For years, taxpaying citizens and particularly the business community outside the Denver metro area have felt disregarded at the State Capitol. The interests of the Denver metro area long have enjoyed outsized priority even as lawmakers from across the state have done their best to represent the interests of their wide-ranging regions.

More recently, that concern has turned to alarm as our ever-more-left-leaning legislature has enacted myriad laws hamstringing employers statewide and undermining the entire state’s economy.

Complaining and criticizing only gets you so far. That’s why it’s a good thing for the state overall that the Colorado Springs Chamber of Commerce & Economic Development Corporation, and the Douglas County Economic Development Corporation, have joined forces — along with other regional partners across 37 southern Colorado counties. They are launching a political action committee that can better speak up for southern Colorado and especially its business community — in an assist to job creators across the state as as a whole — at the State Capitol.

As they say, the squeaky wheel gets the grease. The Southern Colorado Business Alliance will present a unified presence for industries and communities throughout the region. And it couldn’t come at a better time as metro Denver-based business community heavyweights — like the Colorado Chamber of Commerce, Denver Metro Chamber of Commerce and Colorado Concern — are rallying to push back at anti-business regulation that’s bad for the economy.

The new effort from Colorado’s southern flank, as the Gazette reported last week, brings businesses and chambers together from across southern Colorado “to identify, train, endorse and support pro-business candidates and elected leaders at the state level; engage candidates through informed, community-driven dialogue; and coordinate political action that advances economic growth, workforce development, housing and competitiveness.” Each participating chamber holds a voting seat in the alliance.

We’ll say the quiet part out loud: For better or worse, money talks in politics — and it’s good to see the Pikes Peak region and the rest of southern Colorado stepping up its effort in that regard. To pair with the PAC, the initiative features an affiliated expenditure committee, Southern Colorado Action (SoCo Action). It’s an independent medium for individual businesses to participate in advocacy and voter outreach while larger chambers participate through the new alliance.

The alliance is crucial of course for the Pikes Peak region and other areas of southern Colorado to curb the outflow of people and businesses leaving the state due to policies imposed at the Capitol. That’s a point that was raised to The Gazette by Johnna Reeder Kleymeyer, president and chief executive officer of the Colorado Springs Chamber & EDC.

The new alliance is working to have influence on proposed legislation like House Bill 1005, which would deny a workplace’s non-union employees a right to vote on whether they want to pay union dues. It’s the latest hurdle to overcome for businesses and especially small businesses already struggling to stay competitive despite the best efforts of ruling Democrats at the Capitol and their well-heeled benefactors in organized labor.

The new alliance gets the big picture: Colorado is in very real competition with states like Wyoming, Utah, New Mexico and Arizona for not only business, but also taxpaying and job-holding residents. It’s up to southern Colorado to advance the region’s economic interests — and in so doing, advance the economic interests of the entire state.

The legislature’s lopsided Democratic majority can consider themselves forewarned: There’s a new player in state politics that will lean in hard to advance Colorado’s economic vitality — despite the legislature’s best efforts to undermine it.