Lots of people chewing on the state’s 2008 proposed supplemental budget and taxes lately.

But here’s something that until recently was missing from the conversation:In the three legislative sessions from 2004 through 2006, state lawmakers passed at least 61 measures either granting new tax preferences or extending old ones.

Those tax breaks will cost the state nearly half a billion dollars in the 2007-09 biennium.

Wow. A million here, a million there – pretty soon you’re talking about real money.