| Boulder is a Stoopid Place

Beginning in the mid 1990s, the Boulder County Board of Commissioners instituted a plan to divert property tax dollars from the Road and Bridge Fund. Their logic was that because state law required the County to split all property tax dollars allocated to the Road and Bridge Fund 50/50 with the cities within the county, their plan was to short-change all taxpayers by starving road maintenance budgets everywhere in the county. Their thought was that the roads would deteriorate and they could convince the taxpayers to ante up more tax dollars to fix the roads.

In the cities, the plan worked. Since the plan was implemented, $120,000,000 has been diverted from the road and bridge fund with ~$40,000,000 going to the Commissioner’s discretionary fund and the remainder $80,000,000 going to an Open Space discretionary fund. It should be noted that the property tax revenue that went to Open Space was in addition to $662,000,000 generated from Open Space taxes we all approved as voters. The $80 million was used in large part to fund those projects not permitted by the voter-approved open space sales taxes, such as purchasing open space outside of Boulder County. Using these funds, the County has purchased open space or conservation easements in Weld, Jefferson, and Gilpin Counties. The $40,000,000 in the Commissioner’s Discretionary fu