“It is significant, and every day we wait, the deeper the cuts we will have to make as we go through this,” said Mark Ferrandino, Gov. Jared Polis’ budget director.

Because of how Congress wrote the tax bill, the new projected $955 million shortfall is already being felt — meaning the annual state budget that came into effect on July 1 is now significantly out of balance, Ferrandino said. Trump signed the federal bill into law on July 4.

The shortfall is from the legislature’s general fund, which this year was roughly $16.7 billion in a total budget of $44 billion. Lawmakers had already been bracing to return to the Capitol in mid-August, and Wednesday morning’s leadership meeting at the Capitol appeared to erase any doubt that Polis will call legislators back for a special session to solve the budgetary sinkhole that’s opened beneath the state’s feet.

If lawmakers wait until their scheduled return in January, Ferrandino warned, the cuts will be steeper and may top $2 billion. Already, state officials have asked departments to stop any maintenance they’ve scheduled but haven’t yet paid for. Polis’ office earlier had told state agencies to prepare for 2.5% cuts next year, and his team has now asked how much of that savings they can realize immediately.

For taxpayers, the projections include that TABOR refunds expected for the 2026 tax year now won’t materialize, though 2025 tax year refunds are locked in. According to an analysis by legislative staff, $143.9 million in the state’s lost revenue comes from temporary deductions for taxes on tips and overtime for Coloradans, plus $243.2 million from changes to standard and itemized deductions and personal exemptions.

Assuming lawmakers gather next month, they will have few options to fill the hole, none of which are particularly easy or appealing.

Rebalancing the budget will require significant cuts, and it’ll also likely mean dipping into the state’s reserve fund. Lawmakers will also probably discuss raising revenue, too, though options on that front are limited by requirements for voter approval under the Taxpayer’s Bill of Rights.

Still, lawmakers could eliminate certain tax loopholes.

“Pain. What’s coming is pain,” Sen. Jeff Bridges, a Greenwood Village Democrat who chairs the powerful Joint Budget Committee, said outside the committee meeting room. “… Even my colleagues don’t realize how brutal it’ll be to cut a billion dollars from a budget that we already cut by a billion dollars.”

Backed by congressional Republicans — including all four of Colorado’s Republican U.S. House members — the tax bill slashed $4.5 trillion in taxes nationally, cut Medicaid funding and shifted new costs onto states. The changes will trickle down to state budgets, since state income taxes are influenced heavily by the federal tax code — and Colorado is one of four states that immediately implement federal tax changes, Ferrandino said.

$1.2 billion hit to revenue

In all, the moves are expected to strip $1.2 billion in revenue from Colorado in the current fiscal year, state budget officials said, followed in years to come by lesser amounts that still run into the hundreds of millions of dollars. According to the state economists’ analysis, much of that revenue loss — nearly $770 million — is because of corporation-related tax changes.

This year’s $955 million shortfall is slightly smaller than the total revenue loss because the state had expected to deliver taxpayer refunds under TABOR. Now the state will fall below the TABOR cap, which ate up some of the revenue loss. (Wednesday’s $1.2 billion revenue loss projection was worse than an initial estimate, issued earlier this month, that the hit could reach as high as $800 million.)

Two tax credits aimed at lower-income families — a higher state match of the Earned Income Tax Credit and the family affordability tax credit — won’t be available in the 2026 and 2027 tax years, Ferrandino said.

At the same time, the state will have to pay more than $237 million in property tax rebates to local governments in the 2026 tax year, too. Normally, that would be pulled from money that’s above the TABOR cap. Because the tax bill wiped out TABOR refunds for the 2026 tax year, though, it will have to come from the legislature’s primary spending account, the general fund.

What’s more, the immediate budgetary challenges described Wednesday don’t include other looming impacts on the state from the tax bill.

Colorado will have to shoulder hundreds of millions of dollars in new spending to cover Medicaid and food assistance because of the tax bill’s cuts, though those impacts generally won’t take effect until 2027. That’s a separate — but still thorny — issue that lawmakers will have to plan for and solve, likely starting in the next regular legislative term in January.

A difficult special session

The looming special session is likely to be bruising, given the depth of the budget hole facing lawmakers and the interplay of a legislature controlled by Democrats responding to a tax-cutting bill passed by the Republican Congress.

Conservative groups have already started criticizing Democrats for continuing to tax overtime starting next year — rather than adopting the tax bill’s changes — while Democrats have blasted Republicans for passing the tax bill in the first place.

“I am particularly shocked that our congressional delegation would have voted for a bill that has this kind of impact to us,” House Speaker Julie McCluskie said.

On Wednesday, the legislative leadership began laying the groundwork for the policy — and rhetorical — fights to come: The two top Republicans, minority leaders Rep. Rose Pugliese and Sen. Cleave Simpson, questioned why lawmakers needed to return now and referenced Republican complaints that the state has overspent its wallet.

“Is (the tax bill), overall, just compounding a structural deficit that this body has been aware of for several years — that Colorado is on a pattern of spending that could not be supported by revenue stream?” asked Simpson, of Alamosa. “And now we’re going to overlay, again, potentially a $1.2 billion impact in that structural deficit.”

But the executive committee’s Democrats, along with Ferrandino, said the tax bill was a separate and unrelated issue that had been levied upon the state by Congress.

“Right now, we don’t have the cash to pay our bills,” Ferrandino said. “That’s different than where we are long term within the structural issues. Just to be clear, those structural issues will get worse because of” the tax bill.

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Amy Parks asked Weinberg about allegations she had heard about him sexually harassing women at a prominent conservative leadership event earlier that year, Parks told The Denver Post. Weinberg denied the allegations, Parks said, and the two talked about the Loveland-based House seat that Weinberg had been appointed to fulfill as the successor to McKean, the late House minority leader.

Weinberg had beat three candidates for the vacancy committee’s appointment earlier that month. Parks had nominated one of the other contenders, Kristy Hall, and she said that she told Weinberg in the call that he needed to improve his behavior or he risked losing his next election.

According to Parks, Weinberg replied that if Hall challenged him again, he would “kick her in the pussy.”

Taken aback, Parks told him that sounded “Trumpy.”

“Trump uses his hands,” Weinberg replied, according to Parks. “I use my feet.”

