©
By Bob Lewis
RICHMOND
Aides to Gov. Bob McDonnell said Tuesday that the state's final 2010 budget surplus will be nearly $404 million, nearly double the previous estimate.
McDonnell planned to make the announcement Thursday to the General Assembly's money committees.
The senior advisers spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to pre-empt the governor's speech.
Final general tax collections will total about $230 million. But officials did not expect the unspent balances saved by state agencies through austerity moves to reach about $174 million.
The governor's spokesman, J. Tucker Martin, refused a request for comment Tuesday.
The windfall continues a dizzying and unlikely fiscal turnaround for a state whose general operating fund in January faced a $1.8 billion shortfall.
Legislative Democrats maintain the surplus should never have been surprising and that the Republican governor used stagecraft to make the fiscal upswing appear more recent than it was.
For months after he succeeded Democrat Timothy M. Kaine in January, Democrats have complained McDonnell downplayed estimated revenues, creating the perception of a rebound under the GOP's watch.
Factors contributing to Virginia's surplus included stronger collections of individual and corporate income taxes in the final quarter of the fiscal year that ended June 30, austerity measures put in place by Kaine and McDonnell, and the savings that McDonnell will trumpet in Thursday's remarks to legislators.
But it also included a revenue-enhancement maneuver in which the sales tax payment schedule for retailers was accelerated, requiring them to remit collections two weeks early. It's a tactic Democratic and Republican governors have employed in tight fiscal times the past decade.
McDonnell and Finance Secretary Richard D. Brown downplay the benefits of the accelerated sales tax. McDonnell acknowledged last month, however, that the one-time rush of $220 million from the acceleration made it easier for the state to exceed a revenue target that had been lowered three times and marginally increased once over the past year.
The Washington Post contributed to this story.
Delicious
Digg
Reddit
Facebook
Twitter
Google
Yahoo
Let's Stimulate The Economy and Add New Jobs!
Duh, that would make too much sense!
No, Virginia will just build more jails and prisons to keep big business making more money, averaging less wages that we chastized China for in their so called "sweat shops."
We should start practing what we preach, oh elected ones.
Virginia, we have sweat shops right here. Who is going to stop it though? And don't you feel so much safer, now that the drug dealers are all snug in jail, yet the streets are full of stabbings!
Polititians how do you look in the mirror every morning, and like what you see?
Citizens, how many more have to be imprisoned before you see that there is no one left untouched? It could happen to you! If you do nothing and say nothing, you righfully deserve to be behind bars for allowing this to happen!
political math
politifcal math never did add up.
Mystery Math
It's mystery math, don't you know! Since their computers have all been hacked, they have no accountabillity anyway. Writing is already on the wall, if you don't read "Virginia Ebonics"
Let's keep it real!
Democrats cringe at this news.Repay the retirement system first.
Democrats cringe at this news. Repay the retirement system before any additional spending.
It's a lie, a trick, a fraud...untrue, doesn't exist, false
Last winter the General Assembly borrowed $600 million from future retired state employees. They skipped the annual contribution to the Virginia Retirement System. That fund pays out retirement benefits and is budgeted for funding according to employment contracts the Commonwealth of Virginia has made many years ago with its employees.
Unless it's somehow legitimate for the Commonwealth to commit breach of contract and never pay the benefits, the $600 million that was borrowed has to be paid back.
If it were paid back this so-called "surplus" would vanish like what it is, a wisp of smoke seen in a flashing mirror.
I will assume you weren't aware instead...
...of "coming down off the top rope" so to speak. But I think you are just having a knee jerk reaction and it wouldn't matter to you because the Governor is a Republican. The TRUTH of the matter is that YES the money was borrowed but is going to be repaid with if memory serves about $150,000,000 of interest (25%) and so will GREATLY benefit the state employees. Of course it will be repaid with tax revenues of all Virginians so the State employees should all post their thanks to the rest of us who don't have such wonderful conditions/benefits provided by others.
Pension Payment
Funny, the 400 Mil sounds awfully close to the amount of the skipped pension payment that the Commonwealth will eventually have to make. Rather than find some creative way to spend the money, why don't we just pay our obligation to the pension plan now, instead of differing it to another budget?
Too funny.....
Has anyone noticed that "Timmy" has dyed his hair blond?
BTW..........thank you McD! You're doing a great job!
My apologies.
My apologies to ChesaBeachGirl and the Pilot Moderator, but the above comment is one of the dopiest I have ever read, and believe me I have read alot.
Try a different approach
Instead of trying to figure ways of spending the surplus, try SAVING!!! After two or three years we can actually afford to pave the highways! Why commit a 1-year surplus to multi-year commitments (like hiring new people or contracting long term projects)?