Last week, we launched our Fight for Colorado tour, and released The Colorado Blueprint, our plan for our future. It was developed by listening to ideas from hundreds of Coloradans—and reflects not only my vision for what I will do as your governor, but how I will do it—by listening, collaborating, and taking action.
The tour lifted up our policy plans and our vision at numerous stops. One powerful moment was an historic fireside chat I had with former Governor Roy Romer and former Denver Mayor Federico Pena.
Remarkably, this was the first time Roy and Federico had come together to talk about their leadership and, more specifically, it was the first time they discussed their work leading at a time when Colorado and Denver were at a pivotal point similar to today. They were instrumental in turning our home into the great state and city we live in today. Our talk was intended to inspire our campaign and us all. And inspire it did.
Both Roy and Federico talked about their personal stories of resilience—from Holly, Colorado during the Great Depression (for Roy) and South Texas in a rural community (for Federico) to top leadership positions in Colorado and nationally. I identified with their personal and professional journeys given my family’s story of resilience, surviving the Holocaust and being welcomed in America as refugees, which drives my commitment to serve others.
At the fireside chat (which you can watch here), we talked about the challenges of this moment and what we can learn from the challenging times that Roy and Federico faced. As we discuss in The Colorado Blueprint, Colorado is at a pivotal moment. From 2013-2020 Colorado was growing by ~42,000 people per year; from 2020-2023 we grew by only around 6,000.
As was the case at their time, Colorado is now at risk of being a state where young people may look elsewhere to build their futures. To meet this moment, both Roy and Federico called for us to confront our future with a spirit of can-do problem solving, a commitment to dynamism and growth, and faith that, together, we will build a great Colorado.
We acknowledged the challenging times we live in today, with a dysfunctional government in Washington, incivility in our politics, and technological changes that present both great opportunities and real challenges. As both Roy and Federico commented, we are operating with 20th century institutions and policies. We need to better align them with realities of the 21st century.
We discussed how to set our education system up for success and how to meet the opportunities and challenges of artificial intelligence. In particular, we talked about a workforce development system that is broken, an education system that is underfunded, and the need to ensure every student is positioned for success.
We also discussed how we make progress to meet what we need from our government. As both Roy and Federico emphasized, governmental leaders must be trusted collaborators—and the way to build trust and enable collaboration is by showing up, listening, and then taking action.
We all agreed that we must bring together leaders from a range of sectors—business, labor, local governments, education, non-profits, and more—and create space for more listening, more problem solving, and less name-calling. In short, Colorado can and must function in the opposite way of what we are seeing in Washington, DC (as I discussed in this prior blog post).
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The conversation we had with Roy and Federico was consistent with powerful interactions we had last week all across Colorado—ones that bolstered my belief that Colorado will continue to be a shining light for how a government “of the people, by the people, and for the people” can and should work.
I know that we are facing formidable challenges—climate change, threats to our democracy, and the need to build an inclusive economy—and I know that bold, innovative, and collaborative leadership will help us meet this moment.
I am honored and inspired to have Roy Romer and Federico Peña endorsing our campaign and will continue to be guided by their leadership and examples to meet this moment.