A Constitutional Right For The Fossil Fuel Industry? Defeat Colorado's Amendment 82!

This November, the Colorado voters will decide on a ballot initiative called Amendment 82. Despite its anodyne name, this initiative would radically change state policy for the worse. Amendment 82 would enshrine into the state Constitution the enforceable and perpetual right to buy and sell natural gas in Colorado, representing the wholesale capture of a state constitution by one industry.

The initiative is backed by Advance Colorado, a dark money group, backed by anonymous donors, that seeks to manipulate Colorado’s ballot initiatives to advance corporate and billionaire interests.

Amendment 82 is one such effort, and it’s breathtaking in its audacity. No other state carves out such special treatment for a single industry in its constitution. No other state constitution intervenes so forcefully to grant an industry the perpetual right to sell its products in order to make a profit. It would be the first time that US voters in any state enshrined such a blatant giveaway to an industry into its constitution.

If the industry succeeds with their effort in Colorado, they will not stop there—other states will clearly become targets for the next constitutional giveaway to the industry.

Amendment 82 invents a solution to a problem that simply does not exist. Buying and selling natural gas remains legal in Colorado—and is something that a majority of Coloradans do every day. Nothing on the horizon seeks to change that.

What Amendment 82 will do, however, is make sensible, reasonable, and necessary regulation protecting our air, water, and environment from the impacts of this industry nearly impossible.

Efforts to stop gas companies from fracking near homes and schools are at risk of being rolled back, because the industry will argue these rules infringe on their right to sell natural gas.

Regulations to limit the amount of toxins that the oil and gas industry can dump into a community’s air and water become impotent for fear that enforcement will infringe on the right to sell natural gas.

A town’s ordinance that regulates the use of methane camp stoves in times of high fire risk could now be overturned because it arguably infringes on the right to buy natural gas.

Amendment 82 will lock into Colorado’s constitution the ability of oil and gas industries to increase their profits at the expense of the health and safety of Colorado’s people. It gives the industry the right—affirmative and enforceable—to force communities to accept the dangers, risks, and pollution that come with oil and gas infrastructure.

Moreover, the deceptively simple language of Amendment 82 gives these special interests a powerful new tool to block common-sense environmental regulations—far beyond the scope of the oil and gas industry.

If passed, Amendment 82 will lock in fossil fuel extraction as official state policy, and quickly overwhelm pro-environment laws, regulations, policies, programs, innovation, and decision-making in Colorado. It will pose a credible—and likely successful—challenge to any government action that seeks to regulate or limit natural gas extraction, transportation, or pollution outputs, and to any government efforts that seek to reduce the state’s dependence on fossil fuels by advancing clean energy policies and projects.

Amendment 82 is a crisis moment for Colorado’s communities, environment, and the future generations who will be burdened by its impact. But it should also be a wake-up call for the rest of us. If the industry succeeds with their effort in Colorado, they will not stop there—other states will clearly become targets for the next constitutional giveaway to the industry.

Constitutions in the US belong to We the People, not corporations. We give these constitutions—both state and federal—power because they are the means by which we protect ourselves and our inalienable rights from powerful special interests that seek to infringe upon them.

Efforts like Amendment 82 seek to misappropriate that power and give industry titans new ways to infringe on the basic and essential rights of everyday people in the name of profit and exploitation. It cannot be allowed to succeed.