Face The State Staff Report
DENVER – A group of thirty-one influential conservative business leaders gathered Friday at Brooklyn's restaurant to discuss the cost of Gov. Bill Ritter’s unionization order, with a leading state senator providing details on how the pro-business platform that landed Ritter into office has quickly transformed into a pro-union agenda.
SpenceCO Senate News
According to Sen. Nancy Spence, R-Centennial, Ritter's November executive order that mandated collective bargaining for state workers was a “union payback” designed to reward unions for their multi-million dollar campaign contributions during his 2006 gubernatorial bid. In her lunchtime address to the Colorado Republican Business Coalition, Spence expressed fears that the measure's impact could soon seep into the private sector, creating salary inflation and unfavorable conditions for business in Colorado.
Marsha Berzins, a small business owner in attendance, said she suspects that Ritter’s pro-union actions will only hurt a small business’ ability to compete.
Ritter with Union OrganizersVCVN/Flickr
Spence has been joined by other Republican legislators at the Capitol in responding to Ritter’s order with a storm of bills aimed at repealing or a least limiting its effects. Democrat majorities in both houses have stymied their efforts. House Bill 1187, sponsored by Rep. Bob Gardner, R-Colorado Springs, would have prohibited all public workers – including teachers – from striking. Spence sponsored the bill in the Senate where she referred to herself as a known “black belt when it comes to pissing off the teachers’ union.” Democrats tabled the bill in committee, passing a weaker bill, HB 1189, that prohibits only state employees from striking.
Spence worries that Ritter’s mandate takes power away from the legislature and puts it into the hands of organized labor, a group that could potentially use that power to influence how the state’s budget is allocated. However, the Tax Payers Bill of Rights does safeguard against any salary or benefit increase for state employees without voter approval.
“We all remember when Ritter pretended to be friendly towards business,” said Spence, who was appalled by the lack of public notice preceding the Governor’s order, which was released late on a Friday afternoon.
Colorado employees have always been free to join unions if they feel the need for additional representation, but Spence recalls talking to one state employee, who refuses to join a union because he says, “If we can’t strike, what good are they?”
The sad thing is
On February 19th, 2008 Socrates says:
that any one expected anything different from Ritter and the democrats.