Category Archives: TABOR Refunds

Sep 09

Colorado Springs Gazette: New ‘affordable housing’ measure misses the mark

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Colorado Springs Gazette: New ‘affordable housing’ measure misses the mark

  • Colorado Springs Gazette Editorial Board
  •  Updated 
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Rendering of the future affordable multifamily apartment complex to be located at 8315 E. Colfax Ave. in Denver’s East Colfax neighborhood.

Image courtesy of Van Meter Williams Pollack

While visiting Western Slope resort towns, tourists count on some of Colorado’s most aggrieved workers. Few consider how these employees live.

Recent immigrants, students on summer break and others wait tables, clean hotel rooms, park cars, guide rafting tours, teach ski lessons and provide a large assortment of other services required for tourism.

Visitors typically don’t think about the commutes tourism workers make for jobs in Steamboat Springs, Aspen, Vail, Telluride, Glenwood Springs and other resort towns with exorbitant costs of living.

Sperling’s Best Places finds housing in Aspen costs 707.4% more than the national average. Vail housing costs 397% more than the average; Glenwood Springs, 215.7% more; Steamboat Springs, 257% more; and Telluride 391% more. That’s to be expected in communities that provide second homes for wealthy consumers who fly in and out from around the globe.

As the tourism economy spreads to neighboring towns, workers find themselves commuting farther and farther to find basic shelter. The housing cost in Edwards — 11 miles east of Vail — exceeds the national average by 438.4%.

Low-wage employees in Vail often commute 80 miles round trip, or more, to live in mobile homes in Gypsum and other places far from their jobs. Local affordable housing initiatives have helped a fortunate few but not most.

Colorado needs tourists and the industry needs workers. Yet, economic forces prevent restaurants and hotels from paying the wages required to rent or buy in markets with housing costs beyond the universe of normal. Average tourists simply cannot pay $100 for a cheeseburger or $1,000 a night for a midgrade hotel room.

Given this socioeconomic dilemma, we hoped Initiative 108 might help more Colorado tourism workers live closer to their jobs. Called the Make Colorado Affordable Act, the November ballot measure proposes diverting 0.1% of the general fund into a state affordable housing program.

The state would fund this by dipping into future TABOR refunds, such as the $750 in direct payments each taxpayer received this year by mandate of the Colorado Constitution’s Taxpayer’s Bill of Rights. By 2024, the proposed TABOR retention would generate about $300 million for the fund.

That massive diversion of taxpayer earnings must ease the burdens of tourism workers, or it’s not a good plan. Sadly, it would do no such thing.

To continue reading this editorial, click (HERE) to go to the Colorado Springs Gazette.

Jul 30

Affordable housing program will cut into your TABOR refunds

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Affordable housing program will cut into your TABOR refunds

By Natalie Menten

Guest Commentary

The state government has taken more taxes from you than we allow it to have, and it should rebate that over-collection back to you. That money coming back to all taxpayers is now in jeopardy. We should be alarmed at the potential waste.

Colorado voters’ dissatisfaction with government growing beyond its means led to the passage of the Taxpayer’s Bill of Rights (TABOR). This constitutional amendment requires voter approval for tax increases and debt. It also limits how fast government can grow. The formula for automatic tax increases is the prior year’s budget plus adjustment for inflation and population growth.

When government collects taxes above the limit, it must refund the surplus. Later this year, each taxpayer will get a $750 TABOR rebate from the state. The economic outlook predicts rebates for the next several years.

Two statewide ballot measures in November claim they don’t raise taxes, but that’s just not true. Funding for new programs comes from our future TABOR rebates. If we don’t get all those rebates back, that’s effectively a higher tax rate and clearly a tax hike.

One measure proposes to divert TABOR rebates to subsidize affordable housing programs. Proponents have spent hefty money on paid signature gathering. They are meeting with local elected officials and lobbying for political buy-in. They gloat that they had raised $5 million by June 1 and that they plan to spend millions more to sway Colorado voters. How much of the campaign donations will come from developers who specialize in subsidized projects?

