Category Archives: Taxes

Mar 26

Fields: Taxpayer’s Bill of Rights deserves credit for Colorado’s economy, not John Hickenlooper

Posted on by

Under the scrutiny of the national media, John Hickenlooper’s official campaign for President has gotten off to a rocky start. Most of the national media coverage following his announcement has focused on his refusal to be labeled a capitalist during an interview on MSNBC. In a characteristic Colorado style, local TV anchor Kyle Clark tweeted, “’I may be a capitalist,’ @Hickenlooper writes. His 180 turned into a 360 now a 540. That’s @SeanWhite-level rotation.”

John Hickenlooper

In his prepared launch video, and in media appearances since then, Colorado’s former governor has been regularly touting his role in Colorado’s booming economy. It’s true that Colorado has been ranked as the nation’s #1 economy. We’re consistently on lists of the best places to live and work in the U.S., and we attract hundreds of thousands of new residents every year.

Still, the fact is that our economy isn’t thriving because of John Hickenlooper. In actuality, a majority of the credit goes to the Taxpayer’s Bill of Rights (TABOR) – a unique law that allows Coloradans to vote on any and all tax increase.

It’s a simple concept – lawmakers have to make the case to voters in order to get more of their hard-earned money. TABOR also provides guardrails for the size of government. State spending still grows every year, but it’s limited to inflation plus population growth. The end result of TABOR is to keep the government truly serving the people. Continue reading →

Mar 20

Amy Oliver Cooke: Colorado Democrats plan to trick voters into killing TABOR

Posted on by

Amy Oliver Cooke: Colorado Democrats plan to trick voters into killing TABOR

Opinion | March 19, 2019

Amy Oliver Cooke 

Colorado Democrats plan to trick voters into killing TABOR

As expected, Democratic lawmakers announced their intent to keep all taxpayer money and permanently set aside the spending cap that is key to the effectiveness of the Colorado’s Taxpayers Bill of Rights (TABOR), an amendment to the state constitution passed in 1992 that requires state and local government to seek voter approval before raising taxes. The measure also limits growth in state spending to population growth, plus inflation, and if the state takes in more than it is allowed to spend, the state must return the surplus to taxpayers.

TABOR is simple it’s about consent. Our government can raise taxes, but it has to ask first. Democrats in the State House and Senate don’t think they should have to ask first. In addition to seeking voter approval for additional taxes, TABOR fosters good, fair, and consensual government.

Continue reading →

Mar 11

Opinion: TABOR has united Coloradans

Posted on by

Opinion: TABOR has united Coloradans

PUBLISHED ON MAR 10, 2019 5:00AM MDT

Michael Fields@MichaelCLFields

Special to The Colorado Sun

In a growing partisan culture, there’s still something Coloradans ranging the political spectrum can agree on: the Taxpayer’s Bill of Rights (TABOR).

In recent public polling, when given the simple, unbiased definition, 71 percent of registered voters in Colorado support TABOR, while only 28 percent oppose the law.

What’s the secret to this overwhelming popularity? First, Coloradans love being able to vote on tax increases. It’s simple: the government has to make the case to voters in order to get more of their hard-earned money.

Michael Fields

Second, TABOR provides guardrails for the size of government. The state budget still grows every year, but the growth is limited. TABOR keeps the government truly serving the people.

Over the past several years, voters have sent a message to state lawmakers by voting down the last six statewide tax increases on the ballot — most by huge margins.

But this hasn’t stopped lawmakers and progressive special interest groups from developing workarounds in the form of fees, enterprises, and lawsuits to allow the state to spend more taxpayer money. Continue reading →

Mar 10

Democrats won’t leave TABOR alone

Posted on by

Democrats won’t leave TABOR alone

Posted on  by Citizen Press Staff

Are you tired of voting at the polls to keep Democrats from taking your hard earned money?

Well, you may have to do it again with Democrats wanting to take another swing at TABOR.

According to the Colorado Sun, Democrat lawmakers want voters to permanently set aside spending caps in the Taxpayer Bill of Rights.

House Speaker KC Becker, from Boulder, is drafting the measure. Becker at a town hall meeting pleaded, “I’m asking voters ‘Can you let the state keep the revenue we are already collecting?’”

Translation: We’re entitled to keep more of the money we are stealing from you.

The measure would allow the state to keep as much as $960 million in your tax dollars through June 2020.

What don’t these Democrats understand?

Continue reading →

Mar 08

Colorado hospital fees do not violate TABOR, Denver District Court rules (updated)

Posted on by

Colorado hospital fees do not violate TABOR, Denver District Court rules

The fees have generated more than $4.6 billion over the past decade, according to the Colorado Department of Health Care Policy and Financing.