Parks said she took the comment not as a physical threat but as a crass warning that he would easily defeat Hall. It was part of a pattern of inappropriate comments and behavior that Weinberg exhibited during his time as the chair of the Larimer County Republican Party, according to nearly a dozen people who experienced or witnessed interactions with Weinberg.

Those accounts have come to light a few weeks after three women publicly accused Weinberg of making sexually inappropriate comments at Leadership Program of the Rockies events in 2021 and 2022. While Weinberg has denied those allegations and questioned why they were being raised now, The Post found that officials — both at the leadership program and in Larimer County — were aware of his alleged behavior before he entered the legislature.

Weinberg declined to comment when reached by phone. He did not respond to questions sent by email Monday morning. An email sent to his attorney last week was not returned.

Several people, including former party officials and volunteers, alleged to The Post that Weinberg frequently berated board members and volunteers for minor slights, like arriving late or disagreeing with him. A Republican colleague in the House, Rep. Brandi Bradley, said Weinberg has made inappropriate remarks as a legislator.

She filed a complaint with House Speaker Julie McCluskie on Friday accusing Weinberg of copying a master key to doors in the Capitol. In January, McCluskie wrote to the House’s top Republican that House staff had investigated Weinberg for accessing another lawmaker’s office without her permission, according to a copy of the letter obtained by The Post.

Four women who have known or worked with Weinberg in Larimer County — Tasha Carr, Nancy Rumfelt, Kristin Grazier and another woman who requested anonymity out of fear of retaliation — told The Post that they’d blocked his phone number or knew not to pick up if he called late at night, when they suspected he had been drinking and was more likely to yell. Several people approached the Larimer County GOP to raise concerns about the lawmaker in summer 2023, a few months after he’d joined the legislature and departed his local party post.

Grazier, who succeeded Weinberg as county party chair, said: “It would be fair to say I’ve experienced bullying (and) abusive, offensive and disrespectful behavior.”

“It was more than once,” she said. “It was many times, and it was to varying degrees.”

After a reporter reached out to Weinberg last week, eight people who worked with or volunteered for the party under him then contacted The Post. All praised his leadership and said they’d never seen him act inappropriately or yell at anyone.

Several questioned the political motives of those alleging otherwise.

“I’ve never seen him ever do anything, say anything, to a person that was bad,” said Kathy Nelson, who said she met Weinberg in 2020 and then volunteered for the party. “He does have a leadership personality — he’s not a shrinking violet. But as far as anything mean or too forceful or nasty — no, nothing like that.”

Cyndi Fronapfel, who worked for the party under Weinberg, said he would at times raise his voice in excitement or call people out. But she said none of his behavior struck her as inappropriate, and she defended him as a motivated and passionate leader.

Others, though, described being berated by Weinberg at meetings and on phone calls. Former volunteer Kristi Smiley said Weinberg called her after a meeting at Colorado State University and yelled at her, as her husband listened on.

The gist of the call, she said, was that she was worthless and could either back Weinberg 100% or leave.

Carr said Weinberg yelled at her after she questioned him in a meeting, prompting her to get up and leave. She provided emails sent to or about Weinberg in 2021 and 2022. In one, she said his texts were inappropriate. He replied, saying they weren’t.

In another, he apologized for an interaction the previous night and for his “blunt approach.” In a third, from January 2022, Carr wrote a lengthy email to other party officials about Weinberg’s “bullying, abusive and controlling behavior, as well as embarrassing or sexually inappropriate remarks.” She wrote that the board needed to get involved.

Challenging ‘style of communication’

More than year later, in summer 2023, Carr, Smiley and at least four other people approached the Larimer County GOP about Weinberg. Though most of the public testimony was about his behavior, some also criticized his decision to sign a letter supporting a transgender legislator in Montana, who had been barred from that state’s House floor after a tense debate about gender-affirming care. Weinberg’s signature on the letter earned him a reprimand from the Colorado Republican Party.

The concerns about his behavior prompted the county party’s board to adopt a new policy setting conduct expectations for its members, Grazier, the board chair at the time, said. It also required them to treat each other with respect and directed them not to use “force, threat, humiliation” or other inappropriate means to try to persuade or influence someone, according to a copy reviewed by The Post.

The board briefly debated taking a vote to distance itself from Weinberg but decided against it, Grazier said.

Hall, Weinberg’s onetime opponent who was serving on the board then, said the board took a vote of no confidence in him. Grazier demurred when asked about that, citing the confidentiality of executive session meetings. She said the board’s deliberations could be interpreted as a no-confidence discussion, though she denied that such a vote took place.

Weinberg was repeatedly asked to speak to the board, Grazier said, but declined. Hall said the board wrote him a letter.

“We communicated to Mr. Weinberg that we in no way supported his style of communication and the inappropriate language that was being used with women,” Hall said. “And we expected things to change.”

The new allegations come after three women accused Weinberg earlier this month of sexually harassing them at a conservative organization’s events in 2021 and 2022. Two women — Jacqueline Anderson and Heather Booth — publicly accused Weinberg of making sexually inappropriate comments to them at Leadership Program of the Rockies events.

A third woman released an anonymous statement making a similar accusation. All three accounts included allegations from the same Leadership Program event.

The third woman, who spoke to The Post on condition of anonymity, said Weinberg seemed intoxicated and pressured her to steal a flag and leave a hotel bar with him in February 2022. The woman repeatedly refused and grew increasingly uncomfortable with Weinberg’s persistence, she said, until a bystander intervened and walked the woman to her room.

The bystander, a man who also requested anonymity out of fear of retaliation, confirmed the woman’s account to The Post.

The woman said she woke up the next morning “totally disgusted” and reported the allegations to Luzon Kahler, the vice president of the Leadership Program of the Rockies’ 2022 class. The woman said she later spoke with the program’s president, Shari Williams, and that she was told that Weinberg would be banned from future events and that organizers were aware of other concerns raised about him.

In a brief phone call last week, Kahler said she didn’t have time to talk and then hung up. Williams did not return messages seeking comment.

Lawmaker disputes ‘false accusations’

Weinberg has denied those allegations of harassment.

“False accusations have been made against me and they are simply not true,” he said in a social media post earlier this month, prior to being contacted for this story. “These claims, nearly four years old, were never mentioned when I ran for office. Now, the moment I announce my run for Republican leadership, they suddenly surface. I will not be intimidated by political smear tactics.”

