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Dan Pilcher
CACI Senior Vice President
& Chief Operating Officer
Phone: 303.866.9600
E-Mail:
dpilcher@cochamber.com
Friday, May 7, 2010
Controversial Workers’ Comp Surveillance Bill Dies in Sponsor’s
Own Committee
On Wednesday, HB-1012, which CACI and other business
organizations had strongly opposed, died in the Senate Judiciary
Committee three-to-four when the minority-party Republicans were
joined by one majority-party Democrat.
The Committee is chaired by Senator Morgan Carroll (D-Aurora),
who sponsored HB-1012, “Limiting Surveillance of Workers’
Compensation Claims.” The House sponsor was Representative Sal
Pace (D-Pueblo).
Voting against the bill were the three Republican members,
Senators Keith King (Colorado Springs), Kevin Lundberg
(Berthoud) and Scott Renfroe (Greeley). They were joined by
Democratic Senator Linda Newell (Centennial).
On March 31st, the Senate Judiciary Committee heard
testimony on HB-1012 and four other workers’ compensation bills
that originated from the legislative Pinnacol Assurance Interim
Committee that was convened last summer and that was chaired by
Senator Carroll. After the March 31st hearing,
Senator Carroll then repeatedly laid over HB-1012 because of
business opposition to the proposal.
Loren Furman, CACI Vice President of Governmental Relations,
testified before the Committee against the bill because it could
have increased workers’ compensation premiums paid by business.
CACI opposed this bill because it would have limited the ability
of workers’ compensation insurance carriers and self-insured
companies to use public surveillance to detect fraud in workers'
compensation claims. The amended bill would have limited the
introduction of evidence of the presence or absence of a medical
condition at an administrative hearing if the following
conditions had been met:
·
The evidence would have to be submitted to the treating
physician prior to the hearing;
·
There would have to be a reasonable basis to suspect fraud or
misstatements prior to the surveillance;
·
The surveillance was not intrusive, intimidating or harassing;
and
·
The person conducting the surveillance did not misrepresent the
insurer or employer.
HB-1012 as amended also would have required the destruction of
all materials collected during surveillance no later than five
years after resolution of the claim.
For more information on the bill, contact Loren Furman at
303.866.9642 or via e-mail at
lfurman@COchamber.com
or Dan Anglin, CACI Governmental Affairs Representative, at
303.866.9641 or via e-mail at
danglin@COchamber.com
Bill to Provide Tax Incentive to Companies for Re-hiring Workers
Dies in House Finance Committee
On Wednesday, SB-133, the bill that would have created a
corporate income-tax incentive to encourage companies to re-hire
laid-off workers died in the House Finance Committee. The
Committee first voted with five in favor and six against the
bill on its merits.
The second motion was to “postpone indefinitely” the bill, and
the recorded vote had one Democrat, Jerry Frangas (Denver) and
one Republican, Ellen Roberts (Durango), voting against killing
the bill while nine Committee members (four Republicans and five
Democrats) voted to kill the bill.
In other words, the politics of this bill were out of the
ordinary. The bill’s final fiscal note stated that SB-133 would
have cost the State $2.5 million in lost revenue in fiscal year
2010-2011 and the same amount the following year.
The final version of the bill would have created an income-tax
credit for tax year 2011 for businesses that hired people who
had been laid off and who had been receiving unemployment
insurance since March 31st of this year. The credit
would have been equal to $1,000 per hired worker and a firm
could only claim up to five credits each for a total per company
of $5,000. Credit amounts that exceeded the company’s income
tax liability could not be refunded to the firm, but could be
carried forward and used on future tax returns for five years.
The House sponsor was Representative Joe Rice (Centennial),
chair of the House Business Affairs and Labor Committee. The
Senate sponsors were Rollie Heath (Boulder) and Chris Romer
(Denver).
Although CACI was initially neutral on SB-133 when it was
introduced, CACI moved to a position of support because of
amendments that were added by the House Business Affairs and
Labor Committee.
