Monthly Archive for Colorado
Colorado Stories Posted in May 2008
Big Guns Hired In Severance-Tax Fray
Category: Taxes · State: Colorado · Source: Rocky Mountain News
Well-known local political consultants will square off over a ballot initiative that would increase oil and gas tax revenue and create a huge college scholarship fund. David Kenney, an influential political insider who backed Ritter and worked on John Hickenlooper's reelection campaign, will be the campaign manager for the initiative. He said the campaign will be called "A Smarter Colorado" and will be funded by conservation, renewable energy and education advocacy groups. The ballot initiative, introduced last week, would remove a state credit that saves oil and gas firms about $200 million a year in severance taxes. The additional funds would help communities affected by oil and gas drilling, pay for college scholarships and fund water and wildlife projects.
Ritter Questions TABOR Strategy
Category: TABOR · State: Colorado · Source: Denver Post
The rough political road for a proposed state-budget fix got even rougher Monday as Gov. Bill Ritter stopped short of endorsing it and the group expected to propel it to November's ballot expressed concern about funding, timing and other issues. "I don't know ultimately . . . if we're going to have the coalition together to put that on the ballot," Ritter said Monday of House Speaker Andrew Romanoff's plan in his monthly appearance on the Mike Rosen Show on KOA 850. The proposal, which would alter the Taxpayer's Bill of Rights and end mandated increases in education funding, started as a referendum, but Romanoff could not muster the support of two-thirds of state lawmakers — the requirement for it to go on the ballot. On Sunday, Romanoff said he would take the case straight to voters. The effort to proceed as a ballot initiative requires approval of the ballot language and then 76,000 signatures by Aug. 4.
Other Monthly Archives for Colorado
- May 2008 (2)