When Gov. Bill Ritter last fall announced that he was going to use $5.1 million in grants destined for local governments and social services agencies to balance the state budget, the ramifications were profound and immediate.

In Teller County, ambulances were grounded, sheriff’s deputies laid off, road projects halted, and hiring plans put on hold. In El Paso County, agencies such as CASA of the Pikes Peak Region, which trains volunteers to act as court advocates for children involved in abuse, neglect or custody cases, scaled back on everything from pens and paper to avoid laying off staff members.

“There wasn’t a line item in our budget that wasn’t hit,” said Trudy Strewler Hodges, the agency’s executive director.

So when Gov. Bill Ritter announced on Friday that the $5.1 million will be re-instated, officials including Strewler Hodges were pleased, but remain cautious about the future. “We’re a little anxious about whether these gaming funds are going to continue,” Strewler Hodges said.

Her sentiments were echoed by officials such as Tim Dienst, chief executive officer of the Ute Pass Regional Ambulance District; and Candy Shoemaker, EMS director for the Southwest Teller County Hospital District Emergency Medical Services. Both organizations, which have been hard hit by the economy and reduced Medicare and Medicaid payments, have idled ambulances and postponed hiring full-time employees.

“We’re thrilled, obviously. We’ll have to go through the grant process and see where it goes from there,” said Shoemaker.

The grants, called gaming impact grants, have been used for almost a decade to deal with the effects of gambling, which include everything from crime to increased traffic accidents. Funded by a state tax on gambling revenue, the grants provided $6.8 million to 50 entities in 2008.

The grants are distributed to Teller and Gilpin counties, where casinos are located, and eight adjoining counties, including El Paso County. Three counties that have tribal gambling — Archuleta, La Plata and Montezuma counties — also receive grants.

The reinstatement of funds will help “fill the bucket up,” said Jim Ignatius, a member of the Teller County Board of County Commissioners and the state’s Local Government Limited Gaming Advisory Committee.

Teller County, he added, has lost about  $1.5 million in gaming funds. That includes $100,000 for the Fourth Judicial District, $600,000 for the jail, $240,000 for four sheriff’s deputy positions, and $600,000 for roads.

In a press release issued Friday, Gov. Bill Ritter took a lot of the credit for the reinstatement of the grants. Yet Ignatius and others say it was members of General Assembly’s Joint Budget Committee, including state Rep. Kent Lambert, who fought to get the funding re-instated.

Lambert, a Colorado Springs Republican, said he told representatives in the Governor’s Office last fall that he did not support seizure of the funds to help balance the state budget. “They never budged an inch,” he said. “They didn’t do anything to release this money.”

An amendment reinstating the funds was attached to a bill that Ritter is expected to sign.

Former state senator Ron Teck, now intergovernmental operations officer and lobbyist for El Paso County, said Ritter could have released the funds six weeks ago when he received word that the state was going to get an additional $24 million in Medicaid funding.

In an email response to the criticism, Evan Dreyer, Ritter’s spokesman, said the Governor’s Office has worked closely with the Joint Budget Committee to keep the budget balanced. “This is a great example of that partnership,” he said.

The Department of Local Affairs hopes to get the monies to local communities before July 1, according to the governor’s press release and various officials.

In 2011, the amount of gaming impact funds is expected to shrink to about $3.9 million, Ignatius and others say.

Ice hockey player Angela Ruggiero supports the Team USA career program, a U.S. Olympic Committee initiative in which American athletes training for the Olympics can land full-time jobs with health benefits for corporations that sponsor the USOC. Human resources firm Adecco is helping the athletes find employment, initially at Hilton hotels. Photo by THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

Gene J. Puskar