Following graduation Groff worked for one year in the city of Chicago as a case worker for the Cook County Department of Public Aid.
[3] During his time in the Colorado Senate Groff was instrumental in winning passage of legislation making the federal Martin Luther King Jr. Day into an official state holiday.
[3] He also worked actively in efforts to force the state to divest from investments in companies dealing with the Republic of South Africa, then ruled by a white minority government on the basis of racial apartheid.
[3] Groff resigned his seat the Colorado Senate in the first half of 1994 when Governor Roy Romer named him as the state's first director of the Youthful Offender System in Denver.
[5] He was succeeded by Gloria Tanner, whose appointment made her the first African American woman to serve as a Colorado state senator.
Groff was remembered by Denver Mayor Michael B. Hancock as a "truly great leader" who was in turns "a friend, a mentor, and an adviser" who reminded him of the need of elected officials "to stay focused on the community, to always put the needs of the people before politics.