Tax hike should be a last resort

Colorado Springs Gazette Editorial

4/25/07

      It was only a matter of time, we knew, before Gov. Bill Ritter and Statehouse Democrats began maneuvering for a tax increase. Growing government is a cornerstone of their statist political philosophy, and this was all but inevitable given the number of times Ritter used the word “investment” — a euphemism for “spending” — while running for office. 

     How little time it took the taxers-and-spenders to reveal themselves, though, is a bit of a surprise. 

      Ritter’s plan to freeze property tax rate reductions in many Colorado school districts, as a way of paying for full-day kindergarten and other programs, cleared the House Education Committee Monday on a party-line vote, despite the fact that Republicans adamantly oppose it and many Democrats also seem wary. How much farther it will go is uncertain, given the political risks involved in jacking up taxes. But Ritter and a few stalwart statists are pulling out all the stops to ram it through before the end of the session. We hope the effort fails.

      Viable alternatives exist to raising taxes, assuming one shows a little creativity and political courage. But both seem in short supply at the Capitol.

      The most obvious (and thus sensible) alternative is politely declining Ritter’s rather reckless plan to heap additional burdens on the school trust fund, at a time it is supposedly headed toward insolvency. This “investment” may have to be deferred until all other funding and budget-cutting options are explored and the public is convinced it’s imperative. Those efforts haven’t been made.

      Though we thought it had promise, a bipartisan proposal to “securitize” (i.e, sell off) the Colorado lottery and direct some of the proceeds to education seems to be going nowhere, after its chief Democratic backer, State Sen. Chris Romer, suddenly got cold feet. Romer denies he was pressured by Ritter and other Democrats to drop the idea. But it’s clear the governor would like to create the impression that there are no viable alternatives to his tax hike.

      If the school trust fund is in trouble, the culprit isn’t the stinginess of taxpayers but the autopilot education spending increases mandated by Amendment 23, which foolishly walls off this category of spending from all others. If the situation is really that dire, altering or rescinding the amendment seems a logical place to look for answers.

      But that’s a nonstarter for Ritter and other Democrats, for whom 23 is a sacred cow. They dare not cross teachers unions and other groups that have a vested interest in unrestrained education spending.

      Not so long ago, it was widely acknowledged by members of both parties that the state’s budget quandaries required a holistic fix, involving changes to TABOR, The Gallagher Amendment and Amendment 23 — three elements in the constitution that clash. The passage of Referendum C in 2005, while it didn’t alter TABOR, boosted state revenues by billions of additional dollars — dollars that would otherwise have gone to TABOR refunds. This was sold as a solution to the state’s budget crunch, by many of the same folks who are now ginning up another budget “crisis.”

      TABOR supporters took a bullet in 2005, but the tax burden disparities embodied in Gallagher and the autopilot spending increases required by Amendment 23 were left untouched, meaning only part of the “holistic solution” was addressed. That leaves us in the same boat we were in two years ago.

      Instead of rowing in circles, and repeatedly coming back to the taxpayers for short-term fiscal fixes when real or perceived crises crop up, a more responsible (if less expedient) course would be revisiting the more comprehensive solutions talked about in the past. Tax hikes should be a last resort — not a knee-jerk shortcut, resulting from a lack of imagination and political willpower.