The Colorado secretary of state on Friday approved two measures for the 2010 ballot that would slash at least $1 billion annually in state taxes and roll back property taxes statewide, reports the Denver Post. This comes at a time when Colorado, like many other states, is struggling financially because its revenues are way down from the go-go years of earlier this decade. Critics of the tax proposals say, if passed, they will destroy many services that Coloradans rely on. Supporters say the proposals are a way to further reduce what they see as unrestrained government spending.

I’m also reading today’s AP story about the four-year renewal last year of a federal law that pays counties across the nation for lost timber revenue. The law has been very good to New Mexico. In fact, Catron County gets the highest per capita payment in the nation – $1,883 per person, according to the wire service. Meanwhile, New Mexico’s share of the federal distribution of money increased by 692 percent under the new formula.

From the Pacific Northwest, the Portland Oregonian reports that a law intended to save taxpayers $6 million by lopping time off the sentences of Oregon’s nonviolent prisoners has unwittingly opened freedom’s door early to hundreds of violent inmates.

For a respite from all the bad news, here’s an interesting little story from the New York Times about Montana’s small Jewish population, a rabbi and a bomb-sniffing police dog trained in Hebrew and his handler.

Also from the Times over the weekend was this gem: Many local governments are figuring out how to use the Internet to make government data more accessible. Apparently the goal is to spawn useful Web sites and mobile applications — and perhaps even have people think differently about their city and its government. But some wonder if governments will ever offer data that uncovers foibles.

Halfway across the globe, protests continue in Tehran, nearly six months after the disputed presidential election with state authorities cracking down on students and others, reports the Washington Post.

From the media world, New York Times executive editor Bill Keller told staffers Friday in an email that it’s unlikely 100 members of the newsroom will apply for the current buyout offer by Monday, resulting in layoffs before the end of the year, Politico reports. Keller’s admission confirms what people were hearing last week about coming layoffs at the Times. Michael Calderone of Politico has names of four reporters in the Times’ Washington bureau — Stephen Labaton, Neil Lewis, David Johnston, and David Stout — that he knows have taken buyouts.

Google is responding to the search business’ rapid movement from the desktop to mobile devices with various innovations, according to the geeks over at ReadWriteWeb. While Google is the leading search engine, “Anyone with an innovative concept for improving mobile search could gain ground, possibly even overtaking Google as the top search provider for mobile devices.” But Google hasn’t ignored this trend, RWW tells us.