In the business world, there’s one principle that separates success from failure: You can’t spend what you don’t have. If a company tried to launch a dozen new initiatives without funding them, investors would walk, creditors would call, and the board would be out by morning.

Yet somehow, that’s exactly how the State of Colorado has been operating. Each year, new laws are passed that sound good on paper but come with no money to make them work. Those costs get quietly pushed down to local governments — and ultimately to taxpayers.

We call them unfunded mandates, and they’re the public-sector version of bad business.

Here in Mesa County, we’ve been tracking these costs for two years, and the numbers tell the story. This year alone, unfunded mandates are expected to cost our community nearly $10 million. That’s not a one-time expense — it’s an annual hit. Across Colorado’s 64 counties, the total yearly price tag is estimated to exceed $360 million.

If a private company ran that way, forcing its branches to take on new projects without covering the costs, it wouldn’t last a quarter. But that’s what the state has done to counties and cities for years.

Here’s the difference: Local governments, like local businesses, must live within their means. We can’t print money, run deficits or move decimal points. Our books must balance, our budgets must be transparent, and every dollar is traceable to the penny. In Mesa County, we refunded $11.5 million last year because that’s what accountability looks like under TABOR.

So, when the state passes laws and leaves the bill on the counter, it’s not just poor policy, it’s bad economics.

Under Colorado law (C.R.S. 29-1-304.5), if the state requires a service but doesn’t fund it, that mandate is optional for local governments. That isn’t a loophole; it’s common sense written into statute. You wouldn’t expect employees to hit a sales quota if you refused to stock the shelves.

When people say counties are “picking and choosing” which laws to follow, let’s be honest: It’s the state that’s picking and choosing which laws to fund.

That’s why Mesa County became the first in Colorado to formally tell the Governor and legislative leadership: Fund it or fix it. Since then, nearly 45 counties — ranging from rural to urban, and including both Republican and Democratic areas — have joined the effort. When something is this unsustainable, reality eventually wins.

This isn’t about politics; it’s about principles, the same ones that drive every successful business. You don’t expand until you can afford it. You don’t make promises you can’t pay for. And you don’t offload your costs onto someone else’s balance sheet.

When the state overspends, the bill doesn’t vanish. It shows up in fewer local dollars to meet the unique needs of each county. Every dollar the state doesn’t pay is a dollar that comes out of your community.

Colorado entered last year’s legislative session facing a $1.2 billion deficit. Even a special session didn’t solve it; it merely sought new ways to raise revenue without cutting costs. That may be the culture under the gold dome, but it’s not how things work in the real world.

Businesses adapt, streamline and find efficiencies. Local governments do the same, but we can’t keep shouldering the cost of state expansion while being told to “do more with less.”

The good news is this issue is finally reaching the capitol. Western Slope legislators — Sen. Janice Rich, Rep. Rick Taggart and Rep. Matt Soper — have stood beside Mesa County and 45 other counties from the start. They understand that fiscal discipline isn’t partisan; it’s the foundation of trust in any enterprise, public or private.

They also know something every businessperson understands: When you misprice risk and hide costs, the system eventually breaks. Transparency isn’t the enemy of progress; it’s the precondition for it.

The solutions are straightforward:

1. Produce accurate fiscal notes for every bill in consultation with the counties that must implement them.
2. Tie each new program to a dedicated funding source. If the State can’t pay for it, it shouldn’t impose it.
3. Establish a review commission to repeal outdated or underfunded mandates that waste taxpayer money.

Colorado doesn’t have a revenue problem; it has a spending-discipline problem. The same rules that guide a healthy business — budget before you build, pay before you promise, measure before you mandate — should guide state policy, too.

The private sector calls that stewardship. The public sector should start calling it governing.

Common sense still works — Colorado just needs to use it. If not, Colorado’s counties are right to say: Enough is enough.

Bobbie Daniel serves on the Mesa County Board of County Commissioners and helped lead the statewide “Fund It or Fix It” initiative on unfunded mandates.