Proposed legislation unveiled Thursday that would restrict tax breaks for agricultural land is crafted in a way to keep a powerful potential opponent on the sidelines, The Denver Post reports.

Backers of the bill say they are doing all they can to keep from angering agricultural interests, which killed past reform efforts.

State Rep. Tom Massey, a Republican from Poncha Springs, is sponsoring the legislation.

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A bill that would expand the protections of owners of mobile homes is on its way to Gov. Bill Ritter’s desk, which has Boulder officials and residents who helped draft and promote the legislation cheering, The Boulder Daily Camera reports.

Senate Bill 10-156 gained final approval by the state Legislature earlier this month. The governor is expected to sign the bill into law in early June.

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A bill putting oversight of mortgage brokers in the hands of a board instead of embattled real-estate chief Erin Toll headed Wednesday to the governor, despite earlier objections from the House speaker and Toll’s boss, The Denver Post reports.

House Speaker Terrance Carroll, sponsor of House Bill 1141, had originally and repeatedly vowed to strip off the amendments that would shift power over mortgage brokers.

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Gov. Bill Ritter signed into law Thursday the so-called “broker lien law,” designed to help commercial real estate brokers recover unpaid commissions from clients, The Denver Business Journal reports.

House Bill 1288 allows brokers to place a lien on a property, if the property owner fails to pay commissions a broker has earned.

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A state Senate committee Friday approved a bill calling for the creation of an oversight board to discipline mortgage brokers, removing the power from the director of the state’s Division of Real Estate, The Denver Post reports.

House Bill 1141 passed the Senate Appropriations Committee 6-0. Sen. Ted Harvey, R-Highlands Ranch, abstained from voting under Rule 17 (c), which requires any senator having a personal interest in a pending bill to not vote on it. Harvey is a mortgage broker with American Home Funding.

The bill initially focused on the licensing of mortgage brokers, but an amendment was added to create the board, stripping the director of the Division of Real Estate of the power to investigate and discipline mortgage brokers.

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A bill protecting the deed restrictions the city of Aspen and Pitkin County use to create affordable housing with new development projects has passed the state Legislature and awaits the governor’s signature, but that doesn’t mean a local landowner will drop his cases challenging Aspen’s program, The Aspen Daily News reports.

House Bill 1017, which cleared both the House and Senate earlier this month, specifically states that private developers and local governments can enter into voluntary agreements to provide affordable rental housing.

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Political activist Tim Gill and his husband, Scott Miller, are buying the historic Phipps Mansion from the University of Denver in a deal expected to close by the end of the year, The Denver Post reports.

The house, which the university now rents out for events, will be the couple’s primary residence.

“Tim and I have been looking for a house that was very historic and that has a little bit of land so we can have a proper garden,” said Miller, a wealth adviser at UBS.

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An amendment Thursday to a bill in the Colorado Legislature on voluntary rent-control agreements has led the Denver Metro Chamber of Commerce to drop its opposition to the measure and remove it from a list of six bills that it was asking lawmakers to kill, The Denver Business Journal reports. House Bill 1017, sponsored by Rep. Daniel Kagan, D-Denver, changes a 29-year-old provision in state law to allow private developers to enter voluntarily into rent-control contracts on their properties with counties and cities.

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A bill supporters hope will preserve affordable housing, especially in pricey ski-resort towns, has stoked the ire of developers and landlords, who equate it to New York-style rent control, The Denver Post reports. The legislation, House Bill 1017, sponsored by Rep. Daniel Kagan, D-Cherry Hills Village, has already passed the House and a Senate committee. But its journey to the Senate floor has slowed as supporters seek to ease concerns of opponents.

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Editor’s Note: State Bill premium users may listen to the entire Senate Transportation Committee hearing by pressing on the audio player published here:

By Debi Brazzale, COLORADO NEWS AGENCY
A measure intended to help RTD expand rail service in the Denver area — ensuring that the mass-transit agency can piggyback on the rights-of-way along defunct rail lines — passed muster with a legislative committee Thursday despite a lawmaker’s misgivings.
“If this is a new use, it could be questionable,” said Sen. Scott Renfroe, R-Greeley, a member of the Senate Transportation and Energy Committee, where the measure was heard.
House Bill 1276, said its sponsor, Broomfield Republican Sen. Shawn Mitchell, clarifies that a former rail right-of-way sold for the purpose of public passenger rail service?such as RTD’s — won’t revert to the original land owners instead.
“There’s a glitch?a hang-up?with a federal regulator that may or may not recognize the transfer of ownership from the prior owner to RTD,” said Mitchell.
Millions of dollars have been spent by RTD to acquire almost 70 miles of former railroad rights-of -way in anticipation of installing light-rail service. Tourist rail services are not addressed in the measure.
Some of the rights-of-way are federal land grants dating to when railroads first came into being. Federal law says that if the right-of-way is abandoned, it reverts to the federal government. The Colorado Constitution says that these abandoned rights-of-way are a “public highway,” and RTD use would qualify.
State statute, however, does not make such a provision and technically would allow such rights-of-way to return to the property owner.
Renfroe told the panel that his reservations about the bill stem from a similar circumstance in his district. A defunct rail line once used for hauling sugar beets was being eyed by local governments hoping to convert it into a bike path, but the line goes through farmland, and the affected farmers wanted their land back.
“If we’re taking a rail line that was the property of a citizen at one time that was condemned and then taken from them, and now we’re not using it for that original purpose, shouldn’t we go back to that property owner before we put it to a new use?” asked Renfroe. The bill will now go to the full Senate for consideration as early as Monday.

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