College Textbook Affordability Act Heads to Ritter's Desk

The Senate approved Friday an amended version of SB 73, the proposed "College Textbook Affordability Act," and sent the bill to Gov. Ritter.

The bill aims to ensure that students are provided with more information about the textbooks required in classes, in order to be able to compare previous editions with the current edition specified by the course instructor, and prevents publishers from requiring that textbooks be purchased in a bundle with other media items such as DVDs.

To accomplish the information objective, the bill requires textbook publishers to post on their websites the prices of textbooks, history of substantive revisions to textbooks, and estimated length of time the publisher intends to keep such textbooks on the market.

The Senate sponsor is Democrat Ron Tupa of Boulder. The measure was sponsored in the House by Rep. John Kefalas, D-Fort Collins.

There was no opposition to passage of the amended bill by the Senate Friday.