Our TABOR rebates would be diverted into a new “Affordable Housing Fund,” to be split 60/40 between state and local governments. The requirements to release the funds come with damaging, top-down controls. Local elected officials would have to guarantee increasing affordable housing by 3% each year over a baseline number, as well as implementing a 90-day fast-track permit approval process.

If a local jurisdiction won’t or can’t comply with the measure’s requirements, not only would we taxpayers not receive our TABOR rebates, but the local government would be disqualified from the subsidy.

How would dense metro areas increase subsidized housing units year after year? Would they build out, build up or replace?

At what point might local governments discourage and make it more difficult to build singlefamily homes? Examples abound, including Minneapolis, Oregon and California banning single-family developments. It seems far-fetched that Colorado would enact these restrictive policies, but that’s what we have to anticipate with passage of this ballot measure.

This measure encourages government to compete against Ma and Pa to buy property. Who has deeper pockets?

Seniors whose retirement depends on rental income might well be affected because this proposal creates an eviction defense fund, which would pay attorneys with taxpayer money to prevent landlords from evicting non-paying tenants who are at risk of becoming homeless.

There’s a long list of problems in this extreme initiative (currently No. 108). The paid circulators I’ve encountered know little to nothing about the Taxpayer’s Bill of Rights, so they aren’t informing signers that the money comes from our upcoming TABOR tax rebates.

Since backers are apparently willing to spend many, many millions of dollars to pump out TV ads and fill our mailboxes with slick marketing pieces, I don’t know where our opposition campaign will find similar amounts of money to counter the propaganda.

Citizens who sign the petition likely aren’t aware of the devious, negative results. Hopefully by the time the election rolls around in November, voters will understand this ballot issue’s dangers and vote no.

 

Jul 30

Coloradans can thank TABOR for their tax rebate

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Like a lottery jackpot, Colorado’s state revenue surplus keeps growing. And so do the rebates that will be returned to the state’s taxpayers in the next few months. The latest news, reported Wednesday in The Gazette, is taxpayers can expect to receive at least $750 in the mail — up from the previous $500 estimate.

It’s welcome news, of course, especially as the nation’s economy goes sideways amid spiraling inflation. The $750 checks that will go out to individual tax filers — $1,500 for couples filing jointly — will be a boon to many Coloradans who are finding it ever harder to make ends meet. Some 3.1 million Coloradans will receive a refund directly in the mail in August or September.

“We are providing real relief when Coloradans need it most,” Gov. Jared Polis said of the refunds this week. “Everyone in our state is feeling the impact of rising costs, and I refuse to let the government sit on taxpayers’ money when it could be used to make life a little bit easier for the people of our state.”

Wow, thanks, guv! Our Democratic chief exec from Boulder could have delivered that line at the next Republican National Convention and felt right at home. Continue reading →

Jul 22

Affordable housing program will cut into your TABOR refunds

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Affordable housing program will cut into your TABOR refunds

By Natalie Menten

Guest Commentary

The state government has taken more taxes from you than we allow it to have, and it should rebate that over-collection back to you. That money coming back to all taxpayers is now in jeopardy. We should be alarmed at the potential waste.

Colorado voters’ dissatisfaction with government growing beyond its means led to the passage of the Taxpayer’s Bill of Rights (TABOR). This constitutional amendment requires voter approval for tax increases and debt. It also limits how fast government can grow. The formula for automatic tax increases is the prior year’s budget plus adjustment for inflation and population growth.

When government collects taxes above the limit, it must refund the surplus. Later this year, each taxpayer will get a $750 TABOR rebate from the state. The economic outlook predicts rebates for the next several years.

Two statewide ballot measures in November claim they don’t raise taxes, but that’s just not true. Funding for new programs comes from our future TABOR rebates. If we don’t get all those rebates back, that’s effectively a higher tax rate and clearly a tax hike.

Click the link below to continue reading this article at the Denver Post.

 

Opinion: Statewide affordable housing program will cut into your TABOR refunds

Jul 22

Menten: Jeffco commissioners want voters to hand them a blank check

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Jefferson County is one of more than a dozen counties in Colorado that still enjoys the protections of the Taxpayer’s Bill of Rights (TABOR). This constitutional amendment requires voter approval for tax increases and debt.  It also modestly limits how fast government can grow. The formula for automatic tax increases is the prior year’s budget plus adjustment for inflation and local growth.

