A part-private plan, in which students pay more for costlier degrees, would offset cuts.

By Jessica Fender
The Denver Post

As state funding cuts loom in 2011, leaders of the Colorado State University system have started considering an option unheard of in all but a handful of states: converting to a part-public, part-private structure in which students pay more for costlier degrees.

If implemented, the change could mean CSU's $4,800 annual in-state tuition jumps to about $13,500 for liberal-arts programs and as much as $20,000 for engineering degrees at the Fort Collins campus.

The university system also includes a campus in Pueblo, an online program and agricultural outreach offices in most Colorado counties.

CSU executives earlier this month raised partial privatization as a possible answer to the state's defunding or severely reducing its support for higher-education institutions. Also under CSU's consideration are plans to cap the number of Coloradans who can receive reduced, in-state tuition rates.

CSU chief financial officer Rich Schweigert cautioned that the suggestions are the start of a last-resort contingency plan, and their implementation depends on how the state handles higher-education funding. All of the suggestions would require legislative approval.
"If the sky does fall, we're going to have to do something different," Schweigert said.

Colorado institutions are scrambling to cut costs and find new revenue ahead of a funding crunch that will leave them a collective $230 million-plus short in 2011, when federal stimulus money runs dry.

That shortfall represents more than a third of the state's support for colleges and universities, and the shortfall is only expected to worsen with the state's budget crisis.

CSU's share of the cuts now in place represents about 4 percent of its budget. Officials declined to say how much more the system would have to lose to trigger privatization plans.

Privatization, eschewed by University of Colorado System president Bruce Benson earlier this month, could be problematic since campus buildings were paid for by taxpayers, said Sen. Moe Keller, D-Wheat Ridge, who heads the legislature's budgeting committee.

"I don't blame them for bringing them forward," Keller said of the CSU ideas. "I think it's a really bad idea. (Privatization) will change the nature of higher education and make it unaffordable for a large portion of our middle class."
The hybrid public-private model is extremely rare, according to Vincent Badolato, an education-policy specialist at the National Conference of State Legislatures.

Only Virginia, Pennsylvania and New York have versions of it.

CSU looked to Cornell University in New York as its model, where three colleges and a graduate program are public and seven colleges are funded through endowments and other sources.

The setup results in a $21,000 difference for New York undergraduates between the more costly private programs and the cheaper public degrees.

The latter, says vice provost for Land Grant Affairs Ron Seeber, attract many of the school's less-affluent students.

Schweigert said the CSU programs most ripe for privatization are those that cost the most to provide, such as veterinary medicine.
At the same time, CSU could limit the number of students admitted at lower, in-state rates to the amount that state funding will pay for.

Both scenarios would mean tuition hikes for many students.

And both will be met with resistance from the legislature in 2010, when lawmakers expect CSU and other colleges to start pushing backup plans such as these.

Rep. Jack Pommer, incoming chair of the budgeting committee, said higher education's funding crisis has been a long time in the making as lawmakers for years have shied away from politically inexpedient proposals to allow tuition increases and other fixes.

"I'm very glad CSU is looking at these options. They really don't have a choice," said Pommer, D-Boulder. "If we're not going to plan ahead, at least the schools are."

Actually, the three research universities have been looking into options like this for some time. Even back in 2004, when Betsy Hoffman was president of CU, she was talking about partial privatization.

What we've talked about is usually a "high tuition, high aid" model, which lets schools charge much higher tuition, but also requires them to offer a substantial amount of financial aid to students who can't afford the tuition.

This idea, having some schools privatized, is interesting. One problem with the way we limit tuition increases the the cost differences between different majors. This could help with that.

Jessica Fender: 303-954-1244 or jfender@denverpost.com

Colorado casinos' next quest may be 24-hour alcohol

By Andy Vuong
The Denver Post

BLACK HAWK — Now that they can stay open 24 hours, Colorado's mountain casinos are eyeing a legislative push to allow them to serve alcohol around the clock.

Operators have found that, for the most part, the slot machines stop ringing and the dice stop rolling once the beer stops flowing.

State law doesn't let businesses serve alcoholic beverages between 2 a.m. and 7 a.m. Gambling-industry officials say discussions to eliminate or amend that statute — or to create an exemption for casinos — are preliminary, and a proposal may not come until 2011. B

ut they have already raised the issue with some state legislators, and the Colorado Gaming Association is researching liquor laws in other states thathave casinos.

"It's something we're very interested in, but we also know it's a very complicated topic," said Troy Stremming, a senior vice president with Ameristar Casinos, which operates one of the largest casinos in the state and recently opened a $235 million, 33-story hotel in Black Hawk.

