and Resiliency Task Force, policymakers heard a presentation from Aon, which noted that 2025 was the first year where losses from severe convective storms exceeded losses from hurricanes. Colorado's insurance market is hugely exposed to this trend. A recent report on severe convective storm risk found that nearly 1.5 million homes in Colorado are facing moderate or greater hail damage risk. SB 155 creates a program similar to those that have shown results in several other states. The most well-known of these state mitigation programs is Alabama's. Last year, Alabama's insurance commissioner released data confirming that fortified roofs perform better when a hurricane hit the Gulf Coast in 2020. SB 155 state enterprise program would reportedly support $20 million in annual spending for roof fortification, exceeding the spending by Alabama's nation leading program by several million dollars each year. SB 155 also builds off reforms that the legislature has already made. Last year, Colorado became the first state to factor hazard mitigation into insurance modeling through HB 1182. Colorado county governments were strong advocates for HB 1182 because they have been critical partners in supporting hazard mitigation The structure of the enterprise program governance reflects this partnership by including a representative from county governments on the board Thus SB 155 is the latest example of Colorado taking a smart approach to ensure that state and local governments are working together to integrate policy surrounding land use, building codes, climate resilience, and insurance regulation. Please support SB 155. Thank you. I'd be happy to take your questions. Thank you. Please hold for questions. Next up we have Ms. Shupak. Good afternoon. My name is Elise Shupak and I'm a policy advocate with Public Citizen, a nonprofit consumer advocacy organization working to advance the public interest in government with over 29,000 members and supporters in Colorado. I'm testifying in support of SB 155 to create the the strengthened Colorado homes enterprise. Escalating climate disasters, including wildfires and severe convective storms, are driving up insurance costs and reducing insurance availability in Colorado. Between 2021 and 2024, property insurance costs in the state increased by 27%, outpacing inflation by 14%. In some geographies, standard insurance is entirely unavailable due to insurer retreat from climate-vulnerable areas. Rising property insurance is creating financial strain for many homeowners. Research published by the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas found that rising property insurance costs are driving up household indebtedness as well as mortgage and credit card delinquencies. Continued rate increases and retreat will not support viable property insurance markets over the long term. Insurance companies instead should invest in building climate resilience that will reduce losses in the event of a disaster and keep properties insurable. The rise of severe convective storms in Colorado, with an estimated 1.5 million homes in the state at risk of hail damage heightens the need and urgency of widespread roof fortification. The Division of Insurance finds that hail risk is responsible for 26 to 54 percent of Colorado's homeowners insurance premiums and hail mitigation has the potential to save consumers over $300 a year. Fortified roof upgrades have a proven track record of success across parallels including high wind and hail. A study of insurance claims and payments in Alabama following Hurricane Sally in 2020 found that homes with fortified roofs had at least 55% lower claim frequency and 15% lower claim severity than homes with standard roofs. The Strength in Colorado Homes Grant program will be particularly valuable to low and moderate income homeowners who do not have the ability to make upfront investments in climate resilience, but would benefit most from reductions in climate damages and costs over the long term. Public Citizen urges the committee to support SB 155. Thank you for your time and attention to this issue. Thank you very much. And then we have Ms. Curry. You are up next. You need to unmute Ms. Curry, I believe. I do. Now we can hear you. There you go. Good afternoon, Madam Chair and members of the committee. Thank you for your time today. I'm Jerry Curry and I'm here on behalf of United Policyholders in strong support of this bill. I'm also the Executive Director of Marshall Rock, the Marshall Fire Long-Term Recovery Group, and I have seen firsthand the destruction extreme weather inflicts. We greatly appreciate the sponsors and Commissioner Conway's initiative in bringing this measure forward and certainly their efforts in consensus building. Colorado has some of the highest hail losses in the country. Helping Coloradans fortify their homes against hail and wind is critical to preventing damage and preserving affordable insurance This bill is also a fiscally responsible solution to address the challenge of rising costs and decreasing availability of property insurance facing Colorado homeowners The Strength in Colorado Homes Enterprise creates an insurer funded program that they are supportive of, I hear, designed to invest in risk reduction before disasters happen and will generate sustainable funding to provide the much needed grants to insured homeowners to protect their property. These grants are not handouts. They are strategic investments in the stability of Colorado's tax base and insurance market. This bill aligns incentives by investing in home hardening and resilient construction that will reduce losses and restore stability to insurance markets. By prioritizing mitigation, it shifts the system from reacting to disasters to preventing their worst impacts. Resilient roofs are not cosmetic improvements. They are proven measures that reduce damage, shorten the disaster recovery time and time out of the home, and protect families. Homeowners currently bear the brunt of escalating risk through higher premiums, deductibles, and coverage limitations, and this bill addresses risk at its source. Crucially, the bill also directs the state to analyze insurance risk in high-risk wildfire areas, and whether mitigation programs can reduce losses and strengthen insurance availability and coverage. Homeowners in these areas, particularly in the foothills and mountains and my hometown, Boulder, face severe premium hikes, non-renewals and challenges in finding coverage. United Policyholders has been supporting Colorado households and communities for over two decades. Through our Roadmap to Preparedness program, we help homeowners understand how investing in resilience helps to maintain insurability. And we know grant programs and insurance rewards are critical to achieving this objective at scale. And we strongly support this measure. We respectfully urge your support, too. Thank you for your time and consideration, and I'm happy to take questions. Thank you. Members, we have questions for this panel. Okay, seeing none, I guess you've answered all of our