Big Money In Gay Marriage, Domestic Partnerships

Gay marriage and domestic partnerships. The two phrases don’t usually invoke images of dollar signs, but if recent financial reports are any indication, groups dealing with the two issues are packing some major cash.

  • Coloradans For Marriage

    Coloradans For Marriage is a political group trying to define marriage as strictly heterosexual with Amendment 43. The most current Secretary of State reports show that the organization has $24,961.74 on hand, and has spent a total of $240,258.48 since the beginning of the year.

  • Colorado Family Action Issue Committee

    The Colorado Family Action Issue Committee was founded last June with the stated purpose of opposing domestic partnerships and supporting heterosexual marriage. According to the Colorado Springs Gazette, the committee also has ties with the evangelical group Focus On The Family.

    Currently, the committee has $41,086.82, and has spent $674,919.50 since it was founded. A recent financial adjustment also shows that the group spent over $90,000 buying ads on KWGN-TV and Comcast cable.

    Together Coloradans For Marriage and the Family Action Issue Committee have spent over $900,000.

  • Coloradans For Fairness Issue Committee

    The Coloradans For Fairness Issue Committee is on the opposite side of the debate, supporting domestic partnerships for gay couples with Referendum I, and opposing Amendment 43.

    Since March of this year, the committee has spent a total of $1,142,501.05 and currently has $4,358.12 on hand.

Erin Rosa was born in Spain and raised in Colorado Springs. She is a freelance writer currently living in Denver. Rosa's work has been featured in a variety of news outlets including the Huffington Post, Democracy Now!, and the Rocky Mountain Chronicle, an alternative-weekly in Northern Colorado where she worked as a columnist covering the state legislature. Rosa has received awards from the Society of Professional Journalists for her reporting on lobbying and woman's health issues. She was also tapped with a rare honorable mention award by the Newspaper Guild-CWA's David S. Barr Award in 2008--only the second such honor conferred in its nine-year history--for her investigative series covering the federal government's Supermax prison in the state. Rosa covers the labor community, corrections, immigration and government transparency matters. She can be reached at erosa@www.coloradoindependent.com.