Jefferson County government is presently allowed to grow 3.9% annually under the formula as described in a Board of County Commissioners agenda for July 19 (page 171).  That’s a reasonable amount for government growth – compare it to your household. Have you gotten nearly a 4% increase in your income?

Yet, the county commissioners have spent the last few years claiming they have insufficient revenue to maintain operations. Now they blame the revenue problem on the pandemic, yet the county received close to a couple hundred million in COVID relief money.

That pile of federal money still didn’t calm down the county commissioners’ quest to get rid of our Taxpayer’s Bill of Rights.

To continue reading the rest of this story, please click (HERE) to go to Complete Colorado

#ItsYourMoneyNotTheirs
#ThankGodForTABOR
#VoteOnTaxesAndFees
#FeesAreTaxes
#TABOR
#FollowTheMoney
#FollowTheLaw

May 06

Democrats’ top legislative priority: re-election

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Democrats’ top legislative priority: re-election

    • By Mark Hillman

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Mark Hillman

God saw fit to stop at 10 commandments, but politicians can’t leave well enough alone, so a series of “Eleventh Commandments” apply to them. One of those admonishes: Thou shall not make the voters more cynical.

This year, Democrats at our State Capitol are breaking that commandment, too.

So, let’s take a little walk down memory lane and remember this journey through Election Day.

Last week, Gov. Jared Polis and legislative Democrats tossed aside 30 years of fierce opposition to Colorado’s Taxpayer Bill of Rights (TABOR) which they’ve blamed for everything from crumbling roads to failing schools. Instead, they held a press conference to tout “their” plan to send every taxpayer a $400 check barely one month before voters receive their general election ballots.

There’s just one problem: that money already belongs to taxpayers.

Continue reading →

Apr 18

The Colorado Title Board & TABOR

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The April 20th Title Board Hearing has a notable 60 proposals on the agenda because it’s the last chance to get title set for the 2022 ballot. Although the list of potential ballot issues is long, many are variations with a slight tweak.  After title setting, the proponents must do the hard (or expensive) work of getting enough signatures.

Nearly a 1/3 of the proposals pertain to alcohol licensing, sales, and delivery.

Property taxes are another hot topic. Pro-taxpayer advocates are presenting relief in the form of a 2%-3% cap on property taxes.

Bigger government advocates propose a new tax on “Luxury Residential Real Property,” defined as $2 million or more. New revenues would be turned over to government to address affordable housing.  On that same theme, there’s a proposal to increase the income tax rate which would be spent on government-overseen affordable housing.

Another group wants to increase taxes from income tax by reducing deductions, putting increased taxation towards free school lunches for certain public schools – an expenditure of $60 – $140 million dollars a year.

Protecting the Taxpayer’s Bill of Rights begins before a ballot issue hits the street. The public can testify at the title setting meeting to get transparent language about the financial effects. If you’ve been around Colorado long enough you know that proponents of tax increases will actually try to have the question read, “without raising taxes” if they can get away with it. As we know, if you end up with less money in your pocket because of a tax policy change, that’s a tax increase.

Currently, there’s a legal battle just filed with the Supreme Court over initiatives #62-65, called Additional Revenue to State Education Fund.  Proponents are attempting to claim the measures are not a tax increase. Any of the four variations would reduce or completely eliminate our expected rebates from the Taxpayer’s Bill of Rights over the next two years. Since there is no sunset, we would give up a substantial amount of our future refunds if #62-65 moves forward.

You can find the ballot proposals at the Colorado Secretary of State website under Elections & Voting and Initiatives & Title Board. You’re looking for the section titled Awaiting Initial Hearing.

You can testify remotely. The meeting is Wednesday, April 20 starting at 9 am. https://attendee.gotowebinar.com/register/3996912106274902539

Email the Title Setting Board at initiatives@coloradosos.gov. Emails should be sent by Tuesday midday at the latest. Otherwise, listen in remotely and chime in when it’s time. It’s going to be a long meeting.

 

Natalie Menten
TABOR Board Member