Latest News

• 03/06/15: Polis Reintroduces Legislation to Protect Grand County Land

• 03/05/15: Polis, Buck Lead Efforts to Protect Disaster Victims from Aggressive FEMA Penalties

• 02/27/15: Polis Joins Ted Cruz in Calling on Republicans to Stay Out of Local Decisions on Marijuana

• 02/26/15: Polis Hosts Telephone Town Hall on Middle-Class Economics

• 02/25/15: Colorado House Democrats Call for Immediate, Clean Funding of DHS

• Costly dog-eared and out of date textbooks cost schools and families too much money. To address this, the open source community is working to make available updated and high-quality digital content and textbooks for free or significantly lower prices. Tonight, I am excited to announce that my amendment to make federal money available to develop open source text books and educational content was accepted as an amendment to the Elementary and Secondary Education Act reauthorization in the House!
  
  
  
• In Colorado, we are blessed with so many breathtaking and one-of-a-kind natural attractions and scenery. This week, the President recognized the extraordinary beauty and unique nature of one of those sites: Browns Canyon. I have been proud to work alongside the champion of this cause, Mark Udall, for many years, and am excited that this designation has finally been achieved.
  
  Some more good news in the President’s announcement if your kids are in 4th grade: as a part of his “Every Kid in a Park” initiative, the President is providing all fourth grade students and their families with free admission to National Parks and other federal lands and waters for a full year! Get out there and visit our new National Park, or one of the many others across Colorado and the nation!
  
  
  
• This week I was recommended to be the newest member of the House Committee on Natural Resources: Democrats. This role will allow me to ensure our local natural resources issues in Colorado receive the attention in Congress that they deserve.
  
  For instance, last night the Bureau of Land Management in Colorado announced that they had sold 15,494 acres of our federal lands for oil and gas development for only $319,113. This works out to about $20.60 per acre, which to me, seem absurdly low for land in our beautiful state, particularly when this cheap price is for oil and gas companies who spend millions lobbying for more and more subsidies. I decided to take a look at what other things cost more than an acre of land in Colorado:
  
  A KFC 12 piece meal – $23.99
  A Liz Claiborne Elbow-Sleeve Button-Front Soft Shirt, on sale at JC Penney – $27.99
  An Oster Osterizer 14-Speed Blender at WalMart – $21.84
  An 8 Cartridge pack of Schick Hydro 5 razors at Target - $21.99
  Kids Pink Asics GT-1000 shoes at Boulder Running Company – $29.97
  Three bags of Crème de Menthe Stuffin’ Mallows – $23.97
  OR One Acre of land for Oil and Gas drilling – $20.60
  
  
  
• What do I have in common with Taylor Swift and JAY Z? Not a whole lot, but I’m humbled to share the honor with them – and others like Mark Zuckerberg and Elon Musk -- of being named to Upstart Business Journal’s Top 100 list of intriguing people driving the economy. Here’s to rebels, dreamers, contrarians, and others who consistently dare to disturb the universe. http://upstart.bizjournals.com/upstart100/index.html
  
  
  
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  E-mail privacy must be priority
  www.denverpost.com
  Two years ago, the American Civil Liberties Union acquired documents in which the Internal Revenue Service contended its agents didn't always need warrants to read private e-mails — and especially not if they were more than 180 days old.