The long dance in the Legislature over a plan to reclassify the state’s hospital provider fee as an enterprise fund continued on Tuesday, when Speaker of the House Dickey Lee Hullinghorst, D-Gunbarrel, presented a new bill to direct how additional revenues collected from the reclassification should be spent.

On March 28, Hullinghorst introduced House Bill 1420, which would reclassify the provider fee. On April 21, she introduced HB 1450, which describes how revenue saved against the TABOR spending cap should be spent over the next five fiscal years.

The new bill passed on a 10-to-3 vote out of the House Appropriations Committee Tuesday morning.

“The (new bill) is designed to provide a guardrail around the funds that will be freed up as a result of transferring the hospital provider fee into an enterprise,” Hullinghorst said during committee. “This creates a five-year guardrail.”

The bill directs funds be used to bolster the state general fund as well as for transportation, education, capital construction programs and to pay into the state’s severance tax fund. Hullinghorst acknowledged that the bill does not bind the money to the programs, that it only recommends spending priorities.

“It is very hard to put it in a lock box because we can’t make future legislators do something that we told them to do. … I’m being very frank about that,” Hullinghorst said.

During a press conference after the committee meeting, Hullinghorst said that adding guardrails for future spending was something members in the House wanted to see and she hoped would be something that would help sell the hospital provider fee reclassification in the Republican-controlled Senate. She pointed to the 10-3 vote on HB 1450 as a sign that the bill is gaining bipartisan support.

“We’re moving forward on that. We’re still not there yet, but we’re doing the best we can,” she said.

Hullinghorst said her hospital fee bills should be hitting the House floor for debate this week.

-Ramsey@coloradostatesman.com