| Joint House and Senate Session on the FY 2008-09 State Budget |
|
|
The JBC will be discussing the legislation necessary to effect the more than $600 million in spending reductions or transfers that will be required to bring the budget into balance for this fiscal year.
|
|
This is the fine print text where you might tell your customers how the item will be shipped and, for example, if they are overseas that there will be additional shipping charges and must contact you.
|
|
|
Greetings!
You are receiving this newsletter from the EDCC because of your interest in and commitment to a strong and healthy Colorado economy. The Board of EDCC hopes that you find this information to be helpful, informative and of value to you and your colleagues. Please feel free to pass along this newsletter as appropriate. |
 |
Colorado General Assembly |
is in full operation. Monday, February 16 will be the 41st Legislative Day of the constitutionally limited 120 day session. Thursday, February 19 is the deadline for House committees to report House bills introduced on or before the 6th legislative day. Thursday, February 25 is the deadline for each house to pass bills introduced in that house, with the exception of bills in the Appropriations Committee. You can see the Deadline Schedule for the 2009 Colorado General Assembly.
The Senate this week failed to pass HJR 09-1009, which would allow the House of Representatives to adjourn for all or part of time from Thursday, February 26 through Sunday, March 1, 2009. To quote from the Resolution, "...such an adjournment would facilitate and encourage the members of the House of Representatives to continue to communicate with the citizens in their respective districts so that they are better prepared to make critical judgments on the impending public policy issues confronting this state;...". The Senate does not plan to adjourn on those days. House Majority Leader Paul Weissmann plans to continue with his plans to recess the House for those four days, in spite of the opposition of the Senate.
On Monday, February 16 the General Assembly will convene for a rare joint session in the House Chambers to hear a presentation on the FY 2008-09 state budget and the package of bills that will be introduced tomorrow morning to deal with the projected $600 million + shortfall. The negative supplemental bills will be introduced in the Senate, where the parties will caucus on the bills, then debate them on the floor of the Senate later in the week with final passage expected on Thursday. The joint session will be broadcast live on the internet and also on Comcast Channel 165, beginning at 10:30 am.
Remember that you can listen to live audio broadcasts of the floor sessions and committee meetings through links on the home page of the Colorado General Assembly. If you have access to Comcast cable television, the floor sessions of the Colorado House are broadcast live and then repeated frequently on Channel 165.
|
|
Economic Development Legislation |
HB 09-1010, Concerning Film Production in Colorado, passed from the House Finance Committee to the Appropriations Committee this week. HB 09-1035, Concerning Clean Tech Medical Device Tax Refund, has passed from the House Finance Committee to the Appropriations Committee. The EDCC Board has endorsed this bill.
As of close of business on Friday, February 13 the legislature had introduced 285 House bills and 182 Senate bills - a total of 467 of the expected 600-650 bills that we are likely to see in 2009. Leadership in both houses have indicated that they will not be approving as many late bill requests as in past years. In the coming week, we will see the introduction of the negative supplemental bills for the FY 2008-09 budget introduced by the Joint Budget Committee. |
|
Legislation of Concern to the Business Community |
As discussed in last week's newsletter, there are still a number of bills that are facing committee or floor votes and which are of major concern to the business community, should they pass. These bills include:
- HB 09-1057 - Mandatory parental leave;
- HB 09-1070 - Land prohibited from urban renewal areas (URA's);
- HB 09-1117 - Recapture of unearned compensation of corporate executives;
- HB 09-1170 - Unemployment insurance for "locked-out" employees;
- HB 09-1208 - Mandatory payment of "prevailing wages";
- HB 09-1210 - Mandatory paid sick leave;
- HB 09-1226 - No-Fault motor vehicle insurance;
- SB 09-110 - Sunset review of the Colorado Civil Rights Division that the trial lawyers have amended to include expanded remedies to employment claims.