The irony of this bill was initially apparent to CACI when it
was introduced by Senator Heath, who also was the prime sponsor
in the Senate of the various business-tax bills--which will
increase taxes on businesses by $231.3 million in the 28 months
beginning this past March 1st--passed by the
legislature and signed into law by Governor Bill Ritter.
SB-191 Clears House Education Committee
Yesterday, the House Education Committee approved SB-191, the
major bill to reform K-12 education by revamping teacher tenure
and evaluation. The bill now awaits action by the House
Appropriations Committee. For an article by The Denver Post
on the Committee’s action, click on:
http://www.denverpost.com/ci_15036012
The Denver Post
Wednesday editorialized strongly that the House should move
quickly on SB-191, the major k-12 education reform bill, because
the legislature must adjourn by midnight next Wednesday, May 12,
according to the Colorado Constitution.
The Post laid the blame for the procedural slowdown
squarely at the feet of Representative Mike Merrifield
(D-Manitou Springs), a former music teacher who chairs the House
Education Committee because he delayed the hearing on the bill
until Thursday.
“Opponents, mainly leaders of Colorado’s largest teachers’
union, are doing everything they canto kill the bill.
Democratic legislators cannot let that happen,” the Post
said.
CACI supports the bill.
Bill Limiting Enterprise-Zone Tax Credits (and Raising Business
Taxes $36.4 Million) Sent to Senate Floor
On Tuesday, the Senate Finance Committee approved HB-1200, which
would limit enterprise-zone investment tax credits. The bill
passed on a party-line four-to-three vote. CACI opposes the
bill.
The bill now goes to the Senate Floor for Second Reading. The
Senate sponsor is Senator Rollie Heath (D-Boulder).
The bill limits to $250,000 the income tax credit that a company
could take on its corporate income tax for investments in an
enterprise zone. Companies could carry forward the amount of
the credit above $250,000 for three years before they could take
advantage of that amount as a credit.
This bill was one of the 13 bills put forth last November by
Governor Bill Ritter as part of his 2010-2011 budget proposal to
suspend or eliminate business tax credits, exclusions and
exemptions.
The enterprise-zone tax credit was ranked in the top four of the
ones that are most critical to employers, according to a CACI
survey of businesses in December.
The bill’s fiscal note estimates that the state will receive
$11.8 million in tax revenue in fiscal year 2010-2011, which
begins this July 1st, and $24.6 million in the
following fiscal year. In other words, businesses located in
enterprise affected by this bill will pay an additional $36.4
million in increased taxes over the two fiscal years.
Currently, any depreciable equipment purchased and used within
an enterprise zone is eligible for a three percent tax credit.
The credit may be used up to $5,000 of the taxpayer’s tax
liability plus fifty percent of the taxpayer’s liability above
$5,000.
Here are CACI’s major concerns with HB-1200:
·
Because HB-1200 caps the enterprise zone credit at $250,000, it
will hurt companies that invest millions of dollars in equipment
to operate their business;
·
If this legislation is adopted, the unfortunate, likely result
will be that companies will not invest in new equipment until
the full credit is available again in three years; and
·
By capping this credit at $250,000 for three years, companies
may either be discouraged from locating in Colorado until the
full credit is available or will look to locate and invest in
other states that offer a higher enterprise-zone credit.
For further information on HB-1200 contact Loren Furman, CACI
Vice President of Governmental Affairs, at 303.866.8642 or via
e-mail at
lfurman@COchamber.com
Senate Kills Bill to Track Effect of State Economic Development
Incentives
This afternoon, the Senate killed HB-1350. The House Sponsor
was Representative Sal Pace (D-Pueblo) and the Senate sponsor
was Senator Morgan Carroll (D-Aurora).
