The city of Grand Junction has a strange TABOR dilemma on its hands, but the way it’s handling it should be instructive for Mesa County commissioners.

Monday’s City Council work session included a discussion about how the COVID-19 pandemic has clouded the city’s revenue picture. Nobody knows yet how much the city’s revenue might diminish due to the virus-related economic slowdown. But it’s the rebound that has city staff worried.

The city has already de-Bruced — but in a very narrow way. City voters agreed to allow the city to keep any money that’s collected in excess of the revenue cap imposed by the Taxpayer’s Bill of Rights — but only for paving and road capacity projects through 2037. That revenue cap will be determined by this year’s revenue collections, which are expected to be down significantly.

This low-water mark will then determine, per TABOR guidelines, what the city can collect for operations in future years. The “excess” will be earmarked for road projects. When the economy bounces back, the city could have millions for road projects, but still have to cut things like police, firefighters, public works, parks and recreation and general administration.

“It’s the operating funds that are going to suffer and therefore the delivery of services in the city,” Councilor Chuck McDaniel said. “We’re going to get to keep all the money. We’re going to have really great streets and no police to ride on them.”

The City Council pondered the best way to ask voters to do away with the revenue cap. They eventually decided to move forward with asking for a 15-year period with no revenue cap instead of posing a permanent de-Brucing question.

But by merely having a discussion, voters get a clear picture of what’s at stake. Indeed, City Manager Greg Caton prefaced the discussion by saying, “We wouldn’t be doing our fiscal responsibility if we didn’t bring this for discussion and potential consideration.”

Voters may very well reject the question, but at least they’re getting an opportunity to have a say in the city’s fiscal matters, which is what TABOR was designed to do. When we wrote about this topic last week, we included a prediction from Colorado House Speaker K.C. Becker regarding local governments’ ability to cope with the economic crisis: “If they don’t de-Bruce they’re screwed.”

So far, nary a peep from Mesa County commissioners about the fiscal implications of COVID-19 or how it could impair the county’s ability to deliver services — much less whether a de-Brucing question to eliminate the revenue cap could stave off budget cuts or reductions in service.

In 2019, when the topic of de-Brucing last came up, we encouraged the county commissioners to discuss the matter with the public and to consider bringing the question to the voters. They chose not to do so — a decision that now seems very short-sighted in light of a grim revenue picture.

Outgoing Commissioners John Justman and Rose Pugliese are term-limited, meaning they don’t have to hew to TABOR orthodoxy to get re-elected. Maybe that gives them just enough latitude to acknowledge that the unprecedented fiscal crisis triggered by the pandemic calls for something as drastic as — gasp — asking voters if they think fully de-Brucing is a good idea.

And for those who are worried about the perils of de-Brucing leading to a new era of taxation, note that TABOR would still require voter approval for any new taxes by the city or county.