Rio Blanco County, Colo. (Illustration/Google Maps)

“Three extremely conservative Rio Blanco County commissioners unanimously passed very substantial impact fees, and as a result they have the money to fix the roads, they have the money to hire deputy county sheriffs, they have the money to do these things that we don’t,” said Rifle attorney and former Garfield County judge Steve Carver, who lost to Republican high school administrator Mike Samson last year.

The three-member board of county commissioners in Rio Blanco, to the north of gas-rich Garfield County, is comprised of Republicans who saw the need for additional fees to pay for the increasing pressure put on roads, bridges, law enforcement and other county services and facilities by the booming natural-gas industry.

“The handwriting was on the wall: How do we deal with the impacts of something like this?” Ken Parsons, chairman of the Rio Blanco Board of County Commissioners, told the Associated Press in May 2008.

Democrat Stephen Bershenyi, a Rifle blacksmith and artist who unsuccessfully ran against Republican John Martin last year, said the oil and gas industry spared no expense — or dirty tactic — in turning back the Democrats because they feared the same type of impact fee in Garfield County.

“One of the things that scared them the most was what happened in Rio Blanco County,” Bershenyi said. “The county commission, which is a Republican board, decided to charge the energy industry impact fees for each well permit issued. By August of last year [Rio Blanco] County had already brought in more than $6 million in impact fees from the energy industry from wells that they were drilling.”

Rio Blanco charges just under $18,000 per well, with the vast majority of that money going toward road construction and maintenance. An impact fee support study conducted in 2007 estimated the county would have collected $22.7 million had the fee been in place during the heart of the boom (from 2000 to 2006).

Over the next 15 years, when Rio Blanco expects to see another 16,500 wells drilled — with some studies suggesting the next natural gas boom will shift there from Garfield — the county expects to generate $292 million. Still, that won’t cover its estimated $343 million infrastructure tab if its population triples, as predicted.

“[Implementing impact fees] was one of the things that I was advocating that Garfield County do immediately, because we should have done it from the very beginning,” Bershenyi said.

Parsons and Rio Blanco County Administrator Pat Hooker didn’t return calls requesting comment on the impact fees Tuesday, but the groundbreaking step — the first such fee imposed in Colorado — definitely raised eyebrows not only in the rest of the state but throughout the gas-producing Rocky Mountain West. According to the AP’s May 2008 report:

Bob Gallagher, head of the New Mexico Oil and Gas Association, a trade group, said there are no similar fees in his state. “But if our Birkenstock-wearing friends in Colorado have a chance to pass it in Colorado, there’s a chance it will come across the border,” Gallagher said. “It’s a little bizarre that people want to continue to bite the hand that feeds them.”

Bershenyi, without divulging his choice of footwear, said the 4,000 active wells in Garfield County could have provided about $60 million for sorely needed infrastructure if a more conservative $15,000-per-well impact fee — Garfield’s wells aren’t quite as deep as Rio Blanco’s — had been charged.

“When you throw the economic downturn in, [Garfield] County is strapped, and they thought they had a rainy day fund that was really going to put them in good shape, and what they found out was it was woefully short of the goals they needed to carry forward with the services that are being requested of them,” said Bershenyi, who in April was elected to the Glenwood Springs City Council.

Martin, the longtime Republican commissioner, told the Colorado Independent in April that Garfield County had set aside $80 million to weather the recession and slowdown in drilling stemming from plunging commodity prices.

“Hopefully we’ve done enough to survive the downturn because that downturn is going to last for many years,” Martin said at the time.

“What it is is there’s $80 million coming into the county, but $80 million has been spent,” Carter said when asked about the county’s reserves. “He doesn’t have a rainy day fund. That’s totally bogus.”

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The Denver Post reported Wednesday that Shires was indicted for aiding restaurateur Jeffrey Castardi on an alleged money-laundering scheme to hide an illegal gambling operation. Predictably, Shires denies any wrongdoing, claiming that he began to have second thoughts about his association with Castardi. “I said, ‘I can’t hang around this dude,’” Shires told the Post.

