After watching House Republicans quadruple Gov. Jon Huntsman Jr.'s proposed $60 million tax cut last week, GOP senators decided Tuesday to hold off on committing to a specific dollar amount.

The news that came out of the closed, three-hour caucus was that pretty much everything is still on the table, both in concept and size. The GOP senators will talk about it some more when they meet again as a caucus on Jan. 10.

"Rather than say we want this much of a tax cut, we want to get our arms around what's sustainable," said Sen. Curt Bramble, R-Provo.

So they're waiting, even though the governor says Utah can afford to cut taxes $60 million and the House Republicans say $230 million.

Huntsman had expected the Senate majority to come up with a number around $100 million — about midway between what's already been proposed. Now there's likely to be even more political posturing about tax cuts, particularly in the Senate.

Not that anyone was willing to say that publicly Tuesday.

"We appreciate their desire to continue to review the budget," said the governor's deputy chief of staff and spokesman Mike Mower. "We have several weeks before the session begins so we'll have ample time to work with both the House and the Senate."

Senate leaders preferred to describe their lack of action as deliberative.

Senate Majority Leader Peter Knudson, R-Brigham City, said that part of the hesitation for senators was a desire to better understand where the revenue surpluses are coming from so they can determine how long the growth will last.

Current estimates are $581 million in on-going surpluses, which is additional revenue the state will receive in fiscal year 2007, and $445 million in one-time surpluses from money the state has collected, above estimates, for fiscal years 2005 and 2006.

"I've seen good times and I've seen bad times for revenue," Knudson said. "For us to be excited about tax cuts and such, we need to be sure these revenues will continue into the future, or we will just have to come back in two years and raise taxes."

Republican leaders also stressed the caucus barely had time to hear about base budgets for all the appropriations subcommittees, so the debate about priorities was still needed.

After all, they said, the House Republicans required an all-day caucus to arrive at their proposal a week ago, which included $230 million in tax cuts. The House caucus, however, did not specify what taxes should be cut.

Huntsman, meanwhile, was forced to reveal his numbers this month because of a state constitutional requirement that he release a budget publicly 30 days before the start of the legislative session.