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UP TO THE MINUTE is a production of Colorado Radio for Justice (CRJ). It's a weekly snapshot of what’s happening, and what’s on the horizon, in the criminal-legal system in Colorado and beyond, hosted by CRJ's team of system-impacted podcast hosts. CRJ's featured guests / contributors on the show are staff from the Colorado Criminal Justice Reform Coalition (CCJRC). www.radioforjustice.org
[00:00:00]
Introduction
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Joybelle Phelan: This is Colorado Radio for Justice, and today we're on Up to the Minute. I'm your host, JoyBelle Phelan. Today, we are joined by Kyle Giddings, who is the deputy director of the Colorado Criminal Justice Reform Coalition, or CCJRC, and we're gonna be talking about some of the biggest criminal justice bills moving through the Capitol this year. As our session comes to a close, lawmakers are grappling with major questions around prison overcrowding, sentencing policy, public safety, and the state's response to the fentanyl crisis. Hi, Kyle. Thanks for joining us.
Kyle Giddings: Hello. It's good to [00:01:00] be here again.
Joyebelle Phelan: Good to have you. So like we said, we are nearing rapidly the end of this year's- Yeah
legislative session, and it feels like criminal justice issues have been sort of front and center this year.
Kyle Giddings: Yeah, uh, to say the least. Uh, you know, I was told by a, uh, lobbyist friend of mine that no matter where they are, if they're with the Republicans or with the Democrats, the first question when the budget comes up or anything else comes up is, uh, " What the heck is going on in DOC?"
Yeah. "And why are we giving them so much money?" You know, the other day, I heard a story about, uh, Senate President Coleman being at a public event and people asking, "Why did we cut this? Why did we cut that?" And he just straight up, "It's because DOC came and took all of our money, and it's bad." And so- Wow
people are, uh, pretty upset to say the least.
Joyebelle Phelan: So my first question was gonna be, what has stood out to you about this year?
Kyle Giddings: It's that every conversation is being driven by, around the budget, around money, like why bills get money and some bills don't get money.
Why are we cutting child's [00:02:00] healthcare and giving DOC more beds when they don't need them, um, because- ... they're just a broken bureaucracy. And every single conversation starts with that. And I even saw a state senator this year yell at the head of the DA's council. Wow. Um, because she's like, "You guys come in and oppose all the bills to help reform the system and fix capacity issues, uh, but then you come in and propose and push for bills that will increase sentences."
Mm. Um, she's like, "You can't have both." Um-
Joyebelle Phelan: There's a disconnect there.
Kyle Giddings: There's a disconnect there, and she just literally sat there and yelled at him.
Joyebelle Phelan: Wow.
Kyle Giddings: Yeah, in committee. It was quite, quite the show. Yeah, I bet. Yeah.
Prison Overcrowding & Budget Pressures
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Joyebelle Phelan: So a lot of these conversations seem to come back to prison overcrowding and state budget pressures, right?
Mm-hmm. So how connected are those two issues now? Where are we at with all that?
Kyle Giddings: Yeah. Oh my gosh.
So A, they, uh, did not buy a new prison, so that's a really big win. That's a huge win, uh, because Prisons owned by the state are incredibly hard to [00:03:00] close, uh, once they get open, 'cause you get the unions in there and, uh, the workers, and then it suddenly becomes this, like, huge economic driver for, uh, the community that it's in.
And so very difficult to close a state-owned prison. So that's a great thing. Second, the JBC left the door open for them to be able to come in and request more bed capacity, um, but did not outright approve it for them. They said, " Hey, you can come ask in fourth quarter, uh, next year in June if", uh, 'cause they got 1,000 beds.
They got 1,000 beds in the end. Mm-hmm. Um, and so they should have plenty of room and capacity to build up to that for at least over the next year. Okay. Um, and so that's where budget-wise where it sits. You know, DOC got almost $90 million more in their budget when every other department had to cut their budget.
