Senate Republicans lauded Gov. Bill Ritter's support for a major education reform in the GOP's 2008 legislative agenda--standards-based education--which the governor included in his annual State of the State speech today.

The Republicans also expressed cautious optimism after Ritter seemed to take a step back from some overly ambitious and costly proposals that his party embraced last year.

The GOP lawmakers warned, however, that any effort by the administration to push through meaningful school reform would face its highest hurdles in the governor's own party.

"The governor's announcement represents a real boon to the Republican priority for education reform," said the GOP's Sen. Mike Kopp, of Littleton.

"My concern is with the foes of such reforms who run the pivotal education committees in the two chambers," Kopp said. "I hope the governor can shepherd this effort through the General Assembly, and we will be glad to help however we can."

The governor in this morning's speech had touted the Colorado Achievement Plan for Kids, a bipartisan measure that piggybacks on a GOP proposal by Sen. Josh Penry, of Grand Junction, and Rep. Rob Witwer, of Genesee. That proposal, unveiled by legislative Republicans last fall, would establish comprehensive, statewide curriculum standard for graduating from a Colorado high school.

The new plan, which the governor called, "the most revolutionary shift in education policy this state has seen in years," will be sponsored by Penry and Denver Democrat Chris Romer in the Senate as well as Witwer and Democrat Christine Scanlan in the House.

The GOP lawmakers took the opportunity as well to renew their call on Ritter to sign

two Republican proposals for which he has expressed some support--incentive pay for teachers and a strike ban on public employees.

The Republicans said supporting a public-employee strike prohibition is the least the administration could do after its sweeping concessions to big labor last year, when it granted unions unprecedented ability to collectively bargain with the state in setting pay and perks.

"After all of the public debate in recent months about the Ritter administration's troubling accommodations with the unions, I was concerned that he didn't mention the issue once today," said Assistant Senate Republican leader Nancy Spence. Spence and Republican Rep. Bob Gardner, of Colorado Springs, are sponsoring the ban on strikes by public employees.

"I am still counting on the governor to follow through on his pledge to support a strike ban," Spence said. "We have to safeguard the vital public services on which the taxpayers depend."

Senate GOP leader Andy McElhany, of Colorado Springs, said another thing noticeably absent from the governor's speech was any support for a tax hike on next fall's statewide ballot.

"That's a good thing, and I hope for the governor's sake that he continues to back away from his party's very vocal support for costly schemes on issues like health care and transportation," McElhany said. "All the available survey data is telling us the public is in no mood for a tax hike."

McElhany also pointed out that the Ritter administration raised taxes already, having pushed a statewide property-tax hike through the legislature last year. New data from the nonpartisan office of Legislative Council shows that the tax hike will raise property-tax bills on most Colorado homes and businesses by $3.8 billion over the next 10 years.

"Maybe the administration figures one tax hike is enough," McElhany said. "Let's hope so."

Kopp and the GOP's Rep. Cory Gardner, of Yuma, are proposing a measure to let voters reconsider the tax hike.