On Facebook, he’s also shared several letters signed by legislative staffers praising him.

Sandra Aste, the current chair of the Larimer County Republican Party, did not return an email seeking comment for this story. After the harassment allegations were reported publicly this month, the party wrote on social media that the accusations were “deeply concerning on multiple levels.”

“We understand the seriousness of this situation and the impact it may have on the parties involved and our community,” the party wrote.

All three of the sexual harassment allegations were sent to Weinberg’s House Republican colleagues earlier this month, after Weinberg announced that he would pursue a legislative leadership position.

He later dropped his candidacy for minority whip. The harassment allegations were forwarded to the House’s Workplace Harassment Committee, and Minority Leader Rose Pugliese, the chamber’s top Republican, said on social media that legislative leaders “take these allegations seriously.”

In an interview Friday, Bradley, a Littleton Republican who had also vied for the same leadership position, accused Weinberg of making inappropriate comments to her.

Bradley said she’d previously raised concerns to House leadership about Weinberg’s behavior. Later Friday, she filed an ethics complaint with McCluskie, a Democrat who is the House’s top official, accusing Weinberg of “belligerent” behavior while under the influence of alcohol.

She also accused him of copying a master key to unlock doors in the Capitol. She provided emails to The Post between Bradley and the Colorado State Patrol, which provides security for the building, referencing a January investigation into the matter.

In her January letter to Pugliese, McCluskie wrote that Weinberg had entered another lawmaker’s office without that legislator’s permission. He told leadership he did not have his own master key but had taken a key from a senior House staffer. McCluskie wrote that if Weinberg had a master key, he must turn it over. She called the matter “very serious,” warned that Weinberg might face disciplinary action and said it was “imperative that Rep. Weinberg never does this again.”

Weinberg didn’t respond to a separate email about Bradley’s allegations sent Monday afternoon. Earlier, Bradley accused leadership of not doing enough in response to her concerns.

In a statement from earlier this month, Pugliese and Rep. Ty Winter, the assistant minority leader, said that Bradley’s assertions that they hadn’t responded to her were “patently false.” They indicated that Bradley needed to file a complaint with the harassment committee and that members “are only accountable to each other and their constituents.”

Pugliese declined to comment further Monday, pointing to the caucus’ previous statement. Through a spokesman, McCluskie declined to comment on Bradley’s complaint.

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The Colorado Constitution guarantees just compensation for any real estate acquired for a public use and allows owners to challenge whether a use is truly public. Statutes were tightened even more in 2006, with limits barring the use of eminent domain to claim property for economic development purposes or to boost tax revenues.

In short, when land is taken, it must be for genuine public uses, not as a workaround to benefit a private entity.

That matters because Denver Water has sent out “notices of intent” for nearly two dozen properties near its 36-acre campus, which is adjacent to Burnham Yard, a 58-acre site owned by the Colorado Department of Transportation. That former railroad yard, being prepared for sale, is considered a leading candidate for a new football stadium that the Denver Broncos are considering.

But land is also needed for surrounding developments like bars, restaurants, hotels and housing. Sports teams increasingly want to control those assets and profit from them, which requires a much larger footprint in the past.

“Different property owners are responding differently. We figured there was no reason not to go ahead and get an appraisal,” said Adam Foster, an attorney representing the owners of 1245 N. Umatilla St., which was among the properties between 12th and 14th avenues and between I-25 and Shoshone Street that received notices.

Denver Water has been fairly vague in explaining why it needs the land and what it intends to do with it, Foster said, adding that “At this time, we are taking them at their word that it is for a public process.”

The Broncos said the team has studied locating a new stadium in Denver, Aurora and Lone Tree. But since August, proxy companies tied to the team have purchased at least 13 parcels near Burnham Yard and made sellers sign nondisclosure agreements. That suggests the location south of the current stadium and on a light rail line is the leading candidate.

Even with those purchases, the Broncos still need some land from Denver Water’s campus next door to Burnham Yard, and the two sides have been discussing the matter for more than a year via frequent meetings.

“At this time, Denver Water is just exploring some voluntary acquisitions of properties near our Operations Complex to meet future operational needs. There are no set plans, as we are only evaluating potential options for the future,” said Travis Thompson, a communications manager with Denver Water.

Denver Water hasn’t acknowledged that it will need the parcels, which cover approximately 18 acres, to replace land it may sell to the Denver Broncos. And it has repeatedly emphasized the “voluntary” aspect of its purchase requests, which in the case of the Latino Cultural Arts Center’s Las Bodegas campus at 1935 W. 12th Ave. resulted in a rescinded offer to purchase its parcel.

Attorneys contacted said they expect the “notice of intent to acquire” letters that went out in April and May could eventually lead to a “petition for immediate possession” for owners who refuse the initial offer, which would start the formal eminent domain process.

“You have to send somebody that notice. It gives the landowner the chance to plan,” said Don Ostrander, an attorney with Hamre, Rodriguez, Ostrander & Prescott in Englewood who has worked on some of the state’s highest profile condemnation cases, including the assembly of land for Coors Field, RTD’s FasTracks project and E-470.

Appraisals are the next step. Denver Water has determined what it considers a fair value, and property owners are entitled to obtain an appraisal at the utility’s expense, essentially a second opinion.

“Most of the properties will be acquired through negotiation, but not all of them,” Ostrander said.

Owners near retirement, or who face costly repairs or clean-up to sell, or who aren’t up for a legal battle, may take an offer they find agreeable enough and call it a day. Others may push for a higher price or not want to sell.

Denver Water, despite the claim of everything being voluntary, has the ability to force a sale on those who refuse to reach terms, real estate attorneys said. Whether the utility has solid legal standing to do so is another matter.

“You can’t condemn property for an entity that doesn’t have the power to condemn,” Ostrander said. “They have to be careful about using it or they will put themselves at risk that someone says there isn’t a public purpose.”

A key question the courts may be asked to decide is if Denver Water would be acquiring the land in question absent a sale of land it currently owns to facilitate the development of a new stadium.

“The key issue comes down to whether this is for public infrastructure or deemed to benefit a private party. Colorado state law is pretty clear on that,” said Peter Towsky, a partner at Robinson & Henry in Highlands Ranch. “There is a potential trial awaiting each of these eminent domain takings.”

