Few aspects of Colorado state government are as complicated and opaque as the collection of property taxes.

Even those who are paid to understand the state’s Byzantine property tax structure think so.

“Complicated!” is how Colorado’s two leading economists described it in a recently released report on how the state of Colorado changed its tax laws earlier this year with Senate Bill 233.

Governor Jared Polis has wisely called a special session of the Colorado State Legislature to make a concerted effort to prevent two ballot initiatives from further exacerbating the state’s confusing property tax problems.

The current solution, SB 233, was rushed through at the end of a hectic legislative session in May. It was designed to allay public fears about skyrocketing property taxes for homeowners and commercial property owners alike.

Colorado’s recent property tax dilemma was fueled by skyrocketing real estate prices, particularly in urban and resort areas. The huge increases in property values ​​inevitably led to equally high – and unfair – property tax bills.

Because property taxes are influenced by myriad – often competing or conflicting – laws and formulas, creating a uniform method for rejecting essentially automatic property tax increases across the state is fraught with risk.

Another problem is that different local governments levy property taxes at different rates and under different regimes. Legislators, state governments and local governments all agree that there is an unavoidable and, in some cases, serious financial risk to some governments when property tax laws are changed.

In attempting to overcome all of these obstacles with SB 233, neither commercial and residential property owners nor local government leaders were satisfied. According to state officials, even after SB 233’s cuts, the state saw a net increase in property tax revenue of more than 20%.

More than a few Guardian Readers were among those shocked to see their $3,000 annual property tax bill increase by more than $500 per year.

The result of all this was two ballot initiatives slated for the November election. Both measures, Prop 50 and Prop 108, would reduce and then cap property taxes for businesses and residents significantly more than SB 233.

At the same time, both measures could have catastrophic effects on the recipient countries, especially on the school and higher education sectors, as government forecasts show.

The existing complicated system, exacerbated by the two voting measures, represents an extraordinary danger to the state.

The Democrats and Polis have put forward a counterproposal that would effectively result in a slight reduction and cap on property taxes beyond the level they agreed to at the beginning of the year. However, this reduction and cap are considerably smaller than the two ballot proposals.

Although the details have not yet been fully analyzed, the Polis Democrats’ new proposal is far less likely to have critical implications for schools and other governments.

Given the high stakes, bringing this to the legislative level again was a smart move. Republican-run counties, school districts and sheriff’s departments face the same risk as others. And despite SB 233’s efforts, the cuts were too small to not sway voters to approve either ballot initiative.

Lawmakers must keep this in mind as they conduct the special session Polis has called for August 26.

Most voters are overwhelmed and currently have no interest in understanding the mechanics of the state’s property tax dilemma. They want protection from higher property taxes amid still-painful inflation, and they want to ensure that essential services like schools, roads and public safety are not neglected.

Polis, pushing all this toward a workable compromise, said he would not enact the outcome of the special session unless supporters of the two initiatives first withdrew them from the statewide ballot.

If all of this fails in the special session, it will be a difficult task to convince voters across the state to reject large property tax cuts, no matter how counterproductive they may be.

Much depends on state lawmakers and police avoiding a stalemate and delivering the goods in less than a week.

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