"It certainly leaves us no excuses for not maintaining Medicaid at the level required," says Judi Hilman, executive director of the Utah Health Policy Project. "And there is absolutely no excuse not to restore dental and vision coverage [for the poor]."

Kim Campbell, president of the Utah Education Association, is hoping the July-to-June budget year surplus finally will mean an end to Utah trailing in national per-pupil spending.

"Legislators have always said, 'When times are good. we'll invest more,' " Campbell says. "If these aren't good times, I don't know when there'll be some."

Worthy needs and plenty of money - so why are so many Republican legislators cringing at the thought of divvying up an overflowing treasury?

"It's not going to be easy. In fact, it's going to be a Herculean effort," says Rep. Greg Hughes, R-Draper, of the surplus challenge.

He and other legislators complain it is human nature that when state cash seems limitless, no one - from kindergarten teachers to prison guards - is ever satisfied with what they get.

Sen. Curt Bramble, chairman of the Revenue and Taxation Committee, puts in succinctly: "When you don't have a surplus - when money is tight - it is easy to say no to everybody."

Some of the sensitivity on Capitol Hill has to do with the battering lawmakers received after they failed to fund emergency medical care for the poor at a May special session. Still smarting, legislators complain the recriminations and bad press followed a regular session in which they increased spending in nearly every area of government, including a 6 percent raise for teachers and a $60 million increase in spending on health and human services.

The Legislature also took a chunk of the sales tax off groceries. But an acrimonious battle over income tax reform ended in stalemate. One of the goals of income tax reform was to eliminate the extreme vacillation between surpluses and deficits that continues to haunt lawmakers.

"In my six years in the Legislature, we have not seen near the acrimony and contention as in the last session," Bramble says, "In many ways it was driven by the [surplus] money. I don't want to sound cynical. But if anything, last year was a pre-season warm-up for what we will see this year."

Senate President John Valentine points out that most of the $172 million surplus at the 2006 session and the $351 million now, is generated by income taxes that are earmarked for education alone. "We are going to see significant pressure for increased spending in education and that's a good thing," he says, but, "We are very concerned the general fund is not growing."

The general fund, mainly made up of sales tax revenues, pays for all other government services.

Despite public surveys that have shown taxpayers would rather see the surplus go to education, transportation and health needs rather than get a tax cut, many lawmakers still hope to give $70 million to $115 million back. For many it's a philosophical issue, but it doesn't hurt that this is an election year for all House members and half the senators.

"We can invest in education or we can invest in transportation, or - more importantly - we can return it to the taxpayer," says Hughes, chairman of the Republican Conservative Caucus. Hughes and his colleagues warn that gleeful spending in times of surplus means inevitable painful cuts in times of deficit.

No one seems to think the spending limits put in place in the 1990s will have much effect in the upcoming session. "There's a lot of flexibility under the spending caps [education and transportation are exempted from the limits]," Bramble says. "Historically, they have not made a huge difference."

"As a legislative body, we show less discipline than our kids do at Toys R Us," Hughes said, referring to the blessing and threat intrinsic in a large surplus. "I'm 100 percent convinced that we will be cutting those very programs to which we gave increases."

Though Valentine does not see spending on education and transportation as growth in government, because both are meeting the needs of an expanding population, he warns, "If we grow education too fast, we'll just have to cut in the future."

Campbell fears lawmakers will squander the opportunity. "I find it appalling that with all the talk about tax cuts, there hasn't been a lot of talk about investing more in public education."

Bramble warns: "I don't think the needs are mutually exclusive - if you don't demand that everything goes your way. It is going to take people to step up and realize there are other priorities."