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Colorado Voters to Decide More Than a Dozen Ballot Measures Including Tax Hikes, Immigration and Youth Sports
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Axios Denver, Approved, State

Colorado Voters to Decide More Than a Dozen Ballot Measures Including Tax Hikes, Immigration and Youth Sports

By John Frank | Axios Denver Colorado voters will decide more than a dozen ballot measures this November, from remaking the state's tax system to banning gender-affirming surgery for minors. Why it matters: Beyond the candidates, voters will have a direct say on major changes to taxes, immigration, criminal justice and other hot-button issues. State of play: The marquee measure would scrap Colorado's flat 4.4% income tax in favor of a graduated system that would raise taxes on those making $500,000 or more a year. Legislative fiscal analysts estimate the Democratic-led measure would generate an additional $2 billion a year, with the money reserved for education, health care and early child care. The other side: A countermeasure backed by ...
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Montana Looks To Colorado’s Flat Tax Legacy As Colorado Debates Progressive Alternative
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Complete Colorado, Approved, State

Montana Looks To Colorado’s Flat Tax Legacy As Colorado Debates Progressive Alternative

By Nash Herman | Complete Colorado While Montana is poised to learn from the flat tax success stories of Colorado and other Western states, the push for a progressive income tax in Colorado threatens the very policies that made the state successful in the first place.  Some history  Colorado and Montana both implemented progressive individual income taxes in the 1930s during the Great Depression.   However, Colorado was one of the first states to join the “flat tax revolution” when it implemented a single flat rate of 5 percent for all incomes in 1987.  Then, through rate cuts at the turn of the century and Independence Institute-led Propositions 116 and 121 in 2020 and 2022, Colorado lowere...
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Colorado made registration more expensive. Now it punishes drivers who fall behind.
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Rocky Mountain Voice, Commentary, State, Top Stories

Colorado made registration more expensive. Now it punishes drivers who fall behind.

By C. J. Garbo | Guest Commentary, Rocky Mountain Voice There is something almost perfectly governmental about Colorado's growing obsession with expired license plates. First, make an unavoidable part of ordinary life increasingly expensive. Then act surprised when more people struggle to pay for it. Then impose late fees on the people who fall behind. Then send police out to fine them again. And finally, call the whole thing "compliance." Across Colorado, law enforcement agencies have been escalating their efforts against motorists with expired registrations. Denver has conducted repeated enforcement campaigns. Colorado Springs and surrounding agencies have organized regional crackdowns. Police departments speak of zero tolerance. Drivers can face registration cos...
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Weiser’s Blueprint: The costs the plan leaves out
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Rocky Mountain Voice, State, Top Stories

Weiser’s Blueprint: The costs the plan leaves out

By Shaina Cole | Contributing Writer, Rocky Mountain Voice Phil Weiser's Colorado Blueprint is full of numbers.  It reports the almost $900 million his office recovered in opioid settlements. It counts the more than $184 million in AmeriCorps funding he sued to recover, and the nearly $32 million his office won from the e-cigarette maker JUUL.  It measures the problems he wants to solve down to the dollar, from the $11.4 billion it says Coloradans lose each year to congested highways and deteriorating roads to the $36.5 billion it credits to outdoor recreation and the adjacent hospitality and travel industries. What the 109-page plan almost never does is say what Weiser's own proposals would cost. The Democrat attorney general, running for governor, proposes a ...
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The Denver school tax question says $44 million. The measure says something larger.
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Rocky Mountain Voice, Local, Top Stories

The Denver school tax question says $44 million. The measure says something larger.

By Shaina Cole | Contributing Writer, Rocky Mountain Voice The question Denver voters will mark this November asks whether to raise Denver Public Schools taxes "up to $44 million." That is the number on the ballot, the number in the district's public materials, and the figure repeated in news coverage of the measure. The $44 million is not a fixed cap on what the tax could raise in the years after. Read the board's resolution, adopted Aug. 13, along with the ballot question it certified, and the $44 million turns out to be an estimate for the first year.  What voters would also authorize is a permanent change to the ceiling on how much the district can collect through its operational overrides — a ceiling written as a share of the district's total program funding, not ...
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Inflationary Bracket Creep With Initiative 195 Could Push More Coloradans Into Higher Tax Brackets
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Complete Colorado, Approved, Commentary, State