Mm-hmm. Every single one. Um, there was no money for any of the good bills and legislation that came through, and so a lot of stuff was amended into oblivion. But, uh, some-- a benefit on the other side is that a [00:04:00] lot of the bad bills that increased penalties and would've cost the state a lot more money in incarceration also got it amended into oblivion.
Mm. And so there's, like, less impact on the criminal justice system because of them. Um, and so that, where does that leave us? Leaves us with a slate, of few good bills that will help manage the population, uh, a working group, and second look.
Joyebelle Phelan: So we're gonna get there, but I wanna start- Yeah
with, um, so
Prison Population Management Bill (PPMM)
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Joyebelle Phelan: we've talked a bunch on this show about the Prison Population Management bill.
Kyle Giddings: Mm-hmm.
Joyebelle Phelan: And so let's, give us an update on where that is right now.
Kyle Giddings: Yeah. So that, uh, has passed the Senate, it has passed the House, it has been, all amendments have been agreed upon between the two bodies, and it's on the governor's desk.
Joyebelle Phelan: So let's talk about what were those amendments.
Kyle Giddings: Yeah. The amendments were, uh, lots of, like, little technical fixes and stuff, and requests from DOC. Uh, there was a few kinda substantive ones that we really would've liked to keep the verbiage on in the bill, but lost. One of them being, uh, the 60 days of earned time for folks, [00:05:00] uh, in low to medium securities, um, just outright to help them get them moving and out.
Mm-hmm. And the governor made it very clear that if that was still in the bill, that they would veto it. Okay. And so we cut that out. But, uh, we were able still to keep, uh, the provision, the last bucket, where if none of these other provisions that we've created now in PPMM work, it is, the, you can give people that are within 90 days of their mandatory release date 90 days of earned time and get them out the door.
Okay. Um, as long as they have an approved parole plan, they still have to go before the parole board and prove that they're, like, a good candidate and they're ready to go back out into community. But that list is built, uh, not by your security level or anything like that. There are crime exclusions, don't get me wrong, but DOC gets to make that list.
Okay. So they can pull the list of everyone that's within 90 days of their MRD- Mm-hmm ... sit down and be like, "Hey, we know this person's a good candidate 'cause we live with them. This person's a good candidate, this," and make their own [00:06:00] list- Right ... instead of us just having to tell them what their list has to be.
So we're really excited about that. Um, there was also a revision to make it to where we were able to, uh, increase the, uh, trigger, so when it is, uh, when the law is triggered- Mm-hmm ... to 4% vacancy, which it, it started at five, DOC didn't want five, uh, but we got it to four. Um, right now it's at three, and 4% gives us a little bit extra runway, and then it also triggers off when they go above, uh, 4%.
And so, but how DOC does things, they don't do a thing like, oh, we're at 4.0001. They go a full percentage point over then. So it's like it triggers when we're at 4% vacancy and doesn't, PPMM won't turn off until really, until their 5% vacancy level is reached.
Joyebelle Phelan: And what's the benefit of that? Like, how, why is that a good thing?
Kyle Giddings: it's a good thing because it, um, A, allows us to have a lot more runway when we start going in, 'cause right now it's at 3%- Okay ... when it's triggered [00:07:00] on. So, and we realized 3% was, like, way too small of a number, and it was, like, very difficult for us to, like, uh, get things going and, and, uh, working with DOC to get, uh, people out.
Uh, oh, another provision that got to stay in the bill is that now jail backlog is included in their vacancy rate calculation. Mm. Okay. Where originally it was not. It was not. And that's how they manipulated it for so long to stop PPMM from being triggered. So we have now jail backlog, 4% gives us a little bit more, um- Wiggle room, kind of.
Mm ... le- wiggle room to kinda get the ball rolling to start getting people in front of the parole board to get them out. Okay. And then 5%, it just gives DOC more breathing room Uh, to be able to trigger it off and figure out how do we move forward still, because 5%'s about ... Each percentage point is about 100 beds.
