The Colorado Senate on Wednesday tackled scores of amendments in a debate over the proposed $43.9 billion state budget, making adjustments to add to or restore money for certain programs, even as they considered eliminating a “second salary” for a top official and decided to keep a compensation increase for themselves. 

All told, the lawmakers tackled 61 amendments and in the end made few additions, totaling about $7.4 million in general fund dollars.

The budget is the only constitutionally-mandated job of the General Assembly, and by law it must be balanced. And this year, lawmakers scrambled to fill a $1-billion hole in the state’s 2025-2026 spending plan, leading them to make cuts, sweeps or fund transfers totaling hundreds of millions of dollars.  

Senate Bill 206, with its 728 pages, contains the $43.9 billion state budget, which includes $17 billion in general funds and $14 billion in federal dollars. General funds are the discretionary dollars in the state budget, and they come from individual and corporate income taxes, and sales and use taxes. 

Cash funds make up the rest — about $12.8 billion.

The orbitals

Along with SB 206 came 63 “orbitals” — bills that move with the budget bill and contain statutory changes that help balance the state’s spending plan.

This year’s orbitals are likely the most ever due to the complexity of the budget and the Joint Budget Committee’s efforts to cut $1.2 billion in general funds.

It’s not a revenue problem, according to budget committee Chair Sen. Jeff Bridge, D-Greenwood Village.

Instead, the JBC dealt with a structural deficit, as general fund revenue reached the Taxpayer’s Bill of Rights cap. That’s a problem lawmakers knew was coming for at least the past five years.

As a result, according to Bridges, the cuts in the 2025-26 budget would be permanent. The only caveat is the potential that voters could be asked in November to make changes that would raise the TABOR cap, similar to Referendum C in 2005.

Wednesday’s action on the budget began with dispensing with 45 of the 63 orbitals, all added to the consent calendar, meaning there was an expectation that the bills would be passed unanimously and without debate — and they did.

That left lawmakers with the main event: the $43.9 billion state budget and its amendments.

The amendments

Senate Minority Leader Paul Lundeen, R-Monument, took up his annual plea to lawmakers to run the school finance act first and to tailor those dollars to follow the students, distributing it for the benefit — he argued — of the children and not the school districts.

That heralded the start of the discussion on amendments, beginning with a proposal from Sen. Rod Pelton, R-Cheyenne Wells, to eliminate the $200,000 general fund appropriation to the Division of Animal Welfare in the Department of Agriculture.

The money would go to the Arkansas Valley Regional Medical Center in La Junta, which announced in January it would eliminate obstetrics services beginning this month. It left the residents of southeastern Colorado with only one option, the Prowers Medical Center in Lamar, where maternity services have been in jeopardy in the past. The maternity services were closed for 18 months during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic and reopened in February, 2023. Without the Lamar facility, the next nearest place for obstetrics services is in Pueblo, 120 miles away. 

This is for funding “human babies” over animals, Pelton said in advocating for the amendment, which failed. 

Pelton told Colorado Politics the Arkansas Valley center would need $1.2 million to offer obstetric services annually.

His second effort, to take $1.2 million from the general fund to pay for the obstetrics unit, passed. 

Senators debate ‘second salary’ for lieutenant governor  

Sen. Larry Liston, R-Colorado Springs, prepared nine amendments to protect funding for the National Cybersecurity Center at the University of Colorado, Colorado Springs.

Liston secured $436,616, paid for by reducing funding for a recreational program in the Department of Corrections.

Another amendment sought to eliminate the $74,537 general fund “second salary” for Lt. Gov. Dianne Primavera, which she receives for administering the Office of Saving People Money on Health Care. There was also an amendment to eliminate the $250,000 general fund appropriation for that office.

The amendment provoked the most intense arguments of the day, one that pitted JBC members against each other.

Sen. Judy Amabile, D-Boulder, claimed the office had saved Coloradans $1.8 billion through programs such as reinsurance.

That extra salary drew this remark later from fellow JBC member Sen. Barbara Kirkmeyer, R-Brighton: “What a joke!”

Kirkmeyer noted she was on the health committee when bills such as reinsurance were being debated and never once saw the lieutenant governor.