Shires, who has served as the registered agent for dozens of Republican political committees and 527s for more than a decade, has quite the colorful professional history.

He is currently under probation for failing to file federal taxes for the National Alternative Fuel Foundation (NAFF), which was accused of running an elaborate Ponzi scheme that defrauded the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and 56 private investors of more than $4 million. Shires was sentenced in June 2008 and nicked for $3,450 in fines.

In May 2008, NAFF’s founder, William Orr, was found guilty on 23 federal counts of fraud, failure to file tax returns and making false statements. Orr is appealing his conviction. Former U.S. congressman and current member of the Colorado State Board of Education Bob Schaffer was also linked to NAFF and took some heat for his fuzzy recollection of his board tenure while the group was being probed by federal investigators.

In July 2008, after Shires’ tax-fraud sentence was handed down, Colorado Ethics Watch filed a complaint that the Senate Majority Fund, a Republican 527 political committee linked to Shires, violated state and federal law by failing to disclose media buys that supported Senate District 19 candidate Libby Szabo.

Shires was also hauled into court again to answer a state administrative law judge in August 2008 on a private citizen’s complaint that the Colorado Taxpayers League failed to register as a political organization and file an electioneering report for an opposition mailer it sent out in a 2008 Weld County commissioners GOP primary race.

Last month, Colorado Ethics Watch claimed that the League failed to file a mandatory electioneering report to the Colorado secretary of state for a pricey mailer against a Democratic candidate. Controversy magnet Shires serves as the organization’s agent of record and is responsible for filing its campaign finance reports.

In the 2006 election cycle, Shires was embroiled in a money shifting controversy with the Trailhead Group where contributions were shunted to and from like-minded GOP political groups with the money trail varying significantly between the received and expended amounts reported — a difference in several cases of tens of thousands of dollars that appeared to simply evaporate on the balance sheets. Colorado Independent’s investigative reporting spurred some of the groups to quickly amend their reports. Democratic state lawmaker Rep. Morgan Carroll later tightened a state campaign-finance reporting loophole for IRS-designated Section 527 political committees to stem this type of activity.

Stay tuned.

Colorado Ethics Watch claims that the Aurora-based Colorado League of Taxpayers failed to file a mandatory electioneering report to the Colorado secretary of state for a pricey mailer against a Democratic candidate. Controversy magnet Shires serves as the organization’s agent of record and is responsible for filing its campaign finance reports.

From the Ethics Watch statement:

On or about September 19, 2008, the Colorado League of Taxpayers mailed to voters in Garfield County a mail piece advocating against the election of Steve Carter, a candidate for Garfield County Commissioner. State law requires any organization advocating for or against a candidate for elected office, within 60 days before a general election, to file an electioneering communication report with the Colorado Secretary of State’s office or, in this case, with the Garfield County Clerk. There is no report on file at either office from the Colorado League of Taxpayers.

By failing to file a report by the September 29 deadline, the Colorado League of Taxpayers could be liable for fines of $50 per day for each day the report is delinquent. As of February 20, these penalties amount to more than $7,000.

“The Colorado League of Taxpayers is skirting the law and ignoring requirements for transparency,” said Luis Toro, senior counsel for Colorado Ethics Watch. “The election might be over, but groups that refuse to follow the law must still be held accountable.”

Ironically, as an agent for the taxpayers group, Shires pleaded guilty to three federal corporate tax charges in June 2008 for an unrelated business endeavor.

Shortly after Shires’ June federal court sentencing where he was nicked for $3,450 in fines and one year’s probation, he was answering to a state administrative law judge in August on a private citizen’s complaint that the Colorado Taxpayers League failed to register as a political organization and file an electioneering report for an opposition mailer it sent out in a 2008 Weld County commissioners GOP primary race.

Ethics Watch’s complaint echoes an aspect of August charges, which dismissed the registration count on a technicality but levied a $650 fine for failing to file an electioneering report.

Somebody buy this man some twine for his finger.

Jeffrey Bartleson, who listed his job as “political consultant” when he entered the Pueblo County Jail last week on another molestation charge, was the first of several campaign managers for Hasan, who spent more than $350,000 on failed bids in Senate District 8 and then House District 56.

