Build Before You Need It

Colorado Protected its voters in 2018 by building the architecture before the federal guardrail was removed. The CARE Act asks Colorado to make the same choice for caregiving workers - now, in the same window.

Colorado's redistricting maps held this week because Colorado voters built independent redistricting commissions in 2018 - before the federal Voting Rights Act guardrail was removed. Tennessee's maps are being redrawn. Louisiana suspended its primary. Virginia's referendum was struck down. Colorado's architecture held.

By Mark Fukae - Director of Advocacy - Professionals Who Care

This week, the redistricting war arrived.

Tennessee signed a new congressional map eliminating its only Democrat-held district. Alabama called a special legislative session. Louisiana suspended its May 16 primary. Virginia's redistricting referendum was struck down yesterday by the state Supreme Court - handing Republicans as many as 12 additional House seats without a single vote cast.

The trigger: the Supreme Court's decision in Louisiana v. Callais, which substantially weakened Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act - the provision that had for five decades prohibited maps designed to dilute minority voting power.

Colorado's maps are protected. Colorado Newsline confirmed this week that Colorado's independent redistricting commissions - created by Amendments Y and Z in 2018 - likely shield the state from major consequences of the Supreme Court ruling. The state constitution requires maps to protect minority voting power, mirrors the language of the weakened federal provision, and can only be changed by a 55% supermajority of Colorado voters.

The voters who passed those amendments in 2018 didn't know the federal guardrail would be weakened six years later. They built the state-level architecture anyway. Build before you need it.

The same principle applies to employed caregivers.

Federal caregiver workplace protections are narrow, indirect, and dependent on an EEOC operating at nearly half its 1980 staffing levels - with a proposed further cut of $19.6 million for FY2026, and an announced policy of no longer processing disparate impact complaints.

Colorado already named caregiver status as a protected class in the 2021 POWR Act. The class exists in Colorado statute.

What doesn't exist yet is the accommodation architecture: the interactive process requirement before flexible work is denied, the Employment Detachment Event definition that codifies creative dismissal, the anti-retaliation enforcement framework that makes protection real rather than decorative.

The Colorado CARE Act builds that architecture. Zero general fund. $23–38M in projected net annual savings. TABOR-compliant. Built on the POWR Act foundation. The legislature adjourns May 13. The summer interim is the window.

This is Colorado's redistricting moment for caregiving workers. Build before you need it.

Read and Listen to the full piece: therevenueneutralcaregiver.substack.com

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