In times of rain, besides an umbrella, what is a good thing to have?

The answer is a big reservoir, holding all that extra water to use during the long, hot, dry summer.

The suggestion to build a big dam is important because for once, Hawaii is not the weird state, out of step with the other 49.

Hawaii, like almost all the country, is reporting healthy finances with indications that the taxes are likely to continue to flow.

"The outlook for fiscal 2014 is upbeat, while a few states continue to face fiscal challenges," reports Lucy Dadayan, analyst for the Rockefeller Institute, according to Stateline magazine.

"Overall, states would likely continue seeing growth in revenues for the rest of fiscal 2014 as well as in fiscal 2015," she said.

That is why last week Gov. Neil Abercrombie could make a major news conference out of the numbers in Hawaii’s Comprehensive Annual Financial Report (CAFR) for the fiscal year ending June 30, 2013.

If you were to pick the government’s top rockets to boredom, poring over the CAFR would be high on the list. But this year, all those once-red lines are now blue, growth is growing and there is money in the bank.

Abercrombie’s report "shows the State of Hawaii’s net position (assets less liabilities) for primary governmental activities increased for the first time since 2006 by $307.1 million, from $4.5 billion to $4.8 billion."

The good news exists because Hawaii is getting more tax money and not spending it all. For those with a large enough pot of coffee, the report is available at http://ags.hawaii.gov/wp-content/uploads/2012/09/soh-cafr-20130630.pdf.

In the first of a series of reports on state finances, the Pew Charitable Trust’s states’ fiscal health initiative notes two things: First, nearly every state is reporting solid financial growth; and second, the states should start thinking about what to do with the money.

Nearly every state has a list of ways to spend the money, with Hawaii also being in the "spend it" column.

But, Hawaii’s budget is not over-the-top spending and some of the largest outlays are expected to be for paying down the unfunded liabilities in pension and retirees health care costs.

In an interview last week, Brenna Erford, a manager with the fiscal health initiative, looked at our state economy. "When Hawaii has sustained extraordinary revenue growth, say over a two year period, there should be an option to put that in Hawaii’s rainy day fund.

"Your fund has a threshold, a maximum size which hasn’t been reached in a long, long time," Erford said.

The volatility of Hawaii’s economy caught Erford’s eye. In other words, the size of the swing up and down, the highs and lows on the graph for Hawaii’s tax collections, she noted, were in the top half of all states.

That volatility makes it difficult to plan and if the pendulum moves far enough, the state goes in the red, cuts services, furloughs workers and goes into recession.

The solution is that when it is raining money, what is needed is that rainy day fund, a big reservoir with a tiny spigot, because when the dollars dry up, you are on your own. 

Richard Borreca writes on politics on Sundays, Tuesdays and Fridays. Reach him at rborreca@staradvertiser.com.