Colorado
In writing the country’s most sweeping AI law, Colorado focused on fairness, preventing bias
This spring Colorado passed the country’s first comprehensive law over how companies and governments use artificial intelligence to make key decisions over people’s lives.
“Whether (people) get insurance, or what the rate for their insurance is, or legal decisions or employment decisions, whether you get fired or hired, could be up to an AI algorithm,” warns Democratic State Rep. Brianna Titone, one of the main Legislative sponsors of the bill.
The law isn’t aimed at deep fakes or fraud, which some states, including Colorado, have addressed in other laws, but applies to how AI is used in evaluating people for things like school applications, hiring, loans, access to health care or insurance.
It takes effect in 2026 and requires companies and some government agencies to inform people when an AI system is used. If someone thinks the technology has treated them unfairly, the law allows them to correct the data it’s using or file a complaint. It sets up a process to investigate bad actors.
“If you were fired by an AI process and you say, ‘Well, this is impossible, there’s no way I should be fired by this,’” Titone said, “you can find a resolution through the attorney general’s office to say, ‘We need someone to intervene and to double check that this process actually didn’t discriminate and have a bias against that person.’”
She said in some cases AI has been found to give people an advantage based on their names or hobbies such as, “if your name is Jared and you played lacrosse.”
Democratic State Rep. Manny Rutinel, another sponsor, said some provisions require companies to identify how algorithms could lead to discrimination and disclose how the data is used to train the systems.
“We still have a lot to do,” Rutinel said. “But I think this is a great first step, a really significant and robust first step to make sure that technology works for everyone, not just a privileged few.”
Colorado’s move is being eyed by other states
The Colorado law originated from a similar proposal introduced in Connecticut earlier this year, which failed to pass there. Other places have instituted narrower policies. New York City requires employers using AI technologies to conduct independent “bias audits” on some software tools and share them publicly.
“So the states are clearly looking at each other to see how they can put their own stamp on the regulation,” said Helena Almeida, the vice president and managing counsel of ADP, which develops AI payroll services for a number of large companies.
“It’s definitely going to have an impact on all employers and deployers of AI systems,” said Almeida of the Colorado law.
Matt Scherer, an attorney at the Center for Democracy and Technology, said companies have been using various automatic systems, not even referred to as AI, to make employment decisions for at least the last eight years.
“We really have so little insight into how companies are using AI to decide who gets jobs, who gets promotions, who gets access to an apartment or a mortgage or a house or healthcare. And that is a situation that just isn’t sustainable because, again, these decisions are making crucial aspects that make major impacts on people’s lives,” he said.
But he’s concerned Colorado’s law doesn’t allow individuals a specific right to sue for AI-related damages.
“There’s definitely a lot of worries among labor unions and civil society organizations that this bill just doesn’t have enough teeth to really force companies to change their practices.”
Plans to change the law are already underway – it’s just a start
When Democratic Gov. Jared Polis signed SB24-205 in May, he told lawmakers he did so with reservations, writing, “I am concerned about the impact this law may have on an industry that is fueling critical technological advancements across our state for consumers and enterprises alike.”
He said it’s best decided by the federal government so there’s a national approach and a level playing field.
However, Polis said he hopes Colorado’s law furthers the discussion of AI, especially nationally, and he asked lawmakers to refine it before it takes effect. A state task force will meet in September to make recommendations in February. Polis has outlined areas of concern and asked them to focus regulations on software developers rather small companies that use AI systems.
Polis said the law could be used to target those using AI even when it’s not intentionally discriminatory.
“I want to be clear in my goal of ensuring Colorado remains home to innovative technologies and our consumers are able to fully access important AI-based products,” he wrote.
Industry is watching this law and others possibly coming
Michael Brent, of the Boston Consulting Group, works with companies as they develop and deploy AI systems to identify and try to mitigate the ways AI could harm communities.
“Companies have a desire to build faster, cheaper, more accurate, more reliable, less environmentally damaging” systems, he said. He said Colorado’s law could encourage transparency for people affected by AI.
“They can get into that space where they’re having that moment of critical reflection, and they can simply say to themselves, ‘You know what? I actually don’t want a machine learning system to be processing my data in this conversation. I would prefer to opt out by closing that window or calling a human being if I can.’”
For all the focus on creating comprehensive regulations Democratic Rep. Titone said Colorado is very much at the beginning of figuring it out with the tech industry.