questions. Thanks for staying so late to testify with us. We do appreciate it. And next up, we will call up our next panel, which is also all remote. We have Jeffrey Woodruff, Jody Shattuck-McNally, Matt Schur, and Jody Hartman-Ball. Mr. Woodruff, since you are up already, why don't we just go ahead and start with you. Good afternoon, Chair Kipp and committee members. I'm Pickton County Commissioner Jeffrey Woodruff. I previously served for two years on the Colorado Wildfire Resiliency Code Board as a licensed architect appointed by the Department of Public Safety. I'm speaking today on behalf of Pitkin County and Colorado Communities for Climate Action in strong support of Senate Bill 155. Pitkin County is also a proud member of counties and commissioners acting together who is also in support. As the bill sponsors outlined, insurance rates are rising rapidly and hail risk is driving premium increases statewide. As already heard in testimony, 26 to 54% of the premium increases statewide is from hail, which means even that in watersheds like the Roaring Fork Valley, my constituents are still paying higher premiums, even when the mapped hail threat, as defined by FEMA, is very low. This problem needs a statewide solution, and Senate Bill 155 is an excellent first start. The Wildfire Resiliency Code Board was limited. We could only require wildfire resilient roofs. This bill takes a much needed step because we know installing hail fortified roofs will result in reduced premiums. We support establishing an enterprise that will provide homeowners with funding to install resilient roofs, and we appreciate that the funding comes from a fee on insurance providers, not policyholders who are also bearing the brunt of increased premiums. Brunt, sorry. Last year, we supported HB 25-1302, which addressed both hail and wildfire risks. We know we have to prioritize, especially in this fiscal environment, and we appreciate that this bill will fund a study to further assess wildfire and reinsurance risk, and we appreciate that the bill requires insurance companies to report back on how these savings are being passed on to consumers' accountability. Just as important, the amendment before you commits to sharing the results with the legislature. And as your partners, we commit to working with you to ensure that the study leads to meaningful solutions for our Valley and the state of Colorado. Thank you for your time today, and I ask for your support on the amendment and the bill before you. Thank you. Please hold for questions. Commissioner Shattuck McNally. Good afternoon or good evening, Madam Chair and honorable members of the committee. My name is Jody Shadi-McNally, and I'm chair of the Board of County Commissioners for Larimer County. I'm here testifying on behalf of CCAT and as a proud member of CC4CA. Today, the Larimer County Board of County Commissioners is moving into strong support of Senate Bill 26155. I'd like to begin by thanking the bill's sponsors as well as the Colorado Division of Insurance for their leadership and collaboration and bringing this forward, bringing forward a thoughtful, data-driven approach to one of the most pressing issues facing our communities, the availability and affordability of homeowners insurance. And special shout out to Commissioner Conway. In Larimer County, we are on the front lines of climate-driven disasters. From the Cameron Peak Fire, the largest fire welfare in Colorado history, and to repeated hailstorms, flooding, and our communities have experienced firsthand the increasing severity and frequency of extreme weather. In response, we have made significant investments in mitigation, expanding forest health and fuels reduction programs, supporting defensible space initiatives, strengthening building codes, and working closely with homeowners to reduce risk before disaster strikes. That's why the Strengthen Colorado Homes Grant program is a critical tool by helping homeowners install resilient, hail resistant roofs and this bill directly supports the kind of proactive mitigation that at work that counties like mine are already prioritizing hardening roofs also help help stabilize the insurance market by lowering claims and risk exposure and for our residents that can translate into meaningful premium savings just as importantly as continually continued access to coverage. At the same time, while for risk in areas like Larimer County, we know mitigation alone is not enough for growing insurance risk. That's why the study component of this bill is so essential and we need a deeper understanding of how this design will work. And I want to just say, this bill strikes the right balance and for near-term solutions and invest in proven home Harding and other groundwork long-term policy innovations. On behalf of CCAT, Larimer County, and CC4CA, I urge a strong vote for support of Senate Bill 155. Thank you. Thank you. Please hold for questions. Commissioner Matt Scher. Thank you again, Madam Chair. Hello again and members of the committee. I remain Eagle County Commissioner Matt Scher. Here this time on behalf of Eagle County and Commissioners and Counties Acting Together or CCAT to express our strong support for Senate Bill 155 This bill reflects both urgency and pragmatism in addressing Colorado insurance challenges In Eagle County we see a growing disconnect between the steps our communities are taking to reduce risk and the insurance market's ability to respond. We've invested heavily in landscape-scale forest management, supported firewise communities, and worked to integrate resilience into our land use planning and building practices. These efforts are not theoretical. They are real, on-the-ground actions to reduce risk and protect lives and property. Senate Bill 155 recognizes that individual homeowners also need tools to participate in that resilience. The Strength in Colorado Homes program empowers residents to take meaningful action, especially through roof hardening, which we know can significantly reduce losses from the hail events that are the true cause of all our rate increases across the state. When those losses go down, it helps stabilize the broader insurance market. That's a win not just for individual homeowners, but for entire communities trying to maintain economic stability in the face of increasing climate pressures. I also appreciate that this bill acknowledges a harder truth. In high-risk wildfire areas, we cannot mitigate our way out of the insurance availability crisis entirely. Great numbers of Eagle County residents are doing everything right, creating defensible space and investing in mitigation, yet still face limited or unaffordable coverage options. The study component of this bill is essential to better understand how to address those gaps, including what role reinsurance or other market interventions might play in ensuring continued access to coverage. So I appreciate you hearing me yet again today and respectfully urge your support for Senate Bill 155. Thank you. Please hold for questions. And next up, we have Commissioner Jody Hartman-Ball.