Several business organizations, including the Colorado Association of Commerce & Industry and the Colorado Competitive Council, are working with the sponsors of the bills and the proponents to lessen the negative impact on business and the economy of these various bills. We urge you to take a close look at these bills. |
|
EDCC Legislative Update |
The weekly update on legislation that is being monitored or actively lobbied by EDCC is available online at EDCC Legislative Update. Please remember to bookmark this website and then you can check the status of any of the bills at any time, with real-time updates. We hope that this bill-tracking service provided to you by EDCC is of value. If there are bills that are not included but you feel should be, please contact dtomlinson@msn.com with the bill number. Thanks! |
|
Economic Activities in Other States
(Information provided by the State Science & Technology Institute - SSTI) |
Wisconsin
Gov. Jim Doyle has proposed an economic stimulus plan for Wisconsin that includes a proposal to enhance tax credits for angel and venture investors in support of start-up technology companies.
The changes proposed in the state stimulus package would expand credits available to angel investors to $18.25 million and $18.75 million for venture investors, essentially tripling the current aggregate total of $11.5 million per year. The credits would be transferable by investors within certain parameters set by the state and could be applied against premium and franchise taxes paid by insurance companies. Additionally, the legislation seeks to:
- Delete the per-angel investment cap for an individual business;
- Expand eligibility to a broad array of leading-edge technologies and businesses, including clean energy and nanotechnology;
- Allocate $500,000 annually for investments in nanotechnology businesses;
- Allow a one-time transfer of early-stage seed credits to attract a much larger group of potential investors; and
- Improve utilization of the tax credits by authorizing the Department of Commerce to prequalify the amount of creditable investment allowed in each business.
Note - see Colorado HB 09-1105 above.
SSTI has prepared a table listing not only the 2006 GDP for every U.S. metro area in current dollars, but the 2006 per-capita GDP values, as well as the percent change and relative ranking of these values from 2002 to 2006. The data originates from the Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA). The GDPs cover a wide range on this chart, from $1.12 trillion for the New York City metro region to $1.42 billion in Palm Coast, Florida - about a factor of one thousand. Because of this, it may help to break up this list into three size categories: metros with less than $10 billion GDP, metros with more than $100 billion in GDP, and all other metros in between. For the 202 metro areas with a GDP less than $10 billion in 2006, the metro around Corvalis, OR saw a per-capita GDP increase of 38.7 percent to $48,709. Longview, TX and Punta Gorda, FL were also at the top in this category. For the 135 metros between $10-100 billion in GDP, Lake Charles, LA led the pack with a 31.9 percent increase to $48,722. The metros around New Orleans, LA and Peoria, IL were also in the top of this group. Finally, for the 26 metros with a GDP larger than $100 billion, San Jose's per-capita GDP grew by 18.7 percent over the five-year time period. The only other metros in this group with a per-capita GDP growing more than 15 percent were Portland, San Diego, Los Angeles, and Miami. |
|
Colorado Economic Leadership Coalition |
The Colorado Economic Leadership Coalition (CELC) normally meets on the 2nd Friday of each month during the legislative session, at a location near the State Capitol.
The next meeting of the CELC will be on Friday, March 13 at noon.
Please RSVP to Michelle at malcott21@comcast.net so that we will have enough lunches. We sincerely hope you can join us for this meeting of the CELC. With the economy being foremost on the minds of the legislators and people of Colorado, we're sure to have some interesting and informative discussion about plans to stimulate the Colorado economy. The CELC is under the sponsorship of the Economic Development Council of Colorado. Lunch is being sponsored next month by Preston Gibson and the Jefferson Economic Council. Thanks, Preston!
CELC has no dues - we are a group of folks interested in creating and maintaining a healthy, vibrant economy in Colorado and routinely discuss potential legislative ideas, regulatory change and other issues that will assist in that goal.
Please contact us if you have any questions or would like to attend - either Danny at dtomlinson@msn.com or Michelle at malcott21@comcast.net | |
|
Danny Tomlinson
Tomlinson & Associates on behalf of the EDCC |
| EDCC |
The Economic Development Council of Colorado (EDCC) is a state-wide, non-profit organization dedicated to successful, responsible economic development. EDCC professionally represents the collective economic development interests of both the private and public sectors. Our mission is to strategically retain, expand and attract primary employers. EDCC is committed to an equitable and balanced public/private partnership and to growing the economic climate of Colorado to the mutual benefit of employees, employers, governments and citizens. |
| |
|
