More union dough against Amendment 47

While one labor union in Colorado has already spent $4.6 million on an advertising blitz supporting and opposing certain state ballot measures, yet another coalition of unions is also focusing hundreds of thousands of campaign dollars on media purchases.

Protect Colorado’s Future, a campaign committee financially backed by labor groups like the AFL-CIO and the Service Employees International Union, has been focusing on buying ad spots in the Denver and Colorado Springs areas since July targeting Amendment 47, a “right-to-work” measure that seeks to restrict the way unions organize in the state.

The committee has reported spending at least $457,000 on ads, mostly on Comcast cable channels, according to records filed with the secretary of state’s office.

A media buy snapshot from a Comcast cable company contract report for the committee reveals 2,335 spots reserved at a total cost of $421,620 for ads running though Thursday. No future advertising time has been requested from Comcast, though it’s evident the committee plans to run more ads.

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.

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