FOR RELEASE:

State Comptroller Thomas P. DiNapoli today released his office’s first weekly update on the state’s General Fund cash position.  The weekly updates are part of DiNapoli’s on-going effort to increase fiscal transparency for state taxpayers.

“Taxpayers should know what’s going on with the state’s finances,” DiNapoli said.  “Every week we’ll post the cash watch on the State Comptroller’s website.”

“There’s been a lot of talk about next year’s budget gap, and that gap does present a tremendous challenge. But we can’t forget about this fiscal year, which ends on March 31.  In the next three months, the state is facing a General Fund budget gap of well more than $1 billion. If no action is taken, the General Fund cash situation could become very precarious and next year’s budget gap could reach $11 billion. We have to monitor this situation very carefully.”  

CASH WATCH

DiNapoli’s weekly cash updates can be found at: www.osc.state.ny.us.

The State Comptroller’s office processes approximately 232,000 state payments daily. In State Fiscal Year 2009-10, it processed more than 76 million payments totaling approximately $107 billion.

*This information is a summary of weekly activity recorded in the state’s accounting system and does not include post-closing adjustments, which will be reflected in the Comptroller’s monthly Cash Report.

**General Fund receipts are reduced by $2.4 billion to reflect the deposit of personal income tax receipts into the State Special Revenue Fund to finance School Tax Relief Fund (STAR) payments to schools that were made on Jan. 3, 2011, which were delayed from December.