Instead of alms for the needy, some Colorado lawmakers want to give them a shot at a retirement plan – through a new fund that would be set up by the state.

House Bill 1290, recently introduced in the House by state Reps. Brittany Pettersen, D- Lakewood, and Janet Buckner, D-Aurora, sets up the “Colorado Secure Savings Plan” and establishes a new state board to run it.

While it theoretically aims to provide another retirement option for Coloradans of every walk of life, its extensive legislative declaration stresses the lack of retirement savings and limited access to pensions among low-wage and minority employees.

Oh no, you say? More unfunded liabilities – like those incurred by the state’s massive Colorado Public Employees Retirement Association on behalf of state government workers? Not according to the legislation, which includes a key provision specifying that the state and participating private-sector employers do not have any liability for the payments of any retirement savings benefits accrued by beneficiaries. So, perhaps a sigh of relief is in order.

However, another aspect of the measure is likely to stir debate in the legislature and even likelier to give the business community heartburn: All employers, for-profit and nonprofit, that have 100 or more workers would be required to participate in the first year of the plan. In the second year, the mandate ratchets down to businesses and other organizations with 50 or more workers and in the third year, it’s five or more.

From the bill’s summary by state legislative analysts:

…The plan includes a Roth Individual Retirement Account (IRA) provided by one or more financial services vendors approved by the board. Participants make contributions to the IRA through automatic payroll deductions. Moneys received from enrollees, participating employers, gifts, grants, donations, and loans, if pursued, go into the Colorado Secure Savings Plan Fund, a trust established for the plan.

And there’s this provision – sure to sound an alarm among business owners:

The board must determine a penalty structure for employers who fail to enroll employees in the plan within time frames, not to exceed $250 for each employee each calendar year, and develop a process for employees to report non-compliant employers.

The mandate and penalties, among other features of the legislation, suggest it’s dead in the water the moment it leaves the Democratic-controlled House and heads for the Republican-ruled Senate. Assuming it makes it that far.

It also doesn’t help the bill’s prospects with the GOP that, according to business group Colorado Association for Commerce and Industry, the author is liberal Denver think tank Bell Policy Center.

Of course, HB 1290’s odds in the legislature may not matter to co-author Pettersen as much as the bill’s messaging value in her just-announced run for the 7th Congressional District seat now held by fellow Democrat Ed Perlmutter. That’s not to say it’s why she is sponsoring the measure, of course. Just putting it out there.

The bill is slated to debut for its first hearing in the House Business Affairs and Labor Committee April 17.