Justia Tax Law Opinion Summaries

After Washington County assessed the value of one of properties owned by Kohl's Department Stores for the years 2007-2009, Kohl's challenged the valuation. The tax court adjusted the County's assessment by increasing the valuations for 2007 and 2008 and decreasing the valuation for 2009. The Supreme Court affirmed, holding the tax court not err (1) by failing to adjust its capitalization rate to account for the property taxes paid by the owner on vacant space and for the neighborhood's excessive vacancy; and (2) when it calculated the property's fair market rent using comparable leases rather than a percentage of retail sales method. View "Kohl's Dep't Stores, Inc. v. County of Washington" on Justia Law

Mont. Code Ann. 15-7-211 requires the Department of Revenue (Department) to reappraise all residential property in the state every six years. The Department assessed the value of Plaintiff's property in 2008 and used the 2008 appraisal to establish Plaintiff's tax liability for the six-year tax cycle ending in 2014. Plaintiff argued that section 15-7-111, as applied, violated its right to equal protection. The State Tax Appeal Board rejected the claim. The district court, however, concluded that section 15-7-111 violated Plaintiff's right to equal protection because the six-year tax cycle caused some taxpayers to pay a disproportionate share of taxes due to their over-assessed property value and other taxpayers to pay less than their fair share of taxes due to their under-assessed property value. The Supreme Court reversed, holding that similarly situated taxpayers, for a short time, may pay divergent taxes, and such a divergence in taxes does not violate equal protection privileges. View "Covenant Invs., Inc. v. Dep't of Revenue" on Justia Law

Effective in 2010, the Legislature changed the manner in which wind energy generation facilities are taxed. The change (1) exempted personal property used by wind energy generation facilities from the personal property tax and imposed a new tax based upon the facility's nameplate capacity, and (2) allowed taxpayers who had paid personal property tax prior to 2010 to claim a credit against nameplate capacity taxes assessed for the year 2010 and onward. Plaintiffs, Nebraska taxpayers, challenged the constitutionality of the credit. The district court determined that the credit provision of the new statute constituted an improper commutation of taxes and was therefore unconstitutional and void. The Supreme Court reversed, holding (1) the nameplate capacity tax credit did not violate the constitutional prohibition against commutation of taxes because the prohibition does not apply to an excise tax, and the tax in this case was an excise tax; and (2) the statute authorizing the credit was not special legislation prohibited by the state constitution. Remanded with directions to dismiss. View "Banks v. Heineman" on Justia Law

A group of property owners filed suit against the Diamondhead Fire Protection District (DFPD) board of commissioners and several current and former DFPD officers, seeking declaratory judgment that a fee charged for fire-protection services was an impermissible tax. The trial court entered a judgment in favor of the DFPD. The property owners appealed, challenging: (1) whether the monthly fee is an illegal tax; and (2) whether the power to tax should be construed narrowly. Upon review, the Supreme Court found that the trial court correctly decided that the challenged fees for DFPD's services were lawful. Therefore, the Court affirmed the trial court's judgment. View "Alfonso v. Diamondhead Fire Protection District" on Justia Law

New York Life challenged the IRS's determination that the company could not deduct policyholder dividend amounts until the tax year of payment. The court concluded that, with respect to the two claimed deductions, "all events" had not yet occurred to fix the company's liability in the tax years in which the company took the deductions. Accordingly, the court affirmed the judgment of the district court because the liability for the dividends was contingent and it did not satisfy the regulatory requirements for deduction of an accrued expense. View "New York Life Ins. Co. v. United States" on Justia Law

The Commissioner of Revenue ordered Sharon Soyka to pay income taxes, penalties, and interest for the 2007 tax year. Soyka had sixty days to appeal the Commissioner's order to the tax court. Instead, Soyka filed her notice of appeal to the Commissioner, who forwarded the documents to the tax court. The tax court dismissed Soyka's appeal as untimely filed because Soyka did not file her notice of appeal until more than a month after it was due and because Soyka did not file a request seeking an extension of time. The Supreme Court affirmed the tax court's dismissal of Soyka's appeal, holding (1) Soyka's failure to file her notice of appeal before the expiration of the statutory deadline deprived the tax court of subject matter jurisdiction over the appeal; and (2) because the tax court did not receive a copy of Soyka's extension request until the statutory period had expired, Soyka was not entitled to an extension of time to file her appeal. View "Soyka v. Comm'r of Revenue" on Justia Law

Boeri, a citizen of Italy, has never lived or worked in the U.S. He worked for Verizon in Italy for 11 years, Brazil for 5 years, Argentina for 5 years, and the Dominican Republic for 15 years. In 2003 Boeri chose to participate in Verizon’s Management Voluntary Separation Plan, and was awarded a gross separation payment of $247,177 in 2004. Verizon withheld a total of $70,559, including U.S. income tax withholding, Social Security tax, and Medicare tax. In 2009 Boeri filed a nonresident alien income tax return for the 2004 tax year, seeking a refund. The IRS denied the request as untimely. The IRS Appeals Office denied an administrative appeal in 2011. Boeri appealed to the Claims Court, arguing that he is not seeking a refund of a tax overpayment, but correction of erroneous withholding and that these circumstances are not within the scope of the three-year look-back provision of 26 U.S.C. 6511(b)(2)(A). The Claims Court dismissed, reasoning that sections 6513(b)(1) and (c)(2) specify when advance payments of income tax and social security and Medicare taxes are deemed paid, and that the payments for which Boeri sought a refund were deemed paid on April 15, 2005. The Federal Circuit affirmed. View "Boeri v. United States" on Justia Law

The Tribe and CTGW brought suit against the County for imposing property taxes on the Great Wolf Lodge located on the Grand Mound Property, which was tribal land held in trust by the government. At issue was whether state and local governments have the power to tax permanent improvements built on non-reservation land owned by the United States and held in trust for an Indian tribe. The court concluded that Mescalero Apache Tribe v. Jones made it clear that where the United States owns land covered by 21 U.S.C. 465, and holds it in trust for the use of a tribe, section 465 exempts permanent improvements on that land from state and local taxation. Accordingly, under Mescalero, the County was barred from taxing the Great Wolf Lodge during the time in which the Grand Mound Property was owned by the United States and held in trust under section 465. Therefore, the district court erred in granting summary judgment to the County. View "Chehalis Tribes v. Thurston Cnty." on Justia Law

Appellant Centex International filed consolidated income tax returns for three of its corporate affiliates. It appealed an Administrative Law Court order that upheld the state Department of Revenue's denial of its claim for tax credits for the 2002-2005 tax years. Finding no error in the ALC's calculation of the tax, the Supreme Court affirmed. View "Centex International v. SCDOR" on Justia Law

Appellant was subject to an increased personal-property tax assessment. The tax commissioner subsequently issued final-assessment certificates, which included instructions for appealing the assessment. Instead of instructing Appellant to appeal directly to the board of tax appeals, which is the correct procedure for appealing a final assessment, the commissioner instructed Appellant to petition for reassessment with the tax commissioner. Appellant subsequently filed a petition for reassessment. Instead of conducting a substantive review of the petition, the commissioner dismissed the petition because Appellant did not appeal to the Board of Tax Appeals (BTA). The BTA affirmed the dismissal. The Supreme Court reversed, holding that the BTA erred in determining that Appellant had committed a fatal procedural error when it followed the appeal instructions given by the tax commissioner. Remanded with instructions to issue a final determination that addresses the assessment on the merits. View "Crown Commc'n, Inc. v. Testa" on Justia Law