Colorado AG: innovation in government can’t happen without public trust

FORT COLLINS — Colorado Attorney General Phil Weiser believes the biggest problem America faces today is a crisis of trust, leading to a crisis of collaboration. Speaking at a keynote during Fort Collins Startup Week, Weiser pointed to surveys from the Pew Research Center showing that 75 percent of Americans have shrinking faith in the federal government and 64 percent of Americans have shrinking trust in each other. The pessimism for the youngest generation of adults today, with the Pew data showing about 46 percent of people between 18 and 29 would call themselves low-trust people. “This is a threat to the fabric of our republic,” he said. He also blamed companies that take advantage of their customers’ trust for financial gain, pointing to settlements the state made last year with CenturyLink Inc. for allegedly misleading customers on price increases and against credit-score monitor Equifax for its massive data breach in 2017. Weiser believes that lack of trust across the country isn’t as prevalent in Colorado, pointing to a coalition of Northern Colorado law-enforcement agencies and youth groups to encourage parents to lock their firearms out of reach of their children. He also mentioned the CO CURES program, a joint effort of medical providers and clinicians to develop best practices to treat opioid users. Those two groups show there’s room to innovate within the realm of public governance if people can find the common ground to tackle a problem, Weiser argued. “What most people get wrong about government is that it isn’t about Republicans versus Democrats, it’s about innovation versus inertia, and most times, inertia wins,” he said. However, Weiser said he views the world as a network of potential collaborators instead of a top-down hierarchy. That model, he argues, would give people more agency within their local communities and restore the trust lost in larger institutions. Weiser has years of startup development experience before he became Colorado’s top legal officer in 2018. He is a co-founder of Startup Colorado, was previously executive director of University of the Colorado Boulder’s Silicon Flatirons Center and a senior adviser for technology and innovation for the U.S. National Economic Council.