October 29, 2008 08:56 PM UTC

Time for truth about two amendments

• 8 Comments
• by: DavidThi808

from the Denver Post – Charlie Meyers discusses 52 & 58.

Taking only slight license in the proverb’s progression, we have lies, damn lies and the kind of extravagant falsehoods the energy industry tells to avoid paying for its fair share of the mess being made of Colorado’s Western Slope.

continued below the fold…

The oil and gas charlatans compiled a $12 million war chest being used to peddle the most blatant TV advertisement deceit. Repeated hourly by convincing actors, it claims that approval of Amendment 58 will cause a huge jump in your energy bill, both for heating or at the pump. Nothing could be more distant from the truth.

The ballot measure imposes a roughly $300 million severance tax on the industry, still less than it has been paying for years to neighboring states. The industry 30 years ago conned Colorado into an exemption and has been drilling free ever since. Of this, some $30 million to $40 million would be used to purchase land and water beneficial to wildlife.

This assessment recognizes a widely held tenet in national energy exploration – that oil and gas takes extremely valuable natural resources for profit and thus is commonly taxed by the respective states. Here’s the crux of the energy lie: Energy-related costs, whether directly for fuel or the transportation of goods, are determined by broad national and international fluctuations.

This tiny oscillation in Colorado wouldn’t register on the most sensitive seismograph. Further, a great majority of Colorado’s extractions are transported directly out of state.

A no vote on 58 benefits only the wildly profitable energy industry. Voting yes assists various important state programs, not least its wildlife.

This brings us to the next in the succession of deceptions. The intent of Amendment 52 perhaps is most venal of all because its purpose is not mere profit, but raw politics. No one should wonder at Big Energy telling more lies to make a buck. What we shouldn’t expect is a push by alleged public servants to skin us as well.

Under the guise of diverting money for repairs and improvement along Interstate 70, the measure would strip funding from watershed protection programs, forest health and the Species Conservation Trust Fund.

Now for the real rub. At the bottom of all this we find state Sen. Josh Penry, R-Grand Junction, a staunch Big Energy ally and wildlife antagonist. Penry has a burning ambition to be our next governor, sooner the better. To achieve this, he must discredit the Democratic incumbent Bill Ritter, leading proponent of Amendment 58.

Initiative 52 is worded to create conflicts with 58, particularly concerning natural resource affairs. Debate rages over which article will trump; court battles loom if both pass next Tuesday. Penry’s ploy is so blatant that even staunch Republicans have rushed to excoriate him.

“This is not where you do cutesy partisan tricks; you don’t do that with our constitution,” thundered Don Ament, a former Republican state senator and secretary of agriculture in the Bill Owens administration.

A long list of organizations that includes every major wildlife organization, the Farm Bureau, Colorado Forum, Colorado Center on Law and Policy and virtually every water conservancy districts on both sides of the Continental Divide oppose Amendment 52.

So should we all.