Metro Denver voters in Tuesday’s election decided to let the Regional Transportation District and Arapahoe and Jefferson counties keep tax money that otherwise, under Colorado’s Taxpayer Bill of Rights, must be returned to taxpayers.
Incomplete returns posted by Colorado’s Secretary of State showed the RTD measure passing — about 69% to 31%. Incomplete returns showed the Arapahoe County measure was ahead by about 71% to 29%, and the Jefferson County measure was ahead by about 57% to 43% with 98% of ballots counted that were estimated to have been cast.
ELECTION RESULTS: Live Colorado election results for the 2024 election
The money at stake is significant. In the case of RTD’s Ballot Issue 7A, a rejection by voters would have forced the transit agency to refund millions of dollars to taxpayers that otherwise would be devoted to public transit. RTD officials have estimated that $670 million of the agency’s annual budget, or roughly half its revenue, would be subject to TABOR revenue limits — compelling transit service cuts as it hit limits, unless voters later approved a new tax.
Greater Denver Transit advocates welcomed voter passage of the RTD measure as “great news for public transit,” spokeswoman Leslie Welch said. “It avoids cutting funding that would be disastrous for the riders that depend on RTD’s services. We are glad that the voters understood the importance of maintaining funding, and we will continue to fight for more transit funding,” Welch said.
A majority of local governments already have sought and received voter approval to be exempt from requirements of the state’s TABOR constitutional amendment, which limits the ability of governments to keep tax revenues.
It requires voter approval for any tax hike or bond measure introduced to raise funds for cities, counties, the state and schools. It also caps government use of tax dollars collected from residents based on a formula that adjusts each year tied to population and inflation. When governments collect funds from taxpayers that exceed the cap, they’re obligated to return that money as a TABOR refund — unless voters grant an exemption.
These common ballot measures are called “de-Brucing” measures. (Anti-tax crusader Douglas Bruce wrote the TABOR Amendment that became law, and his name now is link to the opt-out measures.)
For RTD, agency directors in 1995 and 1999 asked voters to extend exemptions. But RTD’s current exemption is about to expire.
The ballot measure distinguishes between imposing a new tax to fund transit services and allowing RTD to keep the tax revenues that it already collects, through sales taxes.
RTD officials have estimated that if TABOR limits weren’t exempted between 2007 and 2019, they would have had to refund $650 million to taxpayers over that span. They recently estimated that a rejection of 7A would force RTD to return $2.4 million in 2027 and $3.6 million in 2029, based on anticipated tax collections in those years.
The local governments in Arapahoe and Jefferson counties have provided refunds to taxpayers in the past. In Jeffco, the government refunded more than $17 million to taxpayers in 2022 and is expected to refund nearly $40 million this year under the TABOR requirements. If voters reject the proposed de-Brucings in each county, officials have said, critical government services could be at risk for hundreds of thousands of residents.
The governments in recent years have relied on federal funds to maintain their budgets for spending on services, such as maintaining roads.
