JOAN BARRON

CHEYENNE - There is now yet another reason Wyoming should not emulate Colorado and was smart to ditch term limits for lawmakers.

Colorado still restricts its state senators and state representatives to 8 years each.

What has happened in the neighboring state is that the term limited legislators are resigning before their term expires to give their successors from the same political party a leg up in the next election.

The appointee becomes an incumbent. It is harder for candidates from the opposite party to defeat an incumbent.

In Colorado, like Wyoming, the political parties of the departing incumbent fill the vacant seat rather than voters at a special election.

In Wyoming the county committees of either the Democratic or Republican Party submit the names of three candidates to the county commissioners who make the final selection.

In Colorado, this early resignation strategy resulted in nearly one-third of senators and nearly one in six house members being selected by their political parties, according to a Denver Post analysis..

"Early retirements also mean seats can go for decades without having an open election hardly the type of democracy any of us envision," a Post editorial said.

The newspaper called for changing the state law to require an election to fill legislative vacancies. It blames the large number of appointments on the state' s term limits law.

Early resignations by Wyoming legislators have been rare and usually have been for a legitimate reason.

Last fall Sen. Rae Lynn Job, a Rock Springs Democrat, resigned before her term expired, but after the November general election where voters chose Democratic Rep. Marty Martin to fill her Senate seat.

Job said people had suggested that if she resigned early her successor would have time to build up name recognition for the next election.

But Job waited until after the election so the people could choose who they wanted in her seat

Her reason for resigning early, she said, was because of her guilt over being gone from Rock Springs so much because she was moving to Cheyenne. She said she was not being available to her constituents.

Martin had only a month or so to get a leg up.

The early swearing in, however, helped him a bit in the Democratic caucus, Job said last week.

Martin had a bit of seniority over Sen. Floyd Esquibel, a Cheyenne Democrat, who also moved over from the house. So he was able to pick committee assignments before Esquibel.

Job said she resigned too late to give Martin time for grounding in committee work.

Martin's replacement in the House, Joe Barbuto, a Rock Springs Democrat, was elected in November but was sworn in early to fill the vacancy left by Martin.

Not much of a leg up there, either. He was sworn in in December, only a couple of weeks early.

He received only a tiny leg up.

Although Wyoming's term limits law never went into effect, its threat ruptured the seniority system in the House and churned up the turnover of seats. It also altered the quality of House bills that came to the Senate, Job said.

The House bills dealt more with amending existing law than in proposed major new legislation. This was understandable, Job said, given that so many House members were inexperienced.

The saga of term limits in Colorado fulfills all the prophecies of Wyoming opponents.

In Colorado, term limits did limit the power of the elected representatives as promised. But that restriction has been offset by the power of the permanent state bureaucracy and the growing corps of professional lobbyists.

Wyoming ducked that undesirable fallout.

Contact Joan Barron by e-mail at joan.barron@trib.com or by phone at (307) 632-1244.