Inflationary Bracket Creep With Initiative 195 Could Push More Coloradans Into Higher Tax Brackets

By Nash Herman | Commentary, Complete Colorado Initiative 195, the proposed ‘progressive’ income tax ballot measure, promises long-term pain for Colorado taxpayers due to what economists call “bracket creep.”  But we do not need to speculate about the impact of bracket creep, as we can already see its effect in action since voters passed Proposition FF in 2022.  Proposition FF Through Proposition FF, voters decided to increase taxes on high-income Colorado earners to support a universal school lunch program.  The measure capped state deductions for tax filers with a federal adjusted gross income exceeding $300,000 and directed new revenue to the Healthy School Meals for All (HSMA) program.   READ THE FUL...
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Colorado Voters To Decide Whether To Cap State Income Tax At 4.4%
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Colorado Politics, Approved, State

Colorado Voters To Decide Whether To Cap State Income Tax At 4.4%

By Thelma Grimes | Colorado Politics Election officials on Thursday confirmed that the proposal to cap the state’s income tax at the current rate submitted signatures and voters will consequently decide its fate this November. The fight over tax rates is part of the tug and pull in Colorado between opposing political forces feuding over state revenue. One side of that fight argues that Colorado isn’t generating enough revenue to spend on state priorities, such as education. The competing side counters that the state already collects enough — but policymakers’ spending priorities are misplaced. The Secretary of State’s Office on Thursday cleared Initiative No. 232 after Advance Colorado, the group behind it, submitted more than 184,000 signatures to get it on the b...
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Colorado Graduated Tax Initiative Draws Major Support From Democratic Lawmaker’s Nonprofit
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Complete Colorado, Approved, State

Colorado Graduated Tax Initiative Draws Major Support From Democratic Lawmaker’s Nonprofit

By Sherrie Peif | Complete Colorado DENVER – State Rep. Lorena Garcia, a Westminster Democrat, has been working overtime to ensure a progressive state income tax initiative makes it in front of Colorado voters this November, including donating big bucks via a tax-funded nonprofit to the issue committee charged with getting the measure on the ballot. If passed, Initiative 195 would raise the current flat tax rate of 4.4 percent to 7.4 percent for those earning more than $500,000, and increasing as incomes rise to a top rate of 8.4 percent for those earning more than $1 million. A majority of Colorado taxpayers might see a slight income tax reduction, with many eventually getting caught up in the graduated brackets, as they are not indexed for inflation. ...
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Colorado’s Citizen Initiative Process Faces Growing Influence From Deep Pockets
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The Colorado Sun, Approved, State

Colorado’s Citizen Initiative Process Faces Growing Influence From Deep Pockets

By Colleen Slevin | The Colorado Sun High cost of getting a measure on the ballot has given wealthy interests more power to push their agendas. Colorado loves its ballot questions, ranking among the top states for the most on the ballot. But voters also like to say no — a lot. In the over 100 years that Colorado voters have been able to petition to put questions on the state’s ballot, only 36% of the 256 questions that made it on the ballot have passed, according to a tally by the state legislature. Questions referred to the ballot by state lawmakers have done better, passing nearly 60% of the time. Between 1960 and 2024, Colorado had the third highest number of voter-initiated ballot measures, behind California and Oregon, according to John Mat...
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El Paso County’s public safety tax returns to the ballot with a change to oversight
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Colorado Accountability Project, Approved, Commentary, Local

El Paso County’s public safety tax returns to the ballot with a change to oversight

By Cory Gaines | Commentary, Colorado Accountability Project Heads up El Paso County: you've got a tax to vote on in November and I believe you can speak up about it in your local Grey Book! Per the Tribune article linked at bottom, El Paso County Commissioners approved a ballot measure to extend a sales tax whose proceeds go to help fund the sheriff's office. The tax originally started in 2012 and has been extended a few times since. In its current iteration, it is slated to end in 2029, but commissioners approved a ballot measure which would extend it to 2037.  If you live in El Paso County, take a minute to carefully review the ballot measure. There were a couple things in the article that would have raised an eyebrow for me if I were voting on it. Quoting: "...
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