New Hampshire Tax Collectors’ Association
Executive Board Meeting
January 13, 2005
9:30 AM
President Blandine Shallow called the meeting to order at 9:45 am.
Present: Blandine Shallow (President), Pat Woolsey (Vice-President), Joe Wiggett (Immediate Past President), Joan Porter (Second Vice-President), Cheryl-Ann Bolouk (Education Chair), Pat Milone (Treasurer), Kathy Seaver (Public Relations Director), Jill Hadaway (Legislative Chair), Barbara Robinson (DRA).
The minutes of the October 21, 2004 meeting will be amended and then voted on at the next meeting. Joan offered to take the minutes for today's meeting.
COMMUNICATIONS
Blandine shared a letter from Bernie Campbell regarding pre-payments of taxes. Bernie's opinion is that if the governing body adopts RSA 80:52-a, the Tax Collector must accept pre-payments for taxes up to two years in advance. As always, Bernie recommends that individual Tax Collectors consult with their own town counsel.
Blandine read a letter from Elaine van Dusen announcing that she will be retiring as the Co-Chair of the Sullivan County Coordinators. Regretfully, Elaine will be retiring on 2/8/05 after 25 years in Newport and an additional 3 years in Unity. Elaine has been a very active and productive member of the NHTCA. We wish her well. Blandine will inquire as to whether or not there is a Retirement party or function. If so, she will attend and present her with a gift acknowledging her many years of service to the Association. Kathy Seaver made a motion to leave the cost of the gift (with parameters) to the discretion of the President, seconded by Joe Wiggett. All in favor.
A discussion followed regarding the Secretary of the Executive Board. Kathleen Cassady had accepted the offer to replace Diane Jerry but due to extenuating circumstances Kate has come to realize that she does not have the time to commit to this task at this time. The Board understands and has accepted her resignation with regret. Kathy Seaver has a few people in mind and will approach them and get back to Blandine.
Jill Hadaway made a motion to give Diane a gift to acknowledge her years of service as an excellent secretary to the Executive Board. Seconded by Cheryl-Ann Bolouk. All in favor.
Blandine announced that former NHTCA President Nancy Clifford has agreed to Chair the Scholarship Committee. The remaining two members must hold dual positions since scholarships for Certification are given to Tax Collectors and to Town Clerks.
COUNTY COORDINATORS
Pat Woolsey needs a few more email addresses for County Coordinators. All County Coordinator positions are filled with the exception of Belknap. The current coordinators have not yet committed. She is going to check with them. Pat does have a few names to contact if necessary. She will be inviting all of the County Coordinators to the next Executive Board meeting on February 10 th at 1:00 in Bow at the Town Hall.
DRA
Barbara Robinson indicated that she had a verbal statement from IRS stating that municipalities must report interest of $600 or more on a property tax abatement to IRS, “ in accordance with federal law ” (she was told a written statement would cost $5000). Cheryl was given a packet of information from her Assessor who had received it at the Assessors' monthly meeting. It included a copy of a page from the Sept 2004 issue of NH Town and City written by Judy Silva with various questions and answers on this topic, a letter from IRS to the Manchester Assessors' office, a copy of RSA 76:16 and instructions for forms 1099. This will be a topic at the Spring Workshops.
Barbara also indicated that the position of a Tax Collector on board at DRA is not forgotten. However DRA currently has 5 of 9 positions filled in her Division. DRA is trying to focus more on Tax Collector issues now and is hoping for staff relief in the near future, particularly in light of recent events that have shown the need for DRA involvement.
Barbara was asked by Blandine to put a priority on changing the Current Use form and she indicated that she would do that. The change must be done through the Land Use Board. This change to the form is to match the law. The form states that the form shall act as a warrant and the law says there shall be a separate warrant.
TREASURER
Pat Milone reported that we did make a profit on the Convention and suggested that we may want to apply that to the cost of going to the Balsams this year in order to give some back to the members. No decision was made at this time.
Pat sent a donation to the Newmarket Community Church for Patricia Orcutt who passed away recently. Patricia was the Town Clerk/Tax Collector of Newmarket and a great example of strength, courage and concern for others, even in her final days. She worked unselfishly at educating women on breast care and hoped to make a difference.
Pat also discussed online banking and asked that she be permitted to do the NHTCA banking online. A recent need to research deposits brought this to her attention. Since the secretary needs to sign the form, it was decided to do so at the next meeting.
Pat mentioned the idea of selling our NHTCA list provided in booklet form by First American to title companies, mortgage companies and others. This could be a means of fundraising. It was agreed that most of those companies would appreciate such a list. Joe suggested selling them for a cost of $10.00. Kathy suggested that she keep some extras and mail them out when requested.
CERTIFICATION COMMITTEE
Kathy read thank you notes she had received from several retired Tax Collectors and participants at the Convention.
The Hampton Inn has a new manager once again. Kathy is not getting messages returned with confirmation of the dates. The dates were set tentatively last year with the former manager and she is hoping that this new manager knows that.
LEGISLATIVE
Rep Pam Price of Nashua has sponsored the bill to correct the wording of RSA 80:64. The changes would include: (1) removing the words “ to whom the real estate was taxed ” and replacing them with “ the name of the current owner, if known, or the person against whom the tax was assessed”; (2 ) removing the word “him” and replacing it with “tax collector”.
Also, the wording of RSA 80:70 would be changed so that when full redemption of the lien is made, the tax collector shall within 45 (instead of 30) days notify the register of deeds.
Jill reviewed a list of proposed legislation that she believed could impact Tax Collectors. She asked the Board to let her know if there are any that need close attention. Dave Fredette and Kathy Valliere have been a big help and Dawn Foss has agreed to go over to the Courthouse on short notice as needed, as long as she is available.
EDUCATION
Cheryl announced that the dates for the New Tax Collectors Workshop are March 22, 2005 and March 24, 2005.
Linda was absent so Joan announced the dates for the Workshops which are:
April 2 Marlborough
April 5 Concord (Local Government Center)
April 14 The Inn at Hampton
April 21 Beacon Resort, Lincoln
Topics will include:
The issue of reporting interest on an abatement over $600 to the IRS
Steps for Deeding and Post-Deeding
Tax Pre-payments
Abatement Process
There will also be a legislative report and a certification committee report.
WEB SITE
Audrey Bently said an affiliate group of LGC pays someone to keep up their web site. If we buy our own domain, LGC will not keep it current for us. They currently update our site at no charge. The cost could be $25 a month if we hire someone. We are thinking of getting our own domain but we really have to find a tax collector who has the desire and the time to keep it current.
Pat said she can scan the newsletter onto the web site so that tax collectors can print the form as a newsletter and all of the information would be in one place. Kathy said she realized that the reason the pages are off on the law book is because LGC merged the two documents (index and law book) and numbered the index as page one instead of the first page of the law book. So if LGC can number them as two different documents, the page numbers will match with our printouts.
Pat is also going to see if she can put links to two articles at LGC onto our web site. She thinks they would be of interest to Tax Collectors. The articles are:
“Internal Control Policies and Procedures Preventing Fraud in your Municipality” by Jeff Towne January 2005 issue of Town and City
“Why is the Property Tax NH's most hated tax?” By Thomas Holmes CNHA Oct 2004 issue of Town and City
Joe Wiggett made a motion to adjourn at 12:10 PM, seconded by Jill Hadaway. All in favor.
Next meeting is February 10, 2005 at 1:00PM at Bow Town Hall.
Respectfully Submitted,
Joan A. Porter
Secretary pro-tem