Thursday, November 10:

The monthly revenue report for October, along with commentary from State Budget Director Brian Bailey, has been posted on the State Budget Agency webpage. The report and commentary can be found here: http://in.gov/sba/2696.htm. Charts visualizing revenue data are located on the Management and Performance Hub under the State Tax Revenue section: http://www.in.gov/mph/staterevenue.html.

Results

General Fund revenues for October totaled $1,163.8 million, which is $17.9 million (1.5%) below estimate based on the December 17, 2015 Forecast and $56.7 million (5.1%) above revenue in October 2015.

• Sales tax collections totaled $622.1 million for October, which is $9.6 million (1.5%) below the monthly estimate but $28.7 million (4.8%) above revenue in October 2015.
• Individual income tax collections totaled $463.6 million for October, which is $7.9 million (1.7%) above the monthly estimate and $25.5 million (5.8%) above revenue in October 2015.
• Corporate tax collections totaled $17.1 million for October, which is $8.9 million (34.2%) below the monthly estimate and $10.1 million (144.6%) above revenue in October 2015.
• Riverboat wagering collections totaled $20.3 million for October, which is $2.0 million (9.0%) below the monthly estimate and $3.0 million (12.8%) below revenue in October 2015.
• Racino wagering collections totaled $7.6 million for October, which is $0.1 million (1.5%) below the monthly estimate and $0.5 million (5.9%) below revenue in October 2015.

 Commentary 

Year-to-date General Fund collections total $4,762.7 million, which is $75.7 million (1.6%) below the December 2015 revenue forecast but $192.2 million (4.2%) above the prior fiscal year.

Year-to-date sales tax collections total $2,500.3 million, which is $74.2 million (2.9%) below the December 2015 forecast but $75.5 million (3.1%) above collections through the same period from the prior fiscal year.

Individual income tax collections total $1,766.4 million year-to-date, which is $34.5 million (2.0%) above forecasted collections and $132.6 million (8.1%) above year-to-date collections from the same time last fiscal year.  Compounding the year-over-year growth of individual income tax in fiscal 2017 is the “five Friday effect.”  There was one more Friday of payroll processing in September, which was recorded in October’s payroll tax withholding.  In October 2015 there was no “five Friday effect,” so October 2016 individual income tax revenue is higher than October 2015 revenue due to this factor.

Corporate tax collections continue to underperform compared to forecast and compared to prior year collections.  Corporate collections are $38.7 million (15.7%) below forecast year-to-date and $8 million (3.7%) below fiscal year-to-date collections through the same period.

 BOARD OF ZONING APPEALS SHOULD APPROVE REQUEST FOR PROPOSED WESTSIDE RESTAURANT-BAR

For almost a year well respected and successful businessman Kerry Chesser petitioned the Board of Zoning of Appeals to approve his re-zoning requests concerning a Restaurant-Bar on West Franklin street.

At the last meeting his request ended with a 3 to 3 tie with one member absent.  Because of the tie vote he’s forced to wait another month to see if his re-zoning request will be approved by Board of Zoning of Appeals. This delay will cost him additional legal expenses.

Mr. Chesser originally requested that the Board of Zoning Appeals approve his plans to renovate his 11,000 square foot building into an upscale Restaurant-Bar on West Franklin street.  Because his on-site parking plans doesn’t meet current zoning parking requirements he is now forced  to tear down a section of the building in order to comply with the City’s parking requirements.  Instead of having a 11,000 square foot building to house his proposed Restaurant-Bar will now be 5,000 square feet.

Because of legal opposition from a future competitor, Mr Chesser was forced to draw up new plans for a 5,000-square-foot Restaurant-Bar.  The amended plans will now have the seating capacity for 235 people.  It will have 76 parking spaces and with an side agreement with adjoining property owner  to share 17 parking spaces.  Its important to point out that the amended plans will provide a greater percentage of parking spaces than most other West Franklin street businesses.

We recall several years back that City Council approved West Franklin street as an “ENTERTAINMENT ZONE.”  Also owners of other Restaurant-Bars on West Franklin street supports Mr. Chesser’s new parking request.   Another good reason why the Zoning  Appeals Board should give approval to Mr. Chesser’s request is that the Lamasco Neighborhood Association “endorsed” Mr. Chesser’s petition for parking at his new Restaurant-Bar.

