Gov. Nathan Deal reports that the state's overall tax collections are down for the first time in 18 months.

The figures released Friday show net tax collections for Georgia in December totaled $1.54 billion, a decrease of $19 million or 1.2 percent compared to last December. Through six months of fiscal year 2012, net revenue collections totaled $8.25 billion, an increase of $409 million or 5.2 percent compared to year-to-date December fiscal year 2011.

Georgia's sales tax collections totaled $402 million, up from $374 million in December 2010, an increase of $28 million or 4.2 percent. But Deal says that the state's individual income tax and corporate income tax revenues fell compared to last December because of large audit settlement payments that made those numbers high.

Tags: tax, payroll, Gov. Nathan Deal, revenues