Denver Business Journal

By Ed Sealover
Denver Business Journal

Does a bill need business groups to support it to be considered a pro-business bill? Or are backers' statements that a new law is needed to help Colorado companies good enough?

House Bill 1005, sponsored by Aurora Democratic state Reps. Rhonda Fields and John Buckner, is one of those rare pieces of legislation that sits at a crossroads of those questions.

The measure passed out of the House Education Committee by a 12-1 vote Monday and is on to the House Appropriations Committee.

By Rich Jones

Last week, the Journal carried a story that said Colorado was almost tops in the nation in creating local, state and federal government jobs since the start of the Great Recession. (Colorado 4th for government job gains through recession, March 27, 2012)

By Ed Sealover
Denver Business Journal

Denver business leaders charged Monday that proponents of a paid sick-leave initiative on the November city ballot are deliberately trying to hurt business at restaurants that have come out against the proposed ordinance.

Backers of Initiative 300 shot back that the opposition campaign is trying to distract voters from the fact that 74 percent of city restaurant workers don't have paid sick leave.

By Ed Sealover
Denver Business Journal

A study arguing that a paid sick leave ordinance on the Denver city ballot in November will not hurt businesses was released by a liberal think-tank on Monday, the same day a coalition of independent restaurants rallied in opposition to Initiative 300.

This column appeared in the Denver Business Journal as a counterpoint to a column by Justin Longo of the Independence Institute. (Link to similar column use because of copyright restrictions.)

By Rich Jones

Colorado's working-poor families have increased 51 percent from 2004 to 2010, according to a report released Monday by The Bell Policy Center.

"These are hard-working families, and they are not keeping up," Rich Jones, one of the 2010 report's authors, said in the study. "That has grievous implications for the rest of us and for the economic health of our state."

The new report is an update of a 2004 Bell report called "Opportunity Lost: When Hard Work Isn't Enough for Colorado's Families."

By Ed Sealover
Denver Business Journal
Oct. 28, 2009

Medicaid providers will take another hit in the latest round of budget cuts unveiled by Gov. Bill Ritter Wednesday, but business leaders who have been asking him not to cut tax exemptions and credits can breathe a sigh of relief for now.