Colorado lawmakers have done what they are constitutionally obligated to do: they passed a balanced state budget. Channeling state advertising dollars toward local news outlets was one way. Last month, Maryland became the first state to pass a law requiring state agencies to “direct 50 percent of their advertising budgets to eligible local news outlets and mandate public reporting of their ad spending,” according to the national group Rebuild Local News. “Efforts to weaken the Colorado Open Records Act and give an open meetings law exemption to the state Public Utilities Commission fell short during the 2026 session of the General Assembly,” he wrote. “State lawmakers also restored access to funeral home inspection reports, addressed the opaqueness of municipal courts and reinforced a requirement that all criminal court proceedings be livestreamed.