Opinion ID: 2609362
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: constitutionality of the predecessor training statute

Text: Initially, we address the constitutionality of the predecessor training statute as it existed before the passage of Referendum C. [5] This version of the Sheriff Training Statute required a person elected to the office of Sheriff for the first time to complete certain training requirements and to obtain basic peace officer certification from the POST Board within one year. See § 30-10-501.6(1)(b). The district court held that the predecessor training statute was unconstitutional based upon the reasoning of our decision in Reale v. Board of Real Estate Appraisers, 880 P.2d 1205 (Colo.1994), which invalidated a similar statute requiring a county assessor to obtain a real estate appraiser's license within one year of taking office. We agree with the trial court's application of our logic in Reale to invalidate the predecessor training statute. There is no difference between requiring a county assessor to obtain a real estate appraiser's license within one year of taking office and requiring a county sheriff to obtain peace officer certification within one year of taking office. In Reale, we recognized that the Colorado Constitution provides for the office of county assessor and establishes specific requirements for holding this office. See Reale, 880 P.2d at 1206 (citing Colo. Const. art. XIV, § 10). We held that these constitutional qualifications were exclusive and that [t]he Colorado Constitution reserves no authority in the state legislature to change, add to, or diminish the qualifications for constitutionally created offices. Id. at 1211. To hold otherwise would allow the General Assembly to amend the roles and responsibilities of elected officials while in office and thereby undermine the people's fundamental right to vote for the representatives of their choice. See id. at 1207-08. Similar to the office of county assessor discussed in Reale, the office of county sheriff was created by the Colorado Constitution, which establishes the qualifications for holding this office. See Colo. Const. art. XIV, §§ 8, 10. When Sheriff Jackson was elected in 1994, the constitution only required that a county sheriff be a qualified elector and a resident of the county for the one-year period preceding his election. See id. § 10. The record reveals that Sheriff Jackson met these constitutional requirements at the time of his election. Under Reale, these constitutional qualifications were exclusive, and the General Assembly had no authority to impose additional qualifications as a prerequisite to holding the office of county sheriff. See Reale, 880 P.2d at 1211. Attempting to avoid the application of the rationale of Reale, the State argues that Reale is distinguishable because the Sheriff Training Statute merely requires the suspension of pay for a failure to comply with its mandates, while non-compliance with the statute in Reale prevented the county assessor from performing his or her duties. In other words, the State argues that Sheriff Jackson's circumstances differ from those in Reale because Sheriff Jackson can still perform the responsibilities of his elected office, albeit without the benefit of a salary and fringe benefits, while Reale could not. We are not persuaded by the State's argument because the suspension of the Sheriff's salary represents a job restructuring that effectively prevents the Sheriff from continuing to perform his elected duties. Although we acknowledge that the two statutes provide different consequences for a failure to comply with requirements after being publicly elected to office, both suffer from the same constitutional infirmity: they represent additional qualifications superimposed upon the qualifications mandated by the Colorado Constitution. Since the constitution provides no authority for the General Assembly to impose additional qualifications, we hold that the predecessor training statute is facially unconstitutional and unenforceable against Sheriff Jackson.