DENVER -- Gov. Bill Owens on Thursday set a date for a special legislative session that will deal with Colorado's death penalty law and tougher laws for those responsible for starting wildfires.

The session will begin Monday July 8 and is expected to cost about $14,000 a day.

The special session was required after a U.S. Supreme Court ruling earlier this week called into question the constitutionality of Colorado's death penalty law.

Owens, a strong supporter of the death penalty, and other lawmakers said they will try to avoid a debate over whether Colorado needs the death penalty.

"The people of Colorado have said time and time again we need it. Let's get it done," said House Minority Leader Dan Grossman, D-Denver.

Senate Minority Leader John Andrews, R-Centennial, said lawmakers should quickly enact provisions that have already been tried and tested by the courts.

The Supreme Court ruled Monday that juries, not judges, must decide whether convicted criminals should be sentenced to death. The 7-2 ruling came in an Arizona case but affected at least 168 convicted killers in five states.

In Colorado, juries made death penalty decisions in until 1995, when a new law gave death-penalty decisions to a three-judge panel. Owens said the Supreme Court decision left that law in doubt.

Since 1995, judges have sentenced three men to die, and Attorney General Ken Salazar is trying to determine what will happen to them. They could be resentenced to life, or they could face another jury to reconsider their sentences.

The three are:

Francisco Martinez, convicted of raping, torturing and killing a 14-year-old honor student in 1997.
William "Cody" Neal, who confessed to killing Rebecca Holberton, Candace Walters and Angela Fite over six days in 1998.
George Woldt, convicted of killing college student Jacine Gielinski in 1997.

The Supreme Court decision did not affect the cases of two Colorado inmates sentenced to die by juries before the 1995 change.

Owens also will ask lawmakers to update state laws on wildfires because of the state's unprecedented wildfire season, which has left hundreds of homes destroyed and hundreds of thousands of acres burned.

He also will ask legislators to reconsider a proposal to make people who set fires during states of emergency liable for triple the costs of the damage. A similar bill was killed last May in a dispute over how to deal with accidental fires.