Commissioner's valedictory.

• Position: IRS Commissioner Margaret M. Richardson

On March 17, 1997, Margaret M. Richardson, Commissioner of Internal Revenue, addressed the Midyear Conference of Tax Executives Institute in Washington, D.C. The speech marked Mrs. Richardson's last appearance before TEI as Commissioner, since she had announced that she will resign at the conclusion of the 1997 filing season. The text of her remarks

I am delighted to be able to join you today. Let me begin by wishing each of you a great St. Patrick's Day. It's a day when all of us can be Irish, but as I look around this room, I realize that some of us will always be more Irish than others. [TEI Executive Director] Mike Murphy, because of our friendship, and out of respect for [Deputy IRS Commissioner] Mike Dolan, I added this scarf with green in it to my orange suit.

As most of you know by now, I will be leaving my job as Commissioner in a few weeks. I feel very privileged to have had the opportunity to serve as Commissioner, returning to the agency where I began my career as a lawyer in the Chief Counsel's Office. In the past few years, the many dedicated employees of the IRS have worked hard to improve tax administration, and I am proud to have been able to lead them in their accomplishments.

The IRS has a past it is rightfully proud of and some traditions that should be maintained. From the day I became Commissioner, however, it was clear that change was upon us and that we needed to embrace those changes that would have a positive effect on our customers -- the American taxpayers. In my first speech to the IRS leadership in 1993, I noted that: "these are times of change everywhere -- not just for the Service, but for all of the institutions of government, for corporate America, and for individuals." I also noted that "we need to recognize that change creates uncertainty and anxiety. But change also provides opportunities." I further noted that it was "hard to question the need for change" when we knew that compliance levels were far below what they should be or where they could be, and when we knew that the resources we thought we needed to do our jobs were not limitless. It was also hard to question the need for change when we had a 1950s organizational structure and 1960s technology with which we were trying to administer a 1990s tax law. "But how we go about changing -- what we do -- should be examined and questioned; we will have a healthier organization for doing so."

In speeches across the country, in congressional testimony, and in every meeting with IRS employees, managers and executives, as well as with groups such as TEI, I stated that the IRS had a clear vision about how we wanted to do business (indeed, how we had to do business) in the future and that we were not looking back to the "good old days" to see where we were going. (People may have gotten tired of hearing me say "don't look back -- we're not going that way.")

Some feared change or at least the pace of change; the more impatient among us wanted change to proceed more rapidly. But in any event, it is vital that we not slow the momentum for change that we have built up over the past several years that will make the tax system work better for taxpayers. This morning, you heard from Deputy Secretary Summers about a plan concerning the IRS. That plan builds upon the significant progress the Service has made over the last several years to improve administration of the tax system. All of us at the IRS support the Treasury Department's commitment to continuing the goals of the IRS to streamline the structure of the organization, modernize technology, and improve service to taxpayers, while enhancing taxpayers' rights.

You are familiar with what we have already accomplished in streamlining the organization -- reducing the number of regions from seven to four, the number of districts from sixty-three to...