Revenue Estimates

State legislators are so suspicious of the revenue estimates the governor used to prepare next year's budget that they are considering ways to cut programs automatically if the money doesn't materialize.They say they are particularly worried that the new keno lottery game will yield less than the $100 million estimated by the administration."We've been given another phony budget with wildly inaccurate revenue estimates," Sen. Howard A. Denis, R-Montgomery, complained to his Senate colleagues yesterday.

The Capital Debt Affordability Committee, dominated by appointees of Gov. Martin O'Malley, raised the state's debt limit by $150 million Monday over the dissent of Comptroller Peter Franchot. The move increases the state's capacity to borrow money for such projects as roads and school construction from $925 million to $1.075 billion. The committee's action in effect borrows lending capacity from the future, saying the extra spending during the coming budget year should be repaid in 2017.

MARYLAND'S Board of Revenue Estimates has sent a mixed message to Gov. Parris N. Glendening. The state's economy is slowly strengthening, the board concluded last week, but don't expect the pace to quicken. Look for "steady, but unspectacular" increases in jobs and in tax revenue from now through the year 2001.This state is inching ahead on the economic front at less than half the rate of high-growth years. New jobs are being added at about 1.4 percent a year -- a pittance compared with a decade ago. Tax revenues over the next two years will rise only about 3.3 percent.

After a series of cheerful announcements about better-than-expected tax revenues, Maryland's Board of Revenue Estimates reversed that Friday, projecting that the state would take in $120 million less, mostly blaming weaker-than-expected sales tax figures. "It means [the General Assembly] needs to be very careful about spending and borrowing," said Comptroller Peter Franchot, who chairs the revenue panel. "I've been very consistent to say we are in a very fragile, feeble recovery.

HERE'S ONE problem Gov. Parris N. Glendening doesn't mind grappling with. After three lean years, in which the governor scrambled to hold down spending, Maryland's chief executive finds himself in Fat City. Now his problem is dealing with all the supplicants seeking some of the state's $260 million estimated surplus.lTC The Board of Revenue Estimates confirmed on Monday what economists had been proclaiming: Maryland is finally a full participant in the nation's economic surge. Stock market profits, solid job growth and tight labor markets contributed to a projected 6.2 percent growth rate in income-tax collections for the year ending next June 30. That's $204.

Maryland's tax collections are coming in on target this year, according to newly released state figures, but Board of Revenue Estimates members cautioned that the economic picture remains uncertain. The latest estimates are in line with those that state lawmakers used as the basis for tax increases and recommended cuts in future spending they enacted during last month's special session, meaning that barring an economic slowdown or huge new spending programs, the state will not likely return to the days of projected deficits anytime soon.

In a further sign of a slowing local economy, state officials have lowered their revenue estimates for the current budget year by $40.2 million to reflect sluggish sales and corporate earnings in July and August. Comptroller William Donald Schaefer said he was taking the unusual step of releasing the Board of Revenue Estimates' September revisions because of what he called "the precarious economic situation and the tragic events of Sept. 11." In a letter to Gov. Parris N. Glendening, Schaefer urged him to be "prudent" in preparing next year's budget because of the likelihood that the terrorist attacks in New York and at the Pentagon would cause revenues to fall more.

Maryland's Board of Revenue Estimates said yesterday that tax collections will be about $50 million less than expected in the current fiscal year and the next, a further sign that softening in the economy will exacerbate the state's budget problems in the next few years. Some fiscal leaders in Annapolis had worried that the revenue drop-off would be much worse, forcing Gov. Martin O'Malley and the General Assembly to make immediate, deep reductions to the current budget and the one now being debated in the legislature.

Maryland's recovering economy will generate $31 million more than expected for the state to spend, state fiscal monitors said yesterday in releasing updated revenue estimates. The state Board of Revenue Estimates said that much of the new money comes from one-time sources, so policy-makers should be careful as they include it in the state's $23.8 billion budget for the fiscal year that begins July 1. Maryland is getting more money than it expected from the sale of abandoned property, estimators said, and the comptroller's office has received nearly $14 million from court cases involving corporations that set up shell holding companies in Delaware but who now owe Maryland taxes -- money that will be available for spending next year.

State revenues are pouring in at such a robust pace that Marylanders will likely enjoy a new round of tax cuts this year, key lawmakers said yesterday.Adopting a distinctly partisan tone on what could be the No. 1 pocketbook issue in this year's election, Gov. Parris N. Glendening and legislative leaders said they were working on a Democratic tax relief package to be enacted before the General Assembly adjourns April 13.While no consensus has emerged, lawmakers said a tax plan would likely accelerate the five-year, 10 percent income tax cut passed last year and include new tax relief for the working poor.