On a recent Friday night at the Lodge Casino in Black Hawk, Boulder resident Johnny Archibald sipped on a gin and tonic as he waited to play roulette at a jam-packed table.

"Gambling and alcohol go together," said the 22-year-old. About three hours later, roughly 30 minutes after last call, the same table was almost bare, with just one player. Across the street at the Ameristar casino, the crowd also promptly died down.

"It's so lame," said Sarah Clemmens, 29, while waiting with her friends at the valet at about 2:15 a.m. "I would stay longer if the serving time was extended."

Operators say they want to serve alcohol 24 hours to be on par with gambling destinations such as Las Vegas and Atlantic City, which have round-the-clock gambling and liquor service.

Remember when this was supposed to be "limited gaming," tailored to Colorado?

"Our interest is strictly to be able to provide our patrons something that they expect," said John Bohannon, general manager at the Isle Casino in Black Hawk. "Most jurisdictions where you have 24-hour gaming, you're going to have 24-hour liquor service as well."

Opponents say extending the hours could create more problems with public intoxication.

"I'd have to look into it more, but, off the bat, it doesn't seem like a very good idea," said Rep. Jack Pommer, D-Boulder, co-sponsor of a failed 2008 liquor bill that would have allowed convenience stores and supermarkets to sell wine and full-strength beer. "I would be especially concerned about all-night drinking at casinos."

The grocery store bill was really about competition and fairness -- I don't see why we grant liquor stores a monopoly on selling alcohol when it increases prices and reduces convenience for consumers.

I wasn't trying to increase the availability of liquor. In fact, I assume the liquor stores' vehement opposition came from their belief that adding retailers wouldn't increase overall sales much, it would mostly divide up existing sales over more retailers.

I assume the current 2 am closing time is more to protect neighborhoods from intoxicated patrons and to give legislators and other people a few hours to sober up before heading back to work.

I would be especially concerned about all-night drinking at casinos. The casinos already cause a considerable amount of trouble.

It's an issue right now because of the Governor's decision to balance the current year's budget partially by diverting money from the Local Government Limited Gaming Impact Program. We've been getting stiff opposition including a town that says it will fold if it's forced to handle the impacts of gambling without the state help. A lot of the problems are alcohol related.

Most nightclubs and bars have last call at about 1:30 a.m., and patrons stream out shortly thereafter.

It's not much different at the casinos, and that doesn't bode well for them because they no longer close at 2 a.m. The industry recently spent more than $7 million on a ballot initiative to allow them to stay open 24 hours. The measure, approved by voters in November, also allowed casinos in Black Hawk, Cripple Creek and Central City to raise the maximum bet from $5 to $100 and to offer craps and roulette.

The changes took effect in July. Operators haven't decided whether to seek an exemption or to work with other businesses to eliminate the no-alcohol-service window altogether.

"The key difference is the gaming industry is offering 24-hour entertainment where the stand-alone hotel or restaurant really doesn't do that," said Lois Rice, executive director of the Colorado Gaming Association.

Casinos won an exemption from the statewide smoking ban in 2006, but it was short-lived. Lawmakers killed the exemption in 2007, and the smoking ban took effect at casinos in 2008. Another option under consideration is to extend the service hours, perhaps to 3 or 4 a.m., said Ameristar's Stremming.

"We've heard some legislators say, 'I think that that law is ridiculous, and we ought to get rid of it anyway,' " Stremming said. "But we've also heard others say, 'It's been there, it's always been there and it should stay.' "

In St. Charles, Mo., where Ameristar operates a casino, the company won approval a couple of years ago to extend the end of liquor service from 1:30 a.m. to 3 a.m. in nongaming areas, such as its restaurants.

The casino already was allowed to serve alcohol until 3 a.m. on the gaming floor.

Andy Vuong: 303-954-1209 or avuong@denverpost.com

Colorado Supreme Court gives go-ahead to schools funding trial

The justices rule, 4-3, that courts can decide whether state funding is sufficient.
By Tim Hoover
The Denver Post

In an opinion that could eventually have profound implications for the state budget, the Colorado Supreme Court ruled Monday that a challenge to whether the state spends enough on public schools can go forward.

In a 4-3 decision, the state's high court overturned the ruling of two lower courts that said the question of how much school funding is enough is one for lawmakers to decide, not the courts.

The ruling Monday means the plaintiffs, who include parents from eight school districts across the state and 14 school districts from the San Luis Valley, can now go to Denver District Court and try to prove the state does not provide enough money for education.

"The state has never figured out how much it costs to provide an education that meets the constitution," said Alex Halpern, an attorney for the plaintiffs.

