2006 Legislation
The following House and Senate bills relating to education have been passed into law
Senate Bill 009—Record of Executive Session, Representative McGihon and Senator Mitchell: requires that discussions occurring in an executive session of a local public body be recorded electronically rather than by taking written minutes. Specifies that no record or electronic recording of a discussion involving a privileged attorney-client communication is required in an executive session that has been properly announced by the local public body. Senate Bill 042—Charter School Funding, Representative King and Senator Windels: clarifies the definitions pertaining to funding institute charter schools. Relocates provisions concerning funding, central administrative overhead costs, and purchase of services that pertain to certain district charter schools. Also clarifies the formula for calculating district at-risk per pupil funding for certain district charter schools.
Senate Bill 042—Charter School Funding, Representative King and Senator Windels: clarifies the definitions pertaining to funding institute charter schools. Relocates provisions concerning funding, central administrative overhead costs, and purchase of services that pertain to certain district charter schools. Also clarifies the formula for calculating district at-risk per pupil funding for certain district charter schools.
Senate Bill 055—Report of Assaults in Schools, Representative Garcia and Senator Jones: cleans up reporting requirements regarding school safety issues on the School Accountability Report (SAR). It adds third degree assault, vehicular assault, and disorderly conduct involving fighting to the statutory reporting requirements. It merges two reporting requirements relating to behavioral incidents. It also creates a felony assault category to the SAR to reflect first and second degree, and vehicular assault. It creates new fights SAR category to reflect third degree assault and disorderly conduct involving fighting.
Senate Bill 073—Compulsory School Attendance, Representative Merrifield and Senator Tapia: raises the maximum age of compulsory school attendance from 16 to 17 years, effective July 1, 2007.
Senate Bill 118—Special Education, Representative Larson and Senator Williams: amends the Exceptional Children’s Educational Act to conform with the federal Individuals with Disabilities Education Improvement Act of 2004.
Senate Bill 119—Increase State’s Moral Obligation Cap, Representative Garcia and Senator Groff: for the purpose of charter schools that have bonds issued by the Colorado Educational and Cultural Facilities Authority on their behalf, increases the aggregate outstanding principal amount of bonds that may be secured by the state’s moral obligation to $400 million.
Senate Bill 127—Fresh Produce in Schools, Representative Madden and Senator Sandoval: creates a program to make free fruits and vegetables available to students in public schools. Requires that Colorado produce be used in the program to the maximum extent practicable. Requires the Department of Education to use a portion of the funds that may be appropriated for school breakfast programs to implement the program once the appropriation for school breakfast reaches $500,000.
Senate Bill 130—Restoration of Funding for BOCES, Representative White and Senator Bacon: restores statutory language directing the General Assembly to make a separate annual appropriation to the State Board of Education to cover the estimated cost of the basic grants to eligible boards of cooperative services.
Senate Bill 176—Requirements for Educators, Representative Massey and Senator Spence: clarified grounds on which the Department of Education may deny, annul, suspend, or revoke an educator’s license. Clarified language relating to an educator terminating his or her employment and authorizing the department to suspend an educator’s license if he or she does not give the required notice prior to terminating his or her employment contract.
Senate Bill 235—Public Employees’ Retirement Plans, Representative Marshall and Senator Sandoval: modifies the Public Employees’ Retirement Association (PERA) plan by providing a supplemental amortization equalization disbursement of 0.5% beginning in January 1, 2008 and increasing 0.5% per year for six years to be funded from money otherwise available for use as salary increases. Requires employees hired on or after January 1, 2007, who have less than 35 years of service at retirement to be eligible for full retirement benefits only if they are at least 55 (rule of 85). The 15-member PERA board will include 3 additional trustees who are not members of PERA and who are appointed by the Governor.
House Bill 1001—School Principals, Representative Merrifield and Senator Evans: requires a person who holds a professional principal license to select professional development activities for renewal of the license that relate to improving the person’s skills as a principal and to complete any professional development activities specifically identified by the person’s employing school district. Requires school districts to provide observations and written evaluation of principals with the same frequency as they are provided to teachers. Clarifies that a principal whose performance is deemed unsatisfactory shall receive a notice of deficiencies and a remediation plan.
