The state comptroller’s office has announced the city’s share of January’s sales tax revenue, and the news just keeps getting worse. The city budgeted for $17.2 million, and collected $15.1 million. That’s a 12.2 percent shortfall, and the least the city has collected in January since 2002’s $14.2 million. (The months listed on the comptroller web site are, for accounting purposes, two months ahead. That means the March figure is for January, the February figure is for December, and so forth.) The sales tax accounts for about 20 percent of city income.

For the 2008-09 budget year, sales tax revenue is down 8.2 percent. Projections have failed to meet the budget in three of the first four months, and are even 6.0 percent behind the 2007-08 totals. Our handy clip and save chart is here.