I have a couple of letters I want to share which won’t fit in an open thread. Only this one is from and regarding Colorado. Phil Weiser has been our attorney general for six years – he’s half way through his second term. Colorado is big on term limits, so I assume he is term limited, which is a pity. He has been doing a remarkable job. But our governor is also term limited – and Phil has decided to run for that office. So that’s a good thing. I trust it will be easier to find a different Democrat qualified for AG than for Governor, and Phil will be excellent. I’m glad he is starting to campaign now, since it takes time to build up the enthusiasm he will need, even in a blue state. This letter is not the one I received announcing his campaign, but it provides a much batter summary of his accomplishments than that one did. It’s very personable, and I wanted to share it.
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It started with a pancake breakfast
To:
Joanne and Virgil Dixon
Mon, Feb 3 at 1:30 PM
I have often talked about how my first visit to the San Luis Valley as a candidate for Attorney General transformed my approach to the campaign and serving as AG. It started with a pancake breakfast with Alamosa Sheriff Robert Jackson at the Campus Cafe (the pancakes and cinnamon rolls there are really great).
My daughter Aviva and I at the Campus Cafe admiring the cinnamon roll Sheriff Robert Jackson and I after our visit
At that breakfast, Sheriff Robert Jackson told me a jaw-dropping fact—over 90% of all inmates in the jail in Alamosa County were struggling with opioid use disorder. The fact was so jaw-dropping that no one believed me when I repeated the story—until Colorado Public Radio later reported it. The moral of that story was very compelling—”I can’t help them,” he told me, “but if you are elected as Attorney General, you can do something about this crisis.”
As Attorney General, I have done something—and we have now brought back over $860 million in settlement funds to Colorado. The latest settlement is particularly meaningful, because it results from the first case I brought to hold accountable those who fueled this crisis through their wrongful actions. A few weeks ago, we announced a settlement with the Sackler family and Purdue Pharma that will bring over $70 million to Colorado, as explained in this Denver Post story. The way the Sackler family and Purdue Pharma lied to people, made a lot of money, and harmed people is sickening. This action provides some measure of accountability.
These funds are making a difference. And that difference is evident in communities like the San Luis Valley, where the regional council, led by Commissioner Lori Laske, developed plans for and received funds to open the first drug treatment center in the Valley in generations. (I discussed the significance of this accomplishment to the Alamosa newspaper in this interview.) That means that Sheriff Jackson has an alternative option—to refer inmates to a drug treatment center as an alternative to incarceration or after incarceration. We have also helped fund medication addiction treatment in all Colorado jails, something I recently celebrated in my talk to the Colorado Sheriffs Association. Here’s a picture of Sheriff Jackson and I (along with my friend Erin, who initially introduced us) at the opening of the new drug treatment center, Hope in the Valley:
Sheriff Jackson, Erin, and I
My leadership on the opioid crisis represents how I plan to campaign for Governor and serve as Governor—to show up, to listen hard, and to develop effective solutions. Our approach to using those settlement funds is a national model—and was recognized as much by the Johns Hopkins School of Public Health. And we also did something few states did—we created a dashboard that shows how every settlement dollar was spent. That’s how we build trust in government, through listening, innovative and collaborative problem solving, and transparency.
Thank you for supporting me in this important work.
Phil
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Well, there it is, and I couldn’t be more proud. Not to disparage any other Colorado state elected officials. Our Secretary of State is almost certainly on the Tangerine Turd’s enemies list, for instance. In the close to 50 years I have resided in Colorado, the state has been red, it has been blue, and it has been every shade in between at one time of another. I’m very grateful we are now blue when we most need to be.
(Incidentally, the outfit Phil is wearing in the third picture is known here as a “Colorado business suit.”)
