Wes McKinley

By CHARLES ASHBY
CHIEFTAIN DENVER BUREAU
DENVER - Rep. Wes McKinley was more than a little peeved on Friday when he tried to get one of his bills passed.

The Walsh Democrat has been working for months trying to get support for his measure that would remove the state's blanket permission to the federal government to acquire land in Colorado.

He even narrowed his HB1182 to apply only to eminent domain, requiring the government to seek Legislative approval first before trying to condemn land for such things as post offices, arsenals, courthouses or military bases.

But when he finally got it to the House floor, and lawmakers began to debate it, he saw a fellow Democrat, Rep. Terrance Carroll of Denver, ask that it be re-referred to a committee, the House Judiciary Committee that he chairs.

And even though McKinley asked for permission to debate that motion, Rep. Dorothy Butcher, D-Pueblo, who was chairing the House at the time, declined to let him do so, instead calling for a vote without discussion.

"I'm hard to see, I guess," McKinley said. "(Carroll) doesn't like the bill. . . . But he told me he wasn't going to oppose it."

So even though the measure passed the House State, Veterans and Military Affairs Committee on a unanimous 11-0 vote a month ago, McKinley has to wait again for Carroll's panel to review it.

Carroll said he asked to refer the measure back to committee because there are constitutional questions surrounding it.

"There are multiple amendments with multiple constitutional questions, and the committee most appropriate for addressing them is the judiciary committee," he said. "I don't like the bill, but as I told Representative McKinley, the bill's not going to the committee to necessarily die. We're just going to address these constitutional issues. There are significant constitutional issues regarding the supremacy clause and the use of federal eminent domain."

McKinley introduced the bill, in part, because of the U.S. Army's proposal to expand the Pinon Canyon Maneuver Site. Last year, he got a bill through the Legislature and signed by Gov. Bill Ritter that already removed that blanket permission to condemn land, but it applies only to the Pinon expansion.

Under this year's bill, McKinley is trying to take the matter one step further by removing that authority statewide.