House debating use of $28.9B

Chamber’s spending plan for state calls for major investments in roads and schools.

The state House of Representatives on Wednesday began — much where it left off a year ago — a marathon debate on Colorado’s $28.9 billion state budget proposal.

Lawmakers offered 95 amendments to the budget plan, with Republicans calling for spending cuts and sweeping reforms to how the legislature crafts its annual spending plan, while majority Democrats largely played defense, rejecting one GOP proposal after another that would have cut funding to state departments, Medicaid and a film-incentive program.

Nonetheless, Wednesday’s debate over spending for the 2018-19 fiscal year, which begins July 1, was a noticeable departure from last year’s, when partisan tensions boiled over into fights over sanctuary cities, aborted fetus parts and a short-lived filibuster that pushed the proceedings past a crucial midnight deadline.

The biggest difference? Unexpectedly strong revenue growth forged something of a cease-fire in the annual tug of war between roads and schools.

“We thought our fight was going to be whether or not we funded education or transportation,” said Rep. Millie Hamner, D-Dillon, who chairs the Joint Budget Committee. “I never would have predicted that we would have been here, given where we started this whole conversation months ago.”

Instead, the bulk of the discussions Wednesday were over smaller items, such as whether to fund school security grants and whether to cut money that had been earmarked for the Department of Corrections, which is besieged by bipartisan calls for reform.

The budget proposal finalized last week by the budget-writing committee set aside $495 million for transportation, $225 million to shore up the state pension and $150 million to boost the state’s annual support for K-12 schools. Other winners included state employees, who are set to receive a 3 percent raise, and the Department of Higher Education, which is getting an extra $82 million in discretionary spending, a 9 percent jump from this year that the governor requested to help limit tuition hikes.

For many conservatives, however, the growth in revenue was no excuse to boost spending to the extent the proposal seeks.

Republicans offered dozens of amendments to cut spending on items that ran the gamut from Medicaid reimbursements and eligibility to the Public Employees’ Retirement Association, typically with one of two goals in mind: boosting money for either school safety or road projects.

“This long bill is chock-full of

government help that the taxpayers did not ask for,” said Rep. Lori Saine, RWeld County. “What they did ask for is more funding for roads and bridges.”

In a morning news briefing, House Speaker Crisanta Duran, D-Denver, said the budget proposal was al- ready “sending a very clear message” that the state legislature was making infrastructure a priority, ahead of a possible ballot question on new taxes.

“We are showing that the state has skin in the game to problem-solve when it comes to transportation funding,” Duran said. “We are investing as much as we can even though there’s competing priorities.”

In the wake of the school shooting in Parkland, Fla., top Democrats suggested they would negotiate with Republicans over proposed funding for school security grants, which would go toward facility improvements and resource officers. But, by late afternoon, it was not clear how much of the Republicans’ $50 million proposal they would agree to fund.

Wednesday’s floor discussion, which was expected to culminate in a latenight preliminary vote, was just the opening round. The bill must pass both chambers — and would probably go to conference committee — before it can become law.

In other actions Wednesday:

• Gov. John Hickenlooper’s film-incentive program — an annual political football at the legislature — survived a GOP attempt to strip it of a proposed $500,000 in funding.

• Substance-abuse treatment programs received a $3 million boost.

• The House also cut $1.5 million in payments to private prisons in order to fund a Department of Human Services program for high-risk pregnant women.