Veteran GOP Sen. Ken Kester denounced an unsuccessful advertising campaign against him by the Colorado Education Association, charging it "twists and turns" his opposition to a pending statewide property tax hike.

A spokeswoman for the teachers union, meanwhile, confirmed that the Colorado Campaign for Children and Public Schools, named at the bottom of the newspaper ad as its sponsor, is the CEA's "527" political-spending arm. Records with the Secretary of State's Office show prominent Democrat lawyer Mark Grueskin filed the group's paperwork.

The ad appeared in the April 26 Canon City Daily Record and the Fowler Tribune, both in Kester's vast Southeast Colorado district. Appearing just days before Tuesday's Senate approval of Gov. Bill Ritter's property-tax hike, which Kester and all other Republicans voted against, the ad suggested that Kester actually opposed a property-tax cut for local schools. 

"It's a deceptive smear campaign," Kester said. "It's misleading, it twists and turns my position inside out, and it stinks."

Kester also questioned the union's priorities.

"You would think that an organization that claims to represent so many of the state's teachers would have higher standards," he said. "You'd also think the CEA would have better things to do with all of that advertising money -- like maybe help our financially strapped schools."

Kester, of Las Animas, who was overwhelmingly re-elected to Senate District 2 last November, added, "They're acting like it's an election year."

The property-tax hike --  on its way to the governor for his likely signature -- would freeze the property mill levy in almost all school districts statewide. As property values rise, so would tax bills for most Colorado home- and business owners.

In a small minority of the state's 178 school districts, including Canon City, the mill levy would drop slightly before being frozen. That means in those school districts, taxpayers would experience an initial, marginal cut in their property tax bills before they start climbing in subsequent years as property values rise.

"There was no mention in the ad that tax bills would go up after they dipped the first year in places like Canon City," Kester said, "and there was no mention of how property tax bills would rise right away in much of the rest of the state.

"The ad didn't say anything about how the school districts won't actually get any more money. The tax hike will just let the state give the school districts less funding so the legislature can spend what it saves on whatever else it wants."

Kester also faulted the campaign for failing to mention what he said is one of the most important reasons for voting against the tax hike: "The attorney general said this proposal should have gone to the voters, first, and I agree."

Although Ritter says the tax hike doesn't require a popular vote, Attorney General  John Suthers last week issued an 11-page opinion that found the pending property-tax hike must be put to a statewide vote in order to comply with the Taxpayer's Bill of Rights in the state constitution. That measure, enacted in 1992, requires all tax increases and bonded debt to be put to a vote.

A similiar ad appeared in the Boulder Daily Camera, in the district of Boulder Democrat Sen. Ron Tupa, just days before he also voted against the tax hike.

CEA staffer Deborah Fallin, who is listed as the contact for Colorado Campaign for Children and Public Schools, said her organization picked members like Tupa and Kester, "whose districts were going to benefit" from the tax hike.

"We felt this decision was very important to Colorado and Colorado's children, so we decided to apply a little pressure," Fallin said.