Joint Committee Minutes

October 19, 2004

Members Present

• James Grimaldi, Area 1
• Gwen Handelman, EITC
• Cheyañna Jaffke, Area 7
• Robert Meldman, Ad Hoc
• David Meyer, Area 2
• Paul Nagel, Schedule C Non-filers
• Tom Seuntjens, TAP Chair
• Teresa Smedley, Area 4
• Leonard Steinberg, Payroll Taxes
• Eileen Shuman (for Eshelman), Notices
• George Sullivan, Area 3
• Bruce Twomley, Multilingual
• Sherry Whah, Area 6
• Lillian Woo, Area 5, Ad Hoc

Members Absent

• Mario Burgos, E-Filing

Staff Present

• Bernie Coston, DFO
• Sandy McQuin, TAP Manager
• Patti Robb, Note taker
• Steve Berkey, Program Analyst
• Sallie Chavez, Program Analyst
• Dave Coffman, Program Analyst
• Inez DeJesus, Program Analyst
• Nancy Ferree, TAP Manager
• Judi Nicholas, TAP Manager
• Mary O’Brien, Program Analyst
• Marla Ofilas, Secretary
• Sandra Ramirez, TAP Manager
• Barbara Toy, Program Analyst

Guests Present

• Buck Paolone, TAP Member

Welcome / Announcements / Review Agenda
This will be the last meeting prior to annual meeting.

Roll Call (Quorum is Nine)
Quorum met.

National Office Report
Update on new TAP members. All selectees, except four, were contacted and have agreed to become panel members. Staff will attempt to contact the remaining four once more but if they are not reachable, may turn to the alternate list. TAP received preliminary approval on the list of members and alternates from Secretary Snow. The annual meeting planning is on track. Nina Olson will review the agenda this afternoon for final approval.

Bernie Coston agreed to distribute the member and alternate list to the Joint Committee after list is finalized. Some have declined TAP membership when offered so some have moved from the alternate list and have become the selectee.
ACTION: Toy will send out the number of alternates for each state after the list is finalized.

Coston did not have opportunity to discuss all his issues with Nina Olson. He did not get a response to Area 6’s proposal regarding taxpayer rights and Taxpayer Assistance Orders but Olson has declined to accept the proposals sent forward by the Ad Hoc committee regarding TAP administrative issues.

Tom Seuntjens asked if new issue committees were identified for the coming year. Coston replied that Wage and Investment (W&I) will continue with the three current issues: Earned Income Tax Credit, the Multi-Lingual Initiative and Notices. The Office of Taxpayer Burden Reduction of Small Business/Self-Employed (SB/SE) will only support two issue committees. Coston is meeting with Nina Olson this afternoon to discuss the focus for the Ad Hoc Committee.

Review Assignments
Coston said the review of Internal Revenue Service Advisory Council (IRSAC) and Information Reporting Program Advisory Committee (IRPAC) reports has been done. TAP works on issues in a more detailed manner than IRSAC and IRPAC and neither is currently working issues similar to TAP. Coston will continue to work with the National Public Liaison office to establish future partnerships.

Coston has been working with Sottile and Chesman to get new issues in place with program owners to ensure the issue committees are successful. Helene Bayder will be replacing Margie Kinney in the Office of Taxpayer Burden Reduction. Coston has a meeting with Bayder, Kinney, and Chesman next week to discuss and follow-up on elevated recommendations. Sottile is out of the country right now. The staff has been working with Sottile on issue committees. One of Coston’s biggest concerns is related to issue committees. The focus of the issue and the program owners needs to be identified upfront so committees can start working the focused issue quickly and continue to work issues for the remainder of the year. Seuntjens expressed concern that the larger issue committees would not work well.

Coston reported that SB/SE was concerned that some members on the SB/SE committees did not have any small business or tax experience. Coston has challenged all program owners to do a better job of defining what skills or knowledge members should bring to an issue committee. The program owners should also provide the background of the issue, the expected outcome, and the length of time TAP will work the issue.

The Committee discussed the size of the committees if there were only six issue committees. Some believed it was a benefit since the work could be spread out to more people and enable the committees to form more subcommittees. Others felt the numbers would make the committees unwieldy.

Seuntjens reminded Coston that pre-approval of the TAP annual report should be done sooner this year so TAP’s report will be published on a timely basis. Coston said the pre-approval is more of a courtesy—it is TAP’s report.

Berkey planned on utilizing information from the annual report instead of duplicating efforts so the success stories will not be included in the member’s handbook.

David Meyer has agreed to work on annual report.

All completed assignments will be dropped and all open items carried to the minutes of this meeting.

Review / Approve Minutes
The changes suggested by Gwen Handelman and Bruce Twomley through email will be made and with those changes, the minutes were approved by consensus.