Okay. So you think 500 beds. 500, 500 beds is a pretty substantial amount of beds. That's a good- Yeah ... in some
Joyebelle Phelan: places, that's a prison. That's
Kyle Giddings: a whole prison in some places. Yeah. Exactly. So that gives them a little bit more breathing room to be able to [00:08:00] adjust, continue to adjust, but not have the law sitting on top of them and the threat of massive increases- The pressure
the pressure. Mm-hmm. So- Okay. That makes sense ... we're pretty excited about that.
Joyebelle Phelan: That does make good sense. ... So opponents who might hear the word population management- Mm-hmm ... and worry that we're negatively impacting public safety- Mm-hmm ... how would you respond to people that might be concerned about that?
Kyle Giddings: Yeah. Everyone, uh, that , qualifies under PPMM are non-VRA crimes, So these are, like, low-level drug offenses. These are people, like, theft, that kinda stuff. It's not the violent crimes. we here at CCJRC have no problem with making sure people who've committed, uh, like, more, what is considered much more serious crimes be included in a lot of things, but unfort- unfortunately, that's just not the political reality we live in.
Okay. Um, and so the PPMM exempts, uh, no one, VRA, uh, crimes, in- which includes, like, sexual assaults and stuff like that.
Joyebelle Phelan: So VRA, victim impact- Victim ... is what that means. Yes. Right?
Kyle Giddings: So, uh- So we're
Joyebelle Phelan: talking low-level crimes- Mm-hmm ... maybe property crimes. [00:09:00] Yeah. And we're also talking about people that, they've served their sentence, they're working on rehabilitation.
Like- Yeah ... we aren't just, like-
Kyle Giddings: No ...
Joyebelle Phelan: like, they're not, they haven't been, for example, they have, they aren't someone that's just gotten there a month ago, and hey, the prison's full. No. No, no, no. It's not that sort of thinking.
Kyle Giddings: Yeah. It is not that kinda thinking. It's people that have done a vast majority, if not all their time in some cases- Mm-hmm
um, at, minus 90 days, um, and have been working to rehabilitate themselves. Like, they still have to go before the parole board and prove that they have, like, done the work to turn their life around- Okay ... and are ready to return to society, so.
Joyebelle Phelan: Okay. Yeah. So hopefully that should help people concerned about public safety.
Reform vs. Expansion: A State in Tension
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Kyle Giddings: So right now we are simultaneously discussing reopening prison space while also advancing release-focused legislation.
Mm-hmm.
Joyebelle Phelan: What does that tension reveal about where we are right now as a
Kyle Giddings: it's interesting 'cause in every single committee hearing where we are discussing these early release mechanisms for, uh, JCAP, uh, for elderly [00:10:00] folk who've served at least 20 years of their sentence, uh, PPMM, any of that stuff, the number one thing I hear over and over again from the DAs, the sh- uh, the chiefs of police, and the, uh, Republicans on committee is this, like, spits in the face of Prop 128.
Mm. Um, they're like, Prop 128 says Colorado's made it really clear they want people serving 85% of their sentence before they qualify, blah, blah, blah, blah. Right. Um, and none of our bills, um, affect anything that's covered by Prop 128. Like none of our bills touch the populations that 128 touches. Okay.
Which, yeah, so that is my first counter to that. Okay. But it has opened up, I think, a big hole and wound inside of the Democratic caucus of like how do we navigate making sure we're like protecting our communities and like forward face, like what shows up on a, an ad versus what we already [00:11:00] know is actually real public safety.
'Cause me and you, and many people that listen to this podcast I'm guessing, can sit down and be like, hey, letting people out of prison who've done their time, who have shown that they've rehabilitated their life, is a public safety mechanism. Keeping them locked up is not safe, and it doesn't make the community any safer.
