EDITORIAL: Aurora voters have now become a community of progressive interest

This isn’t your father’s Aurora anymore, and political leaders need to take heed of that fact.

The days of a go-along, get-along suburb to the east are long, long gone, and this week’s General Election highlights that.

Aurora, once a Republican stronghold for the most part, would now be an inhospitable place to the likes of former Sen. Bill Armstrong, at one time heralded as a political demigod in these parts.

With a state legislative delegation of 10 seats, only two representatives, hailing from Brighton and Greenwood Village, are Republicans. Of these delegates, Greenwood Village Republican Spencer Swalm, Brighton Republican Kevin Priola, Aurora Democrat Jovan Melton and John Buckner are men. And of the 10 representatives, three are black.

Aurora has become the home of a majority of progressive voters, leaning to the left and insisting their elected representatives follow suit. City voters mirrored the state this week when slightly more than half voted for President Barack Obama.

Likewise, voters in Aurora sided with the majority in the state by agreeing to Amendment 64, seeking to end marijuana prohibition laws in Colorado.

The one diversion from this trend was the election of incumbent Republican Congressman Mike Coffman. Coffman has a voting record that mocks what the majority of Aurora residents honor when it comes to many social issues such as abortion rights, gay rights and views on social programs. But Coffman has a long and storied history in Aurora as a veteran politician who’s held many seats and titles. He’s well-liked and came to the race as an well-funded incumbent.

While Coffman gained ground with local voters by pushing his non-traditional stance on wasteful Pentagon spending, the race between him and Denver Democrat Joe Miklosi focused on Coffman’s considerable conservative stance and voting record. He must now find a way to justify future votes on women’s reproductive rights, gay rights and immigration reform with a political party intolerant of deviance and a constituent base often at odds with the political demands of U.S. House Republican leadership.

Coffman is not alone in having to look long and hard at how Aurora has changed over the last two decades. City lawmakers, too, need to see how the community has changed.

Since Aurora residents supported pot legalization Amendment 64, city council representatives will need to keep voter intentions in mind should the legal marijuana issue end up on the council floor.

It almost certainly will in some way. Most likely, courts will tie up the state issue as federal officials move in to remind everyone that federal law prohibits the sale and use of marijuana. It will be some time before the issue is resolved.

In the meantime, voters were clear in wanting to end the days of making the “recreational” use marijuana a criminal issue. It’s almost certain that during this gray period in the law, that city officials will have to decide how to handle marijuana law infractions, and whether they should guide police procedures.

How lawmakers from Highland’s Ranch would handle the issue — where voters opposed Amendment 64 — would be very different from those in Aurora, where voters backed the measure.

Finally, as the new Congress and state Legislature move forward, there is little doubt both groups will be handling the issue of illegal immigration. Both the state and the U.S. House have previously defeated measures that would extend some higher education benefits to illegal immigrants raised in the United States. Aurora, and the entire country, needs to find a way to bring many of these long-time residents into the fold of our community, making them legitimate neighbors accountable to tax and other laws, just like the rest of us.

Really, the issues haven’t changed, but Aurora has over the years. The city has grown up to be a place where voters want results based on compassion and practicality. Voters did their part this week, not it’s time for those elected to get their part of the job done.