May
07
Category Archives: Transportation
Apr
27
Colorado lawmakers are looking at how to close a $3 billion budget shortfall. Here’s the roadmap.
The Joint Budget Committee will begin reviewing recommendations for spending cuts this week to rewrite the $30 billion state budget
The impact of the coronavirus pandemic on the $30 billion-plus state budget begins to take shape this week as lawmakers consider massive spending cuts.
How much tax revenue Colorado will lose to the paralyzed economy remains uncertain, but the governor’s budget office is projecting $3 billion in lost revenue for the current fiscal year and the next.
The General Assembly’s budget writers on Monday will start reviewing recommendations from legislative analysts for potential spending cuts across all government agencies. The documents are expected to include scenarios for slashing budgets as much as 20% and force legislators to make hard choices that will impact most Colorado families, according to drafts reviewed by The Colorado Sun.
Apr
07
“Truth and reason in ballot language!”
“Truth and reason in ballot language!”
April, 2020
The Taxpayer’s Bill of Rights includes good government provisions that improve election procedures.
There was a time when Colorado elected officials could push for passage of a bond, or for new taxes, but bury the cost very deep into the explanation on the ballot, in hopes that many voters might not notice the magnitude of the tax.
The ballot language would promise all kinds of wonderful outcomes. Not only would the new revenues for the government solve the problem in perpetuity, but it would bring world peace and even make the voter more handsome! Then, near the end in the midst of a lot of other promises, would come the information that the cost to the taxpayer would be very, very high.
The Taxpayer’s Bill of Rights stopped that sort of game playing. Now, the government must put the cost right up front. It has no option but to state how much the new tax will weigh annually on the taxpayer. For a new bond, the ballot measure must state at the very beginning how much the total new debt will be and what that means for the total repayment cost. Only then may the government (“district”) present its reasons for the new taxes.
Another game that the Taxpayer’s Bill of Rights anticipated and which it explicitly prohibits is a government underestimating a revenue number. If the new taxes exceed the estimate, the entirety of the overage must be refunded the next year and the rate adjusted downward.
Colorado constitution (Article X, Section 20), paragraph 3(c) states: “Ballot titles shall begin, ‘SHALL (DISTRICT) TAXES BE INCREASED ____ ANNUALLY?’ (or) ‘SHALL (DISTRICT) DEBT BE INCREASED (principal amount) WITH A REPAYMENT COST OF (maximum..)’.” Earlier in the same paragraph is the requirement that “if a tax increase exceeds any estimate… for the same fiscal year, the tax increase is thereafter reduced up to 100% in proportion to the …excess, and the combined excess revenue refunded….”
The paragraph was carefully crafted as a good government improvement, with TABOR protecting the taxpayer in ways beyond just voting on tax rates.
Mar
19
Explore the Colorado State Budget
Michael Fields@MichaelCLFields
Here’s a good tool to better understand our state budget. It’s much more accessible than what’s been previously available from the state.
KC Becker@kcbecker
If you’re looking for something to read while #socialdistancing, we’ve launched a tool to help you understand the Colorado Budget! Find simple explanations on where revenue comes from, how taxes are spent, TABOR, school financing, and much more!
To see where the money comes in and goes out in Colorado’s state budget, click (HERE):
Mar
12
Paid leave, petitions ballot measures land in state Supreme Court
Kelly Brough, the president and CEO of the Denver Metro Chamber of Commerce, filed four of the challenges. She wrote in a court petition that she believed Initiative 245, which would create a right to ballot initiative at virtually every level of state and local government, had a misleading ballot title because it omitted descriptions of several key features from the complex measure.
Specifically, she argued that the title should inform voters of a reduction in signatures required to put an initiative on the ballot, of newly-assigned jurisdiction to the Supreme Court to hear initiative protests and of prohibitions on legislation from the General Assembly on topics that voters previously rejected through referendum.
The three-member Title Board sets the ballot titles for voters if they determine that an initiative constitutes a single subject. The title must include the central components of the proposal, but also be brief.
Mar
12
NEW COLORADO BALLOT PROPOSAL
Increase taxes on rich, lower them for rest
By Alex BurnessThe Denver Post
Coloradans may be voting this November on a proposal to raise billions of dollars annually by hiking taxes on the rich and using the money on schools and other, unspecified needs of a “growing population and changing economy.”
An issue committee that calls itself Fair Tax Colorado announced Thursday that it will begin collecting signatures to place its proposal, titled Initiative 271, on the 2020 ballot. They’ll need at least 124,632 of them to qualify for the ballot.
It would compensate for the loss in revenue from the tax cut by requiring everyone earning at least $250,000 to pay a 7% income tax rate on their federal taxable income after the first $250,000 and up to $500,000.