Bartleson was paid a $4,600 monthly salary to manage Hasan’s state Senate campaign, according to forms Hasan filed with the Colorado secretary of state. He left the campaign in early December 2007, at about the time Hasan gave up plans to challenge then-state Rep. Al White for the Republican nomination and turned his attention to the House district race.

“Bartleson left the team when his wife became ill,” according to a lengthy portrait of the Hasan campaigns written by former Colorado Independent reporter Naomi Zeveloff in the Jan. 17, 2008, edition of Westword.

Bartleson, who accompanied Hasan and other staffers on trips across the sprawling district, was the one who discovered that Hasan and the campaign’s publicist, Alison Miller, had begun a clandestine affair. “But then one day Bartleson caught them making out in between interviews for a campaign assistant, and Ali decided to go public with the relationship,” Zeveloff wrote.

CLICK TO ENLARGE - Statement of Personal Expenditures by a Candidate filed by Muhammad Ali Hasan, listing $4,600

CLICK TO ENLARGE - Page 2 of Statement of Personal Expenditures by a Candidate filed by Muhammad Ali Hasan, listing $4,600

The two later had a nasty split that ended with Miller claiming Hasan was stalking her, but she eventually dropped a request for a restraining order against the candidate. Hasan took a public vow of celibacy last summer but said it was at the joking request of Republican officials and had nothing to do with Miller.

Hasan didn’t return a phone message requesting comment.

Bartleson is being held in the Pueblo County Jail in lieu of $300,000 bond.

UPDATE: Hasan released a statement to the Colorado Independent:

Jeff Bartleson and I worked together in the fall of 2007 on my campaign. Bartleson terminated his work with us due to his wife’s illness, which prevented him from continuing to work with us. Bartleson’s departure had nothing to do with the current accusations being brought against him. I have faith that our court system will deal with this matter appropriately.

While the Girl Scout Research Institute’s interviews of 3,284 boys and girls aged 13 to 17 attributes the increased interest in politics and community service to the presidential race, one has to really wonder how much of an effect the poised Obama sisters had standing by the side of Dad- and Mom-in-Chief on the campaign trail.

Nonetheless, the study offers some encouraging predictions for the next generation along with concerns that our daughters haven’t completely nixed the bubble-headed “Barbie” doll attitudes about their place in the world.

Leadership and Girls
• 59 percent say the election has increased their confidence in being able to achieve their goals in the future.
• 55 percent say the election has increased their comfort level in speaking up and expressing their opinions on issues that matter to them.
• 51 percent say the election has boosted their confidence in their ability to change things in the country.
• 55 percent of Girl Scouts versus 35 percent of non-Girl Scouts think they have a high chance of becoming President.

Race and Gender
• 43 percent of girls today strongly believe that “girls have to work harder than boys in order to gain positions of leadership,” a statement that just 25 percent of girls agreed with just a year ago.
• 37 percent of girls believe that “in our society, it is more difficult to become a leader for a woman than a man,” up from 23 percent in 2007.
• 24 percent of girls believe that “today both men and women have an equal chance of getting a leadership position” down from 35 percent in 2007.
• More than four in 10 girls (41 percent) say that the election has had a positive impact on their desire to be a leader.
• One in three young people believe that Obama was held to a higher standard because of his race, though 48 percent believe that ultimately race helped him in the elections.

Engagement in the Election
• 71 percent of teens intend to vote when they reach eligible age. One in two (49 percent) report an increased interest in politics; and 44 percent gained an interest in social and political activism. The election has had a particularly strong impact on girls and non-whites (especially African-Americans) in terms of increased interest in political activism.
• 60 percent of the survey respondents said they would have voted for President Obama while just 26 percent said they would have voted for Sen. John McCain (compared to the 53 percent/ 46 percent split in the national election. Two-thirds of respondents also believe President Obama will bring positive change to the country.
• 75 percent of the girls said they were excited about Hillary Clinton and Sarah Palin’s candidacies.

h/t Feminist Daily News Wire

A second lawsuit against a newly enacted “clean government” measure alleging seven constitutional and Colorado law violations has been filed by public employees and trade organizations representing Colorado educators and first responders.

