New year, new laws

2022 has state and city legislators saying, “new year, new us.” The first of the year ushered in dozens of new laws at the state and city levels. If you forgot to take diligent notes on last year’s legislative sessions, don’t worry, I’ve got you covered. Here are the changes that are mostly likely going to affect you:

• Cha-ching! Denver’s minimum wage increased to $15.87 per hour.
  
• City parking meter rates have increased from $1 to $2 per hour. Mayor Hancock hopes to see the extra revenue fund bikeway maintenance, sidewalk repairs, and other street safety and public transit improvements.
  
• Missed court hearings and late court fee payments are no longer enough to have your driver’s license taken away — a punishment that often left people trapped in a cycle of legal trouble. 

• Medical marijuana users who are 21+ are only allowed to purchase up to eight grams of cannabis concentrate per day (the same limit already imposed on recreational users). The previous limit was 40 grams. 

• It should now be easier for you to remember to cancel that free trial you signed up for. Service providers with auto-renewing paid subscriptions, like a dating app or streaming service, have to give customers more warning and leniency. 

— Peyton Garcia, Your Friendly Neighborhood Newsletter Writer

Other Denver Odds and Ends

🎄 Recycling your Christmas tree: I’m a late-January Christmas décor kinda person myself, but Denver residents can put their trees out for pick-up now through Jan. 14. (Here’s how to do it.) Plus, what to do with your trees if you’re in other metro area counties.

🔥 What caused the Marshall Fire? The FBI and ATF are aiding the investigation to find out. Authorities have now concluded it was not started by a downed powerline as previously speculated. 

• 👉 Related: Here’s a preliminary list of the businesses and residences so far confirmed as destroyed by the Marshall Fire 😢

⛄ Another snow record: Just a few weeks ago, Denver broke its personal record for the latest first snowfall of the year on Dec. 10. Mother Nature apparently wanted to make up for the dry spell by giving us the snowiest New Year’s Eve in Denver in recorded history.

🍳 RIP Breakfast King: The iconic Breakfast King is just the latest in a series of late-night diners to shut their doors for good.

• 👉 Look back: We talked about this tragic trend among Denver diners in this episode of City Cast Denver from November when we found out the Denver Diner was being turned into a Chase Bank. 

🎧 LISTEN: Why can’t Colorado fix its mental health system? It seems ironic that in a state that touts healthy lifestyles like hiking and biking and being outdoors, we have some of the worst mental health stats in the country. Why?? We asked Susan Greene, a reporter for Colorado News Collaborative, who recently published a six-month investigation into the subject.