By KIERAN NICHOLSON | knicholson@denverpost.com | The Denver Post
PUBLISHED:  | UPDATED: 

Hospital fees that have generated billions of dollars in Colorado are legal and do not violate Colorado’s Taxpayers Bill of Rights, according to a Denver District Court ruling.

The Wednesday ruling found that the Hospital Provider Fee and the subsequent Healthcare Affordability and Sustainability Fee are “fees, and not taxes, and therefore are not subject to TABOR,” according to a Colorado Department of Health Care Policy and Financing (HCPF) news release.

The ruling is in favor of the health care policy department and the Colorado Department of the Treasury.

In 2015, the TABOR Foundation filed a lawsuit challenging the constitutionality of the fees. The hospital provider fee is a charge imposed on hospital stays that other states refer to as a “bed tax.”

Continue reading →

Mar 07

Democratic lawmakers want to ask voters in 2019 to end TABOR cap, but Polis is not so sure

Posted on by

Democratic lawmakers want to ask voters in 2019 to end TABOR cap, but Polis is not so sure

The measure would amount to the most substantial effort in years to rollback the state’s unique limits on government spending

The Colorado Sun — johnfrank@coloradosun.com

Top Democratic lawmakers want to ask Colorado voters this November to permanently set aside the spending cap in the state’s Taxpayer’s Bill of Rights.

House Speaker KC Becker is drafting a measure to put a question on the 2019 ballot that would allow the state to keep as much as $960 million in projected revenues through June 2020 — money that otherwise would get refunded to taxpayers. The proposal would split the dollars evenly between K-12 education, higher education and transportation.

But now Democratic Gov. Jared Polis is not sure it’s the right strategy — or that it can pass.

“Going to the ballot in 2019 is possible, but it’s premature to say that it is the right strategy at this time,” Polis spokeswoman Laurie Cipriano told The Colorado Sun on Wednesday. “The governor wants to ensure that if he supports a ballot initiative that it’s set up for success.”

The dispute only further complicates the party’s effort to rollback TABOR, the state’s unique constitutional restriction on spending that is one of most volatile issues in Colorado politics. And it once again pits the governor against lawmakers in his own party early in his term.

Continue reading →

Mar 04

Will Democratic Primary Voters Tolerate a Liberal? A former Colorado governor will test whether the Sandernistas have taken over the party.

Posted on by

Will Democratic Primary Voters Tolerate a Liberal?

A former Colorado governor will test whether the Sandernistas have taken over the party.

By James Freeman

March 4, 2019 4:55 p.m. ET


Former Colorado Gov. John Hickenlooper at a campaign house party in Manchester, N.H. last month. PHOTO: ELISE AMENDOLA/ASSOCIATED PRESS

Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont is claiming a socialist victory in the battle of ideas. Meanwhile former Colorado Gov. John Hickenlooper is running for President and testing whether economic non-extremists can still win Democratic presidential primaries.

Sunday in Chicago, Mr. Sanders implied that people no longer view him as a Marxist kook. The Chicago Tribune reports on a Sanders speech at Navy Pier:

“Three years ago, they thought we were kind of crazy and extreme, not the case anymore,” he said. “We are not only going to defeat (President Donald) Trump, we are going to transform the United States of America.”

 

Mr. Sanders has certainly made extremism cool among Democratic presidential candidates. All of his fellow senators seeking the party’s nomination have joined him in co-sponsoring the Green New Deal and its promise of government health care and the end of traditional energy sources. They have also voted for an abortion policy so expansive that it allows adults to decide the fate of children even when they are no longer in the womb. Continue reading →

Feb 28

State finances are enjoying flush times and some states are sending that bounty back to taxpayers.

Posted on by

Some States, Flush With Cash, Are Sending Money to Taxpayers

Ten years after the recession, many states have revenue surpluses and plan to boost spending or cut taxes

State finances are enjoying flush times and some states are sending that bounty back to taxpayers.
 
Arkansas this month lowered its top personal income-tax rate by 1 percentage point to 5.9% and South Carolina has proposed an income tax rebate to all residents who file returns. In Florida, the governor has proposed lowering property and sales taxes. The givebacks come even as all three states proposed increased spending on education and other priorities.
 
Ten years after the recession, many states have the choice of what to spend revenues on rather than what programs to cut. The National Conference of State Legislatures found in a fall survey that 48 states expected to meet or exceed their revenue expectations.
 
“States have come off of a strong last fiscal year, and the economy is strong so they’re expecting it to continue,” said Kim Rueben, a senior fellow at the Tax Policy Center. “It could mean more spending or cutting taxes.”

Continue reading →