It was only fitting a small band of protesters would barge into the state Capitol on Monday and disrupt the special legislative session called by the governor to rein in runaway property taxes. Granted, the noisy rabble was no insurrection – but it did serve to distract the press and public, if only momentarily, from the fact that little reining in of taxes actually was taking place.

By the time the four-day session ended later the same afternoon, the Democratic legislative majority had cobbled together and rammed through a cluster of bills for Gov. Jared Polis to sign that offered even less relief to beleaguered Colorado taxpayers than did Proposition HH.

Voters had trounced that legislative proposal on the Nov. 7 ballot by nearly a 20-point margin, in part, because it was only a pale imitation of property-tax relief. Also, because they realized it was a bait-and-switch ripoff that wanted them to give up their state “TABOR” refunds.

So, when that blistering defeat prompted Polis to reconvene HH’s authors – supposedly, this time, they’d get it right – it probably was inevitable they instead would slip in some of the same handiwork they originally had drafted into HH. And this time, voters couldn’t stop them.

Hence, a bill offering just one year of property-tax relief – pending a long-term solution – that largely recaps the nips and tucks of HH: A slightly lower statewide assessment rate for real property, and a somewhat higher amount of a home’s value that can be exempt from tax liability.

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The upshot is a typical homeowner’s property tax bill along the Front Range still will be stratospheric compared with prior years.

And, unlike even HH, the minor cuts in the special session’s finished product won’t apply at all to commercial, hotel, lodging, agricultural or other non-residential property.

As an extra thumb in the eye to rank-and-file taxpayers, the special session passed another bill that uses a portion of their TABOR refunds to double the Earned Income Tax Credit paid to low-income residents. That’s after voters turned thumbs down, overwhelmingly, to using their TABOR refunds for “backfilling” local governments that lost revenue to HH’s feeble attempt at property-tax cuts.

Meaning, lawmakers again found a way to siphon off some of taxpayers’ TABOR refunds, albeit toward a different end than that proposed in HH. Lawmakers claim they can do so without the permission of voters because, hey, the Earned Income Tax Credit is a kinda-sorta refund, too.

Bottom line: Lawmakers who never really wanted to cut taxes in the first place and who resent refunding excess state revenue as required by TABOR – the Taxpayer’s Bill of Rights in the state constitution – got to thumb their noses at the taxpaying public after all. Only, they did it through the back door of a special session. As if to say, “So long, suckers!” before heading home.

Nevertheless, there also was some reason to hope – and even to cheer.

The hope lies in the special session’s creation, per the governor’s directive, of a new commission that will work on long-term solutions to Coloradans’ property tax woes amid soaring real estate values statewide. That can’t come soon enough. Of course, we’ll have to wait and see what they come up with.

The reason to cheer?

By voting down HH resoundingly two weeks ago, Coloradans quashed an attempt by the Legislature to subvert TABOR and hijack its refunds for years to come. That taxpayer victory is something lawmakers cannot undo. And it’s something all the rest of us can take to the bank.

Colorado Springs Gazette Editorial Board