DENVER - If all goes as expected in the coming weeks, four GOP-held offices will have been turned over to newcomers in the past year by party vacancy committees rather than by elections.

Three of those seats — those held by Sen. Ron May and Rep. Bill Cadman and the one given up late last year by Rep. Mark Cloer — were occupied by term-limited incumbents.

By leaving the offices early and allowing the Republican Party to appoint a successor, it meant the next election could feature a favored incumbent in the seat rather than an open seat that typically leads to a more competitive race.

Republicans said the spate of turnovers is a combination of coincidence and the cascading effect of May’s early retirement, which could open up vacancies in two other seats because of candidates moving up the political ladder.

El Paso County GOP Chairman Greg Garcia said there has been no effort to get termlimited incumbents to resign seats early so that they can be passed to other party members.

But county Democratic Party Chairman John Morris said he’s seen too much in a 10-month period to feel that Republicans aren’t cheating the system somehow. He was the first person to question Cloer’s motivations in December, and he again asked whether May’s early departure is more about politics than about the private-sector opportunities that the 15-year legislator cited in his resignation letter.

“The whole Republican approach to resigning early and then giving the incumbent a better seat: What is that?” Morris asked. “It seems to me that when a person is elected to office, they have a certain responsibility to the people who elected them to office for a full term . . . I think it’s cynical.”

Cloer won election to a fourth and final term in November but gave up his seat slightly more than a month later, citing medical problems that had developed quickly with one of his sons. Stella Garza-Hicks, appointed by a vacancy committee to take his place, said Friday that she would not seek election to a full term next year.

May resigned effective Oct. 31, and Cadman, a term-limited state representative, is expected to be appointed to his seat. El Paso County Commissioner Douglas Bruce is considered the favorite to grab Cadman’s seat; Bruce is not term-limited, but his current term ends in 2008.

Garcia defended the openings, saying both occurred for personal reasons. He said the party is following state law to put someone else into office.

“We want to make sure people know it’s an electoral process, not an inheritance,” Garcia said. “Preferences being what they are, I wish everybody could have finished their terms. Our preference isn’t something we can govern by, but we can govern by personal needs.”

Morris admitted that Democrats would have a hard time winning the overwhelmingly Republican seats occupied by May and Cadman, regardless of who is in office. But before Garza-Hicks announced her plans to not run, Morris was particularly miffed by Cloer’s decision because the House District 17 seat is viewed as highly competitive.