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State Revenues Down in May

Mal Leary

State revenues were off in May by just over $14 million, reducing the state’s revenue surplus to less than $19 million for the budget year that ends June 30. 

Finance Commissioner Richard Rosen says the drop was a timing issue for income tax withholding payments and the taxes paid by insurance companies, and that  by the end of this month that $14 million should be totally made up.

Rosen says it’s pretty clear that when the revenues are counted July 1, there will be a surplus. “We had a conservative forecast, running about $19 million dollars ahead of that, now 11 months into the fiscal year," he says. "And the expectation is we will close out the year with a surplus.”

The final size of the surplus will take weeks to compute with unspent balances in various areas of state spending adding to the revenues that were in excess of estimates.  

Journalist Mal Leary spearheads Maine Public's news coverage of politics and government and is based at the State House.