If Denver Water acquires land to replace land that will be sold to the Denver Broncos, a private party, it is violating Colorado’s rules on eminent domain actions, Towsky said.

“There are some seemingly legitimate questions that could be raised in a challenge over this,” he said. “The leverage lies with the property owners. If they challenge any of this in court, the public use aspect, that will delay things significantly.”

Richard B. Collins, an emeritus professor at the University of Colorado Law School and expert on eminent domain, however, said a judge could decline to link the two actions. Denver Water is within its rights to sell land it owns, and it can use eminent domain to acquire land that it needs.

“The courts could reject the claim by deeming the two parts of the plan as separate, so that Denver Water’s condemnations stand alone and are valid. The 2006 statute could be avoided by finding that the proposed scheme is not urban renewal,” he said.

Courts have been generous in defining what is of public purpose, and could declare that retaining the Broncos in Denver serves a public purpose, he said. And it will be hard to argue that Denver Water isn’t using the land it acquires for its campus, a public use.

“For these reasons, I think it likely that the courts would not invalidate the scheme. But I could be wrong,” he said.

Colorado tough on takings

Colorado tightened its standards on eminent domain after the Arvada Urban Renewal Authority used a blighted designation to claim a privately-owned and spring-fed lake that was popular with locals. The plan was to fill the lake in and use it as a truck turnaround for a new Walmart.

The Colorado Supreme Court ruled in 2004 that economic dissatisfaction didn’t justify taking private property and that the condemnation was not permissible under urban renewal laws. Private property advocates in the state sought stronger safeguards in 2005, when the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in Kelo vs. City of New London that eminent domain could be used for economic development purposes.

The Colorado legislature in 2006 responded by passing a bill that prohibited takings solely for economic development purposes and required clear and convincing evidence of blight before private property can be condemned for redevelopment.

Retired Grand County Republican State Rep. Al White, a sponsor of that bill, said that Denver Water may be crossing a line if it resorts to eminent domain in a way that benefits the Broncos, who don’t have that power. Its approach is subtle, not flagrant, but in his view violates the protective intent of the legislation passed nearly two decades ago.

“If they go the eminent domain route to acquire property after selling to a private for-profit entity, that would seem to tip-toe across the line of what my bill was designed to do, i.e. prevent public takings for the benefit of private profit,” White said.

Aside from the public use argument, property owners could also challenge whether the price they are being offered is fair, the most common point of contention in eminent domain disputes.

BusinessDen in June reported that LLCs affiliated with the Denver Broncos assembled more than a dozen parcels near Burnham Yard. Some of the purchases carried premiums at two to three times the going rate of prior sales, which will make it harder for Denver Water to replace whatever land it gives up.

For example, Golden developer Jeff Shanahan paid $5.75 million for a building on 1.4 acres at 1530 W. 13th Ave. in March 2023. Backed by a loan from Denver, he planned to build affordable housing. But in January, an LLC affiliated with the Denver Broncos offered him more than double what he had paid — $12.5 million.

Owners want the “Broncos” price, not the “market” price that Denver Water calculated, and many are expected to hire appraisers to determine a value that reflects those purchases, sources familiar with the matter said.

Complicated land transactions involving multiple parcels typically have some holdouts, Ostrander said. That was the case with Coors Field, when Mary Siiro and the Cowperthwaite family fought hard to retain their parcels for as long as they could. The legislature restored eminent domain powers to sports districts, including the Denver Metropolitan Major League Baseball Stadium District, allowing the project to move forward.

The Broncos, however, are expected to independently fund any new project rather than using a stadium district. That puts them in a better position to control the surrounding development and avoid the complications of partnering with taxpayers. But it leaves them without a powerful tool to acquire land.

Denver Water could proceed on its current course and make any purchases without using its power of eminent domain, an approach White favors and one that would avoid a fight over public use. But it may have to pay more, which could trigger complaints that it is harming customers to benefit a sports franchise. Or the Denver Broncos, with their deeper pockets, could also step in, buy up the land, and arrange a swap.

Landowners who can find a way to hold out could realize substantially higher values in five to 10 years as the area redevelops, Towsky said. But if the Broncos find it too difficult to assemble the land needed, they may pursue other options, including staying at Empower Field’s current location.

Breaking up a campus

Burnham Yard is a brownfield site, and the contamination from decades spent as a railroad repair yard will need to be cleaned up. But the surrounding parcels, including the ones that Denver Water wants, aren’t officially blighted. They may not all look pretty, but aside from a few vacant lots and empty buildings slated to become apartments, most remain productively employed.

Tenants include HVAC and roofing contractors, a treatment center, a janitorial firm, a lighting supplier, an oil and gas company, and a distributor of trampolines. Most of the buildings were built in the 1950s, 60s and 70s, and a couple in the 1980s. The oldest, 1340 Umatilla St., dates to 1910.

“I suspect they will be successfully able to argue the case and purchase,” said Vivek Sah, director of the Franklin L. Burns School of Real Estate and Construction Management at the University of Denver’s Daniels College of Business, said of Denver Water’s efforts.

It is one thing if a public entity tried to condemn land in a productive area like Cherry Creek, and another in a tired industrial zone that could use a new lease on life. Too many interests are aligning in support of a new stadium at that location, Sah said.

Tenants typically receive assistance with moving expenses and owners, if they build a strong case on valuation, can likely achieve a price that works for them. Foster said the area, with or without a stadium, is changing rapidly and is ripe for redevelopment.

But owners and tenants alike will likely struggle to replace what they are giving up in terms of highway access, central location and lower cost. Many could find themselves pushed outside Denver city limits.

Denver Water also faces significant trade-offs if it splits up its contiguous campus and moves some of its operations into the surrounding neighborhood, where cross streets and traffic will reduce the privacy and undisturbed access it now enjoys.

“It would be difficult. It’s probably not ideal. But nothing is as ideal as where they are now,” said Jim Lochhead, former CEO of Denver Water from 2010 to 2023.

Building a unified campus cost more than $200 million and years of planning to pull off. The main headquarters was completed in December 2019, right ahead of the pandemic.

Letting it go will not be easy, but Lochhead also acknowledged that the stadium and the redevelopment of the surrounding area presents an important economic driver for Denver. A new stadium has become a top priority for Mayor Mike Johnston, and Gov. Jared Polis is involved in the talks to sell Burnham Yard.

