DENVER – Colorado’s $28.3 billion state budget – which increases funding for K-12 and higher education – cleared the formality of a committee hearing Tuesday.
Senate Bill 254, the so-called Long Bill, represents months of work by the bipartisan Joint Budget Committee and gives a 4.2 percent increase in overall funding from this year’s budget, including $667 million more discretionary funding for the state. It was approved 6-1 by the Senate Appropriations Committee Tuesday and now heads to the Senate floor for a lengthy process of debate and amendments.
While the bottom line number for the budget is $28.3 billion, some of these funds are counted twice, meaning in reality, the budget is closer to $26.8 billion.
Included in the budget is a $216.7 million increase in funding for K-12, which is larger than reported last week and amounts to a 4 percent increase.
Despite this increase, the educational “negative factor,” which is an interpretation of statute that funding for K-12 should be increased based on the total funding for school and not the per-pupil funding, is estimated to go up $48 million.
Higher education in Colorado also receives a funding increase of $177 million under the proposed budget, including more than $303,000 for Fort Lewis College, where in-state students also will experience a $367-per-semester increase.
But something had to be cut to balance the budget because Colorado lawmakers can only retain so much money under the Taxpayer Bill of Rights (TABOR).
Hospitals, particularly those in rural areas, took the brunt this year because of a $264 million reduction in the amount of revenue collected under the Hospital Provider Fee.
This fee is a charge placed on hospitals by the state to unlock matching federal dollars.
Funds received through the fee are then returned to hospitals based on a formula which generally favors rural hospitals and subsidizes their operations.
By eliminating this fee, lawmakers were able to avoid paying refunds to taxpayers and maximize the amount of tax dollars they could retain for operation of the state’s government.
A bill that would enterprise the provider fee to make it not count toward the revenue limit under TABOR, was introduced to the Senate Monday evening but still has an uphill battle as similar measures have been killed by Republicans in the chamber.
Despite the overall increases, few at the Capitol are happy with the final result. Lawmakers are working on amendments that will be presented Wednesday and debated by the Senate before the Long Bill heads to the House next week for a duplication of the process.
The bill will likely go through many iterations before reaching its final version.
Sen. Don Coram, R-Montrose, has run amendments in the past in an effort to stop the state from claiming oil and gas severance taxes as a means to balance the budget. The tax should be going back to communities impacted by the industry to offset expenses incurred as a result of oil and gas activities, Coram said.
“I mean, you look at Durango and the infrastructure that’s required for the last 50 years in La Plata County because of the oil and gas industry. It’s expensive. Your roads, your schools, your fire department, your hospitals, everything’s affected, but we thank God it’s there because without that revenue, where would you be?”
This year, the state intends to claim $45.7 million in severance taxes for the sake of balancing the budget, but Coram said Monday he would need additional time to consider the budget before committing to run any amendments on the Long Bill.
During the Committee hearing for the budget, only one senator voted against the bill – Sen. Andy Kerr, R-Lakewood.
“There are things in this budget which I just don’t think people in my district would want me voting for,” Kerr said.
Included in his list of points of opposition were the reduction in the Hospital Provider Fee and the failure to fund schools in a way that does not increase the negative factor.
Kerr said he has several amendments planned, including one that would bring back a bill he has run for several years to fund full-day kindergarten.
“I’ve run those amendments in the past, and I will continue to try and keep that conversation alive, but more importantly, actually start moving on this,” Kerr said. “It’s been years since we’ve done anything to move the ball on full-day kindergarten, and it’s time we do.”