Mm-hmm. But the Democrats have been a little like, "Uh, that's really hard to navigate in election years." Mm. Um, but with all that said, we've been able to work with, uh, our allies and then a- as well as our bills on top of that, to move some really substantial bills this year. And the Democrats in the end came down to the point as like- We cannot, like, go to the electorate and be like, "We believe in cutting children's healthcare and building more prisons."
Like, they just- Yeah ... they, like, read the tea leaves and they're like, "Okay, we gotta, you know, get back to our roots", you know? For many years, um, it was bipartisan for a long time on these criminal justice reform bills. Mm-hmm. It's less so nowadays. Yeah. Um, but, uh, the [00:12:00] Democrats have really come along to help, uh, move along these bills.
And the help of the pressure from the Joint Budget Committee and, um, leadership as well in both the House and the Senate has been just really great to get, uh, a lot done this year.
Joyebelle Phelan: All right. Well, we'll see what happens in future years.
Kyle Giddings: Yeah.
Fentanyl Legislation & Ballot Initiative
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Joyebelle Phelan: another major issue this session has been the fentanyl legislation.
Kyle Giddings: Mm-hmm.
Joyebelle Phelan: What has, what is CCJRC most concerned about in those debates?
Kyle Giddings: Yeah, so, um, it's the fentanyl ballot initiative. It's actually- Yeah ... not a piece of legislation. It's a, a proposition, uh, a measure. We have, like, a million different words for these things.
Legislation, proposition, measure. Uh, it is a measure that is being put on the ballot by Advance Colorado. Okay. Uh, what it would do, it was m- it would make all possession of fentanyl a felony, even if you unknowingly possess it. Right now, we have a provision in the law saying if you'd unknowingly possess fentanyl, uh, you won't get charged with those higher crimes because there's so much cross-contamination in the drug supply.
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. [00:13:00] Um, and we hear these horror cases of people buying something and it turning out to be laced with fentanyl. Yep. Um, and so, um, it would eliminate that unknowingly clause. It would take all the folks who were convicted of that, and if you're convicted more than once of these possession charges, you then are rolled into the habitual statutes.
Mm-hmm. Um, which is really scary because- Mm-hmm ... the sentences just go up ast- astronomically- Yep ... from there. Um, and then the, like, all that is pretty egregious, but another huge aggre- like, egregious part of it is right now the DF 1, which is the highest level drug felony you can get, has all these cut points that determine, like, okay, who's a stupid kid at a party and who's a member of the cartel and moving a lot of drugs?
Mm-hmm. Gets rid of all of those cut points- Mm-hmm ... and makes any distribution, manufacture, or transfer, AKA sharing of drugs, the DF 1, which is the highest level drug felony, and face a mandatory minimum eight to 32 years. So you can be an 18-year-old at a [00:14:00] party sharing drugs, had no idea it had fentanyl in it, get caught up, and you're facing eight to 32 years in prison, which makes no sense.
Joyebelle Phelan: Didn't we have a measure like this last year?
Kyle Giddings: Uh, no, not last year. Uh, 2022, there was a fentanyl- Okay ... um, bill measure that was done and was whittled down a lot to get across, um, it still increased penalties for a lot of things. Mm-hmm. But it was, it was not nearly... This is war on drugs 1980s like style writing where- Yeah
mandatory minimums, like no three strikes, one strike and you're out- Oh, wow ... um, on this kind of stuff. Eight to 32 years for an 18-year-old is just *bonkers*.
Joyebelle Phelan: That's a life sentence. Or just
Kyle Giddings: people sharing drugs.
Joyebelle Phelan: Right. It's just- Well, so in that, so supporters of these tougher fentanyl penalties will often argue that they're necessary to save lives, protect communities, public safety.
Where does CCJRC... 'Cause I know, like I know you as a human being- Mm-hmm ... public safety is important in your- Yep ... neighborhood. Absolutely. Right? So we're, I don't think we're [00:15:00] arguing about that. No. But if, if someone thinks this measu- measure, uh, will save lives, how would you respond to that?