“It would be too bad for Denver Water to give up that campus or a portion of that campus, but it’s something that I think is for the good of the community, as long as Denver Water is kept whole and its customers are kept whole,” he said.

Denver Post reporter Elliott Wenzler contributed to this report.

Sonya Jaquez Lewis was charged with the felony by the Denver District Attorney’s Office on July 2, according to Denver District Court records. The filing came nearly four months after prosecutors in Boulder and Denver said they were investigating the Longmont Democrat.

Jaquez Lewis turned herself in to Denver police on July 6, spent a night in jail and was released the next morning, said her attorney, Craig Truman, on Tuesday morning. She will be arraigned in early August.

Truman declined to comment on the charges, other than to say that he was “sure when all the facts are known in this difficult and complicated case, justice will be done for both sides.”

Matt Jablow, a spokesman for Denver District Attorney John Walsh, confirmed the charges Monday night. Jaquez Lewis’ case, which wasn’t publicized at the time it was filed, was first reported by Colorado Politics.

Jaquez Lewis resigned from the legislature in February amid an ethics probe into her treatment of her legislative aides. Her resignation came just before the ethics committee learned that Jaquez Lewis had faked a letter of support from a former legislative staffer.

The then-state senator had sent the committee, made up of her colleagues, five letters as part of her defense against allegations that she required aides to do work around her house and had resisted signing off on a staffer’s timecard.

Of five people who submitted letters purportedly on Jaquez Lewis’ behalf, two told investigators they did not author them, according to court records. Another person said she thought a letter submitted under her name wasn’t the letter she’d written, and a fourth alleged author laughed as a Denver investigator read her letter aloud, according to charging documents. The fifth letter was submitted to the legislative committee anonymously.

The Boulder and Denver district attorneys’ offices began investigating Jaquez Lewis in March. Sen. Julie Gonzales, a Democrat who chaired the ethics committee, told The Post then that she contacted prosecutors “about the materials we received from (Jaquez Lewis) as part of the Senate Ethics Committee process.”

At the time, Jaquez Lewis said the letter had been “accidentally submitted.” The alleged author of that letter told investigators that Jaquez Lewis had contacted her repeatedly in January, including by mentioning a potential job lead, according to court records. The woman then learned of the ethics investigation and ignored the then-senator’s calls and texts because “she did not have great things to say about Ms. Jaquez Lewis.”

The Denver Post later confirmed that a second letter of support given to the committee had also apparently been faked. In March, Jaquez Lewis declined to comment about the second letter. Investigators spoke with that purported author, too, and she confirmed she did not write it.

An investigator with the DA’s office also spoke with someone — the name is redacted — who said Jaquez Lewis had asked her to “copy and paste language from an attorney” into a letter that the senator wanted the person to submit to the Secretary of State’s Office on behalf of Jaquez Lewis.

According to court records, the alleged author of another letter said she had written a letter to the ethics committee on the senator’s behalf. But “she believed the letter submitted by Ms. Jaquez Lewis was not the letter she wrote.”

When an investigator called a fourth purported author, the person laughed as the investigator read the letter aloud. The person declined to speak further, according to court records.

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In the joint letter, the two women alleged that Rep. Ron Weinberg made unwanted and explicit sexual advances to them at public events in 2021 and 2022, before he was in the legislature. Both exchanges happened in front of witnesses, including a husband of one of the women, according to the letter.

“Each of us has experienced sexual harassment from Representative Weinberg,” Heather Booth and Jacqueline Anderson wrote. “He has engaged in inappropriate sexual behavior, made unwelcome sexual comments, and pursued unwanted sexual advances.”

Weinberg had recently announced that he would run for the third-ranking minority leadership position in the House. But he dropped out Friday in a post on the social platform X, writing that he would not pursue the minority whip position. He did not mention the letter but cited a desire to spend more time with his wife and family.

On Monday, House Minority Leader Rose Pugliese acknowledged the letter on social media, writing that legislative leaders would “take these allegations seriously.”

Neither Weinberg nor his attorney returned messages seeking comment Monday afternoon. In a statement posted to X on Monday night, Weinberg denied the allegations and said he’d “hired legal counsel and will defend my name and family through the law.”

“These claims, nearly four years old, were never mentioned when I ran for office,” he wrote. “Now, the moment I announce my run for Republican leadership, they suddenly surface.”

Both of the women who wrote the letter have been involved in Republican politics. At the time of the incidents alleged, Anderson was the vice chair of the Mesa County Republican Party, while Booth was on the Elizabeth school board.

Anderson told The Denver Post in an interview that she and Booth were harassed by Weinberg at an annual Leadership Program of the Rockies event in February 2022. Weinberg allegedly also made a lewd comment to Anderson and her husband — about wanting to have sex with Anderson — at the same event the year prior, in June 2021.

Anderson and Booth’s letter was sent to the House Republican caucus and posted to social media last week, after Weinberg announced that he intended to run for the leadership position within the caucus.

At the time of the alleged harassment, Weinberg was the chair of the Larimer County Republican Party and a member of the Larimer County Planning Commission. He would be appointed to the legislature through a vacancy committee several months later, in fall 2022, and take office in early 2023. He was elected to a new term last November.

In the letter, Anderson wrote that Weinberg approached her at a Leadership Program of the Rockies event at the Broadmoor Hotel in Colorado Springs in June 2021, at a table where she sat with her husband, Cory. Weinberg allegedly told Cory Anderson that Weinberg was going to have sex with his wife, using an expletive.

“It was just shocking,” Jacqueline Anderson said in an interview. She remembered wondering whether she’d heard Weinberg correctly. “And my husband’s like, ‘Excuse me?’ And (Weinberg) said it again. And I said, ‘Yeah, I don’t think so.’ ”

Anderson said she and her husband saw Weinberg the next day and confronted him. Weinberg, she said, said he didn’t remember saying anything and noted he’d had too much to drink the night before. He apologized, she said.

But Anderson said he made the same comment nearly a year later, in February 2022. She said her husband, who was again present, had to be restrained.

Booth did not return a message seeking comment about her allegations regarding Weinberg.

In the letter, she wrote that Weinberg approached her and a friend at the February 2022 event, as the pair jokingly discussed getting a facelift. Weinberg allegedly told Booth that she didn’t need a facelift and that she was beautiful. He then allegedly made a lewd comment involving his penis and a sex act.

