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Campaign Updates>
GJ SENTINEL LTR: GOVERNMENT SHOULD SAVE
February 9, 2006
REP. PENRY: GOVERNMENT SHOULD SAVE FOR THE FUTURE, NOT JUST
SPEND
Editor:
To spend it all today or to save for the future. That is
the question that confronts the Legislature in the
aftermath of the passage of Referendum C.
Whatever your position on Referendum C - for my part, I was
the only member of the House or the Senate from the Western
Slope to oppose the ballot measure - it is clear that
Colorado would be wise to save during this period of
voter-approved surpluses so that government won't have to
come back to the taxpayers the next time the economy
softens. If state government had saved a little during the
'90s, there never would have been a Referendum C.
That is why I have proposed creating a $1 billion rainy-day
savings fund, plowing a portion of Referendum C dollars and
a large share of the state's tobacco litigation settlement
into the equivalent of a government savings account.
The plan, endorsed by both opponents and supporters of
Referendum C, would also generate hundreds of millions of
dollars for investment in our roads, but without plunging
our state into debt.
A recent editorial provided an accurate description of my
plan, but The Daily Sentinel concluded that the passage of
Referendum C makes the approach less "persuasive, not more
so." I respectfully disagree. With state government awash
in billions of dollars in Referendum C money, tobacco
litigation funds and severance tax dollars, I believe that
now, more than ever, government must show the fiscal
discipline to save.
In the end, the alternative to saving is for the
Legislature to just spend it all, as some in Denver are now
proposing. That would be an enormous mistake - one that
taxpayers will quite literally pay for the next time the
economy turns downward.
REP. JOSH PENRY
Grand Junction
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