Bottom line, Kerry Chesser is a respected businessman that has contributed many hundreds of thousands of dollars to those in need in our community for many years.  His proposed Restaurant-Bars will be an assist to the West Franklin street area.  It is our opinion that the Board of Zoning Appeals should approve without delay Mr. Chessers plans to locate an upscale Restaurant-Bars on West Franklin street!

The next Board of Zoning Appeals meeting is on Nov. 17 at the Civic Center.

EDITORS FOOTNOTE:  Some Information in this Editorial came from an article that appeared in the Evansville Courier & Press on-line publication. The article concerning this meeting was written by John Martin of the Courier & Press.

Lieutenant Governor Eric Holcomb easily defeated Democrat John Gregg Tuesday night, to win the top seat in the HoosierState.

Govenor-elect Holcomb has spent the majority of his life in public service.

He has worked in Indiana politics for most of his adult life.

Holcomb’s record includes various positions in the administration of former Governor Mitch Daniels and Senator Dan Coats.

He was then elected Lieutentant Governor with now Vice-President Elect Mike Pence.

At a news conference Wednesday, Holcomb expressed his gratitude to the voters.

Trump Could Cement Conservative Supreme Court

IL for www.theindianalawyer.com

Donald Trump will enter the Oval Office with the ability to re-establish the Supreme Court’s conservative tilt and the chance to cement it for the long term.

Trump is expected to act quickly to fill one court vacancy and could choose the successor for up to three justices who will be in their 80s by the time his term ends.

The court has been short-handed since Justice Antonin Scalia died in February, and Trump has said he would seek someone in Scalia’s mold from a list of 21 people, mainly conservative state and federal judges in their 50s.

Trump’s victory was a vindication for Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell’s strategy of refusing all year even to consider President Barack Obama’s nomination of Judge Merrick Garland to take Scalia’s seat. McConnell announced on the night that Scalia died that the vacancy should be filled not by Obama, but by the next president. The Kentucky Republican was heavily criticized for his stance by Obama, other Democrats and even many legal scholars.

Now Garland’s nomination is dead, if not officially.

A fifth of voters nationwide said Supreme Court appointments were the most important factor in determining their presidential vote, and nearly 6 in 10 of them backed Trump, according to exit polls.

“The people deserved to be heard yesterday, and their voice was unmistakable,” conservative activist Carrie Severino said in a statement that praised McConnell and Senate Judiciary Chairman Chuck Grassley of Iowa for standing firm on the Garland nomination.

If Trump sticks to the names of potential nominees that he put out in the spring and added to in the fall, he could choose among several experienced appeals court judges, minority candidates and women. The list also is notable for its omission of some pre-eminent Republican judges and lawyers, including Judge Brett Kavanaugh of the federal appeals court in Washington, D.C., and Paul Clement, who served as George W. Bush’s top Supreme Court lawyer.

After getting a ninth justice on the court, the next big question will be whether liberal Justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Stephen Breyer, and Justice Anthony Kennedy, the pivotal vote closest to the court’s center, will retire during a Trump administration or try to stay on the bench in the hope that Trump is not re-elected in 2020. Ginsburg is 83, Kennedy is 80 and Breyer is 78.

“In the longer term, it is a question of how long Ginsburg, Kennedy, and Breyer can remain. Replacing any or all of them will tilt the Court in a much more conservative direction and can create a majority to reverse Roe v. Wade, eliminate affirmative action, strike down more campaign finance laws,” Dean Erwin Chemerinsky of the University of California at Irvine law school said in an email.

The leader of the court’s liberal bloc, Ginsburg had been confident Hillary Clinton would win the presidency, telling The Associated Press in July that the next president, “whoever she will be,” would have several Supreme Court seats to fill. She, and to a lesser extent, Breyer, had rebuffed pleas from fellow liberals, including Chemerinsky, to retire while Obama was in office and Democrats controlled the Senate, which they did until 2015.

Kennedy was appointed by Republican Ronald Reagan, but he has been the key vote in favor of gay rights and preservation of abortion rights, among issues on which he often sides with the liberals.

Recent Supreme Court history offers two examples of Republican-appointed justices, David Souter and John Paul Stevens, who appeared to wait out Bush’s presidency and then retired after Obama’s election. Stevens was 90 when he stepped down from the bench.