“It was humiliating, disgusting, and terrifying,” Booth wrote. “We were dressed up at a public event, and this man thought it was okay to sexually degrade me like that. I still can’t shake how powerless and violated I felt.”

Anderson said she didn’t know about Booth’s account from the February 2022 event until recently. But she said she met with officials from the Leadership Program of the Rockies after she said she heard about an account from a third woman that also involved Weinberg. She said the group’s leaders banned Weinberg from attending future events.

Messages sent to the group by The Post were not returned Monday.

In Pugliese’s social media post Monday, the House’s top Republican wrote: “We take these allegations seriously. We are cooperating with the proper authorities to ensure all accusations are properly handled and have forwarded the information to Workplace Relations for review.”

The Office of Legislative Workplace Relations is the legislature’s version of a human resources department. But it’s unclear what oversight the office will have over the alleged misconduct, as it occurred before Weinberg joined the legislature.

When he withdrew from the whip race Friday, Weinberg cited only personal reasons, writing on X: “Titles and positions mean little if they cost you your peace, your family, and your purpose. My duty remains to serve my district and stand for our conservative principles, but I will not sacrifice the time and presence my loved ones deserve.”

Anderson said she decided to publicly disclose her allegations when she learned that Weinberg was pursuing a leadership role. The whip position had opened with the resignation of Berthoud Rep. Ryan Armagost.

The race for minority whip became heated on social media in recent days, but Anderson said her decision to speak out wasn’t politically motivated.

“My stance is, I don’t really care who’s whip; it just can’t be Ron,” she said. “… His behavior continues to be a problem, and he’s not being held accountable. That’s just kind of where I’m at. Enough’s enough.”

Weinberg was not present at the House Republican caucus meeting Monday morning, where the caucus elected freshman Rep. Carlos Barron to become the new whip.

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The first day of July is typically one of the earliest effective dates for new laws passed by the legislature in the spring and winter, and it remains a common implementation day for bills passed in prior years, too.

Among the several new laws coming online Tuesday include a provision of a drug treatment bill that allows more access to medication-assisted treatment and requires improved tracking of detox services. Another brings an easing of requirements for people who inspect water or gas backflow devices.

One new law consolidates two crisis hotlines into one, making both reachable by calling 988, a mental health resource. Another ends a new program that has recognized employers designated as “recovery-friendly workplaces” for people with substance-use disorders.

As contentious Colorado housing laws take effect, some cities are playing nice — while others resist or sue

Here's a look at other new laws that went into effect Tuesday:

New gun regulations

Two holdovers from the 2024 legislative session kick into effect Tuesday. Part of a broader package of gun-control bills passed last year, both measures apply tighter regulations to segments of selling and carrying firearms. They were sponsored by Democratic lawmakers.

House Bill 24-1174 requires Coloradans seeking a concealed-carry permit to complete an in-person training class and pass a written exam and a live-fire exercise with a gun. The course must last at least eight hours, which can include both the written and live-fire tests.

House Bill 24-1353 requires gun shops to have a state license -- on top of a federal permit -- to sell firearms. They're required to conduct fingerprint background checks on their employees every three years while training staff on preventing self-harm or straw purchases, in which one person buys a weapon for another person.

Stores are also subject to random inspections. The law was intended to give local authorities more investigative -- and, if necessary, punitive -- power over gun stores, rather than relying on federal oversight.

Compromise on youth detention beds

The product of extensive behind-the-scenes negotiations this spring, House Bill 1146 allows more beds to be used to keep kids in custody before their trials. State law caps that number at 215 youths at any one time; HB-1146 increases the extra 22 emergency beds now allowed by another 17, but they are only to be used if the state has hit its 215 ceiling.

The bill's backers had initially sought to nearly double the bed cap. But pushback to the proposal -- and Denver Post reporting about the lack of safety in the facilities -- prompted the bill to be scaled back to a smaller, emergency-only boost.

The bipartisan bill also launches a pilot program for staff members to wear body-worn cameras in one detention facility and another commitment facility.

More judges across state

Senate Bill 24 adds 15 judges to various district and county courts across the state. Five of those positions are funded starting Tuesday, and the rest will kick in next year. This year, one new district judge will go to district courts for the judicial regions based in El Paso, Adams, Arapahoe and Douglas counties. La Plata County will also receive a new county judge.

Repealed grant programs

The Joint Budget Committee during this year's legislative session was not exactly a land of plenty. As such, budget-writing legislators trimmed, cut, reshuffled and repealed, until they'd scaled back spending by roughly $1.2 billion.

Among the departing programs, officially repealed starting Tuesday, are a computer-science education grant for teachers in public schools; a fund to help high schools pay for advanced placement and International Baccalaureate exams; and grants for institutions of higher education to pay for programs for students with intellectual or developmental disabilities.

Expanded shield law

Last year, lawmakers passed House Bill 24-1072, which generally prohibited courts from allowing descriptions of a victim's clothing or past sexual history with their alleged assailant to be used in proceedings of criminal sexual assault cases.

This year, the legislature passed House Bill 1138, a bipartisan law that applies to civil cases about sexual assault. In those settings, speech, hairstyle, lifestyle and clothing generally can't be used as evidence related to consent, harm or credibility.

Defense attorneys can seek to include them, but that can happen only after a hearing with the judge overseeing the case. Past sexual history can also generally not be included, except for DNA and biological evidence intended to prove another person committed the assault.

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Armagost, of Berthoud, was midway through his second term in the House, where he was last year elected to serve as the chamber’s minority whip. He will resign effective Sept. 1 and move to Arizona in pursuit of a “significant job offer, a meaningful personal relationship in the state, and the chance to expand his work in Second Amendment advocacy,” according to a Monday statement.

During his stint in the legislature, Armagost’s work focused on criminal justice policy, and he was a vocal opponent of Democratic efforts to pass gun control. He also led the unsuccessful effort to impeach Secretary of State Jena Griswold.

“Serving you has been one of the greatest honors of my life,” Armagost wrote to the constituents of House District 64, which is nestled between Longmont, Greeley and Loveland. “I’m proud of what we’ve done together, and I leave confident that the spirit of liberty in this district will only grow stronger.”