Anyone earning more than $500,000 would then pay a 7.75% rate on their income above and beyond the first $500,000, and up to $1 million. Finally, for anyone earning more than $1 million, the measure proposes to tax them $67,700 plus 8.9% of all federal taxable income above and beyond the first million
Mar
04
TABOR repeal is off the table for 2020. Now it’s Initiative 271, a $2 billion tax hike targeting the wealthy
Vision 2020 Colorado, a coalition behind a tax system overhaul, tells The Sun it will move forward with a graduated income tax measure that will lower taxes for the vast majority
A coalition pushing to overhaul Colorado’s tax system will not pursue a complete repeal of the Taxpayer’s Bill of Rights this year, opting instead for a ballot measure in November that would generate billions in new money with higher taxes on the wealthy.
The new initiative — which is expected to receive final legal approval Wednesday — is designed to create a more equitable tax system in Colorado by lowering the current 4.63% tax rate for households making less than $250,000 a year.
MORE: Colorado’s regressive tax system, and a proposed graduated income tax, explained
An estimated 95% of taxpayers who are below the threshold would qualify for the tax cut, which would tax effect for 2021. For those who make more, the rate is higher with a maximum of 8.9% for annual taxable income over $1 million.
The organizations behind the ballot question, known collectively as Vision 2020 Colorado, expect the new graduated income tax to generate an estimated $2 billion a year in new money with at least half earmarked to increase teacher salaries and retention. The remainder would be spent at the discretion of state lawmakers.
“We know middle-income Coloradans are paying a greater share of the tax burden than the wealthy 5%, but our tax code isn’t just unfair, it’s inadequate,” said Scott Wasserman, president of the Bell Policy Center, a leading proponent of the measure. The tough decisions made by state lawmakers about how to spend the $30 billion annual budget, he added, are “a purely consequence of our state not having enough money.”
After repeated losses, supporters hope for a different outcome in 2020
The decision to move forward on this measure — shared first with The Colorado Sun — ends months of speculation about the direction liberal advocacy organizations would take in the 2020 election after testing more than 100 different ways, to revamp TABOR or the state’s tax system.
Feb
25
More Tax Increases Headed to the Ballot?
Denver, CO – New taxes may be on their way to the ballot. Colorado Initiative Title Setting Review Board approved language for 12 new taxes. The next step will be collecting the two hundred thousand or more signature to have these ballot initiatives appear on your November 2020 ballot.
After the sound defeat of Proposition CC in 2019, the tax and spend crowd would go away for a while. The simple answer is no. As long as liberal billionaires fund “think tanks” like the Colorado Fiscal Policy Institute and the Bell Center For Policy, they will always be pushing for tax increases and the repeal of the Taxpayer’s Bill of Rights (TABOR).
From Colorado Politics:
The board also approved 12 initiatives from Carol Hedges and Steve Briggs of Denver that would create a graduated income tax system, raising approximately $2 billion to $2.4 billion. The money would go toward education and addressing “the impacts of a growing population and a changing economy.”
Voters have turned down tax increases and eliminating spending caps every election they have been on the state-wide ballot. The last successful attempt was Referendum C in 2005 after too many Republicans campaigned hard for it. In a related note, those Republicans political careers ended that day.
Feb
25
LETTERS: Amend TABOR to include “fees”
AFP Colorado@AFPColorado
Do you think that voters should be able to vote on fees like they do taxes?
#TABOR #copolitics
Amend TABOR to include ‘fees’
Just received my annual registration for my 2004 Subaru Outback and just reading the receipt my blood again begins to boil. The only “tax” listed is $3 for specific ownership tax, the next 12 items are all “fees”. Age of vehicle fee $7, bridge safety surcharge fee $23, clerk hire fee $4, county road and bridge fee $1.50, emergency medical services fee $2, emissions-statewide air account fee, $0.5 and many more, for a grand total of $70.17.
These are in addition to all of the gas taxes we all pay each time we fill up. I don’t mind being charged for normal needs-based surcharges such as those required to maintain our infrastructure but lets call it what they are.. Taxes! Since I/we are already paying all of these “fees” to the state, it’s another reason why I am appalled at the thought of eventually having to also pay more and more for the myriad of oncoming toll lanes throughout the state.
Feb
14
Colorado House Rep Jovan Melton Said It’s None Of Taxpayer’s Business As To Where Taxpayer Money Is Spent
Ruh roh….
Colorado Rising State Action@COStateAction
This says a lot. We need more accountability in state spending, not less.
Another reason we’re thankful for the Taxpayer’s Bill of Rights.
