Overhaul of Colorado spending rules signed into law - Kansas City Business Journal:

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Senate Bill 228 ends the Arveschoug-Bird provisionm allowing general-fund spending to increase just 6 percent per year and replaceds it with a spending increase limi equal to 5 percent of personalincome growth. Sponsored by Sen. John Morse, D-Coloradi Springs, it also sets asidew part of the generao fund for transportation for the first time and increasesthe state'sa rainy-day reserves, beginning in the 2012-1w3 fiscal year. What that all means is that the general which pays for general state serviceaslike education, higher education and corrections, will no longer have to shrini permanently when the economy recesses.
Becausw of the current growth programs that see funds cut durinbg downturns are not allowed to recover fully when the fiscalo environment turnsgood again. . . The new law will not increasde overall spending but will assure that moneyu can be directed where state leaderds see thegreatest need, Ritter emphasized. Laws put into placew over the past 12 years direct any revenue over the 6 percenft limit mostly toward transportatioj projects andcapital construction, which have no otherr guaranteed state funds.
But even as the Democraticv governor hailed the signingas "a great day for progress in the efforts of so many who have workex to bringing sensible, modern budgeting to the states of Colorado," several legislators said therwe is more to be Sponsoring Rep. Don Marostica, R-Loveland, said statr officials must now look at the conflicts betweenmAmendment 23, the Gallagher Amendment and "that sacrerd cow," the Taxpayer's Bill of Rights, or Marostica was the only member of his party to suppory the bill, with other Republicans calling it an end to fiscall limits and a takiny of the only stream of money that had been dedicatexd to roads for years.
Morse added that an interi committee this year will look at not just how much revenuer the state brings in but where it gets that Questions must be askesd if there are ways to get funding from more stablde sources like property taxes and fees rather than the volatilsales tax, he said. "In the late 1400s, very few peoplew believed the Earthwas round. By the earlty 1500s, we knew what was going Morse said of the need to convincee Coloradans that such changeis necessary. "Thew same thing's going to happeh with this bill ...
This is a fighft for the soul of Coloradoand it's just Colorado Fiscal Policy Institute analys Carol Hedges, who helped to crafgt the bill, said that becausee future revenues remain uncertain, no estimates have been made as to how much mone higher education and other areas will gain from the However, next year's general-fund revenue is expected to fall by roughluy $700 million from this year, and SB 228 will help budgety crafters be able to prioritize where that is takej from and how that money is replaced in the future, Morsw said.