Tuesday, September 30, 2014

Duggins: 100% compliance rate on tax abatements we seldom bother auditing.

Because after all, businesses can be trusted not to lie.

What we've learned since our friend Mark Cassidy began demanding simple attention to detail from city officials and the common council is that tax abatements have not always been filed correctly, with the incorrect filings being rubber-stamped along with the rest ... until Mark's questions started.

During meetings in August and September, the council tabled several abatement renewal requests because the forms were incomplete. The abatements had been suggested for approval by the administration, though they lacked information about job totals and other information.

“I think that if we’re going to give somebody a tax abatement, it’s not asking too much to have forms filled out correctly,” said Mark Cassidy, a New Albany resident who has asked the council and administration multiple times to pay closer attention to the abatements they reward.

By signing the forms, the companies are essentially promising that the job totals are correct. But how does the city really know?

“It’s illegal to sign an [abatement] form that’s not correct. That’s also true about filling out your income tax form, but they still do random audits of income tax forms,” Cassidy said.

It would create more public trust in the program if the city randomly audited the abatement-receiving businesses to ensure the job totals they are vouching for are correct, he continued.

In which case, if the forms cannot be filled out correctly, how do we know they're truthful in the sense of tax abatement conditions being fulfilled?

And, as such, how utterly vacuous is the highlighted statement by the city's chief tax abatement rewards desk clerk, David Duggins?

The city hasn’t voided any abatements since Mayor Jeff Gahan took office, and it’s quite uncommon for cities to take away a tax cut for a business, Duggins said.

Pulling an abatement could lead to a business closing its doors, and so the city’s procedure has been to meet with companies struggling to match their job levels and assist them instead of ending their credits, he continued.

“No company [in New Albany] has warranted having their abatement removed,” he said.

But if no one ever checks the veracity of the information, how can there be this level of certainty?

Is there a magic wand?

If so, might it be wielded in the general direction of independent local businesses in downtown, which have collectively enabled the ongoing revitalization that this and other administrations love to take credit for impelling, but have actually done next to nothing to assist, because there is no economic development plan for downtown New Albany?

The article: New Albany touts tax abatements; some want more oversight, by Daniel Suddeath (Royse City Herald Banner)

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