Block · one region of the page, as the scanner read it. It may hold a whole story, part of one, several, or an advertisement; stitching blocks into articles is the next step. Text is supplied OCR.
Page 3 · column 3 of 7 · from the scan, no model involved
$4.6 million is earmarked by the Senate to aid localities in the greatest need to meet requirements of the Chesapeake Bay Preservation Act. The assembly committee work is a result of six weeks of labor in which revenue projections have gone from bad to worse.
Wilder broke with tradition last Thursday, appearing before the House Appropriations, House Finance and Senate Finance Committees to report the revised fiscal state of the Commonwealth.
The most recent figures reveal a $267 million budget deficit. Shaving and shuffling of numerous budget items was necessary to fill a nearly $67 million hole in the budget for the remainder of the 1989-90 biennium and close a $200 million gap for the next biennium.
While states surrounding Virginia also illustrated a slow growth pattern in sales and corporate tax collections in recent months, state economists are perplexed by absolute no-growth trend in individual tax collections.
“What we’re seeing in Virginia is nowhere reflected in other states in the south,” said Paul Timmreck, secretary of finance. “We have never before received seven months of collection with... no growth.”
“It appears that no one knows what the revenue will be,” commented Del. Alson H. Smith Jr., DWinchester.
“There is certainly more uncertainty in regard to the individual income tax than there ever was before,” responded Timmreck.
‘We cannot afford to end this session and leave this place only wishing, hoping and praying, in other words, speculating on the economy’s future and its ability to sustain state needs,” Wilder told the money committees.
Wilder recommended further cuts in state agency operations, additional savings achieved by reprojecting expenditures, and altering the distributions to localities to reflect the updated forecast.
95.4%