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Taxpayers blamed for state cash crunch

by | 6:09 pm, June 17, 2010 | Comments Off

The state cannot pay its bills and taxpayers get blamed. And no one asks where did the more than $18 billion in taxpayer dollars go.

The Denver Post reports:

Temporarily short on money, Colorado has declared a fiscal emergency and delayed payments to doctors and clinics taking care of the state’s neediest patients.

The usual suspects are providing the usual excuses.  Governor Bill Ritter’s spokesman Evan Dryer claimed the delay is a “cash flow” problem.  Joint Budget Committee member Senator Moe Keller (D-Wheat Ridge) blamed taxpayers who have asked for an extension on their income taxes and have not made “additional payments to the state.”

COST went to the Governor’s user-unfriendly transparency Web site (TOPs) to see where some of our money went.  Consider the following state expenditures:

  • $3,238,437.68 for dues and memberships including various Chambers of Commerce, Colorado State Bar Association, Wine Development Fund and hundreds of other organizations.
  • $6,426,999.36 for bank card fees. Question: do taxpayers get the reward points or miles?
  • $65,824.78 for interest on late payments.
  • $1,285,449.93 for “customer workshops” in places such as Beaver Run Resort.
  • $2,841,045.14 in miscellaneous fees and fines. Maybe the state will reimburse taxpayers for parking tickets received near the state capitol for those taxpayers who parked too long at a meter waiting to testify in committee.
  • $72,899,996.09 for travel including more than $8 million for non-employee, out-of-state travel and more than $2 million for non-employee, out-of-country travel.
Rather than blame taxpayers, legislators and the Governor should prioritize the state budget. What is more important travel or the “state’s neediest patients”? That is the job of the state legislature.
COST believes that spending must be examined, but the state does not make that easy for taxpayers to do. We have one of the worst state-based transparency Web sites in the country. Check out Missouri, Texas, and Kansas for better examples. Even Colorado school districts and some municipalities put the state to shame.
Until the state proves otherwise, COST thinks spending, not the Colorado taxpayer, is the problem.
Category: Colorado, Colorado Politics, Health Reform, Politics, Transparency
Tags: > > > > > > > > > >

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