Republicans stripped $360,000 out of the state’s $25.8 billion budget, as the General Assembly continues to tussle over Gov. John Hickenlooper’s implementation of the Clean Power Plan despite a court-ordered stay on implementation of President Barack Obama’s plan.

The cut would remove 2.5 full-time equivalent (FTE) positions from the Air Quality Division in the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment.

That’s what Republicans estimate is being spent to work on the plan.

Originally all of the funding – about $8 million from the division – was cut by the state’s budget, but Democrats in the House were able to put the money back in. That changed Wednesday when Republicans began debating the budget, House Bill 1405, and almost immediately stripped $300,000 back out.

Hickenlooper, a second-term Democrat, called the dispute the “height of ridiculousness in terms of partisan politics.”

“It is perplexing,” Sen. Jerry Sonnenberg, R-Sterling, said, as he moved to amend the budget. “It’s perplexing that we would argue over 2.5 FTE’s and not about 500 employees that because of the Clean Power Plan would lose their jobs in the coal industry.”

Hickenlooper said Republicans mistakenly think that stripping this funding from the department responsible for permitting some of Colorado’s heaviest industrial operations will result in more coal being burned.

“Regardless of how that plays out, with that one or two positions, we are going to move to cleaner air and cleaner air in the present world requires you have more renewable energy, more wind, more solar, you replace more coal with natural gas,” Hickenlooper said.

Senate President Bill Cadman, R-Colorado Springs, fired back with a statement.

“It’s bewildering that the governor seems prepared to go to the mat with us over this completely reasonable request for a little regulatory and fiscal restraint, given all the alarmist rhetoric he’s been using about the state’s alleged budget crisis,” Cadman said. “His refusal to be reasonable, and Obama-like disregard for the rule of law and democratic process, is forcing us to use the power of the purse to protect taxpayers and ratepayers from runway state and federal regulators.”

That budget passed the Senate preliminarily on Wednesday after hours of debate over amendments to the spending plan.

It will be considered on third reading on Thursday.

If the bill passes then, the House and Senate will put together a joint committee to hammer out differences between the bills the chambers passed.

The biggest difference is the $300,000 in funding for the air quality division. It’s unclear how that will be resolved.

Senators proposed 36 amendments and only a handful of the proposals passed.

Sen Tim Neville, R-Littleton, brought an amendment to the budget that would have prevented Colorado universities from using fetal tissue in research.

“This is a moral opportunity to do the right thing and make sure that we have policy that protects our future,” said Neville, who is running for U.S. Senate.

The amendment passed on an unrecorded voice vote.

Sen. Pat Steadman, D-Denver, urged a no-vote on the proposal saying Colorado has avoided using the budget to legislate.

“Primarily our debate today has focused on dollars and our debate today is trying to veer off and talk about policy and that is inappropriate,” he said.

Some of Colorado’s universities have used fetal tissue for research but Planned Parenthood of the Rocky Mountains has repeatedly said they don’t have a fetal tissue donation program in the state.

Republicans were gearing up to make the issue of fetal tissue use in research a major issue this session. Some GOP lawmakers held an interim committee hearing on the issue. But the issue hasn’t been broached so far, other than a bill that died quickly in the House to give Attorney General Cynthia Coffman authority to enforce an existing state law prohibiting the purchase of fetal tissue.

–

Contact Megan Schrader

719-286-0644

Twitter: @CapitolSchrader

Colorado State Capitol Building (Thinkstock)

Thinkstock