AUGUSTA – The King administration says state revenue for the fiscal year that ended June 30 topped projections by $32.6 million, more than enough to cover contingent spending agreed to by the governor and Legislature.

Combined with departmental savings, the state ended fiscal 2001 with about $44 million, according to Commissioner Janet Waldron of the Department of Administrative and Financial Services.

About $18 million will be

set aside in a revenue reserve account.

The reserve was established for a number of possible uses, including covering the cost of state compliance with federal tax law changes.

Waldron said the effects in Maine of federal tax reductions are estimated to be $18.5 million over the two-year budget cycle that began July 1.

Other potential uses of the reserve money include offsetting future budget shortfalls and shoring up the Fund for a Healthy Maine.

Waldron’s report said June revenue from the sales tax exceeded budget by $7.5 million, reducing a shortfall in the sales tax line for the year to $5.2 million, or 0.6 percent.

Individual income tax revenue was $1.1 million under budget in June, but exceeded projections for the year by $45.8 million, or 4.1 percent.

Corporate income tax revenue was $4.5 million under budget for June and under budget for the year by $17.9 million, or 15.7 percent, Waldron said.

“The regional and state economies, while struggling, appear to be holding up better than other parts of the country,” Waldron reported in the year-end analysis. “Maine’s unemployment rate for June was 3.3 percent, well below the national average of 4.5 percent.”

Adding a note of caution, she added that “consumer sales for the three-month period ending in May grew at an anemic 1 percent over the same period last year.”

June revenue reflects taxable sales in May.

“While consumer sales are expected to improve over the summer months, they are not expected to match May’s numbers,” Waldron said.

Earlier this year, lawmakers and Gov. Angus King agreed on a Part 1 biennial budget worth $5.2 billion and subsequently enacted a Part 2 tax-and-spending package worth more than $80 million.

Within the Part 2 package were conditional expenditures that would be made only if money not anticipated in previous budgets became available.