SB/SE Payroll Tax Issue Issue Committee Meeting Minutes

August 28, 2003
3:00 pm

Attendance

• Clayton Agena, HI
• Denise Bigger, IA
• Charlotte Cassady, GA
• Justin Doucette, NV
• Theodore Perros, DC
• Mary Peterson O'Brien, Designated Federal Official
• Charles Silva, MA
• Leonard Steinberg, NJ, Chair
• Steven Wood, AR
• William Woods, TX

Program Owner

• Margie Kinney

Staff/Note Taker

• Marla Ofilas

Welcome/Announcements/Review Agenda
Leonard welcomed the committee to the teleconference and informed the committee that this will be the last meeting until the TAP Annual meeting in October. Leonard informed everyone that he would be meeting with the Joint Committee in September to discuss the annual report and finalize the agenda for the TAP Annual conference. Each Area and Issue committees will have time allotted to meet as a committee. Leonard felt that there will be ample time to work the issues of this committee and therefore be able to make progress.

Roll Call
Marla Ofilas preformed roll call. Nine members were present. An official quorum was present. No public attending the meeting at this time.

Updates from the Joint Committee
Leonard reviewed the updates from the Joint Committee meeting to the committee members. Leonard explained that an email was sent to all panel members that Daryl Temple, TAP Director, has been transferred to a new position within the Taxpayer Advocate Service and as of August 25 th Sandy Mcquin, TAP Program Manager in Milwaukee, will be acting as the TAP Director until a new director has been named.

Leonard corresponded with Tom Suenjens, TAP Chair, regarding the number of panel members that are leaving the TAP. Leonard informed everyone that Norma Bishop is no longer member of this committee or a member of the panel. Also, it appears that Thad Davis, of Ohio, has also resigned. Leonard was asked by Tom and Barbara Toy to put down the names of the people that have not been participating in the committee. Tom will be addressing the issue of how to approach the members that have not been participating and what the next steps will be.

The Joint committee meeting will be take place in Denver on September 5th and 6th and Leonard feels they will get many things accomplished because of their active agenda.

October Annual Meeting : Leonard discussed the guest speakers who will participate in the October annual meeting. He informed the committee that Nina Olson, National Taxpayer Advocate; Secretary Snow, Commissioner of Treasury; and also Commissioner Everson of the Internal Revenue Service will be in attendance. Elections will be held for each of the chairs for each committee, including the joint committee during the TAP Annual meeting. Also, panel members will have the opportunity to change issue committees during the meeting. Leonard does not know how the process will take place but anticipates this will be a topic that will be discussed during the joint committee meeting in Denver. During the joint committee meeting in Denver, each chair will be responsible to do a presentation regarding the progress of their committee. Once the issue committee meets in October they could begin to plan on what they will do for the upcoming year. The joint committee has made the decision that approximately thirty (30) people from around the country will be asked to volunteer to stay one extra year to act as an transition for the next group. The joint committee and TAP Staff will also work on finding replacements for those panel members that have resigned or for those panel members that do not want participate anymore. The joint committee will be reviewing the people that were chosen as alternates at the begin but not chosen as panel members to see if they are still interested in being on the panel.

Action: Leonard has agreed to email the committee members his notes from the joint committee meeting.

Leonard asked the committee if there were any questions regarding what was reviewed. Theodore Perros was curious to see if it was possible to contact the panel members that resigned to hear what their reasons were. Leonard explained that will be the job of Tom and Barbara Toy to contact those panel members. Mary indicated Tom and Barbara have already been working on contacting those panel members. Leonard asked Mary if the information gathered, regarding the reasons why panel members are leaving, would be made public to the rest of the current panel members. Mary was unsure if the reasons would be public, but knows that the information is being tracked. Leonard indicated he would bring this question up in Denver.

Action: Mary to add question to monthly report regarding information data as to why panel members are resigning and will the data be available to current panel members to view.

Issue Committee Report
Leonard discussed the format and the due date of the issue committee report. Steve has sent the current results from the Reporting Subcommittee to be incorporated into the report. Denise, who is working on behalf of Keith Johnson, sent Leonard her report, which he will share with the committee when he returns from the joint committee meeting. The subcommittee that Leonard is a part of has completed their survey and it looks like they will be working on getting it disseminated.

Deposit Subcommittee: Denise Bigger informed the panel that their survey had been completed and each subcommittee member should have received 10 surveys in the mail along with an email that was sent out. Everyone on the subcommittee was to send out their surveys and have them returned to Mary where she is compiling and analyzing the data from the survey. Theodore asked what the level of return has been regarding the surveys. Mary indicated that she received many surveys and she is having Marla gather them and input the data in a matrix. Mary also indicated that it would be a good idea for the subcommittee to have a meeting once all the data has been entered. Mary has received 27 responses so far but expects to receive more from groups across the country. Mailing of the survey will go out again this month.

Charles asked if the data would be available by the annual meeting. Mary explained that the committee could take what they have now and make assumptions or you could leave it up to the panel. Leonard felt that if the committee still would like to continue doing the surveying work that the more data the committee could get the better statistics and the better information the committee could give to Margie.

The committee continued to discuss the importance of receiving completed surveys. The committee also discussed that they will continue to discuss the data and the return of the surveys in Washington DC during the TAP annual meeting. Leonard asked the committee members to think about their subcommittee work and decide where they would like to go. This could be used as a basis for conversation to plan for with the next year.

Theodore asked if the committee was going to get feed back regarding their work and accomplishments. Mary explained that Margie would be able to give the committee insight of how far the committee has come and also what the committee could do different in the future. Margie also discussed that Michael Chessman and Sue Sotile will be present at the annual meeting to provide insight on what they are seeing coming out of the TAP and what's working and what's not working. Margie confirmed that it would be a review on what the committee has done this year and what the committee will be doing next year.

Margie asked Mary to make a due date for the deposit committee survey for the 20th of September. This will allow the subcommittee time to have the statistical data from their survey. Mary agreed and asked if there was any available from the deposit subcommittee to hold additional meetings between now and October.

Action: Denise Bigger agreed to this agreed to have a discussion with Mary offline. Mary will provide statistics to Denise.

Structure of October Meeting
Leonard previously reviewed this agenda item but did indicate that the issue committee will be allowed to meet for 4 hours during the annual meeting. Mary indicated that there would not be additional time for subcommittee work unless the subcommittee meets on their own time.

Updates from Program Owner
Action: Margie discussed that she would like Mary to convert the spreadsheet of the responses to the surveys to a database. This would make it easier to determine where the responses came from and who they are.

Margie felt that because the committee is not getting a large response to the surveys, it would help the committee to combine all three surveys. This would help the committee particularly where there are the same questions.

Margie and Mary reviewed housekeeping issues that the committee would discuss during the annual meeting.

• Confirm committee chairs
• Brief report from each subcommittee
• Analyze survey data
• Subcommittee break out
• Plan future meetings

Mary asked the members if there were any addition items that should be added to the issue committee agenda. At this time, there were no additional items to be added.