Where does your $400 Colorado refund come from?

DENVER (KDVR) — Federal COVID reduction is spilling into the general public’s fingers in Colorado this 12 months.

Gov. Jared Polis introduced at present that over 3 million Coloradans who file taxes by Might 31 will obtain a $400 tax refund. Joint filers will get $800. Checks will come both in August or September of 2022.

The checks have their origin in a long-time Colorado state budgeting rule.

Underneath the Colorado Taxpayer Invoice of Rights, also referred to as TABOR, the state has a cap on how a lot taxes it will possibly gather. It has to return something previous that cap again to taxpayers within the type of an revenue tax discount from 4.55% to 4.5%, a focused property tax discount or a gross sales tax refund.

In response to the COVID pandemic, $66 billion price of federal reduction funds gushed into Colorado’s state and native governments. Colorado has posted a TABOR surplus in every of the final three fiscal years.

State common fund revenues have greater than doubled within the final ten years as individuals and companies poured into the state. The governor’s workplace most just lately forecasted billions of additional {dollars} within the state price range in upcoming years.

“After exceeding the Referendum C cap (as restored by S.B. 21-260) by $547.9 million in FY 2020-21, income topic to TABOR is predicted to stay above this cover by means of the length of the forecast interval,” reads a report from the governor’s Workplace of the State Finances. “Present projections present that income might be $2,229.2 million above the cap in FY 2021-22, $2,029.2 million above the cap in FY 2022-23, and $1,328.2 million above the cap in FY 2023-24, triggering the non permanent revenue tax price discount in every year.”

In whole, the fiscal years overlapping the COVID pandemic and its aftermath created $6.1 billion of state income in extra of the TABOR cap.