House Bill 1004—Educational Materials for Students with Print Disabilities, Representative Green and Senator Windels: creates the educational materials for the blind and dyslexic grant program to provide grants to nonprofit organizations that provide school districts with accessible educational materials for students who, because of a learning disability, visual impairment, or other physical disability, have difficulty reading the printed word. Directs the State Board of Education to promulgate rules to implement the grant program.
House Bill 1008—Supplemental Online Education Courses, Representative Masses and Senator Isgar: allows each eligible school district that enrolls fewer than 3,000 students and each eligible charter school that is not an online program to receive reimbursement for supplemental online education courses purchased for students enrolled in grades 6 through 12.
House Bill 1055—Worker’s Compensation Mental Health Benefits, Representative Coleman and Senator Schaffer: specifies that the limitation on the duration and amount of medical impairment benefits for workers’ compensation claims based on mental impairment does not apply to a victim of an act of violence, rather than a victim of a crime of violence.
House Bill 1098—Professional Development for Public School Educators, Representative Cloer and Senator Keller: allows public school teachers to receive professional development credit by attending in-service programs on juvenile mental health issues, including awareness and prevention of youth suicide.
House Bill 1109—Measuring Public School Effectiveness, Representative King and Senator Grossman: identifies the schools that receive the Governor’s distinguished improvement awards, instructs the technical advisory panel on the measurement of longitudinal academic growth to determine the method by which to identify schools that demonstrate the highest rate of student academic growth in a school year toward state standards for proficiency. Directs the panel to take school size into account in its recommendations.
House Bill 1121—(became law without the governor’s signature)—Recognition of Community Service, Representative Todd and Senator Williams: requires each board of education to consider, and if deemed appropriate, to adopt a policy to encourage students to engage in community service and service-learning. The policy will specify how students will be recognized.
House Bill 1142—Student Election Judges, Representative Cloer and Senator Williams: authorizes a county clerk and recorder or designated election official, at their discretion, to pay student election judges the same compensation received by an election judge, but, in any case, not less than a specified percent of the compensation received by an election judge for services provided.
House Bill 1158—School Safety Inspections, Representative Weissmann and Senator Tupa: continues responsibility of Division of Oil and Public Safety in the Department of Labor and Employment for plan review and inspections of public schools for compliance with building and fire codes. The Division will cause copies of the building plans to be sent to the appropriate fire department for review of fire safety issues. Allows the Division to authorize a local building or fire department to perform the necessary inspections of public school buildings and structures at the request of the board of education.
House Bill 1240—Voluntary School Restructuring, Representative Marshall and Senator Groff: allows a school with an unsatisfactory rating to operate under a School Improvement Plan (SIP) for 2 years. It will not require a school to automatically be converted to a charter school at the end of 2 years if their rating is still unsatisfactory. The State Board of Education will review each case and determine whether a school should continue to operate under an SIP, whether an SIP should be amended, or whether to convert it to a charter school. It allows a district or the State Charter School Institute to voluntarily restructure an unsatisfactory school and apply to the State Board for determination of whether it constitutes a major restructuring.
House Bill 1270—Medicaid Eligibility Sites at Schools, Representative Merrifield and Senator Gordon: establishes a demonstration project to authorize qualified public school personnel to make determinations of eligibility for Medicaid and the Children’s Basic Health Plan. For the 2006-2007 school year, directs the executive director of the Department of Health Care Policy and Financing to select school districts to participate in the demonstration project.
House Bill 1288—Election of School Directors, Representative Todd and Senator Windels: makes technical changes to school election law to conform with timelines in the general election law. Directs the secretary of a school district to call an organizational meeting of the school district Board of Education within 15 days after the school district receives the official abstract of votes.
House Bill 1375—School Finance, Representative Pommer and Senator Windels: increases the statewide base per pupil funding to $4,863.87 which is a 3.1 percent increase for the 2006-2007 fiscal year. Makes adjustments to the distribution of special education funding. Creates the special education high-cost grant fund to cover the cost of providing special education services to students in the preceding budget year. Creates a formula for distribution of the grant funding. For the 2006-2007 budget year allows 2,000 additional slots for students to participate in the Colorado Preschool Program.
House Bill 1396—School Based Health Centers, Representative Kerr and Senator Boyd: creates a grant program in the prevention services division of the Department of Public Health and Environment for the purpose of providing grants to school-based health centers. Authorized the annual transfer of moneys out of the tobacco litigation settlement cash fund to fund the grant program.