Kyle Giddings: we're gonna be coming out with this study here in the next few weeks from a local doctor who specializes in addiction medicine, has been really involved in a lot of these, this fentanyl legislation, not only in Colorado, but nationally- Mm-hmm
uh, who's built this database to be able to do a bunch of different inputs related to what changes in the laws have happened, da, da, da, da, da, and how that will affect overdoses. Uh, because in the end, um, we all wanna save people's lives. Like we, like we've reversed four overdoses outside of our building- Mm
just this year and, um, it's scary stuff. And, um, those people need help. But what this doctor has discovered is with taking the data from Prop 18-- uh, Prop 85, putting into his like giant database, is that it showed, caused likely an additional 5,000 overdoses in the first [00:16:00] five years. Wow. Because right now the laws are written in a way that people feel safe calling the police, knowing that they're not gonna get eight to 32 years- Right
'cause they're sharing drugs, and now their friend's overdosing. Mm-hmm. They're, they feel safe to call the police, to call the ambulance, to get someone there and, uh, help protect them. But once they start finding out that the penalties have gone up and they're facing sometimes a, a life sentence, 32 years, if, especially if you're in your 30s- 18
or 40s or 18. Right. Like, they're not gonna call, and that's what- Nope ... we've seen nationwide. Right. Um, and you know, Colorado increased penalties on fentanyl, and our over- overdoses are starting to tick back up. Mm-hmm. And so increasing penalties did not fix anything.
Joyebelle Phelan: So is it possible to hold both of the realities in once, like that fentanyl is devastating our communities- Mm-hmm ... and that punitive responses may not actually solve the crisis? Like- Yeah ... where's the middle road?
Kyle Giddings: Absolutely. No, I think- That's my belief. I hold both. I think fentanyl is absolutely a crisis that is devastating our communities, it's [00:17:00] devastating my brothers and sisters who are outside my building every single day.
Um, and you know, I, I'm 12 years sober from opioids. I'm, I'm grateful that I was never using when fentanyl showed up on the scene, 'cause I'm pretty sure I would be dead. Mm. Uh, but based on the amount I was using. Um, but we, we know what works, and we know it's not incarceration. Like, we've been down this road before.
Yeah. Mass incarceration and the drug wars in the '80s and the '90s, like, did not work. Bill Clinton and Ronald Reagan did not get it right. Um, what we do know work, works is when we actually fund community-based, uh, rehabilitation programs for people to enter. Mm-hmm. Uh, when they're ready to enter too. Like, we can't...
Uh, it's really important that we allow folks to, uh, you know, Property fi- 85 creates a mandatory treatment at the lowest level of possession, which is one gram or less, which is, like, nothing. Mm. But you can only get it once. It does not fund treatment. Mm. And, uh, but it mandates [00:18:00] it. Um, it creates no new revenue stream.
Colorado's currently the 46th in the nation for access to mental health and substance use treatment. Mm. And the state just cut another $108 million from substance use treatment in the state. And so maybe instead of spending $430 million on new prisons in five years, which Property 85 would, we should turn around and invest that money- Mm
into community-based resources for people to have access to. Uh, stable housing, stable food supply, stable treatment- Mm-hmm ... that meets people where they're at. Right. That's what works. That's what we know works. Incarceration does not work.
Joyebelle Phelan: So let's circle over to, there's a few, like you mentioned earlier, there's a few other bills moving, um, this year.
Earned Time, JCAP & Second Look
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Joyebelle Phelan: So we've got, we've, um, earned time-
Kyle Giddings: Mm-hmm ... youthful
Joyebelle Phelan: offenders, or JCAP, as you mentioned earlier. Yep. And the second look re-sentencing. So if we take those as a whole-
Kyle Giddings: do you see Colorado beginning to rethink incarceration more broadly?
