Legislators’ Report Card: The Go-To Democrats

As part of our final legislative report card series, Colorado Confidential asks: Which Democrats had the most success getting their bills passed this session?

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Taking tie scores into consideration, 12 legislators made our top list of most effective Democratic legislators. As noted in our previous stories on the legislators’ report card, this is a measure of who did well at getting bills signed by Gov. Ritter, not a measure of success or power.

Just three House Dems made the list, since senators have the advantage of an abundance of House bills needing co-sponsors. All three representatives racked up points by sponsoring more than 10 bills, which was unusual in the House.

Those in the top 10 represent a wide swath of the state.  From Sen. Abel Tapia of Pueblo to Sen. Bob Bacon of Ft. Collins to Sen. Jim Isgar of Hesperus, it’s not just Denver metro lawmakers on list, although a number of them do appear.

It’s no secret that freshmen legislators and those from tough districts are sometimes given softball bills to carry, and that can work out to a high score on our report card. So can sponsoring a large number of bills.

Freshman Sen. Gail Schwartz of Snowmass Village, for instance, won her district last year with just 51% of the vote and saw all of her 11 bills signed by the governor.

Read the rest of our legislators’ report card series:
Pass/Fail: Colorado State Legislators’ Final Report Card
Colorado’s Top 10 Senators
Colorado’s Top 10 Representatives
Colorado’s Least Effective Senators
Colorado’s Least Effective Representatives
The Go-To Republicans