April 04, 2012 12:41 AM UTC

UPDATE: How Dare You Do That Thing That I Did

• 8 Comments
• by: Colorado Pols

WEDNESDAY UPDATE: Charles Ashby of the Sentinel responds today with a blog update citing votes which at least partly back up his original contention that Rep. Scott Tipton voted against funding for the senior homestead exemption. A Democratic-sponsored amendment to fund half the exemption in 2010 was voted down by Tipton in addition to his votes against the Senate bill, ultimately enacted, completely suspending the exemption until this year:

The bill came forward on second reading the day before the last day of the 2010 session. At that moment the bill was to suspend the entire exemption, $94 million a year for two years.

The Rep. Jim Reisberg, D-Greeley, offered an amendment to fund half of the exemption. Along with him, Republicans spoke in favor of it, some Democrats spoke against it. Then Rep. Kathlene Curry, D-Gunnison, was in the chair, and approved it on an overwhelming “division” vote of legislators. That vote required supporters of the amendment to stand and be counted. Lawmakers on both sides of the aisle did so.

Moments later, even though the bill at that point funded half of the exemption, Republicans spoke out and then voted against it.

The following day, the last day of the session when it came up for thirds, Reisberg offered a third-reading amendment that corrected a drafting mistake in the second reading amendment from the day before. The amendment was essentially the same thing. It passed unanimously, 65-0, with Tipton and McNulty and everyone voting for it.

Moments later, Tipton and the Republicans voted against the bill, a bill that, at the time of that vote, funded half of the exemption for seniors. [Pols emphasis]

What say you, Polsters? We don’t want the complexities of these fleeting proposals and procedural votes to confuse the issue, but if Ashby can correctly state that Tipton voted against the exemption because he rejected Rep. Jim Riesberg’s 50% compromise, we have no desire to service Frank McNulty by arguing against it. Above all, we strive to be accurate.

It occurs to us that you could also view this as GOP insistence on 100% netting them 0%, which we suppose would allow Tipton and McNulty technical accuracy, but doesn’t look good.

—–

UPDATE: Apparently Ashby was wrong in his blog post that Tipton voted for the same bill. Maybe Tipton will get some mileage out of attacking Pace over the senior property tax exemption — which might help him with senior citizens angry over Tipton’s votes to privatize Medicare.

For more on the uneven relationship between the GOP and the senior homestead exemption through the years, as noted by State Bill Colorado, Tim Hoover’s 2010 story is worth a read.

But our record of a newspaper’s blog post that, from everything we can see, needed correcting several days ago is now corrected. Thanks as always to our vigilant readers.

One of the primary reasons that CD-3 is considered a potential Democratic pick-up in 2012 is because of the general ineptitude of freshman Rep. Scott Tipton, who excels at tripping over his own feet.

Charles Ashby of The Grand Junction Sentinel recently noted another gaffe by Tipton as he tried to attack Democratic challenger Sal Pace:

In a campaign email [this week], GOP U.S. Rep. Scott Tipton chastises state Rep.Sal Pace, D-Pueblo and his 3rd Congressional Distirct challenger, for “consistently” voting to end the state’s senior property tax exemption…

…While Pace did vote along with other lawmakers in 2009 and 2010 not to fund the property tax break during those years because of the recession, so did Tipton [Pols emphasis], at least in 2010.

That year, when Cortez Republican still served in the Colorado Legislature, he voted along with all 65 members of the House to approve SB190. Unlike the 2009 measure that suspended the break for one year, the 2010 bill did so for two years.

Good work, team Tipton! Way to draw attention to an issue that is going to damage your own campaign as well!