Ritter OKs bill blowing state budget cap; Dems say tax limits are next target

Posted Wed, 03 Jun 2009

As Colorado's Democrat governor effectively signed away a long-standing policy limiting the growth of the state's budget, a key legislative ally called today for rolling back other restraints on taxing and spending. Incoming Senate Democrat leader John Morse welcomed the enactment of controversial Senate Bill 228--diverting billions of dollars away from transportation projects in coming years--by promising that the fight "is just beginning" to retool the state's other constitutional taxing and spending limits.

That double-punch left Republicans incredulous, and they pointed out that only months ago, Colorado voters soundly rejected a ballot proposal that would have gutted the perennially popular Taxpayer's Bill of Rights, or TABOR, in the state constitution. GOP members also said today's developments point to further tax hikes down the road if Democrats were to succeed in dismantling TABOR and other taxing and spending limits.

"Apparently, they’re not content with the largest property-tax hike in a generation or with a billion dollars in new taxes and fees. They're not even satisfied after repealing decades-old spending limits," Senate Republican leader Josh Penry said of Democrat policies enacted in the past three legislative sessions. "Now, it sounds like they’re planning the mother of all tax increases--amid the mother of all recessions."

Added the Grand Junction lawmaker, "If th<!--[if gte mso 10]>

<![endif]-->ey think Coloradans want California-style taxing and spending, let the debate begin."

GOP members say SB 228 derails prudent policies that have prevented runaway growth in the operating

Senate GOP leader Josh Penry

budget under Republican and Democrat governors alike, and it eliminates the only mechanism in place for investing some of the budget in the state's backlogged highway system.

Penry and legislative Republicans have been warning for months of the ill-effects of scrapping the state's 6 percent cap on year-to-year growth in the operating budget. They've noted that states like California and New York that have no meaningful budget caps in place suffer the consequences when revenue falls in an economic downturn. Both states went on spending sprees when times were good and now have to contend with walloping, multibillion-dollar deficits as plummeting tax revenue can't keep pace with their sky-high spending.

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“If governors of both parties like Roy Romer and Bill Owens could function quite well with reasonable growth limits on the state budget, it’s hard to see why this administration cannot,” said Senate GOP Whip Nancy Spence, of Centennial. “I cannot think of a worse time to lay the groundwork for higher and higher taxes than during a recession.”

Republicans say the measure will dramatically shortchange the state's bottlenecked highways and other backlogged infrastructure projects. While the bill inlcludes a funding formula for transportation, Republicans say it is intended as a sop to critics that actually provides no funding whatsoever for highways in its first four years. After that, the bill would cut a small slice for highways—but only for five years, and only if the economy grows aggressively. Even then, it would fall far short of the funding highways would get if the current formula were left in place.

According to one estimate, doing away with Colorado's current cap would short transportation by well over $300 million as soon as the 2011-12 budget year alone. And if the 6-percent limit and the highway-funding formula had been eliminated just five years ago, it would have cost Colorado's highways upwards of $1 billion by now, Republicans say.

Republicans say any Democrat attempts to eliminate even more taxing and spending restraints are an affront to the taxpaying public, which has refused to go along with most such proposals in the past.

Last fall, Colorado voters decisively defeated Amendment 59 on the statewide ballot; the measure, adopted by ruling Democrats during the 2008 legislature, would have mooted key provisions of TABOR by letting the state government keep excess revenue it otherwise would have to return to taxpayers.

In 2003, voters thrashed--by 77 percent to 22 percent--an attempt to roll back statewide limits on property taxes.

Morse nonetheless vowed today to change public minds.

"This is a fight for the very soul of Colorado, and it's just beginning," he said as he lauded Ritter's support of SB 228. "We are not done."

Ritter OKs bill blowing state budget cap; Dems say tax limits are next target

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