Agenda Items

• TAP Member Handbook
  Lillian Woo reported that members have all the text together and in final form which incorporated all suggestions received at Denver Joint Committee meeting. Staff needs to insert the attachments to complete.
• All TAP Meeting Agenda
  Joint Committee reviewed the draft agenda for the November All-TAP meeting.
  
  On the first day the committee chairs will present their annual reports. Later, the issue committee program owners will describe their focus for the upcoming year and the role of the issue committee members. Based on these presentations and the written committee description sheets, members will rank their selections. On Thursday, members will receive their issue committee assignments. Workshops are also on Thursday.
  
  All committee meetings will follow the same agenda. Based upon feedback from last year’s meeting, TAP Program Managers and the national office staff will facilitate the committee meetings. Program Owners will attend and describe the focus of the issue committee for the coming year, and the Local Taxpayer Advocates will attend the area committee meetings.
  
  Rather than have 104 people introduce themselves, the Area chairs are to introduce their returning and new members during the area report time giving their name, city, and state. Area committees will be seated together. Handelman asked if it is possible for returning members to sit in on the new member orientation. Coston replied that unfortunately, the room is not large enough and, with new members and staff, is already near capacity.
• Review of Ad Hoc Recommendations
  Seuntjens reported that the “Dos and Don’ts” recommended by Ad Hoc have been added to the new member handbook. Handelman objected that some “Don’ts” were overbroad, and Seuntjens agreed that changes would be considered.
  
  The Committee then discussed the recommendation regarding Ad Hoc examining all regulatory and legislative issues. Handelman suggested removing the references to regulatory since it has not been clarified if the TAP charter does allow TAP to look at modifications to regulations. Bruce Twomley seconded; Jim Grimaldi, Seuntjens, Paul Nagel, and Teresa Smedley agreed. Concern was also raised about the willingness of members to turn the issue over to Ad Hoc. Meldman replied that any members from the originating committee who were interested would be invited to become temporary Ad Hoc members to assist in developing the issue. In addition, some members preferred following the avenue already established for bringing legislative issues to the National Taxpayer Advocate. The concern was that members would too aggressively pursue legislative fixes taking time from TAP’s primary mission.
  
  The Committee then provided comments on Ad Hoc’s recommendation for TAP chair election and chair-elect position rather than Ad Hoc chair becoming TAP Vice-Chair. Nagel objected to dictating who gets to run and that all members should have the same opportunity. Handelman felt new members would not have enough information to choose the chair elect. Teresa Smedley, Seuntjens and Eileen Shuman also opposed the recommendation.

Monthly Committee Reports Action Items

• TAP Name Change
  David Meyer presented Area 2’s recommendation to change the TAP name. There is confusion between TAS (Taxpayer Advocacy Service) and TAP. Although a lot of money, time, and effort has been spent in branding the name of TAP, the benefits of changing the name outweigh the drawbacks. Future costs of TAP and TAS staff dealing with the confusion would be saved. The name change should be done quickly, first, to start branding the new name and second, to stop spending on printing more materials under the old name. Joint Committee reached consensus to elevate proposal.
  Action: Toy will format Name Change proposal and forward to Olson.
• Refund Misleading Taxpayer
  Handelman suggested change in structure of proposal which was accepted and Joint Committee reached consensus to elevate proposal.
  Action: Toy will format Refund Misleading Taxpayer proposal and forward to Olson.

Closing
Seuntjens thanked everyone for their participation on the Joint Committee and for making his job as chair easier. He also thanked staff for the great support of this committee.

Assignments

Seuntjens, Handelman, Meyer, Whah & McQuin:

1. Draft Annual Report.

Coston:

1. Follow-up for a response to TAP 04-010, Taxpayer Rights under RRA98
2. Follow-up on non-responses to TAP recommendations.
3. Coston will take this issue of Ad Hoc working the legislative issues to NTA.
4. Coston will ask Olson if he can have the authority to do the detailed pre-approval of the annual report.

Staff:

1. Ensure an electronic form of the handbook is available on TAPSpeak soon.

Toy:

1. Obtain the name of the program owner from the Area 7 analyst for the Interactive Installment Agreement and Improvements to CP521 Notice proposals.
2. Format the proposal for elevating the Interactive Installment Agreement and Improvements to CP521 Notice proposal and elevate to the IRS a copy of the CP 521 Notice proposal should be forwarded to the TAP Notice Committee.
3. Format the proposal for elevating the Marketing TAP and Advertising TAP in Publication 1546 proposals and elevate both to the IRS.
4. Send out the number of alternates for each state after the list is finalized.
5. Format Name Change proposal and forward to Olson.
6. Format Refund Misleading Taxpayer proposal and forward to Olson.