Amendment 54, which went into effect Dec. 31, prohibits both unions and sole-source government contractors and their families from giving to political campaigns.

A complaint filed Wednesday in Denver District Court asserts the same First and 14th Amendment infringements as noted in a separate legal challenge filed by a plaintiff class of Children’s Hospital, the University of Denver and three prominent individuals who serve on charitable boards.

The teachers and firefighters further argue that the amendment has significant consequences, though backers largely intended to use it as a vehicle to squelch labor contributions to political campaigns that benefit Democrats.

As members of collective bargaining units within governmental bodies, public employees and their families would be barred from making political contributions — in effect prohibiting guaranteed free speech and equal protection rights, the suit contends.

The everything-and-the-kitchen-sink approach also questions the amendment’s single-issue requirement and a host of technical concerns about definitions and state interpretations for applying the law to some groups but not others.

It’s deja vu all over again of the 18-month legal battle to enact the contentious Amendment 31 gift ban.

The plaintiffs include:

• Kerrie Dallman, a social studies teacher from Pomona High School currently serving a three-year term as president of the Jefferson County Education Association. In her capacity as president, she is prohibited from making political contributions under Amendment 54.

• Laurence Botnick, an assistant professor of social work at Metro State College. He is a taxpayer, concerned that the state’s enforcement of Amendment 54 will violate the Colorado and U.S. Constitutions.

• School District 14 Classroom Teachers Association Political Action Committee, a registered political committee that made contributions to local board of education candidates in 2005 but is prevented by Amendment 54 from making contributions in the 2009 election.

• School District 14 Classroom Teachers Association, a labor organization that made ballot issue contributions in 2006 but is prevented by Amendment 54 from doing so at any time in the future.

• Aurora Fire Fighters Protective Association, a labor organization that, because of Amendment 54, is foregoing its plans to form a political committee to make contributions in municipal races.

• Douglas County Federation, a labor organization that represents teachers and classified employees in the Douglas County School District and is being required to immediately agree to put Amendment 54′s provisions in its collective bargaining agreement, even though that will mean it can no longer make contributions in local ballot issue campaigns.

As we noted throughout the election season, Amendment 54 was touted as a “clean government” measure by its backers. But its aims were far less transparent. While voters narrowly passed Amendment 54 in November by a 51-49 margin under the guise of making public officials more accountable, the measure’s political committee refused to disclose its own funding sources.

City and County of Denver building (Photo/fusionpanda, Flickr)

As we noted throughout the election season, Amendment 54 was touted as a “clean government” measure by its backers. But its aims were far less transparent. The amendment, which went into effect Dec. 31, prohibits both unions and sole-source government contractors from giving to political campaigns. The unspoken goal is to snuff out labor’s largely pro-Democratic contributions.

Except that pesky U.S. Constitution — namely the First and Fourteenth Amendments — prevents citizens’ political voices from being squelched.

Voters narrowly passed Amendment 54 in November by a 51-49 margin after a series of contentious attack ads and counter arguments about the secretive group backing the measure that would not disclose it funders.

The lawsuit challenging the amendment on a constitutional basis is not unexpected.

According to a statement released by the plaintiffs:

The lawsuit’s primary concerns are that Amendment 54 unfairly restricts campaign and political contributions and that it creates a burden on Colorado’s nonprofit community by making it more difficult to attract and retain top quality board members.

Many non-profits provide services at least partially funded by the state or local governments. Amendment 54 includes the funding for those services as ‘sole source government contracts.’ The amendment extends beyond officers and board members of non-profits that receive government funds; it also prohibits the members of officers’ and board members’ extended families from making campaign contributions.

The plaintiffs include:

• Dan Ritchie, former chancellor of the University of Denver. As chairman and chief executive officer of the Denver Center for the Performing Arts (DCPA), Mr. Ritchie is precluded from contributing to political campaigns because the DCPA has a sole source government contract with the City of Denver.

