NOREEN: Bruce's Amendment 61 just plain wacky
Amendment 61 is the latest insane, mean-spirited attack on Coloradans.
It would effectively end large publicly financed projects, from schools and highways to light rail and airports.
Amendment 61 is on the state ballot in November. A good example of how nutty it is can be found by examining the recent history of the Colorado Springs Airport.
In 1991, 69 percent of the city’s voters approved a measure allowing the airport to sell $64 million in revenue bonds to finance the new terminal. At the time, Doug Bruce wrote that the project was “poorly financed” and amounted to “fiscal child abuse.” Like a paranoid Henny-Penny, Bruce raised the specter of “a massive bailout” that would have to be approved when the airport defaulted on the bonds.
Doug Bruce was wrong.
“There’s never been an issue with the financial viability of the bonds,” said airport manager Mark Earle. “It hasn’t even come close. In fact, the bond ratings agency upgraded the bonds.”
As city officials predicted almost 19 years ago, not a penny of taxpayer money has ever been used to retire the debt, which has been paid off with airport revenues, even though the airport hasn’t exactly prospered.
This is relevant now because Bruce is behind Amendment 61, a dubious idea that would force all publicly financed projects to be paid off within 10 years — a short time in the public works world. It would require all debt to be approved in advance by voters, even if no tax money were at risk, as in the case of the airport.
Asked to discuss Amendment 61 on Friday, Bruce hung up the phone. It was a good way to avoid saying something really stupid.
Dan Hopkins, a spokesman for Coloradans for Responsible Reform, a group that is opposing all three of Bruce’s wacky ballot measures, (see my blog) said if Amendment 61 had been in effect in the past few years, residents would notice.
“The I-25 widening project through Colorado Springs was funded through (30-year) bonds. Those absolutely would be prohibited under Amendment 61,” he said. “What Amendment 61 does is prey upon people’s discontent with government debt.”
Under Amendment 61, school construction would come to a halt, because school districts don’t have enough money to pay off projects that quickly. Additions to water systems such as the Southern Delivery System would be impossible.
Limiting bonded indebtedness to 10-year increments means projects won’t be done at all.
Imagine how many citizens could afford to buy a home if they had to pay it off in 10 years. Holding government to such a standard would emasculate it — Bruce’s ultimate goal.
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