Tax

The National Association of Bond Lawyers and the American Bar Association tax-exempt financing committee are urging the Treasury Department and the Internal Revenue Service to develop guidance on the definition of issue price for tax-exempt bonds, Build America Bonds and other direct-pay tax credit bonds.

DALLAS — Oklahoma Gov. Mary Fallin and Republican leaders in the Legislature have agreed on income tax cuts that would reduce state revenue by almost $33 million next year and more than $100 million in fiscal 2014.

House Ways and Means Committee chairman Dave Camp, R-Mich., and other Republican leaders hope by summer to have a broad framework for comprehensive tax reform so that they can fast-track it next year.

WASHINGTON — The Internal Revenue Service is auditing $12.73 million of certificates of participation that were issued by Cañon City, Colo., in 2008 to provide financing for improvements to its water treatment facility.

WASHINGTON — The Internal Revenue Service's tax-exempt bond office plans to send a letter to several hundred bond issuers that have suffered covenant or payment defaults in recent years, alerting them that certain actions they take could inadvertently trigger a reissuance of the bonds.

Gov. Nathan Deal announced that Georgia’s net tax collections for April totaled $1.53 billion, an increase of $152 million or 11% from the year previous.

Miami Beach commissioners last week agreed to ask voters to increase the local tourist tax by 1% to renovate the city’s convention center and pay debt service. The tax will be on the Aug. 14 statewide primary ballot.

Senate Finance Committee chairman Max Baucus urged Congress, as part of tax reform, to put Indian tribal governments on par with states and localities for tax-exempt financing.

Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner said that he expects the deficit reduction and tax reform debates will end with results that resemble the recommendations made by the Bowles-Simpson report.

The Michigan Senate last week passed a package of bills that would repeal the personal property tax, but the controversial measure faces a more uncertain fate in the House, which likely won’t even consider the bills until the fall.

The IRS’s new compliance practice research team will begin circulating a document internally for feedback that will identify red flags for issuers that are likely to occur over the life of a bond issue.

WASHINGTON — The Internal Revenue Service has closed its audit with no change to the tax-exempt status of $19.04 million of tax-increment refunding revenue bonds that were issued in 2003 by the Florissant, Mo., Industrial Development Authority.

Texas collected $2.07 billion from sales tax in April, up 11% from the same period in 2011.

A recent poll found a slim majority of Arkansas voters oppose a plan to raise the sales tax rate to finance a $1.8 billion highway construction program.

WASHINGTON — The Internal Revenue Service's tax-exempt bond office released information on Friday about how financial restructurings of facilities or other property by states, localities or nonprofit organizations can cause tax-law problems and what remedies can be taken to avoid sanctions.

WASHINGTON — The American Bar Association’s taxation section has sent a letter to the Internal Revenue Service and the Treasury Department urging them to update their rules and guidance on management contracts, which are important in determining that certain governmental and 501(c)(3) bonds remain tax-exempt and are not private-activity bonds.

Two members of the House Ways and Means Committee introduced bipartisan legislation that would permanently increase the bank-qualified debt limit to $30 million from $10 million and index it for inflation.

Louisiana saved more than $100 million in debt service costs with last week’s $803 million refunding of gasoline and fuels tax revenue bonds, said state Treasurer John Kennedy.

President Obama's nominee for assistant secretary of the Treasury Department for financial markets suggested that he is willing to work with lawmakers on developing tax-credit bonds such as the transportation and regional infrastructure project, or TRIP, bonds. Matthew Rutherford has been nominated for the post after serving as deputy assistant secretary for three years.

A move to eliminate Michigan’s personal property tax would likely drive up real property taxes, a coalition of public school leaders warned last week.