LAKEWOOD — After growing more and more frustrated with the actions of Jefferson County Commissioners, longtime political activist Natalie Menten has decided to shift her focus from watchdog to candidate.
Menten, running as a Republican, has thrown her hat into the race against current Democrat Andy Kerr, who is finishing his first term of office as a county commissioner after being elected in 2020, following several years as a state legislator.
Menten cites her opponent and his fellow commissioners tone deafness to what the taxpayers want as one of her prime reasons for running.
Although the seat represents District 2 in the central part of the county, it is voted on by all voters in Jefferson County.
Menten was chosen by a Jefferson County Republican Party vacancy committee last month to run against Kerr after the previous candidate Charlie Sturdavant dropped out following an injury. Menten is no stranger to Jefferson County politics, however.
A history of taxpayer advocacy
“I have followed county government closely, very closely,” she said, adding she had even run for a position on the board once before, several years ago, but withdrew after deciding to run for a second term on the Regional Transportation District (RTD) board at that time.
Menten said her candidacy is heavily woven around the property tax issue in Jefferson County, where commissioners, including Kerr, recently referred a ballot measure to forever eliminate the refunding of over-collected tax revenues under the state’s Taxpayer’s Bill of Right (TABOR).
“Ballot issue 1A has been approved to go on the ballot to eliminate our tax caps,” Menten said. “Andy Kerr is a career politician. He is really out of touch with the taxpayers. He’s never owned or run a business.”
Menten, by comparison, previously co-owned and operated an automotive business for more than two decades.
“Doing everything owners do from covering the bills to sales to ordering parts to diagnosing problems,” she said. “After that, I was elected to serve on the RTD board for two terms during the fast tracks build out.”
Menten said she also dealt with collective bargaining agreements while on RTD, something that she believes will come in handy as some of Jefferson County’s departments either already have or are considering unionizing after a 2023 bill allowed government employees to organize at any level.
Menten said the unionizing is frustrating because the county hides the information from the public until it’s done.
“The public is kept in the dark,” she said, adding Kerr’s endorsement page on his campaign website includes several public unions. “For me, I don’t think the tax payers should be forced into collective bargaining, but that is what is going to occur. And we will be at their mercy.”
Menten’s biggest gripe, however, is the fact that Jefferson County voters continually tell the commissioners they do not want to de-TABOR their current taxes, but year-after-year, commissioners ask again.
“The commissioners are tone deaf,” she said. “We’ve had a election twice in the last five years asking for us to eliminate our watchdog, taxpayer TABOR and eliminate our property tax caps and eliminate our TABOR refunds.”
However, what commissioners have done this go around is a “slap in the face” to voters, she said, addressing the fact that Jefferson County paid big money to a county insider to handle the messaging this time around, and Ballot Issue 1A will remove revenue caps on all taxes currently being collected in Jefferson County.
Sweetheart deals
On Nov. 2, 2023, Jeffco’s acting purchasing operations manager Vera Braeckman-Kennedy signed a contract for $340,000 with The Bighorn Company, a Lakewood-based campaign, public policy, and government relations consulting firm co-led by Ian Silverii, the former executive director of Progress Now Colorado, which touts itself as the state’s “largest and most effective multi-issue progressive organization.” Silverii has been married to US Rep. Brittany Pettersen, a Democrat whose congressional district includes Jefferson County, since 2017.
The bulk of the contract includes $180,000 in “fees” for Silverii’s work as well as $110,000 for polling data. The contract outlines recruiting a campaign team, setting up the fundraising, and providing the strategic communications.
Bighorn’s Website boasts that it has never lost a ballot initiative. However, success may not be the only thing that made Silverii attractive to Jefferson County. The connections and history between Silverii, Pettersen, and Jefferson County’s leadership run deep.
Silverii and Pettersen worked together for years pushing progressive policy, while Pettersen represented the Jefferson County-heavy House District 28 in the Colorado legislature from 2013-19 and then Colorado Senate District 22 from 2019-23.
During Pettersen’s time in the legislature, she served alongside two of Jefferson County’s three commissioners who ultimately signed off on the contract: Andy Kerr, who represented Senate District 22 from 2013-19, and Tracy Kraft-Tharp, who represented House District 29 from 2013-2021. Pettersen’s relationship with the third commissioner, Lesley Dahlkemper, dates to Dahlkemper’s time on the Jefferson County school board. In addition to donating to each other’s political campaigns over the years, the two women worked closely on several bills impacting education as well as the successful recall against three Jeffco school board members in 2015.
“It’s cozy relationships, less than transparent processes, and suspect contracts awarded,” Menten said of the deal. “The commissioners are using a deceptive ballot question so that Jefferson County government can grow bigger than the average taxpayer’s income.”
Menten clarified that if the revenue cap is lifted, Jefferson County revenue from property taxes will increase significantly even as the cost of living for those those taxpayers continues to increase.
“Citizens are not getting those wage increases,” she said. “That’s not sustainable. The county is ok with taking double digit increases, while the average resident is just hoping they get a raise.”
No to ‘blank checks’
But TABOR is not Menten’s only beef with Kerr, and the rest of the the Democrat-controlled county commission. She pointed to the fact that Jefferson County quietly killed any conversation about opting out of the so-called “sensitive-spaces” gun ban passed by the state legislature earlier this year, which many other many other municipalities and counties across the state have already done.
“Jefferson County didn’t even take public comment on it,” she said, adding they only discussed it briefly during a work session where the public is not allowed to speak, and those comments were simply that they would not be opting out.
Menten is also frustrated with where Kerr wants to spend the money if 1A passes, calling the broad categories “transportation and public safety” too vague for voters to trust.
“It could go to a safe-injection site,” she said. “They are already handing out safe sex kits and clean needle bags on the light rail. They have paid people to go out on the west corridor (W Line on Colfax) to hand out things.”
“It’s just a blank check. Public safety could be anything from a cracked sidewalk to a lightbulb out.”
Menten said she is known for being a taxpayer advocate, and will continue to protect Jefferson County residents tax situation if elected.
“I’ve dedicated a good part of my life to defending TABOR because I believe in TABOR,” she said. “And I will be much more active down at the capitol instead of sending lobbyists down there defending the taxpayers because taxpayers can’t afford to take off work.”
