Essential! Have you heard that word lately?

The governor, in an attempt to keep us safe, closed businesses he considered nonessential. Travel has been limited to what is essential, grocery stores and some medical appointments. The Legislature has been shut down since March 19, about 1½ months, while the governor issued executive order after executive order. And it worked.

Now it’s time for the Legislature to get back to work. We will do that on May 18. But it will be different. Keep in mind, Colorado has a citizen Legislature. That means we answer to you! It is your right to have your voices heard. And it is our responsibility to listen. But when we return we need to take measures to keep all 100 legislators safe. The staff who work so hard drafting bills, cleaning the Capitol, assisting with committees and with legislators need to be safe. And so do you! So how to do all of that is the question. There will be social distancing, masks and gloves but we need more than that.

We need to find a way to support workers so they can return to their jobs. We need to find a way to support day care centers and health care workers, service providers and others who need and want to return to work. And we need to do all of this in a way that keeps us safe and supports your rights to testify for or against proposed legislation.

This means we must limit the bills we run to those that are essential and only those that are essential. We must pass a balanced budget and school finance. Those are essential! And we will certainly have a handful of bills that will support our workers as they return to their jobs. Again, essential. What we can’t do is run bills for political gain. We can’t take advantage of this “business not as usual” to push pet legislation. Or statement legislation. If it’s not essential to getting citizens back to work or to keeping them safe and healthy, we should not be considering it.

With the primary election coming up it’s certainly normal for people to run bills that make for good campaign fodder. Not this year. We must not run legislation while limiting your access to testify. We must not run legislation putting citizens at risk if they do come to testify. We must adopt a get in and get out policy.

I am pulling most of my bills. Are they important? Yes. Are they essential? No. I certainly hope the other 99 legislators do the same. They can wait until the Legislature is back to business as usual. I’m term-limited, I won’t be there. But, I know, someone else will pick up the issues that have been important to me and will get them passed. Now we stick to what is essential.

Lois Landgraf is the state representative for House District 21.

Lois Landgraf