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AP: State comes up short on planned tax collections
Published 7/1/2009 in News
TOPEKA (AP) — Gov. Mark Parkinson must make some more cuts to the state budget after Kansas ended the fiscal year $126 million short of expectations.
Parkinson planned to outline his budget-cutting plans at news conference Thursday. He has the authority to cut the budget by whatever amount he feels is necessary to balance it and has been conferring with legislative leaders to get their input.
"The final reports on state revenues are just coming in and we are reviewing them," said Parkinson spokeswoman Beth Martino.
The 2009 fiscal year ended Tuesday, and preliminary Department of Revenues show the state collected $126 million less in tax revenue than had been expected. Parkinson wants to ensure that the state doesn't carry the deficit into the 2010 fiscal year, which starts Wednesday.
Senate President Steve Morris, a Hugoton Republican, said he believes the Democratic governor must look at all areas of spending, but should spare some agencies already hit hard by budget cuts, such as the Department of Corrections, which already saw a $4.5 million reduction.
"We don't want to get in the mode of cutting so much that we actually endanger public safety," Morris said.
Tax collections have lagged behind expectations since September, when the nation's economy started tanking. Before then, collections had been slightly above anticipated numbers.
The biggest drop for the year was $93 million in individual income tax collections, which Morris attributed in part to a loss in capital gains by Kansans because of the economy. Sales taxes were down by $15.6 million and corporate income tax dropped $14.7 million.
House Speaker Mike O'Neal noted that lawmakers had voted to spend almost every cent the state had expected to receive in an effort to keep cuts to a minimum.
He and House Minority Leader Paul Davis, a Lawrence Democrat, indicated that public schools likely will face more cuts. Legislators trimmed the education budget by just 2.6 percent during the legislative session, compared with an overall budget cut of 3.3. percent.
"They are 52 percent of the budget and they didn't get hit very much in the last budget," O'Neal, a Hutchinson Republican, said. "It was an attempt to hold education cuts to a minimum and that kind of got us into the trouble with the budget."
However, Davis said he urged Parkinson not to cut education so much that it could endanger federal stimulus money for schools.
"I wish we weren't where we had to make additional cuts in public schools, but it seems inevitable that they have to bear some of the brunt," he said.
He said Parkinson may have to make additional cuts if tax collections continue to fall below expectations.
"Nobody wanted to see the revenue numbers get worse, but they are what they are. If things get even worse, we may have to revisit this again," Davis said.
Tax revenues for the 2010 budget year are estimated at $5.4 billion, a $38 million drop from the previous year.
On the Web:
Kansas Legislature: http://www.kslegislature.org
Governor's Office: http://www.governor.ks.gov
How should the state resolve its budget woes? Talk about it at SWKTalk.com.
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