Isles’ October tax
haul dips from 2003

Although Hawaii's economy remains strong, overall tax revenues were down 2.3 percent in October compared with the same month last year, state officials said yesterday.

General excise tax collections in October were down 9.8 percent, or $15 million, from the same period last year, the state Department of Taxation said.

State Tax Director Kurt Kawafuchi attributed some of the decline to the so-called "weekend effect." Because Oct. 31 fell on a Sunday, some of the excise, income and transient accommodation taxes that were due in October were pushed into November's collections.

The state collected a total of $266.5 million last month, down from the $272.7 million collected in October 2003. Of that, $138.2 million was from general excise taxes, down from $153.2 million collected a year earlier.

The state's strong job market helped to boost individual income tax collections by 6.4 percent, to $106.5 million, in October and by 15.5 percent to $432.4 million for the first four months of the fiscal year that began July 1, the tax department said.

Corporate income tax collections to date rose 106 percent over the same period last year, to $18.9 million, up from $9.2 million in 2003, the department said.

Transient accommodations tax collections were also affected by the weekend effect, falling 3.7 percent, to $12.4 million from $12.8 million last year.

However, Kawafuchi noted that accommodations taxes for the first four months of the fiscal year were up 10.2 percent over the same period last year.

Total revenue collected so far this fiscal year, which started July 1, is up more than 11 percent over the same period last year, the department said.

The state Council on Revenues has projected an increase of 8.8 percent in total revenues for this fiscal year.