Did Perdue cook the books before vetoing the $142 million tax break?:

The state’s income tax take skyrocketed in May, sparking accusations from lawmakers that Gov. Sonny Perdue cooked the books a month earlier to justify his veto of a property tax cut that he never supported.

The May collections were released Friday, four days after House Speaker Glenn Richardson (R-Hiram) sent the Department of Revenue a letter saying he was hearing from taxpayers that income tax checks sent to the state in April weren’t deposited for several weeks.
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News of the poor tax collections for April came on the same day the governor vetoed the $142 million property tax cut approved by lawmakers. “I don’t know what’s going to happen in May or June,” Perdue said at the time. ” I think it’s prudent at this time to be fiscally conservative.”

The state’s financial picture improved dramatically last month. Income tax collections were up 45.4 percent over the previous May, the Department of Revenue reported Friday.

“There is no question they manipulated the numbers in April to justify the veto,” House Minority Leader DuBose Porter (D-Dublin) said Friday. “People sent in their checks by April 17 and all indications are they held some checks.”

Collections of all types of taxes jumped 28 percent, or $466 million in May. For the fiscal year, which ends this month, collections are up 7.6 percent, or $1.1 billion.

My friend, State Rep. Jill Chambers, had stickers that were passed around at the state GOP convention that say, “Real Republicans cut taxes.” Which is kind of funny. There are some members of the State House that truly wanted to see that tax cut come to fruition. Rep. Chambers is in that group, as is Rep. Davis. But it was leadership wanting to get back at Perdue. The taxpayers would have been the beneficiaries of it…but it wasn’t out of principle…much like Perdue’s vetoes out of the budget.

Despite that the legislature needs to over-ride Perdue’s veto as soon as it gets back into session next year simply because it was promised to the taxpayers.

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