This is one of the key points in the lawsuit and education in Colorado. The Constitution says "thorough," but we've never looked at what it would take to give every student in Colorado a thorough education.

Halpern said he expected a trial on the question of funding adequacy could go to court in about a year.

Attorney General John Suthers, who defended the state in the case, said the decision is not good news for Colorado taxpayers.

"The majority opinion suggests the plaintiffs, who are seeking additional tax funding that could potentially involve billions of dollars, might find relief from the courts even though the legislature and the voters have determined current educational funding is adequate," Suthers, a Republican, said in a statement.

This isn't quite true. The voters haven't ever said whether or not we put enough money into education. The last time they were asked, in 2000, the passed Amendment 23 which required the legislature to increase the amount of money that's going to schools. And they were pretty specific that Amendment 23 set a minimum amount of money, not necessarily a sufficient amount.

Legislators have varying views on how well we fund schools. I don't think are funding is adequate and I know there are a lot of legislators who agree. Just because we vote for the School Finance Act, or for the budget, doesn't mean we believe it's spending enough on education -- we make do with what we have and what we can get.

Potential impact is huge Rep. Jack Pommer, D-Boulder, a member of the legislature's Joint Budget Committee and a key lawmaker involved in school finance issues, also said the ultimate impact of the ruling could be huge.

"I think it's good for education but bad for the budget," Pommer said. "If they find that our education funding is not thorough, it puts the onus on us to fix that, and I don't see how we could fix it without more money."

We've taken the view that without enough tests, enough commissions, enough requirements on schools and enough talk, education in Colorado will improve. It hasn't worked and it won't in the future. A lot of legislators say more money won't help. Oddly, they never apply that view to highway construction and maintenance.

Sen. Keith King, R-Colorado Springs, another lawmaker involved in school finance issues, said any challenge to school-funding adequacy would take years to resolve. He doubted a challenge would be successful.

"I think the judiciary would have a very challenging row to hoe to say what we are funding in Colorado is not adequate," King said, "but I've been surprised by courts in Colorado before."

Plaintiffs originally filed the case in 2005, arguing that the state was not spending enough to meet the requirement in the state constitution to provide a "thorough and uniform" system of school funding.

The group of parents and school districts argued that the school-funding system did not adequately provide for disabled, poor or minority students and those who don't speak English and come from low property-value districts.

But Denver District Judge Michael Martinez in 2006 threw out the case, ruling that because the current funding system complied with Amendment 23, the voter-approved measure that requires education funding to increase every year by at least the rate of inflation, the system complied with the constitution and the courts had no say in the matter.

Requiring school funding to go up with inflation just means it stays the same from year to year after you figure in costs. It's hardly a definition of a thorough education. Or uniform, for that matter.

A Colorado Court of Appeals panel upheld the decision in 2008.

But the state's high court Monday overturned both lower courts, declaring that Amendment 23 "neither relates to nor concerns the 'thorough and uniform' mandate" in the state constitution.

Ruling that courts could not decide what is a proper level of education funding "would give the legislative branch unchecked power, potentially allowing it to ignore its constitutional responsibility to fashion and to fund a 'thorough and uniform' system of public education," the Supreme Court said in its opinion.

Dissent: "Thorough" not defined
In a dissent, Justice Nancy Rice said the constitution places the issue "squarely and solely in the legislative ambit."

Sure, but what if the legislature doesn't obey the constitution?

She was joined in the dissent by Justices Nathan Coats and Allison Eid.

"There is no national standard from which this court could adopt a definition of 'thorough,' and more importantly, the varying definitions other states ascribe to the term illustrate no consensus on what 'thorough' means," Rice wrote. "As such, any definition we might construe would necessarily constitute a policy determination. "

Odd how some people who believe in states rights suddenly need a national standard when it's convenient. The Colorado Constitution doesn't call for meeting national standards, it sets its own standard.

It's not hard to construe a definition; the legislature has put plenty of them into law already. Just defer to the legislature, pick a legislatively-approved definition, and apply it. Of course, the we put education standards in law assuming only other people will have to measure up to them, like teaches and school boards, but laws sometimes boomerang on the people who write them.

And, of course, once courts begin to make policy, it is difficult to stop."

The state is facing its worst budget crisis since the Great Depression and has already filled a $1.8 billion shortfall over the past two budget cycles. In September, lawmakers learned revenues likely would be another $240 million short in the current 2009-10 budget year that ends in June.

Gov. Bill Ritter, a Democrat, is considering a cut to public-school funding for the next fiscal year that would result in at least a $170 million net reduction over the current year. Some education groups say that cut could violate Amendment 23.

