Wage & Investment Reduce Taxpayer Burden (Notices) Meeting Minutes

Face-to-Face Meeting
Detroit, MI
May 18, 19 and 20, 2006

May 18, 2006 – 1:00 pm – 5:00 pm

Participants (Panel Members)

• Marilynn Clapp, Boise, ID
• Lee Congdon, Washington, DC
• Joe Hurr, Dayton, OH
• David Jones, Sacramento, CA
• Allena Kaplan, Anaheim, CA
• David Meister, Franklin, WI
• Martin Romeril, Bethlehem, PA
• Allen Scioli, Saginaw, MI
• Max Scott, Baton Rouge, LA
• Lee Stieger, Leavenworth, KS
• Mary Suther, Dallas, TX
• Warren Wong, Rochester, MN
• J. T. Wright, Carrollton, GA

Not Present

• Michael Guthman, Westport, CT
• Sandy Searleman, Glens Falls, NY

Staff Members

• Sallie Chavez, TAP Program Analyst
• Pamara Blount, Local Taxpayer Advocate and Acting Designated Federal Official

Guests

• James (Jim) A. Cesarano, Program Analyst, Wage & Investment, Program Owner Representative
• Sidney Gardner, SBSE & W & I SPOC, Program Owner

Welcome and Announcements/Roll Call
Committee Chair Allen Scioli welcomed everyone. He hoped that the new members who went on the Print Site Tour this morning have move insight into notice printing. He welcomed the Program Owners. He introduced Local Taxpayer Advocate Pamara Blount who will be the Acting Designated Federal Official for this meeting. DFO Blount gave a brief background about herself.

Introductions of Committee Members
Each member introduced him/her self.

National Office Report
TAP Program Analyst Sallie Chavez gave the National Office Report.

The TAP Annual Meeting is being scheduled for December 11 – 15, 2006 at the Hyatt Capitol Hill. This is the same location as last year’s Annual Meeting. Travel will be December 11 with the orientation starting on December 12 in the morning and the Annual Meeting for all members to begin in the afternoon. The meeting will end on December 15 at noon so that member can return home in the afternoon.

Recruitment has ended. There were approximately 800 applicants. The ranking will be done in Milwaukee the week of May 30. Interviewing will be done June 12 – 28. Your area committee manager should contact you and ask if you would like to participate in the interviewing process. Interviews will be completed by telephone conference.

There is only one more Town Hall and that will be in Cincinnati. The Town Halls were a success and will continue.

Review/Approve Minutes
February 16, 2006 meeting minutes were accepted, with corrections, by consensus.

March 2, 2006 meeting minutes were accepted, with corrections, by consensus.

April 6, 2006 meeting minutes were accepted, with corrections, by consensus.

May 4, 2006 meeting minutes were accepted, with corrections, by consensus.

DAT Comments
Chair Scioli asked for comments on the Document Assessment Tool. The committee gave the following comments:

• Need deadlines
• Too many questions on the DAT
• Styles of the notice
• Attitude adjustment to read as if you actually received the notice
• Need phone number to call on the notice
• Would like sanitized version of notices to see what is put in the blanks
• Other judging mechanism
• Weighting of some of the items
• More comments
• Time it takes to score the notice
• History of the notice
• Controlled group testing of notices
• Convincing SMEs to discuss scores

Goals and Objectives
There was a discussion about the Goals and Objectives that were written last year by Committee Members Allena Kaplan and J. T. Wright, with the assistance of other members on the committee at that time.

Program Rep. Jim Cesarano said there is no way to measure 2nd notices. The IRS doesn’t have the data. The IRS does have volume of notices issued.

The committee discussed issues about notices coming into an area and what they should do with the issue. The issue committee has to do a better job of communicating the area committees.

The committee agreed to no specific numbers to justify goals. Committee Member Warren Wong will rewrite the Goals and Objectives for tomorrows meeting.

Comments from SPOC Representative
Program Rep. Jim Cesarano made the following report:

• TAP is still a stake holder in notice process
• He will encourage Subject Matter Experts (SMEs) to do focus groups.
• Will be working on prioritization of SBSE notices
• Will be working on Stuffer Issue to eliminate information included with notices
• No meetings until end of fiscal year on Notice Elimination NPIIT – NPIIT has already eliminated 40 notices – they can’t look at all 600 correspondex letters – they just want to correct grammatical errors
• CP75 and 75A – SME Geoff Gerbore wants focus group with those members who scored the notices
• CP79 – SME Geoff Gerbore had to get revised notice in last week to go out in FY 07 – still wants scores and focus group on this notice
• CP 23, 24 & 25 – starting DPT – committee will be involved

Closing Remarks
Chair Scioli asked everyone to get to the meeting timely tomorrow as there are presenters who need the time to make their presentation. He reminded everyone they have their travel expense report and should try and complete them before the meeting ends and submit them to Analyst Chavez to take back to the office.

Meeting was adjourned for the day.

