Tony Exum Sr. represents House District 17 in southeastern Colorado Springs. He serves as Vice-Chair of the Transportation and Local Government Committee and sits on the Education Committee.
In the 2017 session he sponsored a new law creating a program to test for lead in public schools' drinking water. He also successfully sponsored two bills to help the poorest Coloradans. One continues the Low-Income Energy Assistance Program, which helps the neediest Coloradans with their wintertime heating bills and weatherization. The other continues a tax credit for child care expenses. By making child care more affordable, the credit keeps low-income working parents in the workforce and off welfare.
A retired battalion chief in the Colorado Springs Fire Department, Rep. Exum spent 35 years making his city safer. His 2017 law created a benefit program for firefighters with cancer. In 2014 he successfully sponsored three bills to increase fire safety in Colorado in the wake of the Black Forest and Waldo Canyon wildfires that ravaged the Pikes Peak Region.
Rep. Exum was first elected in 2012. His first legislative session in 2013 was notable for his sponsorship of Breakfast after the Bell, a new law to end hunger as a learning disability by providing a meal at the beginning of the school day in schools where more than 80 percent of students are eligible for free or reduced lunch.
Rep. Exum lives in Colorado Springs. He's the proud father of his sons Jauquien and Tony Jr., a noted jazz saxophonist. He has four grandchildren. |