And this decision won't make "reinterpreting" Amendment 23 any easier."

Tim Hoover: 303-954-1626 or thoover@denverpost.com

Loophole costing Colorado millions in payments to legal immigrants

By Tim Hoover
The Denver Post

A loophole in state law allows elderly legal immigrants to receive the same pension poor, older Colorado residents get, regardless of whether the immigrants' families can provide for them.

Lawmakers this year resisted eliminating the loophole in the state's Old Age Pension program because doing so would have prevented the state from receiving hundreds of millions of dollars in federal stimulus funds for Medicaid programs.

But with the state set to be free of the federal stimulus requirements in 2011, there is talk of reviving legislation next year to tighten requirements for the pension program and cut off what could be thousands of elderly legal immigrants who have relatives that sponsored their immigration and agreed to care for them.

"It's just kind of odd the way it's in law right now," said Rep. Jack Pommer, D-Boulder, who co-sponsored a bill last year that would have closed the loophole.

The pension program made headlines last week after it was announced that a Lakewood man bilked the state out of $1 million by signing up elderly Vietnamese immigrants for the program and keeping most of the pension benefits for himself.

But state officials, lawmakers and a former Denver caseworker say the program has a bigger problem than occasional fraud. The way state law is written, thousands of legal immigrants whose families said they would take care of them are instead receiving help from Colorado taxpayers.

Under federal law, family members who sponsor relatives as immigrants must agree to be financially responsible for them until they become a citizen, have worked for 10 years or have become self-sufficient. The immigrants cannot receive federal benefits for at least five years or until they have received citizenship.

Pension program created in 1936

However, Colorado law, which allows legal immigrants to receive the Old Age Pension, also says that a relative's income can't be counted against the eligibility of someone applying for the pension. Taken together, this means that the income of a legal immigrant's family sponsor isn't counted in getting the state pension, state officials said.

It's especially odd because the standard is stricter for sponsors who aren't relatives; they income can be counted against eligibility.

Voters added the Old Age Pension program to the state constitution in 1936. Originally, recipients had to have lived in Colorado for 35 years before getting the pension, but courts struck down the requirement.

Today, the program provides nearly 24,000 low-income Colorado residents who are at least 60 with cash benefits of up to $699 per month, and in some cases, medical benefits. In a majority of cases, people who qualify for the pension also automatically qualify for Medicaid benefits.

The cash-assistance portion of the pension program alone costs the state just over $80 million, of which about $53 million goes to nearly 8,700 legal permanent residents, which includes family-sponsored immigrants and those sponsored by churches and nonprofits, refugees and people granted asylum.

Department of Human Services officials say elderly immigrants typically qualify for larger cash benefits because they have no demonstrable income.

The department last year pushed the legislation to tighten eligibility, and the bill essentially would have aligned state rules with federal law.

The bill would have saved an estimated $31 million per year when fully phased in by fiscal year 2012, human-services officials said, eliminating the benefit for an estimated 4,000 legal immigrants whose families sponsored their immigration.

Shifting burden to taxpayers

Michael Whalen, a former Spanish-speaking caseworker for the Denver Department of Human Services, said that while a number of legal immigrants are legitimately in need of the benefit, it's clear the sponsoring relatives of others are shifting their responsibility to taxpayers.

Whalen said that during his three years as a caseworker, it was not uncommon to see elderly immigrants who had arrived in the country only weeks earlier applying for the pension despite having sponsoring relatives who had agreed to care for them.

Whalen said he and other Denver caseworkers observed a high concentration of applicants all from the same region in the north-central Mexican state of Zacatecas.

"Clearly, the message has gotten out," he said. "People know that you can do this. And who can blame them? No one's minding the store."

Loophole not a big issue, group says

Chandra Russo, spokeswoman for the Colorado Immigrant Rights Coalition, said the loophole was not a "big issue" because it likely applies to so few legal immigrants.

"I guess I'm not so concerned about a small group of people who have played by the rules and who have waited to get in the country getting some help if they need some help," Russo said.

Well, they're not really playing by the rules. They came here on the condition that the relative who sponsored them would support them if they needed help. Now their relatives have enough money to help them, but prefer to push the cost onto the state. That cost is significant and we're cutting other parts of the budget to get the money.

Pommer and Sen. Abel Tapia, D-Pueblo, sponsored the legislation to close the loophole. They quickly found out they would have to scuttle the bill.

Under state law, Old Age Pension eligibility is also a category of eligibility for Medicaid, the state and federally funded program that provides health care to the poor and disabled.

