There are many reasons to vote against Referendums C and D:
It is a tax increase when many families need the money for increased gasoline and utility bills and can use this money better than government. Only government could ask to keep more of your money and tell you it is not a tax increase.
The proponents say that the senior citizens’ property tax reductions are at risk, but the language of C and D does not mention the property tax. The senior citizen property tax reduction can be enacted regardless of this vote. The legislature can fund this reduction from refund dollars or general fund dollars. The proponents are scaring seniors into voting for C and D – and that’s wrong.
State employees are being told their jobs are in jeopardy if C and D don’t pass. The state budget will continue to increase whether or not they pass. The Department of Corrections used taxpayer dollars to send out information taken from proponents’ brochures. We should not reward and support this with our tax dollars.
What happens if C passes and D fails? Taxpayers get the worst of all worlds and government gets to spend your refund on almost anything. If you rely on the legislature’s information in the blue book, there are general areas of funding. However, given the scare tactics and promises, are there any limitations on the use of the additional $3.7 billion? This is a blank check.
There is no prohibition against new programs, and the proponents have the desire for new programs. If government doesn’t have enough money for existing programs, how will government support additional programs? In an interim committee meeting, a program to pay for health insurance costs for small businesses with your tax dollars passed. The cost of this and other new programs will be passed on to the taxpayers. Having government pay for more entitlement health-care programs is a bad idea. Just look at the uncontrolled costs of Medicaid. Why would we want to give government a blank check to create more programs that have uncontrolled costs?
Supporters claim the sky is falling for higher education if we don’t pass C and D. In the past few years, higher education has received less money from the general fund and has raised tuition to make up these dollars. No one is saying that if C and D pass, tuition will go down to where it was before. You could wind up paying more in tuition and in taxes. Colorado’s in-state tuition for the University of Colorado was recently compared by USA Today to other state institutions in the nation and CU was cheaper than the median rate of 67 institutions. No one likes tuition increases, but let’s not pay higher tuition and higher taxes.
Any proposal should be balanced between the spending for schools through Amendment 23 and the Taxpayer’s Bill of Rights. Any solution that doesn’t include both will run short in the long run. There is a direct relationship between what the proponents say will occur in cuts for next year, about $365 million, and the amount of money that goes directly into the education fund, about $350 million.
We need a proposal that fixes the constitutionally guaranteed spending in Amendment 23 on K-12 education when there is no surplus and a specific amount of increase in the TABOR spending. Just giving government more money without reforming Amendment 23 is not the answer.
Finally, supporters claim that if we don’t pass C and D, the state budget will be devastated. We should vote “no” and tell them to come back with a proposal that also fixes Amendment 23. The legislature can securitize some of the tobacco settlement proceeds to take us through another year.
If we give government this tax increase, there is no incentive to do it right. This is a “forever” tax increase because even after five years, government will forever keep all of our tax refunds up to the highest amount during the 5 years, plus $100 million to pay off the debt if Referendum D passes.
Right problem but wrong solution, and we should not support it.
Let’s vote “no” on C and D and tell government to come back next year with a specific dollar amount and fix Amendment 23.
Republican Lola Spradley is former speaker of the Colorado House.
