interactive policy guide

SOUTH METRO FIRE RESCUE

an interactive guide to our policy

THE PROBLEM

THE SOLUTION

WAIT, WHAT ABOUT WRITE-INS?

WHAT IS THIS COSTING?

the environment

WHO does this affect?

DEFINITIONS

DEFINITIONS

Special District : political subdivisions of the State of Colorado that are created to fill-in service gaps to Coloradans. These gaps exist because Colorado law limits the types of services that county governments can provide to residents.1 Director Districts : Special districts are broken up further by director-districts. So, one special district (e.g., SMFR) can have multiple director-districts. If you think of SMFR as the pie, the individual slices are the director-districts! Director-District Election : When electors can only vote on and run for a board director seat within their individual district that they live in.At-Large Election: When all electors within a special district vote on every director seat. Cancelling an Election (currently) : An election can be cancelled when it is at-large election, non-partisan and uncontested. If an election is cancelled, no ballots get sent out and the person running for the office is assumed the winner.

1. Special Districts | Division of Local Government. (n.d.). Retrieved from https://dlg.colorado.gov/special-districts

PROBLEM

a bit of background:

01.

• SB21-160 allows special districts to hold at-large or director-district elections.
• Director-district elections are when only the electors within each director district vote on that director's seat.
• For example, if I live in District 2, I can only run for the District 2 board seat, and I can only vote for District 2 board seat. But District 1 and District 2 are both in the same special district.

• C.R.S. §1-5-208 allows for a non-partisan, uncontested election to to be cancelled so long as requirements for write-in candidates, postings, etc. have been met.
• C.R.S. §1-13.5-513(4), does not allow elections to be cancelled in part.
• Question: So, if District 2 is uncontested but District 1 is contested, can we cancel District 2's election? Or is that cancelling an election in part?
• Answer: We Need to Clarify

what's the problem?

02.

SOLUTION

Our policy solution is simple: clarify language within C.R.S. to allow director-district elections to be cancelled when that specific district is uncontested.

CLARIFYING C.R.S.

SMFR

DISTRICT 3 UNCONTESTED

DISTRICT 1 CONTESTED

DISTRICT 2 UNCONTESTED

DISTRICT 4 CONTESTED

DISTRICT 5 UNCONTESTED

this is a hypothetical scenario; not all director districts are voted on in the same year within SMFR

THE ENVIRONMENT

1. Our Green Advantage | Simply Voting. (2023). Retrieved from https://www.simplyvoting.com/our-green-advantage/2. myclimate. (n.d.) Calculate your CO2 emissions now! Retrieved from https://co2.myclimate.org/en/flight_calculators/new/

1

3

2

CO2 emissions (kg)1

• The paper required is equivalent to 120 kg CO2
• Letter mail delivery to voters and back generates 400 kg CO2
• The total emissions per 10,000 vote-by-mail ballots is 520 kg

per 10,000 vote-by-mail ballots:

IN CONTEXT2

• The emissions from a commercial airline, roundtrip flight is 12,000 kg CO2

• Carbon emissions from 4 SMFR districts alone are equivalent to a roundtrip, commercial airline flight to the opposite side of the globe!
• South Metro is 285 square miles

SMFR emissions

• The paper required is equivalent to 2,742 kg CO2
• Letter mail delivery to voters and back generates 9,140 kg CO2
• The total emissions for SMFR was 11,882 kg CO2

SMFR sent out 228,500 vote-by-mail ballots in 2023 for 4 districts

the (about) opposite side of the world from Denver is Mauritius

WAIT, WHAT ABOUT WRITE-INS?

01.

• A write-in candidate is someone whose name does not appear on the ballot but seeks election.

• No - but we aren't changing this!
• The process for write-in candidates is a formal process.

• More information on the process and timeline can be found here!

• Yes!

04.

02.

03.

Can I still become a write-in candidate with this policy?

What's the write-in process?

Can I write-in someone the day of?

What's a write-in?

what is this costing?

the bottom dollar

Title here

$488,016.22

hover over the graph to see amounts spent per category

who does this affect?

• In 2023, South Metro sent 228,500 ballots to electors. Three out of the four districts were uncontested.

• South Metro is one of the only special districts that utilized director-district elections since the passage of SB 21-160.

• With the proposed bill language, special districts may decide to cancel uncontested director-district elections for cost-saving and environmental purposes, but they will not be required to.