IT’S GOOD TO BE THE NOMENKLATURA: Tax dollars flow to non-profit run by Colorado state legislator.

Democrat State Representative Lorena Garcia was appointed by a vacancy committee to her seat in the Colorado legislature after her predecessor resigned in 2023. She successfully passed a re-election bid in 2024 and is now serving out a full term in the statehouse.

Prior to that, Garcia worked at a number of nonprofits, landing in 2018 as the executive director of Colorado Statewide Parent Coalition (CSPC), a job she presently still holds.

Mirroring Garcia’s political rise among the majority Democrats at the Capitol, CSPC’s fortunes have also greatly improved. According to the nonprofit’s tax form 990, CSPC’s revenues when Garcia took the helm were about $517,000, growing by about five times to $2.7 million in 2023 (the last filing year available).

Clearly CSPC was pleased with Garcia’s leadership, since her salary went from $57,000 to $133,000 in the same period.

This in and of itself isn’t remarkable. It makes sense that those at the helm of a non-profit be compensated when the organization does better; it would, at least, be smart to align things that way. There is a plot twist here, however. CSPC’s revenues have ballooned in large part because of lots of state tax dollars flowing in.

Colorado runs a website called the Transparency Online Project (TOPS), a statewide database where, among other things, you can search to see who the state is paying, from what department, for what, etc. Think of it as an online register for Colorado’s checkbook.

Details at the link.