By Byron Pelton

My colleagues across the aisle have revealed something extraordinary in their frantic attempt to get rid of Initiative 175: They believe Colorado voters are too stupid to notice their vote will be thrown out in furtherance of their elected representatives’ budget shell game.

For more than a decade, the Democratic majority has systematically raided transportation funds while our roads crumbled to a D+ rating, making them among the worst in the country. Now, faced with a citizen initiative to end their budget manipulation and fix our roads, they’ve introduced legislation in the last two weeks of the session designed to override the will of voters before ballots are even cast.

What the Democrats’ bill, HB26-1430, says is this:  If Initiative 175 passes, and was expected to raise $700 million for roads, they will decrease the source of those funds — the gas tax and certain sales taxes and fees on motor vehicles — by $700 million so roads get nothing. This then allows the state to keep more General Fund dollars that might otherwise be refunded through the Taxpayer’s Bill of Rights (TABOR).

The result? You, the voter, have now had your vote nullified by the government. You also don’t get your roads fixed. And finally, you don’t get your TABOR refund.

Think about that. Democrats are telling Colorado voters: “Sure, you can vote to use your tax money in a specific manner, but we will override your vote as if it never happened.” 

One of my Democratic colleagues said she and the other sponsors are open to discussing alternatives. One catch, however: They won’t discuss anything until the ballot measure is officially withdrawn. A TV reporter on air characterized this my-way-or-the-highway statement as:  “Yeah, you can kind of call this blackmail.”

This is not governing. What it is, however, is evidence of exactly why Initiative 175 needs constitutional protection: Politicians are so determined to keep raiding transportation funds that they’ll override democracy itself to do it. 

Initiative 175 is the solution Colorado needs because it ends the political games and forces accountability. It doesn’t raise taxes. It doesn’t create new obligations. It simply requires that money paid by drivers for roads actually goes to roads — a concept so threatening to the Democratic majority that they’ve resorted to legislative blackmail to stop it.

There is no disagreement Colorado’s roads are in bad shape. Rural road pavement is currently ranked 47th in the country due to the deteriorating conditions, and in my seven-county district, road maintenance is probably the No. 1 issue.

Colorado motorists pay between $7.1 billion and $11.4 billion annually — roughly $3,060 per vehicle in metro areas — for vehicle repairs and fuel costs related to poor road conditions and congestion delays. These costs reach far beyond commuters, affecting school transportation, emergency response times and business operations statewide. Though fees and taxes have been increased to address our deteriorating road infrastructure, much of those revenues have been redirected to address unrelated fiscal concerns. Last session, Democrats pulled $100 million from transportation to use for other programs.

The same Democrats, who now want to override the will of the voters, claim they have no choice because this measure — which affects 2% of the budget — will somehow “decimate” K-12 funding, higher education, and Medicaid. One even went so far as to suggest that filling a pothole would mean closing a hospital.

That isn’t a serious conversation; it’s an attempt to frighten people instead of leveling with them.

Lawmakers make tough budget decisions every single year, and they constantly signal their priorities through those choices. That is their job. What’s really happening here is some politicians don’t like the voters’ priorities, so they’re trying to use scare tactics to protect their own.

What they don’t want to tell you is Colorado’s budget has grown more than 30% in the last six years. Two years ago, we collected $1.7 billion above the TABOR limit — money we had to refund because we couldn’t legally spend it. When your budget grows by billions and you’re sitting on TABOR surpluses, you don’t get to threaten schools and hospitals because voters want their road fees spent on roads.

Democratic leadership has had years to find a meaningful solution to Colorado’s worsening road conditions. Yet, they have done nothing. Now it’s time to let the voters decide. If my Democratic colleagues would rather spend the next six months explaining to voters why they passed a bill that stripped their constituents of their vote, I welcome that conversation. 

Byron Pelton is a livestock producer/master electrician, who represents Senate District 1 at the Colorado General Assembly.