March 31, 2005 | Read Time: 1 minute
In a sign that legislators are showing more interest in cracking down on charities, the Senate Finance Committee announced last week that it plans to hold a hearing on April 5 to shed light on a few key nonprofit abuses and to give lawmakers a chance to ask questions about problems they see in nonprofit organizations.
The hearing is expected to examine how some donors appear to be improperly shielding assets from taxation and taking inflated donations for gifts of land, art, and other noncash items, according to Senate aides.
The inquiry will also look at new rules for stamping out nonprofit abuses that rob the federal government of tax revenue.
Sen. Charles R. Grassley, Republican of Iowa and the chairman of the committee, plans to invite at least five people to testify at the hearing, including Diana Aviv, president of Independent Sector, a coalition of more than 500 charities and foundations; Mark W. Everson, the commissioner of the Internal Revenue Service; Leon Panetta, a former White House chief of staff and director of the Panetta Institute, a center for the study of public policy; George K. Yin, chief of staff at the Joint Committee on Taxation; and a representative from the Congressional Research Service, which prepares reports for members of Congress.
Mr. Everson is expected to talk about a recent increase in the use of tax-exempt organizations to improperly hide income or assets from taxation. Four of the 12 problems the IRS identified in a February report on the most egregious tax schemes it sees involved nonprofit abuses.
Information about the hearing will be made available on the Senate Finance Committee’s Web site, http://www.finance.senate.gov.
