A hotly debated, statewide property-tax hike that Gov. Bill Ritter pushed through the legislature last year is now projected to take $3.8 billion from home- and business owners over the next 10 years. That is more than double the $1.7 billion in revenue that was estimated when legislative Democrats approved the measure at the Ritter administration's behest in the 2007 session.

The change reflects an updated economic forecast by the nonpartisan state Legislative Council, as reported in a front-page story in today's Denver Post. 

Republican Senate and House members, who almost unanimously had opposed the tax hike from the outset, issued a told-ya-so to the administration. 

"It's modern-day bank robbery," Rep. Cory Gardner, a Yuma Republican who requested the new estimate, told the Post. "The fraudulent part of this is it's done without a vote of the people."

Added Republican Sen. Mike Kopp, "We believe it was a reckless overreach last year, and the new numbers bear that out more than ever." Kopp, of Littleton, is carrying a measure with Gardner to let voters reconsider the Ritter tax hike.

The Democrat-approved tax hike froze the property mill levy--the multiplier by which property tax bills are calculated--leading to higher tax bills as property values rise. Property values are expected to do just that in most of Colorado, as is made clear in the Legislative Council memo to Gardner.

"The primary reason for the increase is adjustments to assessed value forecasts:

through FY 2011-12, the assessed value forecast increased by a cumulative total of about $42 billion, or almost 10 percent," the memo states. "Based on recently revised forecasts for inflation, pupil counts, and assessed value, the projected, cumulative ten-year impact of the property tax provisions of Senate Bill 07-199 is just under $3.8 billion. This figure updates the $1.7 billion amount provided in the spring of 2007."

The administration has characterized the tax hike as a boon to public schools because it wants to use the extra money to stabilize the State Education Fund as well as expand some education programs. However, Republicans have pointed out that none of the money will actually stay with the local school districts in whose name the property tax is being raised.

Republicans also have said the tax hike is illegal because a provision in the state Constitution requires all tax hikes to go to a vote of the people. Democrats including the House speaker have claimed a statewide vote was not necessary because all the school districts in which the tax hike has taken effect have individually held votes to modify or eliminate the constitutional spending limits in their districts to fund various projects.

Gardner dismissed that argument.

"Clearly voters in all of those school districts across the state intended their local vote to be for a local issue," Gardner said. "They never intended for the state government to swoop in and skim the cream off the top."

Gardner added, "Let's be honest about this: None of the money collected under this sweeping tax hike is going to stay with local school districts. Those local voters never meant for their hard-earned money to disappear into the black hole of the state budget."