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Education fund plan backed

House panel's vote on tax-rate freeze split on party lines

Berny Morson, Rocky Mountain News

Published April 24, 2007 at midnight

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Gov. Bill Ritter's plan to prop up the state education fund won approval Monday in the House Education Committee on a straight party-line vote.

The measure would freeze the tax rate in most school districts, canceling tax cuts that would otherwise occur under a 1994 school finance law. Ritter's plan would allow taxes to decline in 34 districts that pay the highest rates.

The vote on SB 199 was 8-5, with all the Democrats in support and all the Republicans opposed. The bill now goes to the House Appropriations Committee.

Republicans called the plan a tax increase.

Democrats rejected that argument, countering that the plan does not determine anyone's tax bill, only the rate at which property will be taxed.

Rep. Cory Gardner, R-Yuma, pointed out several times that the measure is projected to raise $1.8 billion in taxes over the next 10 years.

The repeated assertion got under the skin of Rep. Jack Pommer, D-Boulder, the House sponsor of the bill.

"The sound bite is wrong, and you say it over and over again," said Pommer, who believes that Gardner is unfairly inflating the figure by calculating it out over a decade.

Gardner and Pommer also clashed over a GOP assertion that more money could be raised from lands set aside as an endowment for schools. Pommer called the idea an "absurd proposal."

Much of the debate occurred over a Republican move to refer Ritter's plan to voters. It was rejected on a party-line vote.

"I have great faith in the citizens of Colorado that they're strongly in favor of education," said Rep. Tom Massey, R-Poncha Springs, who offered the amendment. "We should at least give them a chance to voice their opinion."

But Democrats pointed to votes in 175 of the state's 178 school districts exempting budgets from revenue caps contained in the Colorado Constitution.

"I think the vote of the people has been heard," said Rep. Judy Solano, D-Brighton, the committee chairwoman.

Supporters of Ritter's plan say it would raise about $35 million in the first year and $55 million in subsequent years.

Ritter proposed the property tax plan in March after projections showed the state education fund will be in deficit by the 2011-12 school year. Because the Colorado Constitution requires an education system, all other state programs would face cuts to maintain school funding.

Property tax rates have been in decline since passage of the 1994 school finance law. The decline in local funding has been offset by higher expenditures from the state education fund.

The education fund was also depleted during the recession in the early years of this decade when funds were needed for other programs.

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