This is an interesting idea. What do you guys think?
Restoring Colorado
From their website:
Our mission is to restore fair representation for ALL Coloradans. Currently, both the House and the Senate in the Colorado legislature are based on population. This is in direct contrast to the way the U.S. Congress is determined, where one body, the Senate, is based on land area (two Senators per state, regardless of size) and the other body, the House, is based on population. The federal model provides a natural balance between large and small states and has been in place since the inception of our Republic.
Our proposal is to restructure the Colorado State legislature with a model similar to the federal model. One chamber (the House) would be based on land area. Each county in the state would have its own representative, reducing the size of the House from 65 to 64 Representatives. The other chamber (the Senate) would remain based on population, with 35 State Senators.
Our founding fathers understood that urban and rural interests would collide without a mechanism to compel cooperation. Simply put, larger urban interests have enough votes to pass legislation without the need for any votes from smaller rural communities. This leads to what is known as the tyranny of the majority. Larger urban areas can pass legislation unfavorable to smaller communities. It also means tax revenues collected from smaller rural communities can be spent on projects in urban areas. This happens in communities like those that produce energy and agricultural products as well as those that support tourism, like ski resorts and casinos.