The Colorado Department of Personnel and Administration (DPA) is a principal department of the Colorado state government. It administers the statewide classified personnel system and supplies shared administrative infrastructure used by other agencies, including central payroll and the statewide accounting system, procurement rules, self-funded employee benefits, self-insurance for liability, property, and workers' compensation, the Colorado State Capitol complex, the state motor fleet, state archives, the Address Confidentiality Program, and a central panel of administrative law judges. The statutory name of the principal department is the Department of Personnel. "And Administration" is the operating name used after the former Department of Administration was abolished and its functions were transferred in 1995.
The department is headed by the state personnel director, who is also the executive director, appointed by the governor of Colorado with the consent of the Colorado Senate and serving at the governor's pleasure. The incumbent executive director is Jana Locke, who succeeded Tony Gherardini. Governor Jared Polis announced the appointment in April 2026 and stated that Locke would begin on May 18, 2026; the department's executive-director page states that she was appointed in May 2026. Headquarters are in the State Services Building at 1525 Sherman Street in Denver, adjacent to the State Capitol.
DPA's customers are other state departments, the General Assembly, institutions of higher education, some local governments, state employees, and the public. Most of its operating budget is reappropriated from user agencies rather than appropriated as General Fund. For fiscal year 2026-27 the Joint Budget Committee's appropriations report recorded $307,807,236 in total operating appropriations and 511.7 full-time equivalent positions after all 2026 session bills, 0.184 percent of statewide General Fund operating appropriations of $17.461 billion. The department is the custodian of its own Colorado Open Records Act records and has been the subject of repeated Office of the Colorado State Auditor performance audits of the classified personnel system, the Office of Administrative Courts, risk management, and statewide cellphone purchasing.
History Creation and 1995 merger Article XII, section 14 of the Colorado Constitution establishes a state personnel system and a state personnel director. The Administrative Organization Act lists a "department of personnel" among the principal departments of the executive branch and creates it in Colorado Revised Statutes section 24-1-128. Title 24, article 50, of the statutes is the State Personnel System Act.
House Bill 95-1362, enacted as chapter 167 of the 1995 Session Laws, merged the Department of Administration into the Department of Personnel effective July 1, 1995. The Department of Administration was abolished. Its functions, including central services, accounts and control, state buildings, archives, and related support, were transferred to the Department of Personnel. The constitutional and statutory name of the principal department remains Department of Personnel. "Department of Personnel and Administration" is the operating name used in later Long Bills and on the department's website. A 2004 statutory rename (House Bill 04-1373) was contingent on a constitutional amendment (H.C.R. 04-1005) that voters rejected.
Section 24-1-107 authorizes the head of a principal department to rearrange internal divisions, which is why Long Bill subdivision names, SMART Act performance plans, and live websites do not always match a single statutory list.
Information systems Statewide accounting before CORE used the Colorado Financial Reporting System (COFRS), in service from fiscal year 1991. The replacement project, later named the Colorado Operations Resource Engine (CORE), is a CGI Advantage enterprise system. The Governor's Office of Information Technology holds the vendor contract; DPA's Office of the State Controller is the business owner. CORE went live on July 1, 2014. A 2013 legislative contract table put CGI Component II (COFRS modernization) at $30,494,986. CGI announced the Colorado and West Virginia go-lives in August 2014, quoting then-executive director Kathy Nesbitt. The Office of the State Auditor's June 2016 CORE security audit and Joint Budget Committee capital figure-setting both treated the statewide go-live as July 2014. In March 2017 CGI announced a Colorado payroll-modernization contract valued at US$66.2 million over 20 years, with optional years. Vendor notification migrated from the Bid Information and Distribution System (BIDS), created in section 24-102-202.5, to the Colorado Vendor Self Service (ColoradoVSS) portal. Paid BIDS access ended in fiscal year 2013-14.
A separate human-resources and payroll modernization known as HRWorks was terminated on May 19, 2020, after about $41.6 million to $43.2 million had been appropriated. A September 14, 2020, DPA briefing to the Joint Technology Committee recorded that vendors had stopped work in February 2019, that the project ended in May 2020 after the FY 2020-21 funding request was eliminated, and that a remaining capital appropriation of about $3.8 million sat against $7.4 million still on the books. The Joint Budget Committee later recorded that the project ended on May 19, 2020, and did not produce a usable HR or payroll system. Central payroll remains a function of the State Controller. Fiscal Rule 9.3 moved executive-branch payroll to a biweekly lag beginning in July 2023.
