TABOR Committee actions in 2025
911 Call Center state enterprise (December into February)
We considered a lawsuit about a new expansion of TABOR enterprises. In this instance a bill last year established a state fee to fund 911 call centers. It is a redundancy of the local systems in place as the eventual fund recipients are the locally funded call centers.
Pfiffner reached out to our supporters in the legal profession, asking if the TABOR Foundation should get involved. There was no interest or support in pursuing a lawsuit even if the issue was a twist to weakening TABOR. The originator of the request expressed strong appreciation for the strength of the team and for a defining response.
Buc-ee’s at Palmer Lake (January into March); again in the summer
Buc-ee’s has proposed a new gas station and store at the Palmer Lake exit on I-25. The Town proposes to tax the development and then use the tax revenue to subsidize the water utility, which the Town alleges is a government enterprise (we have some doubts). One area resident, [—name redacted—], alleges that the subsidy will exceed the TABOR enterprise limit of 10% and asked us to oppose the project. We decided not to take a position for or against the development, but will weigh in if a TABOR violation arises, acting only to clarify what would be allowed under TABOR.  The request was put on hold in the early spring when Buc-ee’s withdrew its application, but the company revived the project in the summer. The possibility of our participation is still open, but for now the ongoing political processes make any such action premature, as a successful recall election removed proponents on the Town Council and put the prospect in doubt, the planning commission voted against the proposal and public hearings are scheduled for later in 2025.
Tracking bills and reactions (January into May)
Several Directors used a donation of a legislative bill tracker to review the bills in the 2025 legislative session. We identified those that were bad ideas and sent out warnings to our membership and discussed how to respond. The session was relatively quiet with a few exceptions. The worst were:
- A bill passed that expanded what can be considered exempt state revenue from lawsuits and property sales, which we concluded would survive any lawsuit we could bring,
- A bill that placed Proposition LL and Proposition MM on the 2025 fall ballot
- A proposal to revive the lawsuit that TABOR is unconstitutional (below).
Debate on legislation (April)
The TABOR Foundation was invited by the Boulder Chamber of Commerce to participate in a panel discussion on three bills. Natalie Menten presented via Zoom on behalf of the Committee, with the exception of HB25-1005, where we did not have a formal board position and instead argued against the bill in her personal capacity:
- HJR25-1023 – Require General Assembly TABOR Constitutionality Lawsuit
- HB25-1005 – Eliminate Vendor Fee
- HB25-1296 – Tax Expenditure Adjustment
The Bell Policy Center presented in support of the measures. Jon Caldara of the Independence Institute also presented in opposition.
Prepared to testify on HJR-1023 (February into May)
This legislative resolution was the Fenster lawsuit redux (Kerr, et. al. vs. Polis). The House Joint Resolution directed the Attorney General’s office to file a lawsuit to overturn the Taxpayer’s Bill of Rights arguing the legal theory that the constitutional provision violates the US constitution’s mandate for a republican form of government. It was introduced and quickly heard, then sat on the House calendar for the final two months of session. We feared that it would move ahead in the final days of the session, like the Sonnenberg $400 million tax increase did several years back, so we closely monitored it over the last two weeks of session. It never was heard by the entire House and died the last day of session.  Kudos to Rep. Gonzalez, who was prepared with a ton of amendments, drafted with the help of Natalie Menten, meant to slow and filibuster the resolution to death. Leadership understood that bringing the resolution forward on the calendar would mean the loss of a lot of other work waiting to be heard.
Monitoring and participation in Title Setting Board actions (May to September)
Our most recent efforts have been to combat various petition initiatives which would institute a progressive tax rate. On October 15, Natalie Menten and Rebecca Sopkin, in their individual citizen capacity, appeared at a Title Board hearing to object to the titles of two proposed initiatives being proposed by the Bell Policy Center, on the grounds that the Title Board had no jurisdiction to set title since the proposed initiatives contained more than one subject. The Title Board agreed and those proposed initiatives have now been withdrawn. However, Bell Policy has already filed their next proposed initiative so this effort will be on-going. The new initiative would delete only the flat rate mandate; a proposed ballot issue that would leave part of a sentence dangling without context in that paragraph.  We prevailed in the first skirmish, but we will have to devote considerable time and effort to fight it in 2026.
Telluride transportation ballot irregularities
San Miguel County and specifically the Town of Telluride set up a regional transportation district, known as SMART, mostly to upgrade the public gondola. A tax issue was placed on an earlier year’s ballot, but the enactment of the decision was timed so as to preclude any opposition statement to be filed in time. [—name redacted—], a property owner, asked us to locate a Colorado attorney willing to take the case to overturn the election, based on several alleged improprieties. After Pfiffner’s initial work with [—name redacted—], Rebecca took over to confer and to offer the names of two possible volunteer attorneys, [—name redacted—] and [—name redacted—]. [The original contact] has not returned subsequent contact to confirm if he approached either lawyer. We have no update on the current disposition of the action.
