The Unaffiliated | Local governments are losing out on $140M in Colorado’s state budget
This time two years ago, state lawmakers went out of their way to make sure local governments wouldn’t suffer financially from legislative and ballot efforts to deliver property tax relief.
How times have changed.
As the property tax cuts grew and the state’s own budget picture deteriorated, the state steadily scaled back its promises to cover the costs to local governments.
Fast-forward to today, and Colorado lawmakers are poised to approve a state budget proposal that has left the idea of financial help for local governments far in the rearview mirror.
The spending plan for the 2025-26 fiscal year, which starts July 1, redirects severance and marijuana tax dollars owed to local governments to fund state programs. It also cuts a key revenue stream for roads and pulls back funding promised to cities and counties for things like transit projects and bike lanes. A popular grant program aimed at revitalizing downtowns was eliminated entirely.
Kevin Bommer, executive director of the Colorado Municipal League, says this adds up to nearly $140 million in losses for local governments — a callback to the 2010s when state budget writers repeatedly leaned on local governments to solve the state’s financial woes.
“I’ve seen it before,” Bommer said. “It doesn’t matter if it’s a recession, it doesn’t matter if it’s times of prosperity. When the state needs money to backfill the budget, they will drain funds that local governments use for prosperity in their own cities and towns and counties.”
While not unprecedented, the moves represent a shift in the political dynamics of the past few years, when local governments had a near-constant seat at the negotiating table — even if they didn’t always get their way.
This time around, Bommer said, “there was no effort to help local governments. I can’t point to anything in any of those cuts and say there was any kind of discussion about ‘we know this is going to hurt, but we really feel bad’ — nothing. None of those discussions happened.”
STATE TO LOCALS: YOU’RE ON YOUR OWN
The shift was already underway in the 2024 legislative session.
A number of state lawmakers by then had soured on the idea of reimbursing local governments for the cost of statewide property tax cuts. Increasingly, lawmakers began adopting a viewpoint shared by many Colorado homeowners, who saw the historic property tax bump as a windfall — the likes of which the state, which is limited by the Taxpayer’s Bill of Rights revenue cap, could only dream of.
Unlike the state, most local governments have ”deBruced” from under TABOR, meaning they don’t have to issue taxpayer refunds when collections rise faster than the combined rate of population and inflation.
After the Proposition HH property tax cuts failed at the ballot box in 2023, state lawmakers began to bristle at the idea of helping any but the most vulnerable local agencies, such as fire and hospital districts. Then, when the state’s budget problems worsened, the Joint Budget Committee sought opportunities to scale back the state’s involvement in local affairs, including a property tax relief program, various transportation and economic development grants, and promised assistance to help counties hire district attorneys and improve their pay.
“We’re in a situation where we need to stop taking on local government responsibilities, and saying they’re ours somehow,” Republican Sen. Barbara Kirkmeyer, a JBC member from Brighton, said at one hearing earlier this year — a sentiment shared by most of her colleagues.
But local governments face budget concerns of their own.
Home values aren’t rising as fast as they were in recent years, and commercial properties face a potential downturn. In the state’s slowest growing areas, local officials didn’t experience the jump in property values as a windfall, but as a lifeline after the decade of budget tightening that followed the Great Recession.
To make matters worse, recession alarm bells are going off due to President Donald Trump’s tariff policies, even as state and federal cuts threaten to take a toll on local agencies that administer the bulk of Colorado’s social services, including Medicaid and food stamps.
Bommer said he doesn’t blame the JBC, which faced a difficult task in closing a $1.2 billion shortfall.
In fact, when the rest of the legislature got its hands on the JBC’s proposal, lawmakers looked to take even more from local governments in order to avoid deeper cuts to state services. The House voted to cut the local share of the state’s marijuana sales tax from 10% to 3.5% — down from the 5% the JBC had suggested.
Gabe Evans’ one criticism of Donald Trump
U.S. Rep. Gabe Evans wishes the White House would be better about communicating its big decisions.
That was the sole piece of criticism the Republican congressman had for President Donald Trump when asked by The Unaffiliated last week to critique the new administration.
“Things will happen and I’ll find out about it on Twitter,” he said, referring to the social media site now known as X. “As we’ve established and built those working relationships with the White House, and with the liaisons that I have in the White House, I think that communication has gotten better. But there’s still been times where big, big policies or statements will come out and I wish I’d gotten a little bit of a heads up on them.”
Trump has repeatedly used social media to make announcements about his whiplash tariff policy, which Evans defended.
“I think the president told us almost 40 years ago how he negotiates,” he said. “I went back and reread parts of ‘The Art of the Deal’ where he talks about ‘I like to induce chaos, because when chaos is induced, then I’m able to go pick the lanes and get the deal that I want.’”
Evans argued that the trade negotiations sparked by Trump’s tariff policy have benefited agricultural producers in his 8th Congressional District. He cited a commitment from Mexico to halt illicit onion growing near the Rio Grande River that has undercut the American onion market as one example of that.
The congressman praised Trump’s work to cut down on illegal immigration.
“We’ve seen some very positive movements made in terms of enforcing the rule of law,” he said. “I kind of wish Colorado could get on board with that, too.”
CAMPAIGN FINANCE
The $1.2 million raised by state Rep. Manny Rutinel during the first quarter of 2025 for his congressional bid included a $6,600 contribution from Marlon Reis, Colorado’s first gentleman. The donation was made Jan. 27, the day the Commerce City Democrat announced his bid in the 8th Congressional District.