Address Confidentiality Program and administrative courts The Address Confidentiality Program was created by House Bill 07-1350 in the Colorado Secretary of State's office (then sections 24-21-201 and following), with enrollments beginning in July 2008. House Bill 11-1080, chapter 256 of the 2011 Session Laws, transferred the program to DPA effective June 2, 2011. It is now article 30, part 21 of title 24 (sections 24-30-2101 through 24-30-2115).
Senate Bill 05-185 renamed the Division of Administrative Hearings as the Office of Administrative Courts effective July 1, 2005. The office is a type 2 entity under DPA. The statutory head of the office is the DPA executive director, who appoints the chief judge.
Colorado State Archives originated with a state archivist position created in 1943 (Herbert O. Brayer). Archives became independent of the State Historical Society in 1959 and entered DPA through the 1995 merger (section 24-1-128(7)(b); title 24, article 80, part 1). The program has been housed in the Centennial Building at 1313 Sherman Street since 1976. Aly Jabrocki has been state archivist since November 2016.
Facilities and fleet reorganizations State buildings functions sit in title 24, article 30, part 13. Senate Bill 13-263 directed a Capitol Complex master plan. In November 2016 DPA moved Capitol Complex facilities management, Capitol Complex architects, and State Fleet Management out of Central Services into a Division of Capital Assets. Senate Bill 22-239 created a Capitol Complex renovation fund in section 24-30-1313, with a statutory repeal date of July 1, 2031. DPA has reported about $91 million encumbered from the fund.
On July 29, 2026, DPA announced that the Division of Capital Assets would be decommissioned on August 1, 2026. State Fleet Management returned to the Division of Central Services. Capitol Complex moved to a Division of State Property. Statewide purchasing is not a DPA "Division of Finance and Procurement"; that former box is obsolete, and the Statewide Procurement and Contracts Office sits in the Office of the State Controller.
Senate Bill 21-055, signed March 21, 2021, repealed Central Collection Services. Agencies collect their own debts under section 24-30-202.4 and Fiscal Rule 10, with a private collection-agency fee cap of 18 percent.
Leadership The executive director is the state personnel director under article XII, section 14(4) of the state constitution and section 24-50-102. Governor Jared Polis announced that he had appointed Jana Locke, then deputy executive director of the Colorado Department of Public Safety, as DPA executive director. The Governor's office said Locke would begin on May 18, 2026. Polis posted the appointment on April 24, 2026. Locke succeeded Tony Gherardini. The department's executive-director page states that she was appointed in May 2026. The State Claims Board lists Locke as the DPA member.
Locke's DPA biography states that she has worked in Colorado state government for more than 20 years. She joined the Department of Public Safety in 2010 and served as legislative liaison, chief planning and communications officer, and interim deputy executive director before her appointment as CDPS deputy executive director in 2019. From 2007 to 2010 she was a senior management and budget analyst in Governor Bill Ritter's Office of State Planning and Budgeting. She was a Presidential Management Fellow at the United States Department of Justice.
Gherardini's last day at DPA was April 2, 2026. Polis's announcement credited his tenure with skills-based hiring, implementation of a statewide partnership agreement with Colorado WINS, a classified step-pay system, an increase of more than 800 electric vehicles in the state fleet, and a reduction of more than 580,000 square feet in the state's leased and owned footprint, which the release said saved more than $9 million a year in lease and facility costs. Gherardini became vice president and chief human resources officer of the University of Colorado system on April 13, 2026. CU's announcement described DPA under his leadership as a roughly 500-person agency with a $450 million budget supporting more than 30,000 statewide employees. Polis appointed him DPA executive director in November 2021, succeeding Kara Veitch, who had moved to the Governor's Office as chief legal counsel.
Tobin Follenweider is deputy executive director of operations. Heather Velasquez is deputy executive director of administration. Follenweider previously was chief operating and performance officer at the Colorado Department of Natural Resources. Velasquez previously was director of recovery and strategic initiatives and deputy director of operations in the Governor's Office.
Recent executive directors documented in official releases and news accounts include Kathy Nesbitt (appointed January 10, 2011; in office through the 2014 CORE go-live), June Taylor (documented in 2016-2017 under Governor John Hickenlooper), Kara Veitch (appointed February 2019; left September 29, 2021), Tony Gherardini (November 2021 - April 2, 2026), and Jana Locke (from May 18, 2026).
DPA is not the Colorado Department of Law. The attorney general is a separately elected constitutional officer heading a different principal department (section 24-1-113). Attorney General Phil Weiser sits on the State Claims Board by virtue of that office, not as DPA staff.
Organization The department's published performance plan and division websites, read together with the Long Bill, describe the following boxes as of August 2026. Internal titles can move under section 24-1-107; JBC presentations still used a Division of Capital Assets through the FY 2026-27 briefing cycle, while DPA decommissioned that division on August 1, 2026.