Parker recreation center (April)
We were approached by [—name redacted—] in the Parker area. He errantly believed that the TABOR Committee is a legal firm and was unfamiliar with TABOR. His concern was that a pool and clubhouse owned by a collection of metro districts charges the same access fees to residents outside the districts as to the districts’ taxpayers. He directed us to investigate the issue and to bring a lawsuit to enforce collection of the higher charges for non-residents. I explained what TABOR can and cannot do, that we could not act as he wanted, and suggested best steps for the situation.
Center-Right Coalition (July to ongoing)
Conservative organizations met once a month for years to share information about their current projects. The Centennial Institute is sponsoring the renewed coalition, meeting on the Colorado Christian University campus on the second Tuesday of each month. Our Committee was invited to participate, and Rebecca has been our representative there.
Pueblo West Metropolitan District (July)
[—name redacted—] asked for our assessment of the expenditure of the quasi-municipal special district that governs Pueblo West. It had spent part of its budget on capital construction for a pool & aquatic facility. Originally, taxpayers had been promised that the taxes to pay for it would come only from a marijuana tax, but other funds ended up being diverted to its construction. The district had followed proper procedures for raising the taxes, so I explained that TABOR is silent on appropriations and his opposition would have to rest on other political arguments against further expenditures on the facility.
South Boulder Creek (April – ongoing)
Randy Weiner, an attorney in practice in the partnership is suing on behalf of homeowners in neighborhoods in which stormwater and flood management fees have been imposed. The City of Boulder is extending a program to pay for handling rainwater from impermeable sources to build a dam and diversion structures to handle potential flooding from South Boulder Creek originating outside the residential area. The new charge appears to be a tax, which would then require a vote for the bonds intended to finance the construction. The judge issued a summary judgment in June against plaintiffs, but the issue is on appeal and ongoing. Rebecca has taken over the role of primary contact with assistance from Susan Canny.
Weld County School District 8 electioneering (August)
The named school district engaged in unethical actions to use taxes to campaign for a new bond election, by spending the money before the official vote to put the issue on the ballot. A local resident, [—name redacted—] of Fort Lupton, asked that we review the issue as a potential TABOR violation and recruit a TABOR attorney if appropriate. I commiserated with her that elected officials would play these games to avoid acting honestly, but explained that electioneering was an issue beyond what TABOR can address.
HOT Lanes fines (September into October)
An attorney, Charles Bradley Sutton (goes by Brad) of Loveland is suing the Colorado Transportation Investment Office on behalf of a client. He argues that the entity has no police authority to impose fines for drivers who improperly cross the express lane lines and that once that position is proven correct, the charges have to be identified as new taxes imposed without a TABOR vote. We considered putting a legal team together to sue on behalf of TABOR, but concluded that any such lawsuit would be unlikely to succeed, would consume too much attention and too many resources, and that the issue itself is not a high enough priority for us to pursue it.
Reaction to T-Mobile vs City of Lakewood ruling (September)
The ruling was an unexpected win for TABOR. T-Mobile sued the City after the government expanded the reach of the original ordinance.  The City tax was only on Mountain Bell’s telephone exchange and lines – a commercial landline service. The City in two different steps passed measures to encompass all cell phone service from every provider. The Colorado Supreme Court, in a unanimous decision, declared that the City would have to go to a vote of the residents if it were to impose an expanded definition of the telephone tax. Pfiffner responded to a request for a quote from (Ms.) Perry Cooper, a reporter for the nationally distributed publication, Bloomberg Law, which covers legal issues.
Moffat County ballot language and blue book interference (October)
[—name redacted—] from Craig contacted us with several concerns about two measures on this fall’s ballot in Moffat County. Initially, they seemed worth pursuing, but as Bill Banta and I reviewed them, we found that nothing had enough traction for us to get involved, and relayed those analyses to [—name redacted—]. He was disturbed by the title, but TABOR does not set out how to name a ballot issue. He also questioned the descriptive language in each of the measures, but upon reflection, the language in each case conformed sufficiently to the requirements of TABOR’s election provisions. The election official for each measure accepted an opposition statement but abbreviated it, even though there were no competing statements. That seemed unnecessary, but allowed by TABOR (in paragraph 3[b](v)). The County Clerks Association should set out standards for when and how an election official can modify statements, suggesting a project for the TABOR Committee to take up next year.
Opposing Propositions LL and MM (October)
The Board took an official position against the two 2025 statewide ballot issues. We created a fact sheet giving reasons why voters should vote down the measures and sent those out to the broadest membership. We found that the original TABOR Coalition network was no longer functioning due to the departure of [—name redacted—] from Americans for Prosperity. West and Pfiffner re-created the group list and sent the fact sheet out to the Coalition, urging each organization to take a stand in opposition, and inviting them to use the fact sheet as they saw fit. Due to the problems with our ISP marking our group emails as spam, it is likely that the messages got lost in the internet ether and so never reached our intended audiences.
