When the state treasury collects more tax dollars than it is allowed to keep under the Colorado Constitution, the extra cash must be refunded to taxpayers. Not spent on the legislature’s pet projects.

That’s thanks to the Taxpayer’s Bill of Rights, aka TABOR, which was added to the constitution by voters in 1992. It requires the state to seek voters’ permission before keeping surplus tax revenue. In the past three decades, TABOR has served as the taxpayers’ best defense against a state government forever scheming to wrest more of their money.

As we learned last week, the state is scheming once again.

Our affiliate Colorado Politics reported that two Democratic lawmakers plan to ask voters this November to give up their already-diminished TABOR refunds to help pay, attract and retain teachers. That would be after accounting for a couple of other diversions that have first dibs on the refunds – backfilling local property tax exemptions for seniors, and funding affordable housing under a convoluted ballot measure approved by voters last fall. This proposal would siphon off and soak up what’s left. It’s another tax hike, in other words.

The proposal is still in its early stages. It’ll have to make it out of the legislature this spring and onto next fall’s statewide ballot.

Mind you, the proposal won’t be asking voters to let the state use the refunds to pay for more tax credits for pricey electric vehicles. Or, to fund the state’s new Equity Office, which will ensure “diversity, equity and inclusion” in state hiring. Or, to pay for the this year’s 5% salary hike negotiated for tens of thousands of state employees by the state employees’ union.

Voters wouldn’t buy it, and lawmakers know it. So, they budget those and other dubious line items using money on hand – and seek new funding for something the public actually cares about.

Which is why the pending legislation’s sponsors, Rep. Cathy Kipp, D-Fort Collins, and Sen. Rachel Zenzinger, D-Arvada, propose to spend the remaining TABOR surplus on the ever-popular quest to “fully fund” public education.

It’s money down a rabbit hole, unfortunately. If the state truly were intent on attracting, retaining and giving raises to Colorado’s classroom teachers, it could have done so long ago with the resources it now has. But those resources keep getting sidetracked, and any spending increase for the K-12 bureaucracy is as unlikely to find its way to its intended purpose.

The reality, as taxpayer advocate Michael Fields told Colorado Politics, is “not enough of that money is going toward teacher pay.”

“People want better accountability with the dollars we are already spending on education,” he said. 

Even if more money were to reach teachers, it is unlikely to turn the corner on flagging student achievement scores and, especially, learning losses since the pandemic. Making broad strides in student learning would require a fundamental realignment of public education’s priorities. Notably, a far more sweeping embrace of school choice and strict accountability measures.

Rest assured, the TABOR refunds that the proposal would earmark for schools only would serve to free up more of the existing state budget for lawmakers to fritter away.

Tax hikes don’t do well on the statewide ballot in Colorado, and the reason for that should be obvious by now. Voters don’t trust the state. They likely will view this attempt at a tax hike with deep skepticism, as well.

Denver Gazette Editorial Board