I get it, it’s hard to keep up with the news these days. But some stories are too important to let slide. And this is one.

In late June, Ben Markus at Colorado Public Radio reported a nursing home scandal — not in New York but right here in Colorado.

According to the story, “Gov. Jared Polis and the leader of the state’s health department never revealed to the public that the state’s lab was overwhelmed or that the state’s nursing homes had become, however briefly, the deadliest in the nation.”

A 25-year-old tech entrepreneur, referred to the governor by a political connection, sold the state COVID tests, $89 million worth, that didn’t work so well. When our leaders, including Gov. Polis, learned the tests were giving false negatives, it took 17 days — yes, 17 days, to pull the tests.

During that two-plus-week time frame, during that hesitation to stop using them, many of our elderly loved ones got sick or passed away in Colorado nursing homes. November, December, and January were devastating months for our elderly here — some of the highest death rates in the nation for nursing homes.

Polis has yet to comment on the story, offer any explanation or make a move toward reform to ensure this never happens again.

He also hasn’t commented on why the state of the art “strike force” that he named in a press conference as a “national model” was just one person on the state Health Department’s (CDPHE) organizational chart at the time.

Markus mentions in his story how Polis at a July 23 press conference talked about what hard work the strike force work was and thanked those who were doing it.

He even recruited a popular singer/songwriter to give awards to the “strike force.”

Maybe the award should have gone to the email marketing guru he brought in early on to scale up testing. The guy who said in an email to the governor, “I don’t know what the f- — I’m doing.”

How on earth has this story been shoved under the proverbial carpet?

Or the story about Jill Hunsaker Ryan, the top health official in the state, one of the governor’s key cabinet members, blowing $3 million in lost funding for prevention of HIV because she didn’t understand a memo from the Attorney General’s Office? Then instead of owning up to it, she fired the head of disease control for the state as retaliation for pointing it out, right in the middle of COVID!

“I don’t know if I knew the implications it would have,” Hunsaker Ryan said. “I was nine months into my job, so I didn’t grasp the full nuances”.

But it didn’t stop there. Hunsaker Ryan and Polis also failed to grasp the nuances of trying to dictate how employees should travel to work. The failed employee trip reduction program would have mandated that every business with over 100 workers hire a parking cop to dictate who in their company could drive to work and who had to take the bus.

Tough luck for those mothers and fathers who take their kids to school or care for loved ones on the way home. After months of pushing this ridiculous idea, CDPHE finally shelved it after businesses expended precious resources fighting back.

Or how about the story we don’t hear much about regarding the very expensive debacle with the Colorado Department of Labor and Employment? Over a million unemployment claims received during COVID are believed to be fraudulent to the tune of more than $22 million in benefits to scam artists. To add insult to injury, our small businesses clawing out from the pandemic will see huge increases in their unemployment insurance to backfill these dollars.

Finally, there’s a crisis that’s life and death, and it is brewing in rural Colorado.

Earlier this year, the Emergency Medical Services Association, the folks who respond and take you to the hospital if you call 911, asked the governor for $40 million in emergency funds.

He denied it even though Colorado has received $3.8 BILLION through the federal American Rescue Plan Act. There are not enough volunteers willing to get paid $12/hour to do this job, one that requires 24-hour coverage. It’s to the point where you won’t be able to get an ambulance when you or your loved one needs one.

I get that it’s hard to keep up with the constant flow of bad players and bad decisions hurting us, hurting our state, but these stories are a big deal.

Running a state is a big deal.

I’ve always thought of a CEO (i.e., governor) as someone who is a leader, an inspiration to the team and most of all someone who makes the organization work. On this count Polis has failed and failed and failed. And the fast and furious stories documenting this are buried.

The cost? The heart and soul of our state. Heartbreaking.

Heidi Ganahl is a businesswoman, entrepreneur, author and at-large member of the University of Colorado Board of Regents, to which she was elected as a Republican in 2016.