I think so. I think the conversation has just really [00:19:00] changed. Um, for so many years we've just given DOC whatever they ask for.
Um, but now we're in this fiscal crisis, and the realities, and all the chickens are coming home to roost. so I think it's been really clear that Colorado's changing a little bit. And now if we're able to defeat this ballot initiative, uh, the fentanyl ballot measure, as well as a handful of other ones that are coming down from Advance Colorado, not necessarily criminal justice related, but like adjacent.
Okay. Um, I think it, it will send a really clear signal that Coloradans don't support mass incarceration. You know, the Prop 128 fight was a really hard fight. Like it's, it very difficult. We didn't have the money and the resources we needed to really counter the messaging that was coming out from Advance Colorado, why we needed Prop 128 and truth in sentencing.
Um, but if we're able to defeat these and defeat them well, I think it will allow the legislature to, um, feel more comfortable in being [00:20:00] able to move forward with a lot more, uh, good legislation like we did this year.
Public Misconceptions About Incarceration
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Joyebelle Phelan: So what do you think that the public, the general public who maybe is not dialed into what's happening- Mm-hmm
um, what do you think the public most misunderstands about criminal justice reform conversations?
Kyle Giddings: I think the number one thing that the general public misunderstands is that there's treatment inside a prison. Mm-hmm. I think that's the number one thing. I think people are like, oh, you know, the word penitentiary comes from the word penance, which comes from the Quakers who opened the first prison on the East Coast.
Mm-hmm. And there was a time in this country where people were able to go to prison and receive rehabilitation. And people who committed some like bad crimes like, uh, felony murder and, um, or manslaughter, like they only went away for 25 years and came back rehabilitated. And those times can come back one day,
It's important that we bust the narrative that people that go into prisons or go into their county jails and [00:21:00] spend a lot of time there are getting treatment. Mm-hmm. 'Cause they're just not. No,we have learned now through this legislative session that DOC is waiting an hour before classes are supposed to begin to cancel them so they're not logged.
And we know they're being canceled 'cause the staff inside of DOC are telling us, "It's being canceled 'cause they're putting me on security shift." Mm-hmm. They don't have access to meaningful treatment inside of the Department of Corrections, and they barely have access to the things that they're required to do, uh, to get out on parole.
You know, I read a story the other day about a fellow who did not start the required class for him to be able to go on parole until eight days after his parole eligibility date. Oh, wow. And it, it's a year-long class, so he was in there for a, that's $68,000- Extra year. Mm-hmm ... from the state budget, and it, he's in there separated from his family for an extra year.
None of that makes sense. So yeah.
Joyebelle Phelan: And that's assuming he gets paroled immediately upon completion of this class.
Kyle Giddings: Ex- exactly. Right? Like it's- So- It doesn't always work like that. No, it does not.
Joyebelle Phelan: So I'm also [00:22:00] curious, um,
Missing Voices in the Legislative Process
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Joyebelle Phelan: what voices do you feel like are still missing from these legislative conversations?
Kyle Giddings: The legislature is not designed to be friendly to the general public to interact with. Right. It's just not. Right. It's very difficult. Now, we, uh, have some wonderful people over at Legislation Inside who are starting to get more im- like, directly, uh, connected and being able to testify on bills.
Uh, David Carrillo did a fantastic job this year on showing up and as a directly impacted person. Uh, like I'm directly impacted, but David is able to speak to things in a much different way 'cause he did so much time. Yeah. And, a- and really counter narratives that are being shared a- as a person who has that personal lived experience.
Mm-hmm. And so we can always use more folks, though. So if people are interested in getting really plugged into the legislative process, they can reach us, out to us at ccjrc.org, or you can email me at kyle@ccjrc.org.
Joyebelle Phelan: So I know you said
Session Wrap-Up & What to Watch
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Joyebelle Phelan: the session is [00:23:00] wrapping up this week.
Kyle Giddings: Yep.
