The Budget, and new pages to explore

The Budget, in one place

The Budget puts Colorado's state budget on one page, in four parts: Right now, Where it goes, What's owed and What a day costs.

Right now starts with the General Fund reserve, the money the state keeps unspent at the end of each year. The state's own Appropriations Report lists the money the legislature authorized to be spent for FY 2026-27. It puts the reserve at $2.2B at the end of that year. That is $22.2M above the amount the law requires. The page also shows the newer September 2026 forecast of the reserve.

Right now also carries the TABOR refund. The September 2026 forecast by Legislative Council Staff puts the refund for FY 2026-27 at $463.7M. It is a forecast, and the next one may change it.

Where it goes shows what the state has enacted, year by year, and how its spending compares with all states. What's owed shows what the state owes and what it holds back. What a day costs shows what a day of custody costs.

Pages to explore

Confidence tracks how confident Colorado business leaders are about Colorado and about the nation, every quarter since 2010.

Cost of Living shows what it costs to live in Colorado: prices, housing, the fees the legislature sets, TABOR refunds and wages.

Education follows Colorado schools from preschool prices to college debt, with spending per pupil, enrollment, test scores and graduation rates.

Budget and Payments puts each state department's budget beside what the state's payment ledger shows it has paid so far, month by month.

Affordability shows how much of what the state government collects comes in as fees rather than taxes.

Vehicle Registration takes one car registration bill apart, charge by charge, with the law behind each charge and the fund it goes to. You can also work out the bill for your own car.

Budget to Actual answers one question about a project: how much of its budget can a public record show was paid? It covers three projects: the Capitol Complex Renovation, Phase 3/4, the I-70 Floyd Hill Improvement Project and the I-70 West Vail Pass Auxiliary Lanes. Each link between a budget and a payment is graded by how sure it is.

Highway money paid to each county

The state's spending ledger has no county column. For one program, though, the payee is the county government itself.

That program is the Highway Users Tax Fund. It holds the state's fuel taxes and vehicle fees, and the State Treasurer pays each county a share every month.

Budget and Payments shows those payments for each county, for two fiscal years. Every county and month matches the Treasurer's own table to the cent.

It is one program, not all the money the state sends to a county.

What CDOT paid in September

CDOT paid its vendors $184M in September 2026, in 16,238 payments. In August it paid $240.8M.

These are the totals of the payments that CDOT publishes, one month at a time. Ask WB shows each month.

Each city has its own week in this brief

See this week for one city: Denver, Aurora, Colorado Springs, Fort Collins or Lakewood.

The city view shows only what changed in that city's records, and the State items for the counties the city is in. The two are not added together.

Corrections

The corrections log lists each mistake we find on this site and what we did about it.

We withdrew a claim that the state's spending ledger was out of date. It is current. We took down wording on Follow Your Dollar that said we had filed a records request. We had not.

Bills that were signed, or that died in committee, showed no outcome on Bills and Laws. Each one shows how it ended.

Some project pages called a sum of contracts, or a construction cost, the total cost of the project. We renamed each figure for what it is.

The legislature is not in session

The General Assembly is between sessions. The next session starts on 11 January 2027.

The General Assembly recorded no votes between 9 October 2026 and 15 October 2026. Its most recent recorded vote was on 13 May 2026.

Every recorded vote since 2016 is at Bills and Laws.

Where these figures come from

Every figure above is one of two kinds, and this is which. FACT means a publisher printed the figure and we read it there. CALC means we worked it out from figures a publisher printed, and the arithmetic is on the methodology page. Nothing here is estimated.

• FACT Projected total year-end General Fund reserve · FY 2026-27 · Joint Budget Committee Staff, JBC Appropriations Report, FY 2026-27 (2026 session) Back to the sentence
• FACT Projected year-end reserve above or below the requirement · FY 2026-27 · Joint Budget Committee Staff, JBC Appropriations Report, FY 2026-27 (2026 session) Back to the sentence
• FACT TABOR refund by surplus fiscal year · FY 2026-27 · Legislative Council Staff, Economic & Revenue Forecast, September 2026 Back to the sentence
• FACT CDOT payments cleared, by month · 2026-08 and 2026-09 · Colorado Department of Transportation (via data.colorado.gov), CDOT Expenses (n5ku-eixc), weekly archived snapshots Back to the sentence
• FACT CDOT payment transactions, by month · 2026-09 · Colorado Department of Transportation (via data.colorado.gov), CDOT Expenses (n5ku-eixc), weekly archived snapshots Back to the sentence