State Wastes Lots of Cash, Ballot-Measure Foes Say

Waste is in the eye of the beholder.

Opponents of two fall ballot measures that would boost state spending say government doesn’t need more money because it wastes what it has now.

They drafted a report this month detailing that alleged overspending.

But much of what the report calls overspending – including locking up drug users, prosecuting anti-trust cases and employing a lieutenant governor – others call core government functions.

The Independence Institute, a think tank based in Golden, identified the alleged government waste in a draft report it recently posted online by mistake.

The “Piglet Report,” at www.taxincrease.org,warns voters against ballot measures Referendum C and Referendum D.

Referendum C would suspend state spending limits for five years, allowing lawmakers to spend an estimated $3.6 billion they otherwise would have refunded to taxpayers. Referendum D would let the state borrow against that money to start transportation and school construction right away.

Supporters say the measures would pull state services from recession and head off a cumulative $2 billion in program cuts over the next five years.

Opponents say the measures would give money to government, which squanders it.

For example, the “Piglet Report” cites $500,000 spent by the University of Colorado on alcohol, about $13,000 of controversial professor Ward Churchill’s salary, a $10,000 film grant and up to $15,000 for fireworks in Pueblo.

Thursday, a leader of the Vote Yes on C&D campaign called the paper “a joke.”

“If it does anything, it proves our point,” said Katy Atkinson, the group’s spokeswoman. “Because you could put the (CU) regents on bread and water, you could fire Ward Churchill, you could make sure every state employee only sits on a folding chair, and you still wouldn’t have enough money to fix one bridge.”

Two of the priciest overspending examples the institute cites are $3 billion in an unfunded liability for a state pension program – money that the state is not, in fact, spending at the moment – and up to $53 million for private prisons, which cost the state less per- inmate than public prisons.

The items in the report – pension funds excluded – don’t total nearly enough to solve the state’s budget problems. They’re not supposed to, said Jon Caldara, the institute’s president. They’re just examples of why voters shouldn’t give the state more money.

“It’s hard to be convinced that Colorado is in a fiscal crisis when the state is spending $600 for oil changes . . . or nearly $1,000 for office chairs,” Caldara said. “It’s hard to believe that we’re actually in a fiscal crisis when we’re spending 15 grand for fireworks.”

Caldara called the list “a work in progress” and subject to change. He said it will likely grow before it’s completed, particularly if state workers contact him with stories of egregious spending.

He also said some items could drop off. He didn’t give examples, but the institute has previously pushed government to save money by contracting with private companies for state services, which is the case with private prisons.

The draft report says the state could save up to $1.3 million by not prosecuting anti-trust cases. It argues those laws “were passed for dubious reasons and they are generally used to squash competition, not foster it.”

As supporting evidence, it cites a paper written in 1961 by Alan Greenspan, who now heads the Federal Reserve Board.

The report calls the lieutenant governor’s office and its $280,990 budget “unnecessary and wasteful.” Caldara said the job “is basically to wake up in the morning, call the governor and make sure he’s alive.”

A spokeswoman for current Lt. Gov. Jane Norton took exception to that Thursday. Sue Smith, the spokeswoman, noted Norton’s work on homeland security, education, a state adoption initiative and Indian affairs, among others.

INFOBOX

State spending questioned Examples of alleged government waste identified in a draft report by the Independence Institute:

* $3 billion in an unfunded liability for state pensions. The state is not actually spending that money at present.

* Up to $53 million on private prisons, for which the report says the legislature “is not getting good value for its money.”

* Tens of millions to incarcerate nonviolent drug offenders.

* $3.75 million on a state airplane.

* Up to $1.3 million to prosecute anti-trust cases.

* Nearly $300,000 for the lieutenant governor’s office.

* About $260,000 for arts grants in the “wealthy areas of Vail, Telluride, Aspen and Boulder.”

* $50,000 on luxury chairs for state workers.

* $13,000 annually in taxpayer dollars goes to professor Ward Churchill’s salary at the University of Colorado.