Revenue Forecast Goes South

The independent committee that generates revenue forecasts for Hawaii’s state government has dialed back its projections.

The state’s tax revenues for the current fiscal year are expected to come in 3.3% ahead of the previous fiscal year, the Council on Revenues predicted last week — down from 3.9% in its previous report two months earlier. In that late March report, the council cut its revenue growth forecast from 4.9%.

The council also adjusted its revenue growth projection for fiscal 2009 to 2%, down from 4.1% in its previous report.

Tourist arrivals are expected to decline and total personal income, adjusted for inflation, is not expected to grow during fiscal 2009, the council reported.

“When you take these losses in future years and compare them to our state’s assumed financial needs, we face very stiff shortfalls in the future,” House Majority Leader Kirk Caldwell said in a statement posted Friday on the Web site of the Democratic House majority.

Caldwell noted that 2009 is a biennium budget year, in which lawmakers put together a budget for the next two fiscal years.

“At this point in time, we anticipate a $242.5 million potential shortfall by June 30, 2010, ballooning into a $366 million shortfall by June 30, 2011,” he said.

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