Officially speaking, Utah state government had a $242 million tax surplus for the fiscal year 2007, which ended in June.

That's a nice surplus, although less than the $308 million the state posted the year before.

But the state actually had more surplus tax money than that.

Lawmakers always open the current budget year during their January-February general session. When there are surpluses, they spend some of that surplus mid-year. Since what is spent is not counted as surplus, Utah actually took in a lot more money over budget than the $242 million available to be divided up come January.

House budget chairman Ron Bigelow, R-West Valley, told his GOP caucus Wednesday that while tax collections will come in higher this year than budgets call for, it won't be as much extra cash as legislators have had in the last several years.

"We have to figure out how to spend less money" during this coming legislative session, said Bigelow. "We've been spoiled" with hundreds of millions of dollars extra to spend.

In fact, during the 2007 Legislature, between one-time surpluses and estimated tax growth, legislators had an extra $1.6 billion to allocate.

"We can't fund all the programs like we did this year," Bigelow said. The surplus in 2007 was just a fluke of a tax year when legislators were able to give a tax reduction, despite record spending.

But not to worry. "It is still going to be another good year" come January, said Bigelow. "We will have the money to fund the essentials."

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