GOP patriarch Ray Powers dies at 79

Ray Powers, who never finished high school but rose to become president of the state Senate and patriarch of the El Paso County Republican Party, died Friday. He was 79 years old.

His granddaughter, Stephanie Hazelton, said the cause was congestive heart failure.

After two years in the state House, Powers served 20 years in the Senate, representing District 10 in eastern El Paso County. His last two years in office he served as majority leader, before term limits enacted in 1990 made him ineligible for re-election. He retired at the end of 2000.

Powers greatly increased state funding for highways. In 1997 he pushed through a $200 million highway bill that overcame Republicans' traditional reluctance to fund transportation projects from the state's general fund. In 2000, Powers sponsored a package of transportation projects that included COSMIX, which widened Interstate 25 to six lanes through Colorado Springs.

"It's a major legacy he leaves for Colorado Springs," said Bill Owens, who was governor when Powers was Senate president.

"He really led through friendship and through trust," Owens said. "People got to know Ray, they believed him and he was very effective in building on those relationships to pursue his legislative agenda."

In a campaign flier from the mid-1990s, Powers also listed stronger enforcement of the death penalty, the appointment of additional state judges to El Paso County, and legislation mandating a Colorado-first policy for state purchases among his achievements.

Andy McElhany, the Colorado Springs Republican who is the state Senate minority leader, described Powers as a "bulldog," adding, "He knew what he was about, knew what he stood for, and there was no backing him away from it."

But Powers was also known for his ability to reach across the aisle. "He served all but his last two years with Democrat governors, and was able to work with them," McElhany recalled.

Powers once said of his relationship with Senate Democrats: "After a debate and argument on the floor, we always went away friends."

Powers was also a great political organizer. Fundraisers at his barn off Marksheffel Road were a staple of Republican campaigns in El Paso County. Plastered to the barn's walls are "a political decal of every candidate who's ever passed through there or run for political office over the last 30 years or more," said El Paso County Commissioner Jim Bensberg, who held a fundraiser at Powers' barn and attended others there.

"There have been literally thousands of Republican fundraisers held in the Powers barn," McElhany said. "Ray made it available to any Republican, whether he supported him or not."

"I always thought of him as a person of true integrity, and there weren't very many in that category," former U.S. Sen. Hank Brown said.

Eight-year term limits will prevent any future Colorado state legislator from achieving the eminence Powers attained. "Ray Powers is one of the last of a breed of long-serving citizen legislators," Owens said. "Term limits mean we won't have people like Ray Powers with us anymore."

"I am a supporter of term limits because I think in balance the principle does generate more benefit than damage," said Colorado Springs developer Steve Schuck, a longtime Republican activist. "But there are exceptions to every rule, and Ray Powers was one of them."

Powers was born June 27, 1929, in Colorado Springs, to one of the region's old ranching families. His parents, Cora and Guy Powers, had a dairy ranch on 720 acres in what is now the Village Seven subdivision.

When Ray was 15, his father was struck and killed by lightning, and Ray left high school to help his mother run the dairy farm. He never returned to school, working as a rancher and dairy farmer. He was nearly 50 when he was elected to the Colorado House, where he served a single term before moving to the Senate.

Aside from his political offices, he served at various times as president of the American Legislative Exchange Council and chairman of the Western Council of State Governments, two legislators' groups; president of the Colorado 4-H Club; and vice president of the National Dairy Council.

Survivors include Powers' wife, Dorothy; a daughter, Janet; a stepson, Steve; a sister, Marjorie; five grandchildren; and nine great-grandchildren. Hazelton said the funeral is scheduled for Tuesday at 11 a.m. at Springs First Church of the Nazarene, 4120 E. Fountain Blvd.

Powers' name will live on in a road traveled by thousands of Colorado Springs residents every day.

Though others say Powers Boulevard was named for Ray's parents, McElhany recalled that several decades ago developer Bill Smartt was building a road in the area of the Powers Ranch.

"He wanted to grade a dirt road," McElhany said. "He knew Ray had a piece of equipment he could use to grade that road. So he went over to Ray and asked if he could borrow that equipment.

"Ray said yeah, and Bill said, ‘I'll name a street after you.' And Ray said, ‘Hell, I don't want any street named after me - I want a boulevard named after me.'"

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Contact the writer: dean.toda@gazette.com or 476-1654


POWERS DETAILS

Date of birth: June 27, 1929
Career: State Senate president, 1999-2000; state senator from eastern El Paso County, 1980-2000; Republican political organizer; rancher and dairyman.

Funeral: Tuesday, 11 a.m., Springs First Church of the Nazarene, 4120 E. Fountain Blvd.