Denver Gazette: Colorado paid more than $630,000 last year to a group of personal and business associates of Gov. Jared Polis that had ostensibly volunteered to help the state manage its way through the COVID-19 pandemic by tracking people’s movements, records show.

Then, when that group’s work was done in late 2020, the state began paying another $1 million in a deal it gave to a startup company created by two people tied to the first group’s work.

Neither of the contracts was publicly bid, but rather were the result of an executive order Polis issued in April 2020 declaring a disaster emergency that suspended state laws requiring bids on purchases relating to the pandemic, no matter the size of the contract. The state normally requires public bids for any contract of more than $150,000.