During a press event at the state capitol Thursday, Governor Jared Polis literally took a power saw to 208 old executive orders, filling the air of his office with a cloud of shredded paperwork.
But the tool that actually took them off the books was his pen, as he signed a new executive order to repeal "irrelevant" orders from past administrations.
“They're redundant, unneeded paperwork, outdated for many different reasons,” Polis said. “Some of them are in law, so they don't need to be executive orders. Some of them put extra work on agencies.”
The governor listed a few outdated orders as examples of those on the chopping block, orders like the one from 1978 stating all contracts must be signed by then-Gov. Dick Lamm, or the Governor’s Committee to Improve Television Reception from 1957.
If an executive order does not have an expiration date, it stays enacted until it is repealed.
Colorado’s Senate Republicans responded to Polis’s action by saying they welcomed any cutting of red tape, but also called it a “very small step in the right direction”
“It falls a country mile from the comprehensive reform Colorado needs to relieve businesses and families from the crushing weight of overregulation.”
They wrote in a statement before listing a number of laws Polis himself has signed — many relating to environmental, labor and tenant protections — that they would also like to see go under the saw.
Editor's notes: An earlier version of this story incorrectly stated the type of power tool Polis used.
