Judy Amabile
Priorities:
- Treatment for serious mental illnesses
- Climate crisis
- Housing availability and affordability
With four years in the House under her belt, Judy Amabile brings experience — and a slate of successful legislation to back it up — to her District 18 Senate run.
“I understand how to get stuff done,” she says. “I come at it being able to be effective on the first day.”
Amabile points to her work on fire insurance protections for homeowners as an example. She says she worked across the aisle with Sen. Bob Rankin (R-D8) as well as with advocates for people who lost their homes to wildfires and insurance industry lobbyists to understand how to get the bill passed and what needed to be in it. She went on to run several other successful insurance-related bills.
“By then I knew what to do and knew who to talk to and knew who was going to be helpful and who was going to just be a pain in the ass,” she says.
In her four years as a representative, 91% of the bills Amabile was a primary sponsor on were sent to or signed by the governor, according to a Boulder Weekly analysis.
As a business owner and mother of three sons, one of whom has serious mental illnesses and has experienced homelessness, her lived experiences shape her legislative priorities.
“We’ve had a very intimate connection with all of these different systems,” she says.
Much of her work centers on mental health and incarceration, including legislation limiting solitary confinement in county jails and creating a jail standards commission. Amabile also sponsored legislation enacting a three-day waiting period for gun purchases and restricting sales to those found guilty of violent misdemeanors.
Amabile says she prioritizes good policy — she’s cast unpopular votes including opposing a bill about predictive scheduling for retail workers she viewed as “draconian” and another relating to what can be entered into evidence in criminal rape cases that she says would have disproportionately impacted people of color and undermined the right to a defense.
“I have a strong stomach for nuance,” she wrote in a BW questionnaire response. “Sometimes things that sound good initially don’t hold up to scrutiny. Other times, an idea that sounds far-fetched deserves a closer look.”
Q&A
Do you support the state’s elimination of local occupancy limits? Yes
Do you support ending the state’s prohibition on local rent control? Yes
Do you support requiring or allowing more density in your jurisdiction as a way to address the affordable housing crisis? Yes
Do you support the Front Range train as the state’s highest priority for passenger rail? Yes
Read Amabile’s full Q&A at bit.ly/JudyAmabileBW
Jovita Schiffer
Priorities:
- Ban on sale, purchase and transfer of assault weapons
- Removing the prohibition on rent control
- Expanding allowed uses for state Medicaid funds to include housing, food and other basic necessities
Though Jovita Schiffer doesn’t have experience in an elected office, she says she’s running to bring more representation to the Senate.
“So much of what happens in government never considers the perspectives of people like me,” she says.
Schiffer is a middle-class, bilingual, Black-Latina single mother who “grew up in poverty, has experienced homelessness, and battles racism and classism in our community every day.” She lost her home to foreclosure in 2012 and paid rent as recently as 2020 before buying a home that she nearly lost in the Marshall Fire.
“I’ve watched so many institutions try to do what’s best for those people living in poverty and not asking those people what they need,” she says.
Despite her lack of government experience, she says her work in human resources, equity and inclusion consulting, and with Boulder Valley School District make her a “different kind of leader.”
Schiffer says she leads with inquiry and doesn’t pretend to have the answers. Instead, she looks to understand the root cause of the problem, what works and what hasn’t.
Though she has certain policy-centric priorities, Schiffer emphasized her approach to governance rather than particular policies.
“I don’t get stuck on any one solution,” she says. “I commit to solving problems.”
Schiffer says she’s not afraid to introduce bills that Gov. Jared Polis would likely veto, naming lifting the state’s prohibition on rent control, one of her top priorities, and making changes to TABOR as examples.
“I don’t give up on things,” she says. “I think we should be willing to put out things that might get vetoed. If we don’t try, we’ll never know. The more you introduce something that people may be resistant to and you’re talking about it, we build a tolerance over time. And you learn: Where is this resistance coming from?”
Q&A
Do you support the state’s elimination of local occupancy limits? Yes
Do you support ending the state’s prohibition on local rent control? Yes
Do you support requiring or allowing more density in your jurisdiction as a way to address the affordable housing crisis? Yes
Do you support the Front Range train as the state’s highest priority for passenger rail? Yes
Read Schiffer’s full Q&A at bit.ly/JovitaSchifferBW