AUGUSTA – It looks like an uptick in state tax revenue will put Maine’s two-year budget more than $70 million in the black, and Republican Gov. Paul LePage said the money should go into the state’s savings account.

LePage also urged state lawmakers to resist finding new ways to spend the increased revenue, as he offered legislation Monday to move the money to the Budget Stabilization Fund or “rainy day fund.”

“The Maine Legislature chooses to spend 99 percent of all general fund revenue received by the state,” LePage said in a prepared statement. “Just one penny of every dollar received by the state of Maine goes into savings. It’s not fiscally responsible.”

LePage said Monday that the $72.7 million extra in income tax collections predicted by the state’s Revenue Forecast Committee would help put state government on more solid financial ground and could help lower interest rates for borrowing for capital investments if the money goes toward the stabilization fund.

“Bond rating agencies, such as Moody’s and Standard & Poor’s, have warned the state of Maine for years of the consequences should we fail to maintain or increase the balance of our Budget Stabilization Fund,” LePage said.

“Our existing balance is insufficient. All too often we wait until the last day of the fiscal year to determine what money the state will put into savings. This is an irresponsible way to run a business and an irresponsible way to run a government. It is time for the Maine Legislature to show that increasing the balance of the Budget Stabilization Fund is a priority.”

Rep. Tom Winsor, R-Norway, a lead Republican on the Legislature’s budget-writing Appropriation Committee, will sponsor LePage’s proposal in the House.

Winsor said he would try to move quickly on the measure, which not only moves the extra revenue to the stabilization fund, but also looks to increase the amount the state saves each tax cycle.

“Having the discipline to increase the balance in the Budget Stabilization Fund from $111.1 million to more than $178 million by the end of the current fiscal year, as well as putting a plan in place to increase that balance to more than $183 million by the end of (the 2017 fiscal year), shows everyone that the Budget Stabilization Fund is a priority,” Winsor said in a prepared statement.

The fund has recently become a source of contention in an ongoing debate over how the state should conform with federal tax code. A bill passed in the Democrat-controlled House would move about $23 million from the fund to shore up state funding to public schools. Republicans have opposed that shift.

LePage has characterized that proposal as a “raid” on the fund by “socialist Democrats.” Democratic leaders have countered that without additional state support, schools will have to turn to local property taxpayers to make up for revenue shortfalls.