“We have to be able to communicate and understand what these issues are and how they can be abused and misused.”
Bente Birkeland covers state government for CPR News.
Copyright 2024 CPR News
On the cusp of the United States’ 250th anniversary and Colorado’s 150th, the Centennial State and its Catholic witnesses show modern Catholics a path forward.
Colorado celebrates its own 150th anniversary this year, as the rest of the country marks 250 years since the founding of the United States. The two milestones bear an interesting connection. In the very year of independence, one of the most important explorations of Colorado was undertaken by two Franciscan friars: Francisco Atanasio Domínguez and Silvestre Vélez de Escalante.
Faith Crosses the Rockies
While the importance of the Domínguez-Escalante Expedition should not be overestimated — it didn’t lead to any settlements and mostly focused on Utah — it nonetheless symbolizes the coming of the Christian faith into Colorado. Their expedition traces the path the Church followed into the Rockies, initially coming up from the south, to be met later from the East by miners. Leaving Santa Fe in the very month independence was declared, the two friars and their companions crossed into the modern-day boundaries of Colorado at the beginning of August 1776. They were not the first Spaniards to enter the territory of the Ute and Arapahoe tribes north of Nueva Mexico — Juan de Oñate was in 1598, and they also relied on the previous expeditions of Rivera — but the friars opened up more regular access to it as they laid the foundation for the Santa Fe Trail that would lead from New Mexico to Southern California.
The friars found in Colorado beautiful mountain vistas, remarking that it was cold even in the summer, as well as dangerous canyons and abandoned settlements in the Mesa Verde area. Their journal remarks: “We traveled a league and turned west through very pleasant narrow valleys with woods, very abundant with pastures, with different blooms and flowers.” (The Domínguez-Escalante Journal, translated by Fray Angelico Chavez, University of Utah Press, 15). Focusing on possible mission sites more than a continental passage, they insisted to all their companions that they should not “have any purpose other than the one we had, which was God’s glory and the good of souls” (40). Their desires would take 110 years to come to fruition with the founding of the first Catholic mission to Native Americans in Colorado, St. Ignatius, on the Southern Ute Reservation in Ignacio, Colorado, in 1886.
From Frontier Territory to Catholic Settlement
Catholic life was slow to arrive in Colorado compared to other parts of the nation, especially given the early settlement of New Mexico not far to the south. The Spanish were never able to create permanent settlements in Colorado, with one failed attempt near Pueblo in 1787. This is where 1776 regains its significance, even for the Church’s development in the region. It was only after the United States annexed the Southwest following the Mexican-American War in 1848 that Catholic settlement began. From the south, settlers arrived from Taos to establish San Luis on April 9, 1851. Not long after, in 1858, the Pikes Peak Goldrush brought a flood of miners from the East. From this mix of New Mexican settlers, Native missions and Catholic miners, the Catholic Church of Colorado finally emerged.
In 1860, Father Joseph Projectus Machebeuf arrived from Santa Fe and, in the eight years before he became Denver’s first bishop, the energetic priest established eighteen churches. I first encountered him through Willa Cather’s fictional portrayal of him as the character Vaillant in her novel, Death Comes for the Archbishop (and she relied heavily on Machebeuf’s letters for the book). Though primarily set in New Mexico, Cather brings the history of the Church in the Southwest to life through the vibrant, often tense meetings of Natives, Mexicans, newly arrived Americans and the French clergy seeking to unite them into a cohesive whole. It was Bishop Machebeuf who presided over the Church when Colorado became a state in 1876.
A Little-Known Bishop With An Important Lesson
His successor, Bishop Nicholas Matz, likewise came to Colorado as a missionary from France and experienced firsthand the difficulties miners faced in mountain towns, especially as a pastor in Georgetown. Seth Fabian brings this lesser-known figure to life in his new book, The Pilgrim Bishop: The Spiritual Biography of Nichols C. Matz (TAN Books, 2026).
Even after living in Colorado for nearly twelve years and working for the Archdiocese of Denver for six, I didn’t know much about this misunderstood and even controversial bishop, who often lacked support from his clergy. Even in a newly established state, still riding high from its mining operations, Bishop Matz interpreted the events around him with a lens formed by the violent revolutions of the Old World, fearing and overestimating the “potential reach of radical socialists or anarchists” (11).
