Opinion: The muni, traffic, open space and TABOR


I just returned from the annual International Energy Economics and Finance Association conference, where people from all over the world gathered to discuss global warming and climate change. I was on a panel discussing “securitization,” a financial tool that uses borrowing to reduce the cost of paying off utilities to shut down coal plants. Interestingly, an op-ed I wrote in April on the Colorado securitization bill was referenced by some people to illustrate their various perspectives. Our discussion ended up boiling down to a fundamental choice: Are we willing to pay whatever it takes to get utilities to shut down their coal plants? Or are we going to force some utilities to take a financial beating, because they invested in coal in the face of global warming?

What really amazed me was how many people were aware of and inspired by Boulder’s struggle to create a clean energy municipal electric utility. I also received reports about utilities that were shifting to cleaner energy because of the implicit threat that cities in their captive markets might create muni’s like Boulder, depart their systems, and cost them significant revenues. So, our efforts here are creating waves that are having effects well beyond our horizon, something we should remember when things get tough.
As to current muni events in Boulder, the Boulder City Council was in a difficult position when they cut their recent deal in which Xcel agreed to drop its lawsuit against Boulder over the 2014 utility formation and to not use Boulder’s lack of a utility as a “direct defense” in a condemnation lawsuit. In exchange Boulder agreed to dissolve that paper utility and abide by some rather vague language about following the City Charter when re-establishing the utility and putting the bonds that will pay for separation costs to a vote. Boulder got boxed into this situation by some prior choices that in hindsight were perhaps not the best, so any such deal is inevitably sub-optimal. And I always worry that by signing an agreement with Xcel, we might just have exchanged current difficulties for future ones.
Traffic

Boulder’s transportation master planning process is finally looking at the big picture. But it appears that the initial focus is on the lack of revenue rather than what really counts — reducing traffic. As I have stated before, the only way out of our current snarl is some sort of direct user fees, like tolls or parking fees, with those revenues being used to pay people to carpool, van pool, use transit, and also cover some operations and maintenance. User fees will thus free up sales tax revenues, government grants, etc., to cover the remaining maintenance and improvements. The fee must hit the behavior directly and not just be some calculated number like a mileage fee or a “frontage fee” that charges people based on how wide their lot is. I note that if Boulder had implemented what 80% of the citizens wanted in 1993 — severely limited growth with target maximums of 100,000 population and 80,000 jobs — we wouldn’t be in this bind. And imposing full cost development impact fees and adequate public facilities requirements would prevent most future growth-caused congestion increases
Open Space

Open space is similarly suffering from too many people, and desperately needs to restore the tax revenues that were recently diverted to other uses. From all the surveys, we really care about maintaining our open space. So the Council should seriously look at putting a dedicated tax measure on the ballot. Collecting user fees for a wide-open system is challenging, but we cannot continue to ignore the fact that our open space is a regional draw. So we’ll have to re-look at the impact of the increasing numbers of visitors, both human and canine. Again, repeating the obvious, growth is the major cause of the excessive impacts.
TABOR
An issue related to all our funding concerns is the emerging debate about repealing TABOR, in full or in part. This 1992 constitutional amendment required votes on tax and debt increases, and imposed both spending and revenue limits that had the effect of limiting governments’ financial abilities, even after the partial freeing up resulting from Referendum C in 2005. Most people I know like being able to vote on tax/debt increases, because voting allows us to express our priorities, like dedicating money for open space or transportation. In fact, citizens would like more of this — for example on densifying their neighborhoods. And I’d rather solve the transportation and school funding issues with full-cost development impact fees than by gutting TABOR.

Popular Posts

Opinion: Opportunity for the new Boulder City Council

Congratulations to the four new Boulder City Council members! You have a great opportunity to make a contribution to the Boulder community, but it will take a lot of work to do it responsibly; the learning curve is pretty steep. Here are some suggestions for you (and other Council members) that may help improve the process. Read the Charter. It is the document that governs how you, city staff, and board and commission members operate, and how you relate to each other. It defines the limits of your and their power, and can only be amended by a citizen vote. You don’t have to remember every word. But just knowing what’s there makes you more self reliant and less at the mercy of others’ opinions. For example, relative to the recent meeting discussion over diversity, the council does  not  have the power to suspend the rules as to when the mayor is selected. Charter Section 14 specifies, “The mayor shall be chosen by the council from its own number, upon the convening of t...
Read more

Opinion: Is this the end of Boulder as we know it?

Much of what has made Boulder such a great place to live has been the work of people half a century ago. These people recognized what I call the “ ratchet effect ,” that bad development decisions cannot be undone, so policies needed to be put in place to prevent, or at least limit, the damage that a growth-at-all-costs majority of the council could do. These policies include charter limits, like the Blue Line that prevents city water for development from being supplied above a certain altitude, the 55-foot height limit that has prevented high-rise development from cutting off our views, and the open space referendum process that allows a 60-day window for citizens to challenge disposals of open space. Other constraints include the Boulder Valley Comprehensive Plan’s requirement for Planning Board agreement for land-use changes in the area inside the city limits (Area I) and additional agreement by the county commissioners and county Planning Commission for urban development further...
Read more

Policy Documents: Impact Fees and Adequate Public Facilities

I am writing this to correct some of the apparent inaccuracies put forward at the 10/14 CC/PB study session about charging growth for its costs. I do not claim to be an expert in the field, but I have studied it long enough and consulted with enough supposed experts and legal types to understand most of the basics. In addition, I have found that the experts don’t necessarily know everything and won’t necessarily put forward the most appropriate solutions. The fundamental rule, both legal and equitable, is that growth should pay to address its impacts so as to maintain existing levels of service (LOS) for existing residents and businesses. But growth cannot be required to improve levels of service. LOS is measured in all sorts of ways depending on the facility and/or service being measured. For transportation, it could be total VMT, travel time, intersection waits, access to transit, etc. For schools, it might be square footage per pupil, etc. For water, it could be water righ...
Read more