Legislators this week held public meetings throughout Maine to get a sense of what taxpayers wanted to do with last year’s state budget surplus. The question came down to whether the money should be spent on worthwhile programs or given back in the form of tax breaks. The answer is that lawmakers can and should do both.

Of the $60 million surplus, approximately $28 million remains to be considered. Lawmakers can both give the money back and support education by increasing the state’s share of education funding. Because education is paid for by a combination of the state contribution and local property taxes, whatever the state fails to fund falls to the property tax. Schools throughout the state have cut back on programs during the 1990s, but property taxes rose significantly anyway.

Not only is this method of returning the surplus a good investment, but it is the right thing to do. While Maine’s budget has grown by hundreds of millions of dollars, the state’s contribution to education funding has grown comparatively little. Just seven years ago, state lawmakers sent back to communities more than 50 percent of the total cost of educating Maine’s children. Now that percentage is 43 percent — and the difference can be seen in the additional $200 million property taxpayers have contributed to cover for the state’s refusal to pay.

Now that there is a surplus, property taxpayers deserve a break for carrying the state’s education share. The Legislature can send the additional money back to communities this year, with school budgets already set, and towns can pass the savings along to taxpayers.

Some legislators have taken a different angle on helping schools, and want to put the surplus into repairing schools that are falling apart because of a lack of funding. There is a problem with that, however. Repair and renovations are supposed to be handled through a district’s annual funding — as opposed to new-school construction. Bangor, several years ago, for instance, invested $3.5 million in a bond to keep its schools well-maintained; other districts have similarly ensured their schools were kept in good condition. The state would be wrong now to give money to schools which failed to make that effort — in effect, penalizing the schools that acted responsibly.

Certainly, some communities can make a case that they supported a higher-than-average tax effort, cut heavily within their school districts and still could not afford to keep their schools repaired. Lawmakers should give these schools priority in helping them back into shape. The cost of helping this inevitably tiny number of schools would not take away from the property-tax relief from increasing school funding.

Maine revenues for the current fiscal year are already $28 million ahead of the forecast. Last year’s surplus and the current excess revenues exist because of the gap between what schools were promised under the state’s funding formula and what they actually received. That gap was closed by another source, however — property taxpayers. Now that the state has a few extra dollars, they deserve their money back.