Posts by Naomi Zeveloff

With more Colorado kids living in poverty, and efforts stalled to improve the state’s child-welfare system, the free-falling economy has left the state’s most vulnerable kids without a safety net.

Colorado Secretary of State Mike Coffman oversaw his own successful election last week to replace CD 7’s outgoing Rep. Tom Tancredo. And that means that Governor Bill Ritter must find a replacement for Coffman, who spent the weeks leading up to the election mired in allegations of illegal voter purging as well as other shenanigans.

The Vote No on Amendment 46 campaign isn’t the only group pleased to see the anti-affirmative action measure lose, albeit on a teensy margin Thursday afternoon.

Several people who launched complaints that they were misled into signing onto the proposal have also expressed happiness that the measure flopped.

After a two day post-election limbo, Colorado’s Amendment 46 failed yesterday on a slim margin. The so-called Colorado Civil Rights Initiative is the first anti-affirmative action amendment propped by California businessman Ward Connerly to make it onto a state ballot and flop.

The significance is not lost on Amendment 46’s detractors. “I am thrilled,” says Melissa Hart, a University of Colorado law professor who co-ran the Vote No on 46 campaign. “Given that everyone kept telling us we couldn’t do it, it is exciting that we did.”

Anti-affirmative-action guru Ward Connerly will likely halt his nationwide push to end race and gender preferences. Connerly, a part black California businessman, spoke with the Colorado Independent an hour after Amendment 46 toppled by an extremely thin margin.

The so-called Colorado Civil Rights Initiative was the first Connerly amendment to flop after making it onto a state ballot. It was also a key measure in Connerly’s Super Tuesday for Equal Rights campaign, a nationwide thrust to dismantle affirmative action programs in five states this year. In three of those states, the measure failed to make it onto the ballot, and Thursday, after a feverishly close tally, it collapsed in Colorado. Nebraska was the only state this year to approve the proposal.

Amendment 46, the Colorado Civil Rights Initiative, has failed. The Rocky Mountain News just posted the outcome of the race on its election results page; the contest was in limbo for the past day and a half.

The Colorado Civil Rights Initiative is still treading water, with the result too close to call. County clerks in Boulder and Adams Counties are still counting ballots which could tip Amendment 46 one way or another. Though anti-affirmative action initiative is trailing very slightly in the polls, opponents are reluctant to call a victory just yet.

Colorado voters had a relatively smooth ride in the polling places on Tuesday. But not so for this reporter. I was ejected from a Ruby Hill voting site in Denver, with one election worker threatening to call the police. Why? Because I was trying to do my job.

The Colorado Civil Rights Initiative, a ballot measure seeking to end affirmative action in the state, has not yet been called.

Dan Aschenbrenner exited the Godsman Elementary School polling place in Denver yesterday afternoon with surprisingly serene smile on his face. The 48-year-old had just cast his first ballot — ever. But it was a long, bumpy ride to get there.