Rutinel spent $532,000 during the quarter, much of it on digital advertising and consultants, ending March with about $660,000 in the bank.
Meanwhile, Evans raised $810,000 in the first quarter and spent $130,500, starting April with $755,000 in the bank.
The spending included $2,000 on an initiation fee at the Capitol Hill Club, a social club in Washington for Republicans.
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OBITUARY
Tom Van Lone, a former chairman of the Weld County GOP and former Erie mayor who ran unsuccessfully for a state Senate seat last year, has died. He was battling cancer.
“Tom was a dedicated leader, passionate advocate, friend to many and a steadfast supporter of our community,” the Republican Women of Weld wrote on Facebook. “His commitment to service and his lasting impact on Weld County will not be forgotten.”
ELECTION 2026
Boulder County District Attorney Michael Dougherty raised $155,000 between Feb. 24, when he launched his campaign, and the end of March for his campaign to be Colorado’s next attorney general. He also loaned his campaign about $10,000 during that span.
Dougherty, a Democrat, ended the first quarter with $137,243.95 in the bank.
Former House Speaker Crisanta Duran, who is also running as a Democrat to be attorney general, raised $36,500 between Feb. 26, when she launched her campaign, and the end of March.
Colorado Secretary of State Jena Griswold, another Democrat who is running for attorney general, raised more than $185,000 in the 24 hours after announcing her candidacy earlier this month.
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Colorado bill aims to prevent GOP bylaw amendments making it easier to opt out of primaries
Tucked inside a bill that would overhaul Colorado’s process of filling legislative vacancies are provisions that aim to make it harder for the state Republican Party to opt out of partisan primaries.
The provisions are a direct response to efforts over the past two years by former Colorado GOP Chairman Dave Williams and his allies to amend the party’s bylaws in an attempt to clear the threshold of 75% central committee support needed to opt out.
Opting out would block unaffiliated voters from weighing in on Republicans’ general election nominees, but it would also cancel GOP primaries and leave the selection process to party insiders through the caucus and assembly process. It would also make signature gathering to get on the ballot moot.
House Bill 1315 would change state law to clarify that the 75% threshold must be reached among voting members of the party’s central committee, not just those at a meeting called for that purpose. It would also require that the threshold be reached by 75% of central committee members affirmatively voting for the opt out. The measure would also bar proxy voting during the opt-out vote.
Williams and his allies tried unsuccessfully to amend the party’s bylaws to change the 75% threshold to be only among those appearing at a meeting where the opt-out vote was taking place. They also wanted to count any central committee members not present at an opt-out vote as supporting the opt out.
By changing state law through House Bill 1315, it would effectively block Williams’ wing of the Colorado GOP from trying to rewrite the party’s bylaws to make it easier to clear the 75% threshold.
House Minority Leader Rose Pugliese, R-Colorado Springs, and state Sen. Barbara Kirkmeyer, R-Brighton, are lead sponsors of House Bill 1315. They are part of the faction of the Colorado GOP that has pushed back against opting out of the state’s primaries.
“We had a previous chair who tried to circumvent the law,” Kirkmeyer said. “I think there needs to be clarity made.”
Williams’ wing of the party is livid about the legislation.
“Sen. Kirkmeyer traded her support for the Democrats’ controversial bill regarding vacancies in elected offices in exchange for allowing her to insert a clause that would make it virtually impossible to opt out of open primaries,” said RINO Watch, a newsletter that attacks Colorado Republicans whose authors don’t think are conservative enough.
As for blocking unaffiliated voters from participating in Republicans’ primaries, either by opting out of the primaries or by rolling back Colorado’s law letting them participate, Kirkmeyer thinks that’s a bad idea either way.
“I think it will alienate or disengage Republican voters, as well as unaffiliated voters,” said Kirkmeyer, who is mulling a 2026 gubernatorial bid.
Salazar’s statement is akin to watching an NFL game and saying “I just hope both teams have fun” — and maybe leaving open the idea that you might jump on the field and start playing, too.
Salazar is in a tricky political spot with Colorado’s Democratic gubernatorial primary. Bennet is his U.S. Senate successor and Attorney General Phil Weiser is his protege and Democratic successor in the AG’s office. And Salazar himself hasn’t ruled out jumping in the race.
He said the men are “both dedicated public servants who have made significant contributions to our state.”
HICK ON BENNET
U.S. Sen. John Hickenlooper’s first reaction when Bennet told him he was running for governor was that Bennet would be bored as Colorado’s chief executive.
“Michael Bennet is a deep thinker. He’s one of the smartest, most strategic people I know that I’ve ever worked with. I think he’ll be a great governor,” Hickenlooper told reporters in Eagle this week. “I think you don’t have to have a lot of genius to be considered a great governor. A lot of people went around saying, ‘God, Hickenlooper, such a great governor.’”
Hickenlooper, who was governor for two terms ending in early 2019, endorsed Bennet’s gubernatorial bid, but that doesn’t mean he doesn’t think highly of Weiser, too.
“I called Phil and I told him I was going to endorse Michael Bennet and that does not reflect any lack of trust and belief in all that he’s done,” Hickenlooper said. “Everywhere I go, up and down, people are always telling me: ‘Phil Weiser did this, Phil Weiser did that. Look at what Phil Weiser did over here.’ I think it’s going to be a real, real hard race. I think that the challenge will be to make sure that that election stays positive.”
Colorado Sun staff writer Jason Blevins contributed to this report.
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