Our General Assembly excels at it.

Consider HB 1292, a bill that started life raising state construction contract costs by $100 million annually in order to hire fewer out-of-state workers. When the Denver Post editorialized against this radical increase, Democrats changed the bill to cut it to perhaps $10 or $20 million (estimated from the second fiscal note). While less, this is still crazy when ourroadways need billions in repairs” per Don Hunt, CDOT’s ED.

Annual regulatory enforcement costs will be half a million bucks, so regulatory “overhead” will be 5% or less. Democrats (plus one Repub – who got $500 in construction union cash) think that’s cheap payment for construction union bosses.

Construction and electrical union cash, last election, totaled $234,000. [FollowTheMoney.Org creditUnions paid a cheap price to push $10-20 million in contracts their way.

What’s really likely to occur if this (comparatively) bitty bonanza passes?

We already have an example. State government keeps track of “personal service” contracts’ out-of-state and even out-of-country workers.

Here’s what the website tells us, starting in 2009: 13 contracts – in 4 years – with 25%+ out-of-state workers. Total cost? $16.4 million. Talk about straining for gnats. (This bill ain’t about lowering unemployment; this is flat-out payback.)

ALL of these contracts, incidentally, were approved by Democratic officeholders.

What’s especially rich is that the website that lists and permits searches of contracts comes from a company … wait for it … located in Runnemede, NJ.

You can’t make this stuff up. The only thing that would have made this better would have been if sponsors and supporters had dressed for the House vote … in kabukimonos and kumadori make-up.