Once again, Coloradans face an election in which activists are seeking to soak taxpayers under the pretense of investing in education — while insisting it isn’t a tax increase.

As The Gazette reported, a coalition gathered at a Denver high school to launch a campaign for a ballot proposal to slash taxpayer refunds by $1 billion, promising the money will bolster education funding.

The refunds in question are those assured by the Taxpayer’s Bill of Rights, which requires a vote of the people to raise taxes and caps year-to-year increases in revenue state and local governments can collect. Excess revenue must go back to taxpayers unless they grant permission at the ballot box to let government keep the extra cash it collected.

“The state has no source of money other than the money people earn themselves,” the late British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher said. “There is no such thing as public money; there is only taxpayers’ money.”

She was right, and nowhere is that clearer than with Colorado’s TABOR refunds.

If Proposition NN on the Nov. 3 ballot isn’t a tax hike, as its backers would contend, why did lawmakers — who referred the measure via Senate Bill 26-135 — have to ask permission in the first place? 

The ballot language lawmakers came up with is crafty. The proposition uses verbal sleight of hand to ask voters to fatten the state budget by up to $2 billion over the next decade.

“Shall state investment in K-12 public education increase two percent each year for the next ten years … without raising taxes but instead funded by raising the annual limit on state fiscal year spending …”

It’s for the kids, you see, so teachers get paid more, class sizes shrink and disability services grow. Who would dare oppose “investment” in Colorado kids?

“We believe voters will choose to invest in our kids, our families and our future by voting Yes on Proposition NN,” said Colorado Education Association President Kevin Vick.

Except most of the revenue won’t even go to schools — exposing the phony premise behind the heartstrings appeal.

A nonpartisan analysis found three-quarters of the money will go to the general fund, not to schools. That leaves lawmakers with new money to spend as they wish.

All the while, families foot the bill by forfeiting $7,381 per taxpayer in TABOR refunds between the 2026-27 and 2036-37 fiscal years. Less than $2,000 of that will go to schools.

And as for that “without raising taxes” promise? If voters agree to let the state keep excess revenues, the limit on government growth would vanish — permanently — even after the promised 10-year window for schools.

“Once voters authorize the state to retain excess revenue, those refunds are effectively eliminated indefinitely, not just during that initial ten-year window, due to the open-ended nature of the measure,” wrote Elizabeth Caven, outreach director and policy analyst for Advance Colorado, which opposes the measure.

That would end TABOR’s essential check on runaway government spending.

Proposition NN is a deceptive attempt to permanently hollow out TABOR’s spending limit. And it comes as Initiative 195 takes its own swing by dragging Colorado back to a graduated income tax.

Together they would strip TABOR’s limit and the 4.1% flat tax in one election — and hand taxpayers the bill.

This past spring, the legislature had to bridge a $1.5 billion funding gap in the 2026-27 fiscal year’s budget by implementing wide-ranging cuts — after having gone on a spending spree and running up the tab. Lawmakers don’t need even more play money; it only gets them into trouble.