Colorado, like many states, was set to receive hundreds of millions of dollars in federal stimulus funds to help shore up its Medicaid program. But any reduction to existing Medicaid eligibility levels would have disqualified the state from receiving stimulus funds to help with its Medicaid costs.

"We needed to do it last year, but we ran into a conflict with federal law," Pommer said. "I think we should do it again. It's outrageous. We should have tougher regulations on this."

Tim Hoover: 303-954-1626 or thoover@denverpost.com

Re-Bruce, Part II

By The Daily Sentinel
Wednesday, April 01, 2009

The Mesa County commissioners apparently spooked Democrats in the Legislature when they talked of school districts “re-Brucing” to make up for the mill-levy freeze.

The Mesa County commissioners alerted us to the fact that they had a plan to get taxpayers in the rest of the state to subsidize their schools. We're not spooked, in fact we expect politicians from Mesa County to look for new ways of getting the rest of the state to subsidize them.

The School Finance Act, introduced in the Legislature this week, includes a provision to penalize school districts that re-Bruce in an attempt to reduce their property taxes. The legislation also includes new student-monitoring requirements for school districts that approve changes related to the mill-levy freeze.

It doesn't penalize the school districts, it just says we won't make everybody else in the state pay more to make up the difference. If people in Grand Junction want to pay less for their schools why should everyone else in the state have to pay more for their schools? If we reward that kind of thing, they'll decide not to pay anything for their schools and we'll have to pay all of it.

It was Colorado Attorney General John Suthers who noticed the measures, buried within the lengthy school finance bill, and alerted the public and GOP lawmakers to them.

Interesting. Colorado's Attorney General sees his jobs as supporting Republican legislators rather than upholding the laws of the state.

Now, Senate Minority Leader Josh Penry is hoping he can strike a compromise with Democrats about the provision.

We hope he’s successful. Voters in school districts around the state should have the option — without penalizing their school districts — of making it clear they never intended to raise property taxes when they approved overrides to TABOR revenue limits.

And there's nothing in the school finance act that would increase their property taxes. This is about what happens when they lower their property taxes. If people in the school district lower the property taxes they pay for their schools, does everyone else in the state have to pay more to make up the difference.

That was the case for years, until the Legislature passed the mill-levy freeze in 2007. It prevented school districts’ mill levies from dropping as their assessed valuations increased. That effectively raised taxes in 174 school districts statewide. The Supreme Court ruled last month that the mill-levy freeze didn’t violate TABOR.

The reasoning here is that not letting people in Grand Junction lower their property tax rates is actually a property tax increase. They say it's an increase because if the value of a person's home goes up, the amount of tax they pay goes up.

Oddly, the Mesa County Commissioners think that's just fine when it comes to paying property taxes to support their county. They just don't like it when it applies to paying property taxes to support their schools. What's the difference? A subsidy. If the Mesa County Commissioners cut their own property taxes, they lose money.

But they were hoping that if they cut their property taxes for schools, we'd force taxpayers in the rest of the state to increase their subsidy of the Grand Junction schools to make up the difference.

In response, the Mesa County commissioners suggested School District 51 should “re-Bruce” — reinstate the provisions that allow the mill levy to drop as the district’s assessed valuation increases.

We argued last week that putting such a question to voters should be a decision of the District 51 School Board, not the county commissioners. And, even though members of the School Board don’t seem inclined to push such an approach, we believe they ought to have the option.

But with language included in the School Finance Act, they would be penalized for doing so.

School funding comes from both local property taxes and the state general fund. The school-finace language says if school districts vote to re-Bruce, they won’t get any additional state funding. Whatever money they cut in local property taxes will be deducted from the school district’s budget.

Is that a radical concept. You cut the taxes you pay so your school district has less money to spend?

Additionally, any school district that votes to re-Bruce would face new requirements for reporting to the state and for boosting student achievement, mandates that other school districts wouldn’t have to meet.

This is something the Senate put into the bill and it does seem unfair. We might take it out in the House.

We’re all for doing things to improve student achievement, but these requirements are clearly punitive, designed to treat school districts differently if they try to overcome the mill-levy freeze.

We don’t think many school districts will try to do that in the current economic crisis. But, with the School Finance Act, the Legislature is telling voters in 174 school districts, “We raised your property taxes without your permission, and we’re going to do everything we can to prevent you from reducing them.”

Not really. The provision they're talking about said that if the voters in a school district voted to let the district keep the money it gets from the existing property tax rate, the district can keep it.

The provision in this year's bill just says that if you lower your property taxes we won't force everyone else in the state to pay more to make up the difference.

That’s not exactly the way to promote trust in government.

Actually, it's exactly the way to promote trust in government.