Thank you, Rep. Barbara McLachlan – The Durango Herald

Our next representative for House District 59 will have some very big shoes to fill.

Barbara McLachlan has served us well over the past eight years, being our only representative in this district to do so. She is a hard worker who possesses the qualities necessary to achieve great results.

No doubt his firmness and composure honed while teaching teenagers at Durango High School probably came in handy under the gold-leaf-clad dome.

But most of all, we appreciate that many of his bills came through his constituents, including those that led History Colorado to get to the truth behind Colorado’s Indian boarding schools.

“That’s my job,” McLachlan said.

Yes, we know, but a percentage of our elected officials do not prioritize listening to what voters have to say, especially voters of different political persuasions.

McLachlan is different.

He has always had a knack for making people feel comfortable and finding common ground. In this time of divisive politics, McLachlan makes that less so. He put time and energy into relationships.

As reported in The Herald of Durango and The diaryMcLachlan said, “If I want to meet with a senator or the legislators who are closest to me, they are Republicans, and if I ignore them, I am ignoring part of my district. I represent a lot of Republicans, so I think it is in my best interest to say that I should listen to Republicans, Democrats and unaffiliated voters.”

After spending years in classrooms, education was always close to McLachlan’s heart. He helped eliminate the Budget Stabilization Factor, a post-2008 recession tool that took billions out of Colorado schools.

And she considers her greatest achievement in the Legislature to be the passage of HB19-1262, which funded full-day kindergartens across Colorado.

She is also proud that Democrats and Republicans have worked well together to bring the “rural voice, the western side” to the state Capitol. McLachlan represented us well in this regard, too, but she will tell you that she never did it alone.

If McLachlan could have done more, he would have included Native American education in the fifth- through 12th-grade curriculum to “get a good look at tribes.” The Legislature can’t mandate this, but it could put money into a resource bank for art or history or whatever the Department of Education wanted.

A good handout item for the next rep.

Other credentials: Six years as chairman of the House Education Committee; first year as chairman of the House Services Committee; vice chair of the Statutory Review Committee; vice chair of the Sportsmen’s Caucus; member of the Agriculture, Water and Natural Resources Committee; and member of the Interim Agriculture and Water Resources Review Committee.

Last year, McLachlan served as vice chairman of the House Finance Committee for 30 minutes during the special session.

Phew.

Her next goal is to “plan my new life. I want to know the state.”

And in collaboration with History Colorado, she wants to write a book about her great-grandmother, Carrie Ayres, who traveled to Sterling with her widowed mother and brother and became the first teacher at age 15 on the Eastern Slope. In fact, Ayres Elementary School in Sterling is named after her.

It’s no wonder where McLachlan got his enthusiasm from. It must be genetic.