A panel of the state's fiscal leaders said Thursday that the government will have more money than legislators expected when they approved the state's spending plan, reversing a nearly three-year trend of downward revisions because of plummeting tax revenues. The projected $89 million increase is not enough to rescind hundreds of millions of dollars in cuts made to programs during the 2010 legislative session. But leaders said that when it is combined with the $180 million in extra revenue reported last month from the fiscal year that ended in June, it indicates that the economy is improving.

In his Commentary disparaging both Maryland's life-saving one dollar per pack tobacco tax increase enacted in 2008 and our proposed dime a drink alcohol tax increase ("Alcohol tax: Haven't we been here before?" Aug. 13), Mark Kilmer left out some very important facts. Most importantly, he omitted the fact that the tobacco tax increase resulted in 74 million fewer packs of cigarettes being sold in our state, which helped to give Maryland the sixth lowest smoking rate in the country. This saves tens of thousands of lives from preventable tobacco caused illness and death, and saves us all billions of dollars in health care costs.

When you're stuck in construction traffic on Pratt Street throughout the next year, take comfort that your sacrifice will allow Indy race car drivers and promoters to earn millions next August when Baltimore hosts the Grand Prix. Gov. Martin O'Malley, Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake and other officials claim the event will inject about $70 million into the local economy, but the numbers do not compute. The Baltimore Racing Development report from which the figure is taken assumes hotel rooms booked would not have been captured otherwise through other activities.

W hen the current fiscal year ends in June, Maryland's tax collections will likely have dropped 5.2 percent from the previous year, the worst showing on record. Personal income in 2009 is expected to show the lowest growth rate since 1954; unemployment is at its highest level since 1983 and is expected to get worse; and solid economic growth is not expected until 2012 at the least. Believe it or not, that counts as good news, at least in a relative sense. The figures released Wednesday by the Board of Revenue Estimates are about the same as they were in the group's last report, in December, and that one was largely unchanged from September.

When the current fiscal year ends in June, Maryland's tax collections will likely have dropped 5.2 percent from the previous year, the worst showing on record. Personal income in 2009 is expected to show the lowest growth rate since 1954; unemployment is at its highest level since 1983 and is expected to get worse; and solid economic growth is not expected until 2012 at the least. Believe it or not, that counts as good news, at least in a relative sense. The figures released Wednesday by the Board of Revenue Estimates are about the same as they were in the group's last report, in December, and that one was largely unchanged from September.

Even as the fiscal picture in Maryland brightens, Gov. Martin O'Malley called on the federal government Wednesday to provide more help to states that are laboring to keep their budgets balanced. The governor's plea came as state analysts announced that Maryland's revenue projections have fallen $77 million more for the current fiscal year and the next. While that means O'Malley will have less money for next year's budget, which he will present to the General Assembly in January, the decline was far less precipitous than previous Maryland revenue adjustments during the recession.

The legislature did not meet yesterday, the 48th day of the 1991 session.Todayp.m.: Senate Budget and Taxation Committee considers budget of the Department of Personnel, Room 100, Senate Office Building.4:15 p.m.: Board of Revenue Estimates delivers updated revenue estimates for fiscal years 1991 and 1992, Governor's Reception Room, State House.5 p.m.: Senate Executive Nominations Committee considers nominations for District Court judges and other executive department positions, Room 300, Senate Office Building.

ANNAPOLIS -- The General Assembly's chief budget adviser warned yesterday that the revenue estimates on which Gov. William Donald Schaefer is basing next year's state budget may now be too high by $75 million to $100 million or more.William S. Ratchford II, director of the Department of Fiscal Services, said the economic effect of war abroad combined with a deepeningrecession at home were not anticipated when the state's Board of Revenue Estimates delivered its official revenue projections in December.

Maryland faces a projected budget shortfall of nearly $2 billion next year, far more than expected, the state Board of Revenue Estimates reported Thursday. The gap means that the cycle of wrenching cutbacks will continue. Budget Secretary T. Eloise Foster said the widening gap became clear when updated projections showed a $920 million drop from previous revenue estimates, on top of the expected shortfall of more than $1 billion. The numbers form the foundation of the spending plan that Gov. Martin O'Malley will release in January, which by law must be balanced.

As the Baltimore County Council debates the details of a bill to implement speed cameras, two things should be clear to everyone. First, anyone who drives more than 11 mph over the posted speed limit in a school zone deserves a speeding ticket. Second, whenever the government tells us that speed cameras "are not about the money," it's time for us to hide our wallets. Baltimore County's speed camera program is designed to change driving behavior by issuing tens of thousands of tickets, resulting in the collection of millions of dollars in fines.