Colorado: Judiciary Committee

Colorado Senate Minority Leader Josh Penry (Photo/Bob Spencer/The Colorado Independent)

Senate Bill 228, Democratic Sen. John Morse’s controversial budget reform legislation, received key preliminary approval late last night after a 10-hour Republican filibuster that, for all its passion, never seriously threatened passage of the bill.

Senate members on both sides of the aisle agreed SB 228 was among the most important laws they would consider this year and would have ramifications on Colorado governance for years to come, amounting to a “sea change,” as state Sen. Keith King, R-Colorado Springs, described it, in the way tax revenues would be spent.

SB 228 seeks to repeal a 1992 budget provision called Arveschoug-Bird that requires any revenues collected by the state above a 6 percent annual increase to flow away from the state’s discretionary General Fund and into transportation and capital construction projects such as highway maintenance and construction at public university buildings.