Legislative staff identify drafting flaws and constitutional conflicts in review of four limited-gaming initiatives

Legislative Council staff and the Office of Legislative Legal Services on April 3 questioned multiple drafting and constitutional issues in four proposed Colorado constitutional initiatives (4-15, 4-16, 4-17 and 4-18) that would authorize limited gaming in towns, cities and counties.

In a review-and-comment hearing, Greg Sobetsky of Legislative Council Staff and Richard Sweetman of legislative legal staff read the stated purposes of each measure and asked the proponents to clarify numerous points of potential ambiguity. The initiatives would, in broad terms, allow local jurisdictions to authorize limited gaming by voter approval, permit local limits on games and bet sizes, and require certain payments of adjusted gross proceeds and tax revenues to state-created funds.

Staff pressed the drafters on constitutional compliance and internal consistency, citing the Colorado Constitution’s single-subject requirement and potential conflicts with existing Article 18, Section 9. "The proposed initiatives do not address the existing language of Article 18, Section 9," Sobetsky said, and staff warned that relying solely on a 'notwithstanding' clause could leave conflicting and obsolete language in place.

Staff also identified multiple technical drafting problems: inconsistent references to jurisdictions (for example, alternating between "town, city, county, or city and county" and other permutations), duplicate subsection numbering, erroneous internal cross-references, improper use of colons and Roman numerals where the constitution expects lettered sub-subparagraphs, and several incorrect citations. Richard Sweetman flagged that some provisions appear to duplicate or conflict with existing distribution rules under current limited-gaming law and section 9.5.

On finance and revenue, staff asked whether proponents intended communities that adopt limited gaming to transfer all local gaming tax revenues to a state-created "local limited gaming fund," or whether communities would retain some revenues. "There is currently no local limited gaming fund in the state treasury," Sweetman said, and staff asked proponents to explicitly state whether the initiative would create such a fund and whether its distributions would support state programs, local programs, or both.

Staff also reminded proponents about effective-date drafting. Under Article V, Sobetsky noted, absent a specified effective date an initiative would take effect on the date of the official vote certification and gubernatorial proclamation; staff suggested that proponents include an intended effective date (they proposed an example of 01/01/2027 for clearer implementation timing).

The proponents acknowledged the questions but offered no substantive clarifications on the record during the hearing. Staff concluded with an offer to walk through technical comments; the proponents had nothing further to add. The review-and-comment hearing ended at 10:27 a.m.

The staff’s questions and requested redrafts focus on legal clarity, consistent numbering and cross-references, explicit treatment of how proposed language interacts with existing Article 18 provisions, and precise instructions about revenue handling and any new state fund. Proponents are expected to resubmit corrected language addressing the enumerated drafting and citation issues before further consideration.