The Joint Budget Committee on Monday held a first-ever opportunity for the public to weigh in on how they think the state should prioritize its budget.
Many of those testifying pleaded with the JBC to fully fund full-day kindergarten, including the superintendents of a half-dozen school districts who sources said were there at the request of Gov. Jared Polis. He’s made free full-day kindergarten among his top priorities and has asked for $227 million to pay for it. But Senate Democrats have raised concerns about how to pay for the program after the first year or two, when the state is expected to have a revenue surplus of more than $1 billion.
Approximately 49,941 students are enrolled in a full-day kindergarten program, according to the Colorado Department of Education. But the state currently funds only about 60 percent of the costs for 44,225 of those students.
Districts can tap into their state funding to cover the rest, use mill-levy overrides, or use federal dollars. And some charge parents tuition to cover the rest of the costs.
Among those testifying: Superintendent Bill Wilson of Brush RE-2J, who pointed out that his district is one of three in the state that has a mill-levy override (a special property tax), approved by voters more than a decade ago to fund the district’s kindergartens. Full-day kindergarten is essential, Wilson explained, because 65 percent of his students are on free and reduced lunch, an indicator of poverty.
About 50 members of the public testified during the Monday event. In addition to advocating for free full-day kindergarten, some asked that the state pay off its $672 million debt to K-12 education, known these days as the budget stabilization factor. Others sought money for child care, film incentives or increased reimbursements for home health care aides. No one spoke up about cutting the budget.
Save that one for Sen. Jerry Sonnenberg of Sterling, who led the charge on Thursday to reject mid-year budget hikes for a host of state agencies.
But he reserved his harshest criticism for the Department of Regulatory Agencies, which now oversees the state’s conservation easement program.
In December, Sonnenberg presided over a hearing in which appraiser Mark Weston, now director of the Division of Conservation Easement, was to present a report on a working group meeting that would come up with recommendations on the program. Weston admitted he never actually convened the working group as required by 2018 legislation. Instead he hand-picked stakeholders for a survey; none appeared to be landowners who have fought the state over the program.
That led to a 974-page report that recommended the program continue as is, rejecting suggestions from aggrieved landowners and lawmakers.
The mid-year budget hike, known as a supplemental appropriation, is sometimes used by lawmakers to send a message to a state agency when they’re unhappy with the agency. Two years ago, the House initially killed a supplemental appropriation for Attorney General Cynthia Coffman. Democrats were angry over her defense of oil and gas in state lawsuits; Republicans felt she was overspending. Once that message was sent, lawmakers passed a second bill with part of the money the Attorney General was seeking, for information technology uses.
The supplemental appropriation for the Department of Regulatory Agencies was for just one thing: $383,734 and four full-time staff for the conservation easement division.
Sonnenberg wasn’t able to persuade Senate Democrats Thursday to join in on his criticism of the conservation easement program and they passed the bill on a party-line 19-15 vote with one senator absent.
But he reminded lawmakers that the issue won’t go away. On Wednesday, Sonnenberg told the Senate that the agency did not do what it was ordered to do by the General Assembly under House Bill 18-1291, a bill that won final approval on the last day of the 2018 session.
“The agreement was that they would solve this problem. Their idea of a stakeholder meeting was to send out a survey to a handful of people. They.did.nothing. I wouldn’t pay for this.”
“If we continue to give them money it will never be solved and will continue down the same path,” Sonnenberg said.
JBC Chair Sen. Dominick Moreno of Commerce City pointed out the bill was needed to fix an error in the 2018 legislation that omitted the division’s funding.
Is there hope for a fix? Perhaps. Democratic Sen. Faith Winter of Westminster told the Senate that she is part of the group working on a fix for the decades-long problems faced by farmers and ranchers who say they have had their lands stolen by land trusts and tax credits unfairly denied by the Department of Revenue. “We are working on making those people whole,” Winter said. “There will be a bill” this year, perhaps several, she said. Democratic Rep. Dylan Roberts of Eagle, who chairs the House Rural Affairs and Agriculture Committee, also has pledged to be part of that effort.
Sonnenberg said the discussions don’t appear to be headed in the right direction. “We still have the authority of the purse to utilize leverage” over the program.
This bill doesn’t solve anything, added Republican Sen. Larry Crowder of Alamosa.
Another effort to put oversight into the state’s beleaguered conservation easement program on Monday, however, went down to defeat in that same House committee.
House Bill 1091, sponsored by Republican Rep. Kimmi Lewis of Kim, died on a party-line 7-4 vote on Jan. 28.
The bill would require property owners considering a conservation easement to sign off on a disclosure that they understand the risks. That disclosure form, which Lewis called a “right to know,” would be housed within the Department of Agriculture, a long-standing fix desired by supporters since those most harmed by the program have been farmers and ranchers.
The disclosure form would include a lengthy laundry list of all of the problems those who say they have been harmed by the program have faced over the last two decades, including that some property owners have been forced to pay back the tax credits when the Department of Revenue rejects their appraisals, that a conservation easement makes it more difficult to obtain a loan against the property and that appraised values accepted by the Department of Revenue are almost always lower than the appraisals paid for by the landowner.
Lewis’ bill, as introduced, also attempted to set up a database of conservation easements by county, to be set up and administered by the ag department.
Alan and Julie Gentz of Sterling testified in favor of the bill, as did Jilliane Hixson of Lamar, all long-time advocates for changes to the program and parties to a federal lawsuit suing the state. But they weren’t alone. The hearing included an opportunity for testimony from people around the state, with witnesses testifying in favor of the bill at Fort Lewis College in Durango, Colorado Mesa University in Grand Junction and at Trinidad State College in Trinidad.
In Montezuma County, for example, two witnesses told the committee that a conservation easement, which is supposed to save the land from development, is being developed by the Montezuma Land Conservancy into a 30-car parking lot and a two-story building. There’s no oversight over these land trusts, said Allen and Valerie Mays.
But opposition to the bill came from the land trusts and conservation groups who have long held more sway with Democrats. That includes Conservation Colorado, the Colorado Coalition of Land Trusts, Colorado Cattlemen’s Land Trusts, Palmer Land Trusts, Audubon Society and the various state agencies in charge of the program.
Lobbyist Ben Watters testified on their behalf on Jan. 28. He said he is involved with the legislators who are working on the other bill. Part of that bill will include transparency, Watters said. “We heard Rep. Lewis and the members from the community loud and clear…[but] this bill creates a new process for an extinguishment” of a conservation easement, which he said is already available in state law (but he failed to inform the committee that an extinguishment requires a court order). The bill would require the Attorney General to assist a landowner with the documents necessary to obtain the court order for an extinguishment of an easement.
Eric Glenn, past president of the Colorado Coalition of Land Trusts, acknowledged there were problems with the land trusts and that the General Assembly has tried to fix the problem. “We cannot just trust certifications,” Glenn told the committee. “You have to do your homework, choose your partners wisely.” But then he added that “I’m not saying these landowners did anything wrong…We’re 100 percent behind transparency and that conservation easements can be upheld in the public trust.”
The committee agreed to amend the bill at Lewis’ request, to keep the “right to know” label that would be kept within the Department of Regulatory Agencies. That would eliminate the database and the bill’s more than $500,000 annual cost.
“It is unreal what people have gone through,” Lewis said. Democrats did not provide any reasons during the hearing for voting against the bill.
There are still 11 lawsuits against the state over the conservation easement problem, according to the Attorney General’s office.