Youngkin Adds $1.25 Billion to FY 2022 Revenue Forecast, Asks General Assembly to Approve His Tax Proposals

Governor Glenn Youngkin asked the administration’s finance team to perform a mid-session review which added another $1.25 billion to the Fiscal Year 2022 revenue forecast. Youngkin highlighted the additional expected cash in a Friday letter to Virginia’s top money legislators as part of his push to save his broad tax reduction plan.

Youngkin wrote, “[T]he bottom line is taxes paid to the government are soaring and the revised revenue forecast estimates the Commonwealth will collect $1.25 billion more in the current fiscal year. That, of course, is on top of the additional $3.3 billion added to the original forecast last December. This is a staggering number, the largest mid-session re-forecast in anyone’s memory. The stunning amount of money being collected from taxpayers is the direct result of over taxation. Put simply, without significant tax relief, the Commonwealth’s general fund collections will grow by over 40 percent between 2018 and 2024.”

The extra money in the forecast is critical for Youngkin’s pitch to legislators who are currently crafting a budget. Democrats have highlighted Youngkin’s calls for significant increases in education spending and other areas alongside his calls for broad tax cuts. Both chambers unanimously passed bills to send $300 refunds to individual taxpayers, and there has been bipartisan support for at least a partial grocery tax elimination. However, Youngkin’s other key tax policies face resistance in the Senate.

In his letter to Senate Finance and Appropriations Chair Janet Howell (D-Fairfax) and House Finance Chair Barry Knight (R-Virginia Beach), Youngkin called the new forecast a “conservative view,” and emphasized that Virginia law requires adding $498.7 million…

(Excerpts from the Virginia Star)