At a joint meeting of the Oregon Senate Finance and Revenue Committee and House Revenue Committee on February 15, State Economist Mark McMullen released the quarterly Economic and Revenue Forecast.

According to McMullen, projected state revenues are up another $161 million for the 2011-13 biennium since the last forecast in December 2012 and up $90 million above the close of session forecast. The total forecast for 2011-2013 general fund revenues is now $14.1 billion. McMullen said the fundamentals of the economy are strong and that growth will be better going into the future, but it will continue at a slower pace than previously.

According to the forecast, General Fund revenues will total $15.4 billion in 2013-15, an increase of 9.4% percent from the prior biennium.  This is 0.5% below the December forecast.

The forecast’s numbers will become the baseline for the budget to be released by the co-chairs of the Ways and Means Committee. The co-chairs’ budget may diverge from the Governor’s budget, which was premised on PERS and sentencing reform and used a new approach to presenting state agency budgets. They are set to release their budget early next month.

State Economist’s presentation

February forecast summary