03/28/2025
Colorado Senate OK's CPW appointments, including the one that didn't get a favorable committee recommendation.
The Colorado Senate approved four of Polis' appointments to the CPW Commission: Commission Chair Dallas May (2nd term), Tai Jacober, Murphy Robinson, and Jay Tutchton (2nd Term).
I'll leave it to you to read up on the details of all four appointments in the Colorado Politics linked below, and instead focus in on the one commissioner who did not receive a favorable committee recommendation, Jay Tutchton.
Readers may recognize that name because he's been a frequent subject of this newsletter. For example, in the second link below, I cover the rather swampy connections between Mr. Tutchton, the Polis administration, and the Southern Plains Land Trust.
This was also mentioned in the Colorado Politics article. Quoting:
"Senators last week [at the Senate Ag Committee hearing] and on Tuesday [in the full senate hearing] questioned Tutchton's ties to the governor's office and a perceived lack of independence, as well as his disdain for agriculture and hunting. Sen. Rod Pelton, R-Cheyenne Wells, also raised a conflict of interest issue on Tuesday, noting that CPW is a financial sponsor of the Southern Plains Land Trust."
This latter, that CPW is a sponsor of the Southern Plains Land Trust being bolstered in the article by a graphic which I will leave to you to find.
Tutchton got approval in the full senate despite his unfavorable recommendation from the committee, on a 21-13 vote where two Democrats (Roberts and Mullica) joined the Republicans in a no vote. This echoes Tutchton's earlier Senate approval which was on strict party lines.
Clearly enough Democrats were not put off by Tutchton's previous comments and his connections to be bold enough to embarrass Governor Polis, telling him to try again.
While I appreciate Roberts and Mullica's votes here, while I appreciate that Roberts will, when it suits him, gnaw on one or another CPW commissioner, I have seen enough of his votes (along with those of Mullica), and enough of his equivocating (again, along with Mullica's), to sense that some of this is performative.
In other words, I wonder how those two would vote and act if they knew that the vote count for Tutchton were tighter. An academic question at this point I suppose since I don't think a Democrat-controlled Colorado will ever come get to a vote this close on a Democrat nominee.
https://www.coloradopolitics.com/news/colorado-senate-oks-appointments-to-parks-and-wildlife-commission/article_ed92f71c-0416-11f0-8f09-1b81d02d78d6.html
https://coloradoaccountabilityproject.substack.com/p/swampiness-in-wildlife-policy-and?utm_source=publication-search
