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Colorado Lobbying

Mary Leonard
Blog Post 3

            The recent election in Colorado meant changes in legislation and policy not only from the votes of citizens, but also due to the decisions of legislators. The possibility for change also come with an increase of spending to and from lobbying firms to help motivate certain alterations. In the world of politics, money has become the driving force behind policy change for better or for worse. Money is considered the lifeblood of Congressional campaigns, and therefore is also very vital to even local votes.

A new record has been set in lobbying spending in Colorado this year, hitting a whopping $36.4 million. This is 9% more than was spent last year. Various groups have contributed to this spending including business interests, associations, nonprofits, and more. This large amount greatly adds to the national spending of about $3.45 billion on lobbying in 2018. According to the author of the Colorado Sun article explaining this rise in lobbying spending, Sandra Fish, more than 600 firms and individuals have joined in to the lobbying numbers in Colorado. (Fish)


According to Hall and Deadroff, lobbying is a form of legislative subsidy. In other words, it is a matching grant of policy information and labor that helps convince legislators to achieve certain desired goals. The subsidy increases the ability for legislators to be more productive on the issues the lobbyists care about. The graph above shows the varying of levels of spending month to month from 2018-2019. March and April had the largest amount due to the focus of lawmakers on certain major bills at the time. As lawmakers begin to pay more attention and make decisions to specific legislation proposals in order, lobbyists also up their game to sway these choices.

The two industries that spend the most on lobbying in Colorado are unsurprisingly the Cannabis and the Oil industry. These are highly debated industries so it is extremely valuable to them to employ lobbyists to try to influence policy making. Along with this, the bill to create a statewide paid family leave program attracted around 200 lobbyists. The lobbying on this bill ended up proving successful as legislators decided to scale back on it in order to “to study the issue”. (Fish)
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The top-ranking lobbyist in Colorado is Colorado Legislative Services, followed by Brandeberry McKenna Public Affairs, and Axiom Strategies, and the company that paid the most to groups like these was Xcel Energy at $374,876. Its goal for spending this much was for the “renewal of the Public Utilities Commission and a bill that set carbon emissions reduction targets”. It succeeded in renewing the Public Utilities Commission, but the emissions reductions did not pass. Another group, Conservation Colorado, which fights for environmental rights and against oil and gas production in the state, also greatly contributed to lobbying by paying $84,000 on one single bill, which, in total, almost tripled their spending from last year. (Fish)

Lobbying is a way for interest groups and citizens to have their opinions heard which helps legislators make more representative choices. However, Colorado’s Secretary of State, Jena Griswold, has concerns about the amount of spending that is being done due to the fact that majority of it is done by big corporations. Therefore, they have the most influence. To solve this issue, she believes that there needs to be an increase in transparency. This transparency is done though system reforms that make payments to lobbyists and documentation of how much they receive more visible. This has been a goal because their income can often be unreported due to various loopholes. (Fish)

Lobbying, in an essence, is not necessarily a bad thing in the political atmosphere, however it can become risky if it is not completely transparent. Money is one of the most important driving forces of politics, but can quickly lead to corruption and bad blood.

Fish, Sandra. Colorado Sun. August 20, 2019. “Lobbying Spending Sets New Record in Colorado, as
Interests Shift to Influence Democratic-Controlled Capitol”.
https://coloradosun.com/2019/08/20/lobbying-spending-sets-new-record-colorado/

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