Thank you. Members, do we have questions for this panel? Senator Marchman.

Thank you. Who would like to weigh in on this? Commissioner Shattuck-McNally, I'll call on you.

Does that answer your question, Senator Marchman?

Okay, thank you very much. Okay, I do have any further questions for this panel. seeing none thank you so much for hanging out all day to testify with us we really appreciate it sorry oh okay let us continue with our next panel our next panel is Allison James Craig Williams Ian Anderson Jocelyn Fankhauser and Ken Watkins and I will say that we did have but Kinsey Hasted signed up to testify, but I believe that she is traveling and it says she may submit testimony written testimony so I would check your box But with that bring up any or all of those folks And we will start with Allison James. Please unmute yourself, and you have two minutes.

Thank you. Please hold for questions. Next up, Craig Williams, you have two minutes. Just need to unmute yourself there.

There you go.

All right.

Can you please wrap up your testimony?

Sir, you're an entire minute over. Would you mind wrapping up, please?

Okay. Thank you very much. We appreciate your testimony. Ms. Casey Fox is up next. Thank you.

Thank you. Please hold for questions. Jocelyn Finkhouse.

through this process. Thank you. Please hold for questions. And next up, we have Mr. Watkins again.

available for your questions. Thank you very much. Members, do we have questions for this panel? Looks like you guys were very thorough and covered it all. Thank you so much. We really appreciate you staying in line to testify with us this late. Okay, we have one more witness, and that is Michael Conway from DOI himself. So come on up, Mr. Conway. Okay. Please proceed.

Thank you. Do we have questions for Commissioner Conway? Okay. Apparently you have also answered everybody's questions. Thank you so much. And I would just invite anybody else in the room who has not yet testified to come up now because those empty seats are yours if you want them going once going twice three times and we will bring up our sponsors back for the amendment phase Senator Mullica.

Thank you. Tell us about L1.

Okay. Is there any questions or concerns about L-001? Seeing none, is there any objection to L-001? Seeing none, L-001 is adopted.

Tell us about L-002.

Thank you. Any questions or concerns about L-002? Any objection to L-002? Seeing none, L-002 is adopted.

Tell us about L-003.

Okay, thank you. Is there any questions or concerns about L003? Any objection to L003? Seeing none, L003 is adopted.

Tell us about L004.

Thank you. any questions or concerns about L-004? Any objection to L-004? Seeing none, L-004 is adopted.

Tell us about L-005.

Thank you. Any questions or concerns about L005?

note, study, I mean, you know. Say it again, I'm sorry. Is the study going to drive a fiscal note?

Yes. Yeah, it's basically just saying that it's going to be placed on website. It's going to be shared appropriately, so it shouldn't drive a fiscal note. Perfect. Any objection to L-005? Seeing none, L-005 is adopted.

Are there any questions or concerns about L006? Is there any objection to L006? Seeing none, L006 is adopted. Do you have any further amendment sponsors? Members, do you have any amendments? Seeing none, L00, or no, the amendment phase is closed. L0012, I don't know. Okay, who would like to wrap up first?

Thank you. Senator Mullica.

Members, do we have any comments before we vote? Senator

Thank you. Thank you. An appropriate motion, Senators, would be to the Committee on, sadly, again, appropriations.

Thank you. Ms. Rudabish, will you please call the roll?

Yes. Congratulations. You're on the way to the Committee of Appropriations, and there's a six to three vote. Everybody, that concludes our business for the day. Thanks for hanging in there. For finance, it's a late committee. Have a wonderful night. Thank you. Thank you.