Joyebelle Phelan: Is there anything our listeners, um, should be paying attention to?
Like, what are next steps?
Kyle Giddings: Yeah. I don't think there's anything left to pay attention to that is currently working its way through the system. Okay. Now, it's let's pivot and see what the governor signs. Okay. So far, we've been, everything we've been told is that he will sign all these CJ bills that, criminal justice bills that got onto his desk.
The PPMM will likely be signed. We're within 90% c- convinced it will be signed. Um, the, um, working group as well as the earn time will definitely be signed 'cause that was proposed by DOC. Okay. Um, and the earn time is pretty significant. And like, if people earning 10 days a month will be bumped up to 12, and people making, earning 12 days a month will be bumped up to 14.
Okay. So like in some cases, up to three weeks extra a year. Mm-hmm. And if DOC makes the choice, they can retroactively go back and redo people's earn time and give them a lot of time over the years. That would be great. It would be amazing. [00:24:00] Um, and so there's that. And then the working group and the second look bill, w- it now it's, we're on the, uh, the watching clock.
We have, he has 30 days from the last day of session- Okay ... to sign all the bills, uh, or let them administratively be signed. Um, which means he doesn't do anything, and they just become law.
Joyebelle Phelan: Okay.
Kyle Giddings: Yeah. All right. Which is fine by us. Um- Fine by
Joyebelle Phelan: us. So I would also ask, um,
Hopes, Concerns & Closing
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Joyebelle Phelan: what is giving you some hope right now, and what is still concerning you?
Kyle Giddings: giving me hope is that this legislative session was, like, the biggest session we've had in years, and it was because of everyone that showed up and helped us hold DOC hostage at the Joint Budget Committee- Mm-hmm ... and changed the conversation in the building. Um- 'Cause they were just gonna walk in and get everything they wanted, but then they lost.
And it shifted the whole conversation. The governor's office was convinced CCJRC was running the Democratic caucus for like a minute, and we're like, "No, we only talked to, like, four of them." Um, [00:25:00] and it was ... It changed the whole conversation. And so that gives me hope because I think we can continue to ride that, 'cause our fiscal problems in this state are not going away.
They're just not. So I, that, that's what gives me hope, um, and seeing how powerful the legislation that we got through is gonna be. Like, the second look bill's gonna be really big. Mm-hmm. The earned time, the JCAP eliminates the governor from the process, so all this- He wanted that. He wanted that and he's finally gonna get it.
Um, which allows for all these, uh, folks, I think there's 12 or 13 right now- That are sitting ... just sitting in purgatory. Mm-hmm. Like, within, once it's signed, I think there's, uh, a 90-day safety clause, and then after that, uh, it's only 30 days from there and then they would be presumed to be eligible and out, which would be amazing.
Mm-hmm. So there's just, like, a lot of really impactful bills that are actually gonna get people out, which is just really exciting. Now, what am I still anxious about? Mm-hmm. Uh, I'm anxious about November's election and the- Yeah ... ballot initiative fights.
[00:26:00] because if Prop 85 passes, it will undo 20 years of criminal justice reform. doesn't matter, uh, all these great bills that we got passed if, if we're putting 900 more people in prison a year for addiction instead of, uh, putting them in treatment.
Mm. Or creating mandatory minimums for low-level people sharing drugs at a party.
Joyebelle Phelan: Right.
Kyle Giddings: Yeah.
Joyebelle Phelan: So if our listeners remember one thing from today's conversation, what would you hope it to be?
Kyle Giddings: vote no on the fentanyl ballot measure- Okay ... would be my number one thing.
And go tell your neighbors.
Joyebelle Phelan: Well, there are your marching orders. Kyle, thank you so much for joining us today and helping us to unpack all this. We've been speaking with Kyle Giddings, deputy director of the Colorado Criminal Justice Reform Coalition. I'm your host, JoyBelle Phelan. This has been Up to the Minute on Colorado Radio for Justice.
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