Her Capitol office was a work in progress the Monday before Christmas. A maze of boxes, pictures and stacked papers suggested disarray, but incoming state House Speaker Dickey Lee Hullinghorst is getting her house in order in more ways than one.
She holds the gavel over a party that lost three seats in the last election, keeping a narrow 34-31 majority. And with that margin, it’s critical that Hullinghorst, the first Democratic woman to serve as speaker, has to pull together a party fractured over such issues as fracking and local regulations, business development tax breaks and committee leadership.
“I think I’m a pretty nice person to work with, but I can also be pretty tough,” said Hullinghorst, who has been working in Colorado government and politics since 1975.
The 5-foot-2-inch, 71-year-old Hullinghorst has a constant smile and a chipper tone of voice suited for anybody’s favorite aunt. But the Boulder Democrat’s nature also helps lower people’s guard and brings them to the negotiating table, friends and peers agreed.
And that might prove to be her greatest political asset in a General Assembly so narrowly divided.
Hullinghorst said if it comes down to an impasse, Democrats will flex the muscles that come with holding the majority.
“There will be some issues where we will differ, and if we in the majority believe we are representing the best interest of the people of Colorado, we will be glad to differ and pass those things,” she said.
Yet Hullinghorst, with her résumé deep in party politics and liberal causes, is the kind of party figurehead — like House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi — who fires up the base.
“Dickey Lee Hullinghorst is obviously a talented leader, but she strongly represents that liberal wing,” said Denver pollster Floyd Ciruli.
Position of power
House speaker is one of the three most powerful positions in state government, along with the Senate president and the governor. The speaker has a hand on the throttle and brake to determine which bills survive.
Chosen by the majority party after the election, the speaker appoints the committee chairs and committee members and determines how many Democrats or Republicans serve on any given committee.
Hullinghorst can send bills to committees that have the best chance of nurturing or killing legislation. The speaker and the House majority leader control which bills make it to the House floor for a vote.
Outgoing House Speaker Frank McNulty, a Republican from Highlands Ranch, knows first-hand what Hullinghorst is facing.
McNulty inherited an almost identical situation in the 2011 session. Republicans had a one-seat majority in the House, and Democrats controlled the Senate during his two years.
He recalled the ongoing challenges of politics and process, plus running a large staff and getting too much credit and too much blame for everything that happens in the statehouse.
McNulty said Hullinghorst will be the final referee on every squabble or battle in her chamber for the next two years.
“I feel a huge amount of sympathy for her,” the former legislator said and chuckled. “But she’s up for the challenge.”
Historic rise
Hullinghorst becomes the first House speaker from Boulder County since Rienzi Streeter of Longmont in the 1880s, back when the Utes still controlled most of Colorado west of the Continental Divide.
Republican Lola Spradley of Beulah was, in 2003, the first woman chosen as speaker.
For 23 years, Hullinghorst was the intergovernmental relations director for Boulder County. She developed public policy, organized partnerships and lobbied the legislature and other counties.
C.L. Harmer was a lobbyist for the Governor’s Office of Energy Conservation in the 1970s, when Hullinghorst lobbied for the Colorado Open Space Council, which is now the Colorado Environmental Coalition.
Harmer was in attendance to watch the Democratic caucus elect Hullinghorst in November. They shared an emotional moment afterward in honor of how far they’d come.
“We were just kids,” Harmer said. “We were very early in our careers. The last thing we could have imagined then was that Dickey Lee would be the first Democratic woman to serve as speaker.”
Cool joins fiery
House Democrats in November also chose Crisanta Duran of Denver as their majority leader, marking th e first time two women have led either party in the Colorado legislature.
Thirty of the 65 members of the House are women, the highest ratio of female legislators in Colorado history and the most of any other state at present.
Hullinghorst says early on in her career being a woman was, for her, an asset in the then-male-dominated political arena.
“I actually found it advantageous for me — to sneak up on them,” she said of her male counterparts. “If they do underestimate you, you can work a chess strategy on them.”
But while Hullinghorst has a reputation for a patient approach, Duran is a 34-year-old firebrand, a labor lawyer clearly passionate about issues such as affordable housing, workforce development and state spending priorities.
Duran’s public profile dates to her work as the lawyer for the United Food and Commercial Workers Local 7, a 23,000-member union of grocery store, meatpacking and private health care workers. Her father, Ernie Duran Jr., was president of that union for a decade, but lost his re-election bid in 2009 after his opponent claimed nepotism for his hiring his daughter and son, Ernest Duran III, to staff jobs.
Early in 2010, as Crisanta Duran was making her first run for the state House, the union’s new leadership rescinded the endorsement UFCW Local 7 had provided under her father’s leadership.
“I cherished the opportunity to work for the grocery clerks, meatpacking workers, barbers, nurses and many more that made up the UFCW,” Duran said of her time there.
She said she’s glad to work with the union’s current leadership and legislators of either party to accomplish those goals.
In July , Duran joined in a mock funeral procession in Denver in which union, Latino and other community groups who chanted, “Death to the Colorado GOP for killing immigration reform.”
Despite detractors, Duran has compiled an impressive legislative record. She was named the top legislator by a handful of groups, including Housing Colorado, Conservation Colorado and Health Care for All Colorado, along with local and national recognition as a rising young leader.
House Democrats chose Duran as majority leader over Rep. Dan Pabon of Denver. Hullinghorst appointed Pabon speaker pro tem last month to serve in her role whenever she’s absent.
Outgoing Rep. Amy Stephens, R-Monument, said she was shocked the caucus chose Duran over Pabon.
“Dan Pabon works across the aisle to try to get things done,” she said.
Stephens has tangled with Duran on several issues.
“If she behaves the way she did on the Joint Budget Committee, I don’t see this going well or productive on the House floor,” she said. “She doesn’t play well with others.”
Duran doesn’t refute her reputation for passion. She said both sides would “roll up our sleeves.”
While several Republicans called Hullinghorst a negotiator, they were doubtful of Duran’s commitment to bipartisanship, and wondered if Hullinghorst would be able to rein her in.
“It’s going to be interesting to see how they work together,” said McNulty. “My experience tells me that the speaker and the majority leader have to be on the same page. If there are problems there, there are going to be problems having an effective leadership.”
Joey Bunch: 303-954-1174, jbunch@denverpost.com or twitter.com/joeybunch
Rep. dickey lee hullinghorst
Party: Democrat
Age: 71
Current title: speaker of the colorado house
Political background: state representative since 2009; member of the appropriations, finance and joint budget, state affairs, agriculture and natural resource committees; house minority leader, majority leader and minority whip; chairwoman of the boulder county democratic party.
Family: Husband, Bob; daughter Lara Lee Hullinghorst.
Hometown: Gunbarrel community
Native of: Maywood, Neb.
Education: Bachelor’s degree in sociology from the University of Wyoming;
post-graduate work in public policy and administration from the University of Colorado.
