With the 2018 legislative session soon drawing to a close, Senate Bill 18-200 (SB 200) cleared its latest legislative hurdle on Tuesday morning, when the Colorado House passed the legislation.

The vote came after a clarification about 21(c) rules, which enable legislators to recuse themselves from a vote if they have a conflict of interest in the matter at hand. The final tally was 38-23, with four lawmakers excused. On May 2, the Senate moved to create a conference committee to work out the differences between the two chambers.

On Monday evening, SB 200 passed the House on a voice vote during second reading, after about 90 minutes of spirited and amicable bipartisan debate. The deliberations didn’t begin until just after 8:00 p.m., reflecting state lawmakers’ packed agenda with only nine days left on the legislative calendar.

During approval discussions about the House Finance Committee report, representatives offered 16 amendments, including four related to restoring the defined contribution plan option that the House previously amended out of the Senate version of the bill. Those four motions all failed, but eight of the other amendments passed. These included:

• Three technical amendments that corrected or clarified prior language in the bill
• A deletion of the previous version with new members after December 31, 2019, retiring at any age and 40 years of service credit at 65 with 5 years of service credit and adding retirement eligibility for new hires at age 60 with 30 years of service credit
• Expansion of the existing Police Officers’ and Firefighters Pension Reform Commission to include oversight of PERA and creating a Subcommittee exclusively focused on PERA and staffed with four legislators appointed from the Commission and ten appointed external experts in relevant industries.
• A provision that allows the annual direct distribution from sources in addition to the General Fund via the budgeting process
• A change to the direct distribution provisions that delineates the amount assigned to the state and to K-12 public education

Later on Monday evening, during the Committee of the Whole reading after the main proceedings, Rep. Polly Lawrence (R-Roxborough Park) offered two amendments. The first would change the Highest Average Salary calculation to seven years and was defeated, 37-28. Rep. Lawrence’s second amendment to raise the retirement age for new PERA hires to age 65 also went down, 36-29. Rep. Kevin Van Winkle (R-Highlands Ranch) reintroduced his amendment to reinstall the defined contribution option for new PERA hires into the bill, but it also lost, 36-29. And Rep. Justin Everett (R-Jefferson County) moved to indemnify the State Legislature and taxpayers against legal action as a result of the passage of SB 200. This amendment also was defeated, 37-28. The House voted to adopt the Committee of the Whole report, 43-22.

To see a comparison of the latest version of Senate Bill 200 with prior versions and the Board’s recommended package, please see this chart.