State Revenue Shortfall Shrinks

Jim Legans, Jr. / Flickr

NH's revenue situation isn't as bad as originally projected

Although revenues haven’t quite pulled New Hampshire away from a budget shortfall, it seems that day could be approaching.  As Kevin Landrigan reports for TheLobbyNH.com:

“The state took in $251 million in April, which was $2.1 million – or less than 1 percent – below the estimate that House and Senate budget writers had come up with nearly a year ago.

Late last week, top legislative leaders had feared that April would be off by $12 million or more.”

With two months to go before the fiscal year wraps-up, Landrigan writes that the state’s raked in about $1.9 billion, and is only $32 million away from making the projected forecast.  And Administrative Services Commissioner Linda Hodgdon is reasonably optimistic that the state could clear a good chunk of that shortfall away, if not eliminate it altogether.

Part of the problem at this point is that Business Profits Tax revenue is down (but by much less than originally expected).  Meanwhile, some large hospitals are holding onto $40 million the state says they owe in Medicaid Enhancement taxes (and providers say they don’t).

But in the good news column, despite the kerfuffle over the legislature lowering cigarette taxes, the volume sales strategy apparently worked better last month.  Cigarette tax revenue actually beat expectations for April.