Hey all. Never posted on SS before, but I lurk the forums occasionally, know many military vehicle owners, and have been following this issue as it is nearly a "takings" issue in my opinion that amounts to the loss of use of tens of thousands of dollars worth of vehicles.
CO-HB1170 sponsored by Steve Humphrey, Vicki Marble, and others is coming up tomorrow March 4th for a House Transportation & Local Government Hearing in Room LSB-A at 1330. The bill is pretty simple and seems to fix the situation.
SECTION 2. In Colorado Revised Statutes, add 42-4-109.7 as follows: 42-4-109.7. Military vehicles A SURPLUS MILITARY VEHICLE OR MILITARY VEHICLE MAY BE DRIVEN ON A ROADWAY.
https://www.billtrack50.com/BillDetail/1187054
https://leg.colorado.gov/sites/default/files/documents/2020A/bills/2020a_1170_01.pdf
I'm out of town for work and can't be present. I know it's
extremely last minute, but I'm hoping at least one person here can. Hopefully we can show some support in person for the committee meetings (are they open meetings?), and keep up with the bills progress to prevent any malicious strikes and/or replacements of wording as with happened with the last bill. I am wondering if it needs an addition to remove SURPLUS MILITARY VEHICLES from the definition (11.5) (b) Off highway vehicle.
For research purposes, you can view the changes to the previous bill SB19-054 below. It's interesting to see how the original bill, which was extremely friendly to FMV owners, was changed in April. Digging through the various changes under the Associated Documents tab, both Crowder and Valdez wrote the original, friendly version, and it was completely and suspiciously changed by April. The original version included what looked like some emissions exemptions, which is what may have caused some head turning.
https://www.billtrack50.com/BillDetail/1005117
EDIT. I've found a rough summary of events for the progress of SB19-054 last year. The link below lists each session of each committee in the House and Senate by date and by cross-referencing the steps in the bill tracker above you can access each meeting's documents.
https://leg.colorado.gov/content/committees?field_session_target_id=30
I've reviewed the changes last year. The body of SB19-054 from the Senate Appropriations Committee meeting on
March 13th did not get struck and replaced to include SURPLUS MILITARY VEHICLES under the definition of Off highway vehicle until the Senate Appropriations Committee meeting on
April 9th. The related amendments on that date, J.002 and L.010 are unavailable on the Committees page
here. The only information available is that the motion to adopt the amendments was moved by Moreno.