• Pat Hamill, president and chief executive officer of Oakwood Homes. Since his company has sole source contracts with local subdivisions, Hamill is subject to the restrictions of Amendment 54. And as a board member of the Boys and Girls Club of Metro Denver and the University of Denver, he is precluded from future contributions to campaigns of candidates for elected office or political parties.

• Charlie Brown, Denver City councilman. Brown serves as a Board member of Visit Denver (formerly known as the Denver Metro Convention and Visitors Bureau), which has a sole source contract as the City of Denver’s official marketing agency. As a result of Amendment 54, Brown cannot even contribute to his own reelection campaign.

• The Children’s Hospital, recognized as one of the best children’s hospitals in the country. The Children’s Hospital provides specialty services for children through state Medicaid contracts that are not provided by any other health care provider in Colorado, such as heart transplants and cancer treatments. A violation of Amendment 54 would prohibit The Children’s Hospital from providing such services to children for the next three years. Members have contemplated resignation from the Board.

• The University of Denver, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit higher education institution, is a sole source contract holder with the City and County of Denver, the state of Colorado and various other governmental entities. Amendment 54’s severe First Amendment restrictions make it more difficult for DU to attract and retain community leaders to serve on its Board of Trustees and in its senior administration.

“Amendment 54 could have catastrophic repercussions for children throughout Colorado,” said Jim Shmerling, president and CEO of The Children’s Hospital. “There is no one else in the state that can provide many of the services we offer, and it would be devastating if that care was jeopardized for children on Medicaid.”

The suit requests Gov. Bill Ritter and the executive director of the Department of Personnel and Administration from implementing or enforcing Amendment 54.

Scanlan, recently tabbed majority whip, spent $84,540, according to The Vail Daily, and Hasan — who ran a flamboyant and some say over-the-top push for the House District 56 seat (representing Lake, Summit and Eagle counties) — spent $352,792.

The son of a Beaver Creek managed-health-care pioneer, Hasan’s campaign was marked by months of bizarre twists and turns culminating in his slim victory in wealthy Eagle County but defeat in the more working-class mountain enclaves of Summit and Lake counties.

The Vail Daily noted that Hasan singlehandedly nearly outspent all other state and local candidates in Eagle County combined. He also may have set a new high-water mark for spending for state House races in Colorado.

The Associated Press reported today that the $745 million was more than twice the amount that Republican John McCain raised during the campaign.

In an interview clip embedded in the AP video story, Obama pointed out that 90 percent of his contributions came from individual donors, not special interests.

Coincidentally, the final tally came just as the Obama campaign sent out the latest mass appeal for contributions — in exchange for the above-mentioned four-year calendar — yours for a $35 contribution.

From the sales pitch:

It’s been just over a month since Election Day, and we’re getting ready to change America.

We can’t do it alone, and we can’t do it in a single day.

But thanks to supporters like you, change is coming.

Show your support for our ongoing movement with an Obama four-year calendar — or share one as a holiday gift.

Media-watchdog-in-chief Bill Menezes will serve as moderator to some of Colorado’s sharpest political watchers:

Hank Brown, former U.S. senator and former University of Colorado president
Adam Schrager, political reporter, KUSA 9News
Robert Moore, editor, Fort Collins Coloradoan
Cara DeGette, senior reporter, The Colorado Independent
Tara Trujillo, spokeswoman, Mark Udall campaign
Wayne Laugesen, editorial page editor, The Gazette of Colorado Springs

The pugnacious campaign between Mark Udall and Bob Schaffer will no doubt be a hot topic of conversation.

Menezes thinks so too.

“After a campaign cycle in which Dick Wadhams and his ilk led too many of the media around by the nose, this is a chance to talk about some of the things the media did well in the 2008 election,” said Menezes. “This panel of people who were down in the trenches covering this race or otherwise contributing the public voice also is likely to have some pretty strong and divergent ideas about how media influenced the public dialogue about the races, what the media missed in covering those races and how new media played into the whole equation, both for old-time outlets such as the newspapers as well as emerging competitors such as The Colorado Independent.”

The free discussion will take place from 11 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. at the Denver Art Museum’s Sharp Auditorium. Contact Serena Woods for questions or directions.