“This is shameful. She’s not running a department, she’s running a made-up office through an executive order,” the lawmaker said.

(The office was later codified in statute).

“We have a moral requirement to justify every dollar we spend,” Kirkmeyer said, explaining that the lieutenant governor should be doing that job without extra pay. “It’s $75,000 that no one in this room can justify.”

A second attempt, an amendment during the final action of the day, known as the committee of the whole report, failed on a 17-16 vote (it needed 18 to pass).

Lawmakers tackle provider rates, long-term care and their pay raise

Few amendments received bipartisan support. One that received intense lobbying was offered by Sens. Lisa Cutter, D-Littleton and Pelton, to restore provider rates for occupational, physical and speech therapists.

That came with a cost of $6.5 million, including $1.9 million in general funds. The amendment passed, although it did not identify a source for those funds.

An amendment with funding for long-term care and medical services for Medicaid clients, a treatment program in the Department of Human Services and a “safe streets” initiative in the Department of Public Safety also garnered bipartisan support. It carried a cost of $9.3 million in general funds, for a total of $12.4 million. The general fund money would come from a capital construction project for the Department of Corrections. That amendment also passed.

Another amendment attempted to stall a pay increase for lawmakers, in a year when they’re cutting hundreds of millions in state spending.

Lawmakers are in for an increase in per diem in the 2025-26 budget, the result of a 2024 bill. Currently, lawmakers who live within 50 miles of Denver can claim $45 per day. Under House Bill 24-1059, that increases to $71 per day and it applies to 40 House members and 21 senators. That would result in an increase of about $3,120 per person for the 120-day session.

For those who live more than 50 miles away, the per diem would go from $240 per day to $254 per day, for the 120 day session, or an increase of about $1,680 per person.

Sen. Byron Pelton, R-Sterling, offered the amendment that would save $421,650 in general funds. 

“What’s at the heart of this amendment is leading by example,” said Sen. Rod Pelton. 

The amendment failed. 

Sen. Byron Pelton brought the amendment back during the last action of the day, the final approval of the committee of the whole report, a sort of “business is concluded for the debate” procedure. It won 17 “yes” votes but needed 18 to pass. It failed on a 17-16 vote. 

Lawmakers have in the past put on hold their own salary increases during times of economic struggles, most recently through a bipartisan bill in 2020. 

Oil and gas inspectors

“A matter of life and death” was how the Senate’s newest member, Sen. Katie Wallace of Longmont, described her request for $268,562 in cash funds to add four more inspectors for oil and gas operations to the Energy and Carbon Management Commission, part of the Department of Natural Resources. The funds would come from the commission’s reserves.

Wallace said one of her constituents watched from her back porch the explosion of a drilling operation that killed a worker. Another constituent, with wells next door to her property, has benzene in her blood and is under treatment.

“I hope to live in a state where wells are regularly inspected,” said Wallace, who noted wells are only inspected once every 1.5 years to three years — and only on a risk basis. 

The department didn’t ask for this, noted Kirkmeyer, who said the agency has already added 125 new inspectors in the last few years, despite a declining number of wells and revenues from oil and gas operations. 

Lawmakers annually send messages to departments, programs and policies they disagree with through amendments.

This year, for Republicans, that included the Prescription Drug Affordability Board, various programs within the Department of Public Health and Environment, the Department of Revenue for its firearms dealer division, transgender healthcare in the Department of Corrections, funding for equity office positions in the Department of Revenue and economic development programs in the governor’s office. 

Also among the returning amendments from previous years: across-the-board cuts in salary, and in health, life and dental benefits for state employees.

The amendment with the largest impact sought to eliminate all general fund dollars for the Department of Public Health and Environment, offered by Sen. Byron Pelton.

That would come with a general fund impact of $140 million, an increase of more than $90 million over the past eight years, along with 36% more in full-time employees, he said.

Pelton pointed to the large increases in general fund support for the department over the past several years.

“This is the impact of crushing regulation,” he said. Pelton has offered the amendment every year. 

As with other amendments tied to political messaging, it failed. 

By day’s end, Senate amendments added about $7.4 million in general funds to the budget without a corresponding cut somewhere else. That included an amendment to take $2.5 million from the general fund reserve. 

The budget bill heads to a final vote on Thursday.