May 19, 2006 – 8:00 am – 5:00 pm

Participants (Panel Members)

• Marilynn Clapp, Boise, ID
• Lee Congdon, Washington, DC
• Joe Hurr, Dayton, OH
• David Jones, Sacramento, CA
• Allena Kaplan, Anaheim, CA
• David Meister, Franklin, WI
• Martin Romeril, Bethlehem, PA
• Allen Scioli, Saginaw, MI
• Max Scott, Baton Rouge, LA
• Lee Stieger, Leavenworth, KS
• Mary Suther, Dallas, TX
• Warren Wong, Rochester, MN
• J. T. Wright, Carrollton, GA

Not Present

• Michael Guthman, Westport, CT
• Sandy Searleman, Glens Falls, NY

Staff Members

• Sallie Chavez, TAP Program Analyst
• Pamara Blount, Local Taxpayer Advocate and Acting Designated Federal Official

Guests

• James (Jim) A. Cesarano, Program Analyst, Wage & Investment, Program Owner Representative
• Sidney Gardner, SBSE & W & I SPOC, Program Owner
• Patricia Gray
• Joanne Lane
• David Tyree

Welcome/Announcements
Committee Vice Chair Max Scott welcomed everyone. He said we have guests and asked the quests to introduce themselves.

Forms 886DP, 886HOH and 886EIC
Joann Lane and Patricia Gray made presentation on the 3 forms. They asked the committee to review the forms and provide feedback to them.

The committee read through the forms, discussed and provided feedback.

Both provided their email addresses and fax numbers to the committee so the members could provide any additional information. They will set up a conference call (with a small group) after all the information has been provided.

Overview of Dynamic Project Teams (DPT) and Notice Process Improvement Initiative Team (NPIIT)
Program Owner Rep. Jim Cesarano made a brief presentation on DPT and NPIIT. He Provided a CD of the Notice Support Site as well as information on the DPT and NPIIT.

Stuffer Task
Program Rep. Jim Cesarano provided a spreadsheet on “stuffers” included with notices. He discussed it a little. He would like to have time at the next meeting to go into it in more detail.

CP23, 24 and 25 DPT
David Tyree presented copies of the notices as previously used along with the DAT scores from last years TAP group. He also presented copies of the rewritten notices. He would like them scored by the end of July. He discussed the DPT and the notices they will be working to revise.

BMF Prioritization
Program Owner Sidney Gardner reported the Individual Master File (IMF) notices were prioritized several years ago with the help of a Notices Committee Member. Now the Business Master File (BMF) has to be done. This develops the work for the DPTs. He explained how the BMF notices will be prioritized. The team is still working on it. There are about 140 – 150 notices in this group.

Goals and Objectives
Member Wong revised the Goals and Objectives. The committee discussed. Chair Scioli will have them in final form by tomorrows meeting.

Closing
Chair Scioli reminded everyone that the meeting tomorrow is being held at the Hilton Garden Inn in Saloon C & D starting at 8:00 am.

Meeting was adjourned for the day.

May 20, 2006 – 8:00 am – 12:00 noon

Participants (Panel Members)

• Marilynn Clapp, Boise, ID
• Lee Congdon, Washington, DC
• Joe Hurr, Dayton, OH
• David Jones, Sacramento, CA
• Allena Kaplan, Anaheim, CA
• David Meister, Franklin, WI
• Martin Romeril, Bethlehem, PA
• Allen Scioli, Saginaw, MI
• Max Scott, Baton Rouge, LA
• Lee Stieger, Leavenworth, KS
• Mary Suther, Dallas, TX
• Warren Wong, Rochester, MN
• J. T. Wright, Carrollton, GA

Not Present

• Michael Guthman, Westport, CT
• Sandy Searleman, Glens Falls, NY

Staff Members

• Sallie Chavez, TAP Program Analyst
• Pamara Blount, Local Taxpayer Advocate and Acting Designated Federal Official

Guests

• James (Jim) A. Cesarano, Program Analyst, Wage & Investment, Program Owner Representative

Welcome
Chair Scioli said there is a change in the agenda for today. We finished the BMF Prioritization yesterday so that will not be discussed again today.

The scheduled conference call for June 1 is cancelled since it is less than 2 weeks away.

Today is scheduled to complete the DAT scoring for each team. Member Kaplan volunteered her group to score the CP23, 24 and 25 for David Tyree.

Chair Scioli again read through the Goals and Objectives. There were no objections to the rewrite. He will get these out to everyone by the July meeting.

Program Owner Jim Cesarano wanted to go over his commitment to the group:

• For the DAT scoring of notices outside of the prioritization list, he will give the committee deadlines
• He will get sanitized copies of notices or will give background and history and what stuffers go with the notice
• Will hold conference call with the teams before they score the notice
• He will talk to Committee Members Mary Suther, Lee Congdon and Joe Hurr about the Direct Mail
• There will be a conference call with the members who scored the CP75 and 75A with Geoff Gerbore
• There will be a conference call with members who make additions comments on the Form 886s
• He will provide an acronym list of notices acronyms
• He will get volume and cost for the CP30
• He will help the team to score the correspondex letters

Committee Chair Allen Scioli discussed the DAT scoring again. It was suggested that the committee score some notices at the Annual Meeting during the Notice Committee Meeting. That would mean the new members would have to be trained during the meeting. It was suggested that the 2nd year veterans would work on training and standards. Committee Member Allena Kaplan volunteered to take the lead. Committee Members Warren Wong, J. T. Wright and Martin Romeril will assist her.

Program Owner Representative Jim Cesarano said that if changes are needed to the DAT, the committee can recommend the changes to the Notice Support Group.

DAT Scoring (Break-out)
Committee Members went into their teams and “normed” their assigned notices. The “normed” scores were given to TAP Program Analyst Sallie Chavez to be forwarded to the Program Owners.

Meeting was adjourned.