The Senate Finance Committee had stripped out an amendment that
would have required the bill to be applied to tax credits for
New Energy Economy programs operated by the Governor’s Office of
Energy. In other words, tax credits for New Energy Economy
programs would not have been scrutinized under this
bill. Here’s the amendment that was stricken from the bill by
the Committee:
(c) Notwithstanding any other provision of this section, by
February 1, 2011, the governor’s energy office shall conduct a
study of all so-called “green” jobs created through tax
incentives.
Promotion of the New Energy Economy by the Governor and the
majority-party legislative leadership has been the main economic
development strategy of Colorado in recent years. Ironically,
on the day that the Committee deleted the above amendment, the
Governor told a national conference in Washington, D.C., that
Colorado’s New Energy Economy economic development strategy is a
road-map for other states to follow:
http://www.colorado.gov/cs/Satellite?c=Page&childpagename=GovRitter%2FGOVRLayout&cid=1251574197116&pagename=GOVRWrapper
In its introduced form, HB-1350 would have required businesses
to disclose and rationalize economic development incentives.
The original intent of Representative Pace was to review all of
Colorado’s business tax exemptions and credits and determine
whether or not they create jobs. Representative Pace believes
that these provisions should be eliminated if it cannot be
proved that they create jobs.
CACI and other business organizations opposed the bill, even its
amended version, because it would have sent the wrong message to
the business community, both within the state and outside of
Colorado.
The amended bill mandated that any company receiving state
economic development assistance would have to provide to the
Colorado Office of Economic Development and International Trade
(OED/IT) information about the average and median salaries of
workers hired because of the incentives. By January 2011, the
OED/IT would have had to give the legislature a report on how
the State could determine the number of jobs created by the
various current business tax incentives and provisions.
Revisiting HB-1429 . . .
When a bill is strongly advocated by a House Majority Leader,
the second most powerful person in the majority-party’s
leadership, is killed with support from the members of his (or
her) caucus, it’s a big deal at the State Capitol.
Such a scenario played out Tuesday afternoon at the State
Capitol when HB-1429, sponsored by House Majority Leader Paul
Weissmann (D-Louisville), who is term-limited, died on the House
Floor.
HB-1429 would have required the House and Senate Finance
Committees each year to jointly review specific business tax
credits and decide whether they should be continued, repealed,
or modified. The bill targets the following taxes paid by
businesses: severance tax, gasoline and special fuel tax,
alcohol beverage tax, sales-and-use tax and income tax.
CACI strongly opposed the bill.
Five Democrats joined the minority-party Republicans and the one
independent/unaffiliated member to kill the bill. An attempt to
revive the bill failed when seven Democrats and the one
independent/unaffiliated member joined the minority-party
Republicans to block the effort..
The House Democratic Communications Office quickly blasted “Big
Business” later that afternoon following the demise of HB-1429.
Below is the press release sent out by this Office which fails
to mention that members of Representative Weissmann’s own
Democratic caucus voted against the bill.
Big business beats back Dem’s efforts to hold them accountable
for tax breaks
(DENVER) Democratic Majority Leader Paul Weissmann
(D-Louisville) led the charge for more corporate accountability
but found even he could not counter the influence of big
business lobbyists at the capitol, and his call for basic,
once-a-decade reporting on tax breaks was killed, largely along
party lines.
Weissmann, who works at the family-owned Blue Parrot Italian
restaurant in Louisville, made this analogy:
“If I came down to the capitol and asked for a sales tax
exemption on meatballs, what would you say? You just gonna
trust me? Write me a blank check? Or do you want some
accountability? Don’t you want to see what I’m doing with that
tax break – am I selling more meatballs and creating more jobs,
or not?”
“Look, everyone from school kids to seniors are taking a hit
with all these budget cuts; we need to balance out the equation
and make sure that big business is paying their fair share and
not exploiting corporate tax loopholes. To do that fairly, we
need basic information, once every ten years, and I don’t think
level of accountability is too much to ask for.”
Despite his pleas for corporate accountability, the bill lost.
Big Business had been aggressively lobbying against the
“Accountability Bill.”
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