A replacement legislator will be selected by a vacancy committee of Republican elected officials and party volunteers after Armagost departs. He’s the second legislator to resign this month, after Senate Minority Leader Paul Lundeen announced he was also leaving for another job in early June.

Armagost’s replacement committee will be the seventh time a vacancy committee has selected a new legislator this year.

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RTD directors approved an intergovernmental agreement during a special meeting Tuesday afternoon, with several hedging their votes with hesitation about whether the project will make financial sense.

The agreement will create a committee of RTD, Colorado Department of Transportation and Front Range Passenger Rail District officials and task them with developing a plan for a passenger rail line from Denver’s Union Station through Westminster, Broomfield, Louisville, Boulder, Longmont, Loveland and Fort Collins. The rail district is set to meet about the agreement this week.

It would also complete the long-promised, never-realized Northwest Rail approved by voters in 2004 as part of the FasTracks project, according to RTD documents. The project is still a point of contention for Coloradans north of Denver, and those grievances resurfaced Tuesday.

The Northwest Rail has been “an albatross around our neck,” RTD Director Lynn Guissinger said before the vote.

“…This gives us a way to move forward,” she said. “It needs to happen. It gives us the power to go back and really know the numbers.”

Transportation officials say that at current funding levels, RTD’s line between Denver and Boulder County will not be ready until the 2040s — but the Front Range line could be ready as soon as 2029.

Other directors agreed that their future support will hinge on the finances – specifically how much it will cost to use BNSF Railway’s freight line. The new committee will negotiate that number with BNSF.

Director Michael Guzman described his vote as a “tepid yes” while questioning how it would impact RTD’s existing services and how the line would be maintained.

“If we do not have the funding to keep it in a state of good repair and operational, then why are we doing it?” he said.

Potential funding sources for the new line include fees on rental cars and oil and gas production recently approved by the Colorado legislature, which bring in about $72 million a year. RTD has amassed another $190 million for future FasTracks projects, and because the line would connect several cities, it could unlock additional federal transportation funds.

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Then his back seized up. He’d slammed into a wooden beam during a training exercise and fallen about 10 feet, something that didn’t seem a big deal at the time. But a few years later, while working his IT job from his Denver home, the pain sprouted.

At times, it was so bad that he could only work while flat on his back in bed — if he could work at all. Insomnia set in, too.

That’s when a buddy told him about Veteran Benefits Guide. It’s a for-profit company that’s part of a burgeoning — and, critics charge, pseudo-legal — industry that helps veterans file disability claims with the federal Department of Veterans Affairs, often in exchange for thousands of dollars.

Nearly a year after he first reached out to the company, Anderson now owes VBG roughly $2,000, he said, after it filed what he described as a “shotgun” blast of claims to the VA and then stopped returning his phone calls. He’s now sharply critical of the company and the broader industry, adding his voice to a national debate over how to regulate a lucrative service that some veterans groups insist shouldn’t be allowed to exist at all.

That debate unfolded earlier this year in the Colorado legislature, where opposing bills backed by industry groups and their critics in the veteran community both died. A third proposal, which will still allow the companies to operate here but caps the fees they can charge, advanced and passed, with the initially begrudging support of the Veterans of Foreign Wars.

Now its backers are hoping to bring the model to Congress, where a similar debate has taken shape. At the federal level, the companies have proposed a higher ceiling on what they can charge.

“It’s difficult for me to look at this private market and not just see a bunch of vultures that are trying to steal money from, essentially, the government. They’re essentially trying to steal veterans’ benefits from veterans,” Anderson said.

The industry says it fills a critical role for veterans, arguing that while free assistance is available from counties and groups like the VFW, many veterans have too few gratis options. The system is complicated, and for veterans willing to pay, the companies say, they help maximize the monthly checks that veterans can receive for injuries approved by the VA.

“VBG guides veterans through the process of compiling their disability benefits claim,” Patrick Holmes, Veteran Benefits Guide’s director of communications and marketing, wrote in an email. “Our case managers are highly trained and understand what’s required to get an accurate disability rating. We never charge anything up front; clients only pay if they receive a favorable decision.”

Federal law omission allows industry

Anderson’s first check from the VA — which included months of backpay — was for roughly $10,000. His bill from VBG was nearly $3,000, which he refused to pay, he said, because the company didn’t help him prepare for his VA appointments. He also accused the company of charging him for “scraping” his medical record for any ailment that could secure a payment. (Asked about Anderson’s case, Holmes said in an email that the company had a 90% success rate after helping more than 45,000 veterans and that it had received “thousands of five-star reviews.”)

The company eventually agreed to drop $1,000 from his bill, Anderson said.

“If there was a chance I could control where a meteor would land,” Anderson said earlier this month, “I would know exactly where I would put it.”

As Anderson contemplated meteors, the national debate about regulating the benefits companies came to Colorado.

The industry is legal only by federal omission: It’s illegal to charge veterans to file claims for them with the VA, but Congress removed the teeth from that law in 2006, allowing the industry to blossom.

The companies typically charge based on a multiplier of the new benefits a veteran receives. Veterans are given a disability rating by the VA that determines their monthly benefits, and some companies take five times that amount as their fee. Anderson was rated to receive more than $750 a month, for instance, bringing VBG’s initial fee to around $3,000, he said.

Lawmakers in other states — and in Washington, D.C. — have debated proposals backed by the industry, which seek to cap their fees at $12,500 for helping boost veterans’ benefits, and from veterans groups, which want the industry to stop the practice altogether. Some of the companies have faced lawsuits and investigations, and at least three states have passed laws banning or restricting the industry. Louisiana passed a law backed by the companies that institutes a $12,500 cap.

A microcosm of that debate played out in Colorado this year. Lawmakers debated the industry’s preferred bill and a bill to ban the companies outright. Both bills died in committee.

In between them, though, came Senate Bill 282.

The bill, backed by a bipartisan group of lawmakers who are military veterans, still allows the companies to operate. But it caps their fees at 25% of a veteran’s new benefits — or $9,200, whichever is less.

The bill passed the legislature in early May and was signed into law June 3.

“There’s a fight about this nationally, and I’m really proud of (Senate Bill) 282 because we are the first state that has been able to find a middle ground on this issue,” Sen. Matt Ball, a Denver Democrat who sponsored the bill, said at the bill’s signing ceremony.

