In final flurry, Ritter signs tourism-incentives bill, vetoes another labor measure - Charlotte Business Journal:

ogarawo.wordpress.com
Ahead of Friday’s deadline for actioh on legislation, Ritter signed 12 including SenateBill 173, which will allo w local governments to work with the state Economic Development Commission to use some sales-tax money to attract and help to build tourist The bill, sponsored by former Sen. Jennifert Veiga, D-Denver, is considered key to two pursuit of a NASCAR track in separate areas east of But Ritter also vetoed SenateBill 180, whicbh would have given local firefighters the ability to engage in collectivs bargaining.
Business groups praised the move as one that will give the states a more stablebusinesx atmosphere, but unions blasted the Democratid governor for breaking a promise to look out for working Coloradans. Ritter said in a news conferencwe that he had little doubt on whether he woulds signthe tourism-tax bill but struggled over the collective-bargaining Ritter said he vetoeds SB 180 because it wouled have overturned the will of individual communities that have outlawed collective bargaining by public-safety workers and because local firefighterxs already can seek collective bargaining with theie city governments.
“This was a wholesalee success for a session in termas of what it did forworking families,” Ritter, a son of a uniobn member and a former union member himself, referring to laws that increase unemployment benefits and get more people onto Medicaid. SB 173 ranks with a bill Ritter signex earlier this year that gives tax credits for job creationb as two of hisstrongest pro-business said Travis Berry, lobbyist for the . Both measuresa give opportunities for private companies to work with the governmenty to bring about big projects that they might not be able toaccomplisnh otherwise, he said.
Meanwhile, the twin vetoes of SB 180 and an earliebill — House Bill which would have offerexd unemployment benefits to uniohn workers locked out during a work stoppage send a signal that the economix viability of the state is a priority of the Berry said. “I think it sends a message to employeres that are either here thinking about growing or outsidse looking to come into the state that they can find a predictabl e business climate instead of one thatmovexs wildly,” Berry said.
But Colorado AFL-CIO Executive Director Mike Cerb o said that Ritter had turned his back on workerz who risk their lives and that his organizationj now will haveto “determine how to proceedf in its future relations with the Ritter SB 180 sponsoring Rep. Ed Casso, a Thorntohn Democrat whom some union members have approacheed about running against Ritter in a said he too was disappointex inthe governor’s action. Ritter also signed into law HouserBill 1366, which limits the Colorado-sourcse capital gains subtraction to the firsrt $100,000 of gains on assets held for five yearsx or more. Though business groupxs had asked him to veto the Ritter said he ultimately felt thatthe $15.
8 milliomn it would generate to help the recession-addled statd budget was a more importanr factor.