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Tag Archives: Diana Aviv
May 15, 2012, 2:02 pm
5 Experts to Testify at Hearing on IRS Nonprofit Oversight
A House subcommittee has announced that five nonprofit experts will testify at a hearing it has scheduled for Wednesday to examine several issues related to the Internal Revenue Service’s oversight of tax-exempt organizations.
They are Diana Aviv, president of Independent Sector; Roger Colinvaux, an associate law professor at the Catholic University of America; Joanne DeStefano, vice president for finance at Cornell University, who will be testifying on behalf of the National Association of College and University Business Officers (NACUBO); Bruce Hopkins, a nonprofit lawyer; and Michael Regier, a senior vice president at VHA, a nonprofit hospital cooperative.
Rep. Charles Boustany called the hearing. The Louisiana Republican heads the oversight subcommittee of the House Ways and Means Committee.
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February 7, 2012, 5:48 pm
Preserving Charity Tax Breaks Won’t Be Main Goal of Nonprofit Coalition
Independent Sector, a coalition of nonprofits and foundations that has waged a vigorous campaign against proposals to limit the charitable deduction for wealthy people, has now decided to devote more attention to other aspects of budget and tax policy that could harm poor people.
Critics have accused Independent Sector and other nonprofit advocates of spending a disproportionate amount of energy protecting the charitable tax break, given other critical issues facing the nation, especially those affecting vulnerable people.
Diana Aviv, the group’s chief executive, said Independent Sector’s board “sympathized with that point of view.” It adopted a series of “guiding principles” last week, saying it plans to promote policies to cut the nation’s deficit and overhaul the tax code that do not “exacerbate income inequality or increase poverty.”
The principles, which were sent to the or…
September 13, 2011, 10:01 am
Jobs Bill Includes Nonprofits in Tax Credits
President Obama’s new jobs bill, released yesterday, offers tax credits to nonprofits that hire veterans and long-term unemployed people.
When Mr. Obama outlined his plans last week, it was not clear whether those credits would apply to tax-exempt organizations.
But the bill specifically mentions that they would be available to nonprofits and public universities—applying to payroll taxes, which nonprofit employers pay, instead of to income taxes.
A nonprofit employer could get a tax credit of up to $1,560 for hiring a veteran who has been unemployed for at least four weeks and up to $3,640 for a veteran who has been out of work for at least six months. It could get a tax credit of up to $2,600 for hiring any other individual who has been unemployed for at least six months. The credits are about two-thirds those available to for-profit groups.*
Noting that nonprofit…
April 28, 2011, 10:44 am
Nonprofits Urged to Lobby Against Limits on Charity Tax Breaks
Independent Sector, a coalition of charities and foundations, is calling on its members to lobby against a proposal by President Obama that would limit tax breaks for charitable gifts.
Diana Aviv, Independent Sector’s chief executive, in a letter sent Wednesday, strongly encouraged nonprofits to contact federal lawmakers and ask them to protect the charitable deduction.
In the letter, Ms. Aviv urged nonprofits to focus on the lawmakers who sit on the committees that draft tax policies.
“Let them know that your organization depends on the charitable gifts that this tax incentive generates,” Ms. Aviv wrote.
She also noted that a bipartisan group of senators plans to introduce legislation in May that could include more substantial changes, such as eliminating the charitable tax deduction altogether and replacing it with a 12-percent credit for charitable gifts that exceed 2…
April 18, 2011, 9:52 pm
Nonprofits Call for Changes to ‘Arcane’ Lobbying Rules
Independent Sector, the coalition of charities and foundations, says it is time to explore ways to change the federal rules that restrict nonprofit lobbying.
Nonprofit and legal experts, who discussed the issue at a closed-door meeting last week, criticized existing lobbying rules as “arcane” and “vague to the point of being dysfunctional,” says Diana Aviv, Independent Sector’s president.
They argued that the restrictions discourage charities from exercising their legal right to speak out about legislation that affects their missions, she says.
For example, Ms. Aviv says, few charities take advantage of provisions that allow them to use a formula to determine whether they are spending too much money on lobbying. That option was introduced by a 1976 law that sought to give organizations an alternative to existing language that was considered too vague. That language, which…
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