Bishop Matz’s difficulty in addressing the social question in his diocese points to an ongoing difficulty for both Colorado and the entire nation in this celebratory year marking their founding. Dr. Fabian raises a fundamental question we must consider: “the question of how individual Catholics live their daily lives in a pluralist society” (386).
We have a strong legacy of Catholic settlement across the continent, of our ancestors seeking to consecrate this land to God. In fact, in just a few weeks, on June 11, the U.S. bishops will do so again when they consecrate the nation to the Sacred Heart of Jesus. Yet we face pressing challenges that call us to wade into difficult social questions, especially those related to technology and artificial intelligence, as Pope Leo XIV is expected to do in his first encyclical, to be released on May 25.
Despite the real challenges, if we advance, as Domínguez and Escalante did, seeking “God’s glory and the good of souls” above all else, we can continue our great Catholic legacy and open a path for future generations to follow.
Rising tomato prices are putting pressure on restaurants across Northern Colorado, forcing some businesses to adapt while trying to keep costs low for customers.
At Cafe Mexicali, which has several locations, founder and co-owner Rick Krammer said recent spikes in tomato prices created major challenges for the restaurant’s bottom line.
“It’s very important to support and have your local economy thrive,” Krammer said.
But that effort became more difficult as tomato prices climbed and supplies tightened. The issue came as the result of multiple factors including a spike in gas prices, weather events in states that grow tomatoes and tariffs on countries them export them to the United States.
“I cannot charge what we need to, to make the margins that you need to make,” Krammer said.
Krammer said Cafe Mexicali, also known as “Cafe Mex” among frequents, prioritizes fresh ingredients even as food costs fluctuate.
“Our number one goal is to serve the best food that you can, the freshest. At least that’s our goal. And, you have to do that in the economics that work that leave you enough to make your investment work for you,” Krammer said.
Tomatoes are a staple ingredient in many Mexican dishes, especially pico de gallo, making the price surge especially difficult for the restaurant.
“Pico, for example, the main ingredient is tomatoes,” Krammer said. “Those prices went from $7 for a 25-pound box up to $78. Well, that’s tenfold. You just don’t recover that.”
Despite the rising costs, Cafe Mex avoided immediately passing those expenses on to customers.
“What we charge guests is the same, but our costs go up, and so we have a challenge of when we raise prices and when we don’t,” Krammer said.
To conserve product and avoid increasing menu prices, the restaurant recently began offering pico de gallo only upon request.
“It’s going up day by day by day,” Krammer said of the tomato market. “That situation lasted for almost four weeks.”
Krammer said the impact of food inflation reaches both businesses and consumers.
“The economics of pricing, it just affects us all, whether you’re making your own food or having someone else make it for you,” Krammer said. “That pinch is hard.”
He added that restaurants often wait until grocery shoppers begin noticing rising prices before making adjustments of their own.
“We usually don’t do anything until it hits the grocery store, and the public is already educated,” Krammer said. “They know, ‘Hey, prices there are crazy.’”
In recent days, Krammer said tomato prices have started to decline, helping the restaurant avoid menu price increases while continuing to use fresh ingredients.
“Our balance is always to offer the quality with the value,” Krammer said. “It’s worth it, because in the end you need the people to get their value.”
Krammer said the company recently returned to offering their full menu without need for requesting things like pico.
-
World9 minutes agoYoung MC Follows Morris Day in Exiting D.C. ‘Freedom 250’ Festival Over Trump Connection, as C+C Music Factory Weighs Options: ‘The Artists Were Never Told About Any Political Involvement’
-
Business27 minutes agoThe Google Insider Trading Case Hits Polymarket
-
Health39 minutes agoHow Author Mary Kay Andrews, 71, Lost 65 Lbs. Microdosing GLP-1 Meds
-
Culture51 minutes agoFinding Wisdom in a Poem by Wendy Cope
-
Lifestyle57 minutes ago‘Look to your elders’: Alfre Woodard shares her secret to Hollywood longevity
-
Technology1 hour agoNintendo’s newest WarioWare is a weirdo smartphone app
-
World1 hour agoPutin lands $16.5B nuclear win on Russia’s doorstep in massive Kazakhstan pact: reports
-
Politics1 hour agoPolice rush to SCOTUS justice’s home amid rising threats against conservatives — but report quickly unravels