He sponsored the measure with Republican Sen. Byron Pelton, Democratic Rep. Lisa Feret and Republican Rep. Ryan Armagost.

Goal: to keep industry from being ‘predatory’

In interviews, Ball and Armagost both said SB-282 was an acknowledgement that the industry was needed, even if groups like the VFW — and veterans like Anderson — are sharply critical of it. Every county has a veterans service officer who helps veterans for free, and groups like the VFW also have accredited staff. But industry officials told lawmakers that there were more than 2,400 Colorado veterans for each free service officer.

“There’s a free market. If somebody can run a business successfully that’s actually looking to take care of veterans, veterans should have the opportunity to have those benefits,” said Armagost, of Berthoud. As for the companies, the new law “helps keep them in those guardrails so that in the future or otherwise … it doesn’t turn into something where maybe it is predatory.”

Lawmakers’ acknowledgement of the industry’s importance didn’t stop the companies from opposing the bill during its legislative journey. Industry representatives argued that the fee cap would put them out of business.

But Ball now hopes SB-282 will serve as a model nationally. He’s set to travel to Washington this month to meet with veterans groups opposed to the industry. A bill in the U.S. House — and backed by the benefits companies — has nudged forward. It’s similar to one of the Colorado bills that died last session; it would have allowed companies to charge up to $12,500.

Ball said it wasn’t easy getting the VFW to support legislation that kept the industry in place. Steve Kjonaas, the legislative director for the group’s Colorado chapter, has no love for the companies, which he calls “claims sharks.”

They don’t help veterans get access to benefits any faster, he said. The VA processes claims at the same speed regardless of who files them, and free options don’t cost veterans thousands of dollars in the meantime.

At the same time, industry-backed regulations that allow for higher fees have gained ground elsewhere. The VFW’s preferred option — of reinstituting the penalties that make the practice illegal — has faltered at a federal level. So Kjonaas took Ball’s idea of the SB-282-shaped compromise back to national leaders in D.C.

“We still don’t like it,” he said. “We absolutely do want the penalties back in. … But we realize that’s going to be just about the most impossible thing to activate.”

Kjonaas said the language in SB-282 was being drafted into federal legislation that would hopefully be introduced in the U.S. Senate and serve as a counterweight to the proposal backed by the benefits companies.

For its part, the industry is not thrilled with the compromise that is Colorado law.

Holmes, from Veteran Benefits Guide, said the bill would “make it impossible for honorable companies like VBG to continue serving veterans in Colorado.”

Veterans “are telling you they want access to private companies to assist in their disability claims, and they’re OK paying the fee model that exists,” Mark Christensen, from another firm called Veterans Guardian, told lawmakers said during his committee testimony.

Anderson, the Colorado veteran, disagreed. He said he wanted the industry gone and that he’d had success working with free benefits assistance since his experience with Veteran Benefits Guide. He plans to file an appeal to get additional assistance for breathing troubles that he suspects were caused by exposure to burn pits in the Philippines.

Still, he said, SB-282 was a start.

“I want a full ban,” Anderson said. “But also, if you just make it so difficult for them to really run a business and make a profit off of (veterans), then that’s fine, too.”

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The GoFundMe fundraiser — dubbed “Tell Governor Polis to Clear Colorado’s Rape Kit Backlog!” — raised more than $10,000. Organizer Kelsey Harbert said she is working with different county crime labs to disperse the remaining money to speed up the processing of locally held exams, commonly known as rape kits.

She thanked the donors for helping with “this awful problem that hundreds of survivors and their loved ones are being affected by daily.”

The donation, which won’t clear the backlog by itself, is largely symbolic. The Colorado Bureau of Investigation’s plan, as seen in a report issued in February after the backlog was publicized, involves outsourcing 1,000 kits at an estimated cost of $2,000 per kit. The fundraiser represents community pressure for the agency to act.

As of May 31, the CBI had more than 1,300 kits in the backlog.

“Seeing so many strangers donate and volunteer to help us spread the word reminded me that not everyone places politics over people,” Harbert wrote in an email. “Most people recognize the inhumanity of this crisis and share our sense of urgency to address it — even if the Governor and his administration do not.”

In a statement Friday, the CBI said it “sincerely appreciates the donations towards a goal of reducing the sex assault evidence kit backlog. We recognize how important this is to victims.”

Harbert, who ran the fundraiser with survivor Angelique Perrin, estimates the donation will pay for the CBI to process six exams in-house, or for three to be sent to an outside lab for processing. She said state officials are assigning the money a tracking number to ensure it’s used to process the kits.

She and Perrin plan to continue the fundraiser until the state has cleared its backlog.

Officials with the CBI and the Colorado Department of Public Safety confirmed in January that sexual assault victims were waiting an expected 550-plus days for the state to process their kits. But the public acknowledgement came only after a survivor, Miranda Gordon, testified to having waited more than 400 days for her own kit to be processed. Gordon was not involved in the fundraiser.

Officials said the backlog started to build in 2022, but it exploded when the Missy “Yvonne” Woods tampering scandal was discovered in late 2023, prompting the retesting of old DNA samples.

CBI officials had expected to have the turnaround time for processing kits down to 90 days, the state’s goal, by spring 2027. But on Friday, Deputy Director Lance Allen said the agency was on pace to hit that goal by the end of 2026.

“Thanks to this donation and the $2.5 million dollars requested by Gov. (Jared) Polis and allocated by Colorado lawmakers, the CBI expects to start reducing the backlog next month and cut the turnaround time in half by this time next year,” Allen said in the CBI’s statement.

He was referring to what was left of money that had been earmarked for the processing of sexual assault forensic exams. Lawmakers in the recent session gave the CBI more time to spend that money, through mid-2026.

Department officials plan to outsource 1,000 kits over the next year to speed up processing.

During this year’s session, lawmakers repeatedly criticized the CBI and the department for their handling of the problem. The CBI is part of the department, which falls under Polis’ purview. Legislators also passed several laws, signed by Polis, to add oversight and accountability for the processing of the exams. Harbert regularly testified and advocated for the measures.

One of the new laws, Senate Bill 304, will create a new review board in the Colorado Attorney General’s Office, along with other oversight measures. Polis signed the law in early June, calling the backlog “simply unacceptable.” That law was named after Gordon.

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