"It's not enough to me . . . because of the money that is available," said Pat Rusk, president of the UEA. "They can do much better than that for public education."

Alexander said his caucus has not yet taken a position on H3. "But my feel is it may not pass in the House," where the top tax cutting issue is removing at least the state's portion of the sales tax on unprepared food.

In the Tuesday GOP House caucus, closed to the media and public during budget discussions, Alexander said members talked about proper places to spend one-time monies.

The state has around $300 million in one-time cash surpluses, both from the last fiscal year that ended June 30, 2005 and extra monies in the current fiscal year, which ends June 30.

"We've actually been holding off" on taking caucus positions on how to structure income tax and food tax repeals or changes "until we speak with the Senate leaders tonight."

---

Contributing: Josh Loftin and Jennifer Toomer-